Zeitgeist: Moving Forward reviews

[Jaden]

So it's finally out! Well, the release only came one day late, but I expected it to be 11 days ago.

it's 2h40m, so set some time aside and grab your popcorn. It's available just on dvd quality, so you might as well watch it on youtube instead of looking for torrents and such.

Before you and I go posting anything, let me say this:

Annoyingly, the last ZG topic got locked before this film was even available for viewing. I'm not a member of the Zeitgeist movement, just a fan of the excellent quality films it produces...and I was quite looking forward to seeing the AS crowd thoughts on this. I think the ZG topics until now have been great reading with lots of different, mostly really critical posters.

However the fervor with which people posted their arguements created an atmosphere that'll lead to lead to general bitterness and eventually flame wars. The mods don't appreciate that. So, I'd like this thread to be focused on reviewing the film. If you feel the need to correct others or extend a discussion to Zeitgeist as a whole, be nice about it or rather take it to PMs, please. I'd like most people to have a word before this topic gets locked as well.

Links:

The old Venus Project thread in all its flaming glory

The last thread for this film that got a bit heated and locked

Press conference after the release of this film with the minds behind it all

Now for my review.

Part one deals with human nature. It's the part that I liked the most, probably because I agree with it the most. The ZG views on this subject are scientifically sound, and this part presents well what is also my own reasoning for supporting enviromentalism. As in caring for the environment not only to protect the vitality of nature, but also that of ourselves.

However for this subject, there are more detailed works. I can recommend this documentary. It's more in-depth and not in the framework of any agenda like ZG.

Part two is criticism on the current monetary system. If you've seen the last ZG film, then you have seen this before and could pretty much skip this part. The difference would be that this time the judgement is even harsher. But still, I have to painstakingly agree to these things.

Part three is actually the second half of the film, and I actually don't like it that much. It goes far overhead with the Venus Project visions of the future. The nature of the film kinda suddenly changes, from being scientific to being science fiction. From rational to stroking the viewer's heartstrings.

We're supposed to arrive to the Resource-Based Economy vision based on the criticisms presented in parts one and two, but the logic of "Money isn't working out for us, so this is how we must do things" just doesn't hold. Also, the vision itself is crude and really lacking in integrity. It can still be interpreted as just a central planned economy, except the issue of leadership is evaded. Instead there's this overwhelming trust for science to take care of things, and blind trust for the rationality, empathy and capabilities of humanity.

There's clearly a conflict here between presenting things solidly like a documentary, and creating a good film. Towards the end, it heavily slides to the latter side. It's altogether audiovisually stimulating, and the ending is like something out of a hollywood drama...almost made me cry. And the effort done to produce and spread this work for literally no gain is admirable. The idea of a balanced, open, and evolving society without the incentive of profit or violence-based governance is beautiful and worth striving for.

Still, I'm also disappointed it wasn't made more like a documentary, and that there isn't any other proper Zeitgeist works like that. With the Opus Magnum of the movement being just a 180 minute film, it's no wonder people call it the Zeitgeist cult and get generally turned off by the science-fiction stuff. We're left to do a lot of thinking and research ourselves, which I encourage everyone to do...a film or two isn't enough to form a world view.

[synaesthetic]

I watched it, because I can't stand it when people claim I'm Complaining About Shows I Don't Watch...

I agree with you pretty much in that it was more like a film and less like a documentary. I still don't agree with their ideology, I still think it's ridiculous, impossible and damned scary, but on the merits of the documentary itself?

It was pretty hard to take seriously. Especially the latter parts, concerning the Venus Project, looked pulled right out of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It's too great a leap, especially since the Venus Project keeps talking, and talking, talking, talking...

... and taking money...

... but they've apparently forgotten that they're supposed to be, you know, constructing a test city.

So yeah. I may disagree with the ideology behind it all, but more than anything I'm annoyed that they seem to be a lot of talk (especially with these films) but not a lot of action or realism. The plan to spread ideas through the medium of film and documentary is not a new one; it's been done by plenty of people plenty of times and it does work.

But I think they should have grounded this one a little more firmly in reality to get the maximum effect.

[defrule]

Youtube comments are flooded...

[risingstar3110]

Will watch it when have time...

But, wow 3 hours in length? Gonna be interesting!!

[GundamFan0083]

You all knew this was comming.

I watched it all the way through.

Introduction:

The monopoly story about his grandma was a nice touch but the conclusion shows his complete lack of understanding of money.

