Rationing during WW2
Families taking children from the cities etc.
(PsychoChomp, Tue 19 Jun 2012, 16:16, 1 reply, 13 years ago)

Nobody was starving.
If you're going to analyse something that has its root in a survival instinct, you're goign to have to look at situations where it was present in its purest form.

You talk about a disaster, or a war, everybody's on a more or less equal footing. Nobody's actually starving, rationing was actually a great equaliser in that capacity. Nobody's at a survival level. The tsunami had international aid packages and the rest of the country's food reserves. When everybody else is suffering to the same extent you are, people are much more willing to co-operate.

I'm saying that capitalism has its root in the same acquisition of resources as that survival instinct. I'm not saying that all humans act like that all the time, but people are fundamentally selfish and will act in that way when they think they can get away with it.
( Kroney, Tue 19 Jun 2012, 16:19, Reply)

There's a football thread
you can duel this out with rolled up Guardians if you want
( Light In Chains maker of the ikea sofa, Tue 19 Jun 2012, 16:22, Reply)

I don't get your argument.
Because peoples self preservation is not immediatly at risk, they didn't have to be greedy?
Unlike Jimmy Carr, who's starving and therefore only able to act under his primal urges.
(PsychoChomp, Tue 19 Jun 2012, 16:24, Reply)

You're taking it too literally.
When everybody has nothing, they will co-operate to survive. When there's an inequality, they will fight each other for resources.

The rich want to keep what they have because they've acquired it themselves, they have a me and mine attitude. The poor want a piece of it through taxing the rich to provide services or more dole money, or whatever. They have a me and mine attitude.

I was just comparing it to a survival instinct because, ultimately, I think it's the same aspect of our character that triggers the behaviour.
( Kroney, Tue 19 Jun 2012, 16:26, Reply)