The first sentence of every paragraph is the premise?
In our case, yes.
Ah, but the people who worked in sweatshops are traditionally people from small rural villages. Try again.
That's an
ignoratio elenchi. It does absolutely nothing to harm my argument.
individualism is about seeing self as independent of others, collectivism is about relating self to others (interpersonal)...
Collectivism isn't about the relating the self to others; it's about a collective whole. There is no 'self' in collectivist thought. Collectivists are concerned with the general will.
We're no more individualistic than we were before. In the rhetoric we're supposed to be, but by and large, individualism is basically discouraged.
People live their 'individualism' if it could be called that, vicariously through movies like Juno or TV shows like House, where the star character possesses a standout and or daring persona.
I'd say 90-95% of the people, at least in america, at best, pretend; we play at individualism, and let our quasi-adventurous bombast do the rest of the work for us.
It's easy to tell stories.
I think you and I have different definitions of individualism. I'm talking about reliance on the self alone to live; without help from others (or at least the perception of aidless living). What you're talking about are people who express their individuality through the media; you're referring to artistic self-expression and the like. I'm not interested in this. I'm thinking about individualism in the political and societal sense.
"All people are inherently greedy, its just that individual greed is harnessed in a capitalist society leading to the benefit of all, whereas in a communist society it is suppressed but mainfests itself in other ways".
That statement is very true. You only need to look at all these collectivist economies wearing orange and going capitalist to see what is most favoured by the people.
Absolutely. Communism cannot work and never will because people, by nature, are greedy and selfish. It is a fact of life that one must accept. Just as you can't stop people from desiring other people, you can't stop people from being greedy.
Historically, capitalistic endeavors have lead to exploitation of collectivistic cultures. Take colonialism. Columbus comes across the ocean, commits horrible atrocities against the native inhabitants. Next comes the conquistadors who label the natives of lands as "sodomoites" so they can justify the raping and pillaging of the lands. Later come European settlers who force the Natives off their communal lands. Later, the United States takes up policies of extermination, removal, or forceful assimilation of the natives. The slave trade booms and the ancestors of African Americans are forced to labor for the white land owners. Later immigration begins to boom in America and the the traditional familial immigrants are pushed into working low wage dangerous factory jobs, where they could blacklisted if they complained and were fired once they were sick or injured.
Capitalism does not have a good historical track record.
All the above mentioned cases have absolutely nothing to do with capitalism. That was about power, not money. Capitalism is primarily about money; that was about occupation of land. Capitalism hadn't even been invented by then. Plus, I'd just like to mention that the central American civilisations were just as greedy and corrupt as we were. Any you wonder why. Well, could be something to with human nature. Just a thought.
That is a value judgement. I believe everyone has an agenda. Not everyone's primary agenda is their own self preservation and promotion.
I disagree. Those who supposedly supercede this desire e.g. Mother Theresa, don't truly supercede it. There is always a deep, underlying desire to either promote oneself, preserve oneself, or both.
If you want to talk about less advanced or less powerful people and how they are exploited, then thats nothing to do with individualistic capitalism. Did Native Americans not form tribes and kill each other.. is that not expolitation.
Again, good point.
Then Individualism and Anarchy are one and the same.
Incorrect. Individualism and anarchism are by no means synonymous with one another. It is perfectly logical to find collectivist anarchists; this is essentially the end state of true communism; the kind of communism thought up by Marx. Of course, it was an ideal (and a nice ideal it was), and it could never occur.