Olley Maruma Needs Slaves

The Herald via AllAfrica: Corporate World Must Be Strictly Supervised

Some readers who read my article on socialism and the nationalisation of land have referred to me as a "Marxist fossil", the intention being to dismiss my views as old and "fossilised."

My kinder foes praised me for my "solid facts" and "cogent logic", before noting superciliously: "Great idea, but it will never work in practice."

So am I a "Marxist fossil"?

No, sorry, comrades, I am not. I am merely not ashamed to admit that I am a socialist and have been one since I read books at university by writers like Hegel, Karl Marx, Albert Camus (ironically - The Rebel), Steve Biko and many others. Just as some people become born-again Christians, I became a socialist. After all, was Jesus Christ not the first true socialist?

From my perspective, this is akin to saying, I am merely not ashamed to admit that I am an advocate of institutionalized theft and the deliberate application of force against those people who show individuality and initiative.

Jesus wasn't the first socialist, but he certainly was one of the more famous.

I may be a socialist, but that does not mean I am opposed to wealth creation and rewarding hard work and entrepreneurial endeavour. Far from it. I am not only a property owner (the first requirement for being a capitalist), but I am also an investor both in the economy in general and on the stock exchange in particular.

Some of my friends have told me being a socialist is inconsistent with investing on the speculative stock exchange. I beg to differ. One can be rich and still be a socialist. It is all about your state of mind and your attitude to humanity.

So Ayn Rand could have been a socialist as long as she had some special "state of mind" and a particular "attitude" towards humanity? What about Ludwig von Mises? This is just bullshit and it will be revealed in the very next things Mr. Maruma says.

I am very suspicious of and am sometimes repelled by the system of capitalism. That is because it is a system fed and driven by individualism, egotism, excess and greed.

Thus, my beef is not about ideology. It is about human experience, our inalienable right to live a dignified life, showing respect for the Creator's creatures.

My beef is about integrity in corporate governance; it is about transparency, good governance; and, most of all, it is about social justice.

So here's his state of mind:

• screw the individual, it's the collective that matters
  
• screw your inner desires and wants, you must sacrifice yourself to others
  
• screw what you have, I say you've already got too much
  
• screw what you think you want, everyone else thinks you have enough

That's some pretty profound attitude there.

How can you have justice and a dignified life when you reject individualism? What kind of respect can you show for humans when you apparently hate the thing that motivates them: self-interest?

However, corporations do not use personal or family money to expand and grow. They use other people's money. Which is where I have my beef with them.

*pause*

A socialist is complaining about someone using other people's money.

This is probably the worst hypocrisy I've read so far this year.

This guy wants slaves for his beloved statist machine to devour. Stay away from him.

Posted by Drizzten at July 15, 2004 09:37 AM