Money is not an asset, money is the vehicle to acquire assets to improve the freedom of one's existence.
Peter fails to describe the types of money systems (there are many) and gives an overly simplistic child's tale as if the intended audience are a bunch puerile simpletons too stupid to understand that the Parker Bros. board game is nothing like the reality of the world.

He asks "What matters" in the world?
His answer was money, but that's not accurate.
What matters in the world is power, money is simply a vehicle to acheive power.
Whether that power is over one's own life or over the lives of others is immaterial when speaking of economics.
Again Joseph exposes his ignorance of reality.

Then we get to Fresco.
Ah, I can see Alzheimer's must have set in long ago because this old fart is definitely demented.
First he bashes the United States with a quote right out of the propaganda film "the Story of Stuff" by saying the United States has essentially plundered the world.
Believe me, if we had plundered the Earth you'd all be paying taxes to us and we'd not be in the economic crisis we're in.
Instead we're begging China for a loan.
Then this fuzzy brained idiot goes on to completely omit the actual reasons for WWII [you know the rise of Nationalist Socialism, Communism, and other looney totalitarian regimes invading countries...like I don't know...Poland for example?].
Fresco completely ignored the ideological reasons for both WWI and WWII and I can guess why.
Jacques is clearly a socialist.
His disdain for the capitalist system is crystal clear, and he exposed that when he bashed the Free Market economy and called it materialism.
That also shows a complete ignorance of economic theory.
Materialism is joined at the hip with CORPORATISM, which I have already said before IS NOT Capitalism.
Corporatism is what the Fabian socialists [an a short Italian guy with a really BIG ego] call the "Third Way."

Although I do agree with Fresco on one point, "This shit [Zeitgeist], has got to stop."

Part I:
Since Peter Joseph doesn't believe in "credencialism" I'll use his standards to critique the three scientists he chose to use for Part I.
Oh where to begin?

As soon as I saw their names it became clear to me where this movie was going.

Doctor Robert Sapolsky is a card carrying atheist, and member of what is called "The Third Culture" based on the book by self-described Marxist John Brockman.

This movement's members consist of a "who's-who" of atheist, socialist, and Marxian-socialist scientists from around the world.
Thus it's no surprise that Peter Joseph would add him to the film.
I don't trust anything a Marxist says, nor anyone willingly associated with their movements.
Doctor Mengele was a brilliant physician, and also a madman.
Having a PHD doesn't stop you from being human.

Expert number two:
Doctor Gabor Mate.
Interesting fellow this one.
I agree with him in part, and of the three scientists presented, he is the most credible.
I found no links to communism, socialism (though he is Canadian ), or other socialistic ideologies.
Though, I do not agree with his overall hypothesis.
Psychopaths, Schizophrenics, and other antisocial disorder sufferers can grow up in a loving, caring, environment and still commit horrendous crimes.
Jeffery Dahmer being a prime example of this.
Theirs is a product of genetic defect.

Expert number three:
Doctor James Gilligan.
Yep, his last name says it all.
Well little buddy, this is why I don't have any respect for you or your PHD:

"[Dr. Gilligan] argues that traditional approaches to violence prevention, which emphasise punishment, actually make violence worse; and the more severe the punishment, the worse the violence grows. Violence is more likely where there is a culture of shame. Key risk factors for shame include rigid gender role stereotyping, with resulting distorted views of what is to be “masculine” or “feminine,” and entrenched social hierarchies, based on inequalities of opportunity, income, and hope... [He] concludes that we can reduce violence by reducing social inequality and other stigmata of shame. We should also stop putting people in prison except in those cases where people need a type of therapeutic restraint for the protection of others. If we do this, we should provide therapy and education for violent offenders, rather than deprivation, isolation, and more shame."

This kind of Utopian crap is why I have little hope for the advancement of science right now.
It's been polticized to the point of becomming a secular-religion.
While I agree that the current forms of punishment for violent offenders is not working, I completely disagree with his conclusions.
We don't need "kindler, gentler" punishments for murders, rapists, and childmolesters.
We only need one punishment, the one the ancients used for these types of social deviants and that's death.
It's cheap, effectively ends any chance of repeat offense, and solves the problem eternally.
I don't need this reject from Gilligan's Island trying to rewrite human history because he's trying to make a new scientific "break through" at the expense of the penal system.
That this twit is in the Zeitgeist movie only helps solidify my opinion of this Utopian Socialist cult.

NEXT PART:

Part II:

OH...MY...GAWD
Doctor John (I'm a crackpot anti-Capitalism, Marxian Socialist-Pig) McMurtry.
I've actually read his book The Cancer Stage of Capitalism and there is no doubt he's a Marxist...none.
Did I mention he's also a "Truther?"

