Reading Time: 6 minutes Advocates of free-market capitalism such as Ayn Rand claim that progress comes about through solitary geniuses who defy the critics and do what everyone said was impossible. But in real life, innovators can’t overcome the laws of physics.
capitalism
Posted inEconomics
Attack of the woke brands
Reading Time: 5 minutes Why are corporations using social-justice-themed messaging? Conservative pundits concoct sinister conspiracy theories, but the real explanation is much simpler: they’re going where the money is.
Posted inCrime and Punishment
Truth loses, capitalism wins in Fox News defamation settlement
Reading Time: 4 minutes The legal settlement in which Fox News this week agreed to pay Dominion Voting Systems $787.5 million was a victory for profit-obsessed American capitalism, not journalistic truth. The irony is that bald-faced lying for profit at the expense of truth is what landed Fox News in court in the first place. The top cable-news purveyor […]
Posted inFilm/TV
When capitalism steals the face of your favorite artist
Reading Time: 7 minutes A neat trick: From Star Wars to Watchmen to Disco Elysium, stories with strong anti-capitalist messages are increasingly co-opted and turned into the very capitalist sausage they once attacked.
Posted inBiology
Let us all now praise caffeine
Reading Time: 6 minutes Caffeine is a psychoactive and addictive drug, even if we rarely think of it that way. Still, our lives would be poorer without it.
Posted inEnvironment
Patagonia company owner gives it away to Planet Earth in perpetuity
Reading Time: 3 minutes The owner of outdoor clothing and equipment company Patagonia, Yvon Chouinard, is giving the entire company away to support the environment and fight climate change devastation, something that many in the humanist community interested in helping our planet, will laud. Yvon Chouinard, a self-described “existential dirtbag” who dislikes the label “businessman” he accidentally acquired, drives […]
Posted inEconomics
When scarcity is contrived for capitalist ends
Reading Time: 4 minutes In a capitalist system, a business is judged to be successful if it is profitable. To maximize profits, producers often restrict production rather than ensure the maximum utilization of resources. The strategy of restricting production to increase profits is known as artificial scarcity. It uses the forces of the capitalist “free market.” By restricting supply, […]
Posted inPolitics
Why do we keep blaming the poor for their poverty?
Reading Time: 7 minutes Is poverty’s root cause more nurture than nature?
Posted inGeneral
How to Become a Millionaire
Reading Time: < 1 minute Normally I’m down here telling you to become a supporter on Patreon, but not today! Today I’m telling you about my Kickstarter project to turn my barbarian comic “Barb” into a book you can have for your very own! Or for a friend. If you like funny adventures with monsters, skeletons, and battleaxes, then check […]
Posted inCartoons, General
Resistance is Feudal
Reading Time: < 1 minute We may change system names from time to time, but it seems we tend to revert to the same basic formula. Anyway, I’m no political scientist. Blah blah blah. Resistance is feudal.