Michael Moore's New Film Says that Capitalism Is Evil
The Irony of It All
According to Reuters, Michael Moore's main argument is that "Capitalism is an evil, and you cannot regulate evil. You have to eliminate it and replace it with something that is good for all people and that something is democracy."
Michael Moore's targets include big banks, hedge funds, large corporations, Wall Street, and even the Catholic Church. He suggests that US Treasury officials catered their policies to favor Wall Street rather than Main Street. He also argues that businesses contributed to the current economic crisis by encouraging Americans to borrow against the values of their homes.
Michael Moore also criticizes the Catholic Church, arguing that capitalism was anti-Christian because it didn't do enough to help the poor.
Michael Moore Says Capitalism is Evil: The Irony
I couldn't help thinking of the irony behind Michael Moore's proclamation that capitalism is evil. After all, Michael Moore wouldn't be able to enjoy the commercial success he's had under a socialist system. Where did he get the resources to produce his films? How was he able to find the best staff, editors, and cinematographers? And wasn't it a capitalist system that allowed him to market his films to his target audiences?
Only under capitalism could Che Guevara T-shirt sellers profit while Michael Moore enjoys commercial success.
Michael Moore Says Capitalism is Evil: The Fallacies
To be sure, no system is perfect, as capitalism will invariably lead to unequal distribution of resources. And certainly there are corporations whose business practices are not the most scrupulously forthright. Still, the alternative to capitalism is much worse. After all, citizens of Cuba enjoy equal living conditions and equal distribution of resources. Winston Churchill said it best. "The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent vice of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."
As for Bush and the Wall Street bailouts, the bailouts were not a sign of the evils of capitalism, but rather of the failures of government intervention. After all, under pure unbridled capitalism, those banks would have been left to sink or swim without the help of government bailouts.
Michael Moore Says Capitalism is Evil: The Catholic Church
As for the Catholic Church, there are two ways to respond to that. First, the Catholic Church actually has its paternalistic elements. Pope Benedict has written about government's role in alleviating conditions of poverty. Many on the Catholic left admired Ted Kennedy for his positions on immigration and social welfare (even if they disagreed with him on abortion).
Yet while Christianity teaches the importance of charity and helping your neighbor, there's an important distinction. It's one thing to use your own resources to help the poor. It's quite another to involuntarily use other people's resources to achieve those goals. Giving of your own to help the poor is an act of charity while using the government to redistribute resources is an act of coercion.
In any case, the trailer for Michael Moore's film Capitalism: A Love Story is available on YouTube.
Sources:
"Capitalism is evil," says new Michael Moore film, Reuters
Trailer for Michael Moore's film, YouTube
Published by Tina Molly Lang - Featured Contributor in Arts & Entertainment and Lifestyle
Tina Molly Lang is a violinist, violin, piano, and voice teacher. She is also an active writer. Her work has been published in The American Thinker, Active Americans, Yahoo's OMG! and Yahoo News. View profile
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- Michael Moore's film, Capitalism: A Love Story, proclaims that capitalism is evil.
- Michael Moore's film premiers today at the Venice Film Festival.
- The irony is that Michael Moore owes much of his own commerical success to capitalism.
7 Comments
Post a CommentMichael Moore never gives any logical arguments based on facts. All his statements and questions are very subjective as he tries to point the finger at whoever he does not like.
Capitalism and the free market is what US essentially stands for! Perhaps his ideal would be to tax and put lots of restrictions on wall street, but what will that lead to? Capital outflow, loss of business, loss of talent etc. The reason why countries like UK and US are such big financial centers of the world is because they have good legal systems and freedom to do business. Think about a global business that considers listing on a stock exchange. Which stock exchange will they choose? Where will they spend millions of dollars?
All these hedge funds, investment banks and money managers are financing businesses, allowing people to borrow in order to buy a house, funding student university education etc They invest pensioners money, they close businesses that are inefficient and help open businesses that
Despite the irony of Moore attacking capitalism, and the irony is hard to ignore regardless of where you stand on him and his movies, he makes strong and valid points on why it has led us all astray. Even if not all of our problems came from capitalism, a large percentage of them did.
I agree with Bandit...and your assessment of the ironic fact that Moore wouldn't be wealthy or be famous for his movies without our capitalist system.
You people are delusional - why on earth would you support a system that exploits the many for the good of the few. The only answer is that you are the few and not the many who are enslaved by this system and will never break free of it. You have been propaganded into believing capitalism and the free market is the answer to a 'good' life. All it does is promote the individual and forget about the importance of the collective. As much as you might like to pretend it is not the case, you live in a society that means that you have responsiblities to look after the people around you and in so doing you will benefit yourself and your family. You have been misled my American friends.
Michale Moore gets on my very last NERVE! Cannot stand this man. great work though :)
I certainly think this is worth seeing whether I end up agreeing with any of it or not.
What amazes me is not the anti-American rhetoric of MM..but the sheep that will bray his tune. Ok...that won't amaze me either...kind of getting to the lost directing the way ;-) Great report Tina.