That said, let me dismiss the credibility of this idiot professor with one swift blow.
John Locke DID NOT invent the concept of private property.
That is a flat out lie, and anyone who claims to be an expert in economics knows this.
Even the Marxists know this Johnny boy, it was the GREEKS that started what we now know as private property.
With that simple exposure of this man's bias and propensity to fabricate history for his own purposes I can safely and confidently write him off as a complete hack.

Nevertheless, Peter Joseph adds insult to injury and throws in his own asshattery when he takes a shot at Adam Smith.
Let's not trouble him with the fact that Laissez-faire capitalism IS NOT mercantilism/corporatism and that Adam Smith actually said this about corporations in his work The Wealth of Nations.

Smith's Quote:

The directors of such [joint-stock] companies, however, being the managers rather of other people’s money than of their own, it cannot well be expected, that they should watch over it with the same anxious vigilance with which the partners in a private copartnery frequently watch over their own…. Negligence and profusion, therefore, must always prevail, more or less, in the management of the affairs of such a company.

Translation: Smith despised Corporations and wanted them abolished.
But facts rarely stand in the way of a good socialist yarn, especially a Utopian one.

Then move on to the erroneous "Employer, Employee, and Consumer" wheel that Peter thinks makes sense.
He's making one huge mistake.
In our system there are TWO additional players in all transactions involving economics: the Banks, and the Government.
The Banks through loaning money for payroll, credit, and acquisitions, and the government for regulations, taxes, and wage-fixing.
The system he's describing with his wheel graph is one of unregulated, Laissez-Faire, economics, but he's saying that's what we live under when in fact WE DO NOT.
In short, he's lying, or he's stupid.
Not sure which.

I also find it interesting how in the first film there were enough resources for everybody, but in Part II of this film there is a finite amount of resources.
Which is it Peter?

Then he moves into the concept of "Planned Obsolescence."
That's a coporatist ideal, which was pushed by the Money Power/Round Table Groups to generate the capital needed to erect the New International Economic Order started in 1931 after the demise of financial-"capitalism"/late-mercantilism and the move into monopolistic-"capitalsim"/corporatism.
This system was ushered into by the international banking interests as fully explained in Carroll Quigley's Tragedy and Hope.
Maybe you Zeitgeisters should pool some cash together and send Peter a copy of both that book and The Anglo American Establishment because he clearly doesn't understand what's going on in the world today.
If he did, I imagine his films would be quite different, and a helluva lot more accurate.

Then we see the young student asking Milton Friedman about the death of an old man from the inability to pay his electric bill.
First off, we cannot substantiate that this student's story is even true.
Peter then attacks all of the Liberal economists, yet doesn't touch Marx, Engles, Lennin, Stalin, Benito, or any Socialist thinker.
I can tell you for certain that Wall Street hates Hayek, and VonMises (the so called "Austrian" Economists) as much as they despise the Marian Socialists.
Thus again we see the now all too familiar pattern of Peter Joseph and his Zeitgeist movement.
He is bashing the Liberal economists, lumping them in with the corporatists, and claiming that they are "evil" and "responsible" for all the world's woes.

However, I don't see any mention of the Holdomor Massacre.
Or the Holocaust caused by the Nationalist Socialists.
Or the millions murdered by Mao's China, or the countless others murdered under Socialist regimes.
Where's the outcry about that?
Where's the critique of socialism.
Peter Joseph is either a complete ignoramous about history (which I highly doubt) or is intentionally editing history to focus on his enemy--Capitalism.
He's a Utopian Socialist-pig and too much of a coward to come right out and say it.

Now we get to Max Keiser.
Woah!
An Austrian economist!
Wait a second.
Peter just told us that VonMises and VonHayek were evil????
Now he's using Mr. Keiser as an expert?
Here is Keiser bashing the Money Power and their international coporatist scheming on his own website:

Maybe Peter should have vetted Max a bit before he added him to his "visionary" movie.
The contradictions compound themselves throughout this film.

With that we move on to "structural classism."
Again, this is what the Money Power intentionally built into the system they started under mercantilism back in the 1500s and erected the world over through coporatism, not capitalism.
You see, under capitalism a business is like it's owner.
It is born, it lives, and it dies.
In coporatism a corporation is created by government (it is a creature of the state), it lives off of credit (from both government loans, and private banks), and is immortal (like a vampire, it sucks the life blood of the proletariat and bourgeoise to feed it's Aristocratic hunger for power).
If Peter could shed his Utopian Socialistic idealism he might actually discover the truth, but then he'd get hung out to dry by the corporate media.

