@GossiTheDog yup, exactly like a cancer

@GossiTheDog capitalism at its finest.

@GossiTheDog

It has probably gone past that stage though.

We had the growth at any cost stage, now we have the oh shit we tried to grow too fast and too much so now we have to eat each other to survive stage.

@GossiTheDog I guess we aren't stopping to define "growth" in a proper context itself. Growth of what, exactly? Would it be feasible existentially? What are the costs? Why is a particular growth desirable while the costs are bearable?

@GossiTheDog so much of our world is shaped by the great depression, when consumption slowed down too much and the whole economy stalled, like an airplane

the lessons learned during recovery and the fear of a repeat of it are still driving a lot of what we see around us

@GossiTheDog the greatest trick capitalists ever pulled, was convincing the world greed is good.

@GossiTheDog Not long ago, when my grandparents lived, #business.es were still about providing value for people, in amount necessary for good living & only in that amount, not larger. Good #entrepreneurship was making some margin by the way, but mostly cultivating & passing artisanal wisdom from Master to Journeyman

It’s how a 1318 yrs old #hotel, 1220 yr old #restaurant still operate - don’t they?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_companies

Where’ve we lost it?😔

@GossiTheDog I've been using this same analogy for a while now, and people always look at me all bug-eyed...

@GossiTheDog “the share price of Brawndo started to tank and the computer did the auto layoff thing!!!!”

@GossiTheDog exactly this!! The problem is that there is no obvious solution to this problem and therefore collapse is inevitable, it’s just how and when… even the most enlightened person is trapped in this system. Bit depressing for a Sunday afternoon!

@GossiTheDog On the plus side, population growth is stabilising.

The antinatalist malthusians are even starting to get replaced by pronatalist cranks in the twitterati because of the post-peak-population demographic gap.

https://youtu.be/QsBT5EQt348

@GossiTheDog @WTL I’ve long said that this goal of perpetual growth is unsustainable. Nothing in the natural universe grows this way. Everything has a cycle — an expiration date.

Except, perhaps, black holes. Probably not something we should be striving for.

@GossiTheDog “Cancerous growth”! Now that’s a term to invest in.

@GossiTheDog Agent Smith monologue wasn’t wrong.

@GossiTheDog I blame Milton Friedman and his theory of shareholder primacy.

@GossiTheDog I've said for years that continuous growth of anything.. business, whatever just isn't sustainable. It doesn't mean that people, commerce, markets can't thrive but growth forever just isn't feasible. What's the answer - that's what capitalism is, continuous growth. Barely any talk about improving living standards and rights.

@GossiTheDog
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1948262.Limits_to_Growth

@GossiTheDog
And if you are not down with this, you are automatically a "woke commie socialist"

@GossiTheDog sounds rather similar to a conquest based society, like Rome or Mongol Empire. It's a different form of warfare, but the push to expand and grow is the same unsustainable model.

@GossiTheDog and when you listen to wealthy economists they often make it sound like growth is required for the economy to thrive... Which sounds a lot like a pyramid scheme when you think about it. Especially as a handful of people seem to be doing much more than thriving.

@GossiTheDog Excellent analogy.

@GossiTheDog It has been normalized for decades. I was ranting against growth in the early 1970s. That was when "The Limits to Growth" came out. We were warned and did not take heed.

@GossiTheDog i mean, there are externalities that should be factored in but of course we want as much growth as possible.

@GossiTheDog I thought I was the only one who saw things this way. Thank you.

@GossiTheDog there’s actually a pretty great case for continuing to have the human population grow.

@GossiTheDog or as the Matrix's Agent Smith describes it, Humans are a virus...

@GossiTheDog well said.

@GossiTheDog

Or bacteria in a petri dish. They want indefinite exponential growth in a finite environment.

This is also why Space Karen wants space. Infinite environment for growth. Except for that inhospitable part they gloss over.

In space no one can hear you die.

@GossiTheDog The real problems does not exist "outside of ourselves",... but? only a few really dare to realize/understand/see this? For any (real) "change to occur", we must "look ourselves in the mirror", and realize the real problems exists *within ourselves*, (in our ego, nowhere else), and no change CAN (ever) happen, until we dare to realize/understand/see this...

@GossiTheDog I mean... as an American my ability to live comfortably, even survive, is quite dependent on the earnings of my retirement accounts comprised entirely of this or that stock... at least until I get sick, then the medical industry will clean that out while torturing me and then dumping me off to die in a charity hospice.

@GossiTheDog 💯

@GossiTheDog

I realized something was crazy when "beat last year" became the most important yardstick of business success.

Eventually, either prices get too high, or you run out of customers to steal from the competition.

@GossiTheDog The Last of Us got it wrong: not fungi but greed.

@GossiTheDog Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins has a great quote about this in his autobiography, carrying the fire: "we need a new economic paradigm to create prosperity without growth"

@GossiTheDog As long as the countries leaders are so obsessed with growth this is going to continue and drive us to self destruction

@GossiTheDog "Normalized" is doing a lot of work. Literally every global economy is based on it. Even *North Korea*. It's a poison that has wormed its way into literally every aspect of daily life. I would argue it's the greatest mistake humankind has ever made.

@GossiTheDog essentially, capitalism is a parasite?

@GossiTheDog YES. It’s not possible— or healthy— to constantly grow. And so often one company’s growth is dependent on hurting another company!

@GossiTheDog Excellent analogy. Perhaps we should start replacing "capitalism" in our vocabulary with "cancerism".

@GossiTheDog Do you remember Agent Smith's monologue in the firist Matrix about humans being a virus? He said we just consume and then move on to consume again. I remember seeing that for the first time and being like...MINDBLOWN.

@GossiTheDog Attitudes, theories and know-how leading to faster growth become dominant in the course of history. Groups growing fastest will destroy or assimilate others. Their attitudes then become the basis for the next round. The growth ideology is part of this. It is a self-amplifying process. When this ideology started, world economy was smaller by about factor 600. Initially, the limits of resources could be ignored. It seemed to work. Now, we are hitting the limits.