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#14994778
“Winners Take All”: Anand Giridharadas on the Elite Charade of Changing the World

An insider's groundbreaking investigation of how the global elite's efforts to "change the world" preserve the status quo and obscure their role in causing the problems they later seek to solve.
#14994861
I like the morale of the first video, where the author concludes that we need to wake up and stop being suckered by marketing and PR.

His point that the rich use marketing to convince the masses that "rich people are the best positioned to enact useful change" is right on. As he says, the rich will use these "change institutions" to make sure that no real change takes place, because their wealth and power depends on the status quo.

But Anand Giridharadas (the author) used to work for the New York Times. That means he was vetted by the rich and powerful propagandists before he ever wrote his book.

I wonder if his connection to "the fundamental problem" has ensured that certain information never gets revealed.
#14994934
QatzelOk wrote:But Anand Giridharadas (the author) used to work for the New York Times. That means he was vetted by the rich and powerful propagandists before he ever wrote his book.

I wonder if his connection to "the fundamental problem" has ensured that certain information never gets revealed.


Obviously you should always be skeptical of everybody in the media and you should always do your own thinking on every issue, but just because a piece of analysis isn't comprehensive doesn't mean it isn't useful. That guy's not telling me anything I don't know but there are plenty of people who are completely oblivious to how the rich use philanthropy to protect their own power and privilege and a New York Times columnist has credibility with those kinds of people.
#14994952
Sivad wrote:...there are plenty of people who are completely oblivious to how the rich use philanthropy to protect their own power and privilege and a New York Times columnist has credibility with those kinds of people.

But someone who gives credibility to the New York Times has been persuaded by its narratives already and is unlikely to start a jihad against rich phonies.

I wonder if some New York Times readers use being seen reading books like this one to pretend to care about the poor and defenseless, when in reality, they're obsessed admirers of their every tactic and scam.
#14994954
Yes indeed, "the rich," and "the elite" are evil, greedy, only care about themselves and it is in fact the poor, the uneducated, the homeless who are all things good. Never mind that the top few percent pay 90% of federal income taxes. Never mind that the wealthy business owners provide jobs, and wonderful products people WANT to buy, voluntarily. It's the drug addicts, the alcoholics, the ne'er do wells who make America great.

Bill Gates gives billions of dollars to improve the lives of poor people around the world.
Some wealthy businessmen have built Charter Schools in New York City to give outstanding educations to the poor and disadvantaged. Such is the thanklessness of the Left.

Moreover, Christians and conservatives donate more to charity than atheists and "progressives" (sic). The former give more to charities, to families, to secular organizations, and more time as volunteers and more blood to blood banks. All this is documented in Arthur C. Brooks' book, "Who Really Cares."
#14994990
MrWonderful wrote:Yes indeed, "the rich," and "the elite" are evil, greedy, only care about themselves and it is in fact the poor, the uneducated, the homeless who are all things good. Never mind that the top few percent pay 90% of federal income taxes. Never mind that the wealthy business owners provide jobs, and wonderful products people WANT to buy, voluntarily. It's the drug addicts, the alcoholics, the ne'er do wells who make America great.

Bill Gates gives billions of dollars to improve the lives of poor people around the world.
Some wealthy businessmen have built Charter Schools in New York City to give outstanding educations to the poor and disadvantaged. Such is the thanklessness of the Left.

Moreover, Christians and conservatives donate more to charity than atheists and "progressives" (sic). The former give more to charities, to families, to secular organizations, and more time as volunteers and more blood to blood banks. All this is documented in Arthur C. Brooks' book, "Who Really Cares."

Also, McDonald's provides children with excercise (ball) rooms and special centers for children with disabilities (Ronald McDonald house). So their food isn't toxic at all, right?

And many motorcycle gangs organized promotional "rides" to raise money for children to buy their first motorcycle. Nothing wrong with motorcycle gangs.
#14995004
QatzelOk wrote:Also, McDonald's provides children with excercise (sic) rooms and special centers for children with disabilities (Ronald McDonald house). So their food isn't toxic at all, right?

And many motorcycle gangs organized promotional "rides" to raise money for children to buy their first motorcycle. Nothing wrong with motorcycle gangs.


Why don't you tell everyone here what is "toxic" about McDonald's food, hmmm? Then define "toxic" using your own words. Don't look it up. Use your scientific prowess and intellectualism you "progressives" always boast about.

Then tell us how wonderful all the world's poor are. What are their contributions to humanity, specifically.
Do you even realize that the overwhelming majority of wealthy people started out in lower social strata, and worked their way up the financial ladder?
I did. So did many of my friends.
#14995009
MrWonderful wrote:Do you even realize that the overwhelming majority of wealthy people started out in lower social strata, and worked their way up the financial ladder?
I did. So did many of my friends.

