Sometimes I think about how much art was never created because of capitalism. It either never got funded, or a potential artist never got the chance to make it, because just to scrape by, they had to spend too much time toiling to make some business owners money. It's depressing.
And, just to cut off one potential counterargument: I don't give half of a shit how "good" that art would be. I'm confident there are spectacular works of art that never came to be, but even putting it aside, it's all subjective. Some folks would have loved it, and the artists would have found value in making it. That's more than enough, and a hell of a lot more meaningful than breaking your back working for a living so that other people can own stuff for a living.
I've seen so many youtube videos from conservatives where they literally just listen to someone saying what their minor/emphasis was and saying "wow, it's so stupid that's even offered, that's completely useless". The comments tend to be more unhinged, I frequently see "these universities should lose their accreditation", "it should be illegal to offer these", etc. Usually it's something extremely basic, like the impact of colonialism on X, or something to do with intersectionality. Like, these aren't even their majors, they're just a component of their degrees that they can freely choose. I feel like many conservatives are just against any new ideas regardless of their validity.
Reminds me of George Lucas talking about how Soviet filmmakers had more creative freedom than American ones https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWqvaMEFIdI
Thus political economy – despite its worldly and voluptuous appearance – is a true moral science, the most moral of all the sciences. Self-renunciation, the renunciation of life and of all human needs, is its principal thesis. The less you eat, drink and buy books; the less you go to the theatre, the dance hall, the public house; the less you think, love, theorise, sing, paint, fence, etc., the more you save – the greater becomes your treasure which neither moths nor rust will devour – your capital. The less you are, the less you express your own life, the more you have, i.e., the greater is your alienated life, the greater is the store of your estranged being. Everything which the political economist takes from you in life and in humanity, he replaces for you in money and in wealth; and all the things which you cannot do, your money can do. It can eat and, drink, go to the dance hall and the theatre; it can travel, it can appropriate art, learning, the treasures of the past, political power – all this it can appropriate for you – it can buy all this: it is true endowment. Yet being all this, it wants to do nothing but create itself, buy itself; for everything else is after all its servant, and when I have the master I have the servant and do not need his servant. All passions and all activity must therefore be submerged in avarice.
Neo cons unironically love all of those degrees, at least in the US. Don't forget that student loans are a big business.
Non-occupational degrees give a steady supply of young workers with massive debt and qualifications that won't enable them to get a job with a high enough wage to pay back the principle of that debt.
This is how the gig economy flourishes.
This is how Amazon stays in business.
This is how the hospitality industry thrives on a deliberately broken business model.
This is how landlords profit.
This is how the post-boomer generations are oppressed.
We are cannon fodder.
Rise up.
Become ungovernable.
FTP
The problem is it doesn't let you catch them.
Capitalism is the only system that lets you chase your dreams as long as you can sell them
Dude, capitalism has been taking advantages of those degree, or rather, the whole education system!
It assumes one only dreams of making money.
I keep saying this to conservatives: what do they think will happen if there is oversaturation of "useful" jobs? They do not want an educated population, they want a dumbed down and compliant one who are unquestionably obedient.
It's true. ...As long as your dream is to make money or owe someone money, capitalism can make it happen!
To be fair, how many historians etc do you need to qualify every year?
What's the point of studying something for years, getting in to dozens of thousands in student debt, potentially getting near the top of your field and then having to go work in a Starbucks because there are so few vacancies in your field?
I agree that these degrees are nice to have, but we should be honest with students in regards to the sort of lifestyle they can expect after they qualify.
dO YoU ThInK YoU'Ll bE A PoEt oR ArTiSt iN A CoMmUnIsT PlAcE?? YoU'Ll bE A WoRkEr. Oh wAiT, yOu'rE NoT OnE UnDeR CaPiTaLiSm eItHeR? oH WeLl, StIlL , LeFt bAd.