Then we get to the "True Economy" that is the so called "dictatorship of nature."
What Peter leaves out of this is that violence IS natural.
A lion doesn't care about the gazelle whose throat he's just tore out, nor does the alligator care about the crane he's just devoured.
An asteroid doesn't give one hoot about the all the life it extinguishes on a planet when it impacts, and a Black Hole doesn't wince when it devours a whole star system.
What Jacques and Peter completely ignore is the fact that we humans are different than nature because we have the ability to manipulate it, change it, and conquer it.
We are not held hostage to it the way Peter tries to claim in the last hour of the this movie.
He's simply pushing the already disproven theory of Henri de Rouvroy who believed in these same kinds of naturalistic theories in which science would become the religion and governing law of man.
That simply will not happen.
It's been tried before, and failed.

I won't comment on the last 41 minutes of this film.
synaesthetic is correct when he/she says it is pure science fiction right out of Star Trek.
It's a nice dream, but that's all it will ever be.

As for my opinion of the entire work.
It's a steaming pile of Utopian Socialistic propaganda that should be archived for future referrence so that we know what the warning signs look like for these groups.
Zeitgeist is dangerous, and this movie is concrete proof of it.
For that I thank Peter Joseph and Jacques Frescos as it is always good "to know thy enemy as thyself."

[defrule]

CHina is the future, all hail china!

LOLIOUS

[Sugetsu]

WOW! it has only been two days and the movie already has over 800k views and 16k comments

I won't be making the same mistake I have been making in my previous threads; which is to respond to quotes by other posters on the subject who clearly have no intension whatsoever to open their minds to a new concept. Rather than fall into this trap and making the thread go around in circles like a dog chasing its own tail I will just expose my review of the movie and address the most common questions on the subject.


I really love this movie. I think it did a masterful job at conveying a message in an easy to understand way in order to be watchable by people with low educational background. As always, Peter Joseph made sure to present factual information instead of making stuff up. The animations and the humor were great and they help to lighten the mood of what otherwise would be a very somber and gloomy movie.

Part I:

This movie started wisely with the most crucial part of the whole project, which is to demonstrate that humans are a reflexion of their environment. Jaden posted an excellent documentary that demonstrates this notion further. I have done the same in previous threads but I would like to add another video this time with Jack Fresco himself, whom many consider to be "The Da Vinci of our time", this guy is versed not only in many schools of science but also in philosophy and psychology as well.

I suggest you turn on the subtitles for this video because he is a little hard to hear.

Investigating Behavior
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmT1r...eature=related

This is the bedrock of movement itself; acknowledging that we are product of our environment and thus, a change to the system will change us as well.

Part II:

This was well done and dumbed down enough in order for many people to understand the problems of the monetary system. They did a good job, but I don't think it was good enough to convince people that money itself is the problem. There needs to be another movie that explains this subject specifically.

I would like to expand on this subject myself, as it is important to establish three important aspects of the current system:

1: Money creates social stratification. This is the most crucial problem when it comes to money. Money automatically implies that having more of it will give you a better quality of life. Once an individual has more than enough money to satisfy his basic human needs money becomes an instrument of power that when hoarded in massive amounts can influence society itself.

Social stratification is the harbinger of suffering in this society, as it creates division among the population, which in turn generates lack of trust, which in turn leads to ignorance, which in turn leads to hatred and violence. This factor was masterfully explained in the movie and doing away with it should be the #1 priority of humanity.

2: Money, no matter the system it is being currently used on, such as american capitalism, communism or socialism, assumes that there are infinite resources which leads to mass production and in turn leads to source depletion.

3: Money is debt, and debt is slavery. There is no freedom in our current society, we are only free to choose our enslaver. Even the decisions we make every day are the product of media influence in one way or another.

I would like to explain the concept of debt much further in tree steps (Warning, these are very long but very important to correctly grasp the concept of money creation and circulation)

Please watch the following 47 min Google video before proceeding any further:

1) http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...6453790090544#

The mechanics of the monetary system:

2)

Spoiler:

The Dynamics of Debt :

We have all been taught that adding a little profit to the selling price of the goods or services that we provide is reasonable and beneficial to us individually and to society as a whole. Profit is that little bit extra that you add to your selling price after you have already included all of your other costs. Profit is that extra $1 that you add to your price when your total costs are only $9. It is a reward for risking your money in the marketplace.


Now if all sellers are trying to do the same thing and are only paying out $9 in costs to the marketplace, but are trying to take in $10 in prices from the marketplace, then where is the extra money needed to buy all of the stuff in the marketplace supposed to come from? If only $9 in purchasing power was ever paid out for each item made, how can you expect people to give you back $10?


The only answer that Capitalism provides is debt. For everyone in the marketplace to sell all of their stuff, someone must borrow money along the way to pay for the profits that were added to the prices. Each time the total volume of profit increases, the total volume of debt must also increase, so that all of the stuff in the marketplace can be sold. Profit and debt are actually opposite sides of the same coin. Profit makes debt essential, debt makes profit possible.


Consider the following example :

Imagine that 10 people become stranded on a remote island. To survive, they decide to implement a Capitalist monetary system like the one they used at home. Each person agrees to produce 10 units of whatever they make so that everyone on the island can enjoy a fair share of the total production. For the sake of simplicity, this example assumes that each unit costs $0.90 to produce but sells for $1.00 (so that each person can make a reasonable profit). To get their business started, each person borrows the $9.00 needed to produce their first 10 units.

Here's a summary of their economy:


Right from the start, their economy will be short the $10 needed to cover their profits. If they dont each borrow another $1, business #10 will be unable to continue operating. For the sake of simplicity, this example assumes that all of the people decide not to purchase the product of the same business. (the overall effect would be the same if the shortage of sales was spread evenly and each business only sold $9 of the $10 units that they produced)



If everyone only pays out $9 to the marketplace (labour and input costs), but trys to take in $10 from the marketplace, there wont be enough money in circulation to cover the extra profits embedded in the prices. Additional borrowing will be needed to monetize the profits and clear the inventories in the marketplace. It doesnt matter who receives the profits, without new debt, there wont be enough money to go around.

It is interesting to note that the added profits actually hurt the community. If one person is no longer able to produce, everyone must make do with less. If each person borrows another $1 to increase the money supply, the increase in their debt will cancel out all of the benefits of their profits and they will simply inflate prices.


If all the profits from the first production cycle ($9) are spent back into the marketplace to purchase the new goods produced in cycle 2, then the new production can be cleared without any additional borrowing.



If however, all of the profits from the first production cycle ($9) are used to pay off debt, then only $81 ($90 - $9) will be left in circulation to fuel consumption. Since $90 (9 x $10) is needed in cycle 2 to clear the new production, additional goods will remain unsold and a second business (#9) will be unable to continue operating ($8 short).



If all of the profits ($8) and cash-on-hand ($1) from the second production cycle are saved, then only $72 ($81-$9) will be left in circulation to fuel consumption. Since $80 (8 x $10) is needed in cycle 3 to clear the new production, additional goods will remain unsold and a third business (#8) will be unable to continue operating ($7 short).



To summarize :

Once profits have been financed (monetized) by new borrowing (debt), as long as they are fully spent back into the marketplace, no additional new borrowing is required. If, however, profits are used to pay down existing debt, new debt must replace the old debt or else there will be insufficient funds available to sustain the existing market volume. Each time the total market volume of profit increases, the total market volume of debt must also increase by the same amount or the additional profits can never be achieved. Businesses, governments and investors cannot pay down their debts without stalling the economy unless consumers are willing and able to take on additional debt. The same debt dynamics apply if profits are saved or are exported to a different (external) marketplace. If people increase their savings rate and new borrowing levels stay the same, the economy will stall.



The Dynamics of Compound Profit :


For any product or service that you can think of, if you break it down into its components and then trace each of those components back to the Earth, you will quickly see that labour and profit are really the only two costs in the whole production process. All other operating costs like raw materials, parts and supplies, buildings and equipment, energy and utilities, packaging, transportation and marketing services, etc. Are really just complex combination of natural resources, human labour and profits.


When we take natural resources from the Earth, we do not pay Mother Earth anything for them. We dont throw money into the sea when we catch fish and we dont bury money in the ground when we extract oil or minerals. Ultimately all of our natural resources are free. We do pay the costs of extracting and processing them, but the natural resources themselves are totally free.


Human labour + natural resources produce tools; human labour + natural resources + tools produce machines; human labour + natural resources + tools + machines produce everything else that we desire, including all of the goods and services that we include in operating costs. Tools and machines (and all products for that matter) are really just forms of stored human labour and natural resources.


But wait a minute, if natural resources are totally free, shouldn’t prices simple be equal to human labour costs? How do profits creep into prices?


Every good or service offered in the marketplace relies on a complex series of interwoven supply chains. Every producer requires the goods and services of many other producers to operate their business. If all producers are trying