The book this movie is based on was written as a parable to the idiocracy of communism. When I went to uni years ago I had a fair few Marxist lecturers. The more I read into Marxism and communism the more I find it both fanciful and horrific. The places where its been tried as way to run a society usually lead to the worst excesses of cruelty and depravity.

One of the worst examples was Kampuchea where they Khmere Rouge were crazy enough to follow Marx's belief that all people are completely equal and anyone can do any job. Any form of specialisation, education or ability possessed by an individual was wiped out.

evlPanda said...
If you let Capitalism run wild, zero regulation, would you not end up with a monopoly? A single company running the country, effectively it would become the state. Everybody works for it and it owns everything.

...wait a minute. That's communism.

Perhaps but an anarchic capitalism would probably lead not to monopolies. Most monopolies develop because of rules and regulations stopping competitors from entering the market. There could be some exceptions, possibly the example of Eastern States Standard Oil, the Rockafellers or the Bell company that had to be broken up.

Even there I think competition and innovation would break up any monopoly.

A pure capitalist system cannot function unless individual property rights are respected and upheld by the law. Right now we have situations where property rights are not respected, for example miners demanding entry to private property to extract minerals and gas. This is due to apparently the Commonwealth owning all the mineral rights under the soil. It doesn't seem that right to me. If you own the land, you own the land and you should be allowed to decide who or who cannot enter it.

Quote:

"... in cosmology we have dark matter holding everything steady, does society have the equivalent?"

Yes. It's called fear.

Mobydisc said...
This is due to apparently the Commonwealth owning all the mineral rights under the soil.

Not quite- mineral rights are retained by the states- not the commonwealth.

apart from that, I agree with you, if you own the land (ie: a farmer) a mining company should not be able to tell you to move over so they can dig up your farm for minerals, or extract gas/ oil.

stephen

Land can be disposed of pretty much as the government likes. The state owns it (formerly the Crown) and issues title to it in "fee simple" which is as close as you can come to outright ownership. This was started by King William c 1070. He had his Doomsday book compiled listing all the property in England and said this is all mine but I'll grant you a title to it. It's a clever device that allows people to "own" property and feel free to dispose of it and trade in it much like other commodities but at the same time gives the government the legal authority to override any such ownership. Today the government exercises this authority when they resume property and when they issue mining rights. The conditions that apply to mining rights can be varied as Parliament sees fit within the law to the extent of whatever the voters will bear.