Mildly Infuriating

“And replace them with socialists, right?”

“Kill the capitalists.” What an absolutely deranged thing to chant as though it were some kind of political slogan worth celebrating. Apparently we’ve reached a point where people can casually advocate killing an entire class of people and then congratulate themselves for being morally enlightened.

For all the advancements humanity has made in medicine, philosophy, science, and morality, we still manage to say incredibly stupid shit like this and other people cheer it on because they seem to have forgotten what the word kill actually means.

And before anyone starts: no, capitalism is not perfect. Of course it isn't. But pretending that capitalism has produced nothing but misery requires ignoring an enormous amount of history.

We are living through one of the most prosperous and peaceful periods in human history. The countries that consistently rank among the world's most prosperous, stable, and livable are overwhelmingly capitalist economies. Germany is capitalist. Sweden is capitalist. Norway is capitalist. Denmark is capitalist. They have extensive welfare programs, strong labor protections, and social safety nets, but they are still capitalist economies.

Even the United States, despite its very real problems, remains one of the wealthiest and most prosperous countries on Earth. You don't have to like that fact, but disliking it doesn't make it untrue.

There is nothing inherently virtuous about hating an economic class. There is certainly nothing virtuous about fantasizing about killing people because of the economic system they support.

“Kill the capitalists” isn't a serious political argument. It is virtue signaling dressed up as revolutionary rhetoric, a way for people to feel morally superior without having to articulate an actual solution to the problems they're angry about.

If your political philosophy requires you to start by deciding which group of human beings deserves to die, perhaps the problem isn't capitalism.

Disclaimer: None of this should be interpreted as me claiming that capitalism is some flawless or inherently virtuous economic system. I fully acknowledge its massive faults, including exploitation, wealth concentration, monopolistic behavior, and the increasingly corporatocratic nature of the United States. I simply reject socialism as an economic model and don't believe that acknowledging capitalism's failures requires pretending that socialism is the answer. You can criticize capitalism and we absolutely should without advocating for its abolition or fantasizing about killing the people who participate in it.

Additional disclaimer: I am not oblivious to the violence happening around the world right now. I am fully aware of the ongoing genocide in Gaza, the massive war between Russia and Ukraine, the conflict involving Iran, and the numerous wars, insurgencies, and other forms of violence occurring across Africa and elsewhere. None of that should be minimized or dismissed. My point is a comparative historical one: even with these horrific conflicts occurring today, humanity as a whole is still living through one of the least violent and most peaceful periods in recorded history when measured against the enormous scale of human history and global population. That does not make today's suffering any less horrific, nor does it excuse any of it. It simply puts the present into its proper historical context.