Really? Do you have a website we can click on to start making money online right now? (I promise not to forget to remove the "@" from the url) :lol:

Anyway, back to more serious matters...

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Raj Chetty on Social Mobility

The main vehicles of "social mobililty" offered by the rich to the poor, are military service (kill other poors), or organized crime (help parasitic rich gangsters). If you click on the above link, you will see how little social mobility exists for people who don't want to hurt other poors.
#14995019
Not a whisper from you on those "toxic" foods at McDonalds.
Not a whisper from you on how you personally define "toxic."

As a chemical engineer, let me tell you something about toxicity.


There are no toxic chemicals, only toxic levels. People have died from ingesting too much drinking water, to cite just one example.

Now as to your abject hatred and intolerance of "the rich," it is envy, pure and simple. Karl Marx wrote an infamous book about it, inspiring his acolytes to murder over 100,000,000 humans, and the count continues to climb. And now I am done with you.
#14995044
MrWonderful wrote:Not a whisper from you on those "toxic" foods at McDonalds.

You're right. Keep eating there all you want. (I win!)

All rich people should eat at McDonald's every day. It could even be made a law, since crap processed foods are one way in which the rich have attacked the overworked poor.

McDonald's food was one way the rich really "changed the world."

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#14995053
MrWonderful wrote:Not a whisper from you on those "toxic" foods at McDonalds.

I haven't eaten at McDonalds in many years, but I stopped because every time I did, I got a stomach ache.
Now as to your abject hatred and intolerance of "the rich," it is envy, pure and simple.

So there is no such thing as injustice that profits the rich, only the envy of those who lose by it??

"As to your abject hatred and intolerance of slave owners, it is envy, pure and simple. Save up some money to buy your freedom from your owner, then save up some more and buy some slaves of your own. Problem solved!"

Is that about it?
#14995101
QatzelOk wrote:But someone who gives credibility to the New York Times has been persuaded by its narratives already


or they just don't know better. Some people are stupid, some are dishonest, some are stupid and dishonest, but with a lot of people it's just a matter of not knowing any better.
#14995248
MrWonderful wrote:Then tell us how wonderful all the world's poor are.

Nobody said, "all" or "wonderful." The poor are human beings like anyone else. Some are partly to blame for their poverty, but all are victims of the greedy, privileged, parasitic rich.
What are their contributions to humanity, specifically.

Their contributions are as individual as anyone else's. Never heard of the working poor? Do you know how much work it takes to raise a child to become a worker supporting rich, greedy, privileged parasites?? Do you think it doesn't take an effort of will to raise kids even though you know they are likely to become economic cannon fodder?
Do you even realize that the overwhelming majority of wealthy people started out in lower social strata, and worked their way up the financial ladder?

"Worked"? Maybe. But there is a difference between working to make a contribution to production, and working to DIVERT production away from the productive who earned it and into one's own pockets. The wealthy have overwhelmingly obtained their wealth by working at the latter. Rent seeking is often work; it just isn't HONEST or PRODUCTIVE work.
I did. So did many of my friends.

Yes, well, the fact that some are strong enough to run a race while carrying a free rider on their back does not mean those who are not strong enough are to blame for their inability to do so rather than the riders they are forced to carry, or that the riders deserve credit for the running just because some runners were strong enough to carry them over the finish line.
#14995330
The problem of the poor is their poverty, the problem of the rich is their uselessness. - based on a popular statement by George Bernhard Shaw


And fast food, white bread, sweets etc make people obese through carbs, not through fat.

The problem with carbs is if you consume them without also consuming fiber and/or fat, they are processed very fast by the digestive system, causing you to be hungry quickly again, causing you to consume too much energy overall, thus making you gain overweight.

Neither of the other two sources of energy, fat and proteine, have this property. Fat however can be of poor quality, which can cause other problems.
#14995339
There's climate change activists out here in Hong Kong eating "fresh by air" poussin (baby chickens) flown in from the UK.

Like I said in another thread, the war on white privilege doesn't hurt you if you are a rich white person. Same with climate change.
#14995369
Hong Wu wrote:Like I said in another thread, the war on white privilege doesn't hurt you if you are a rich white person.

Right. "White privilege," "male privilege," "straight privilege," blah, blah, blah are a stratagem to divert the attention of the victims of REAL privilege -- land titles, bank licenses, IP monopolies, broadcast spectrum allocations, etc. -- from the massive, systematic, institutionalized, and wholly gratuitous economic injustices that are actually oppressing them. Privilege (from the Latin for "private law") is a private interest's legal entitlement to benefit from the abrogation of others' rights without making just compensation. Anything else is not privilege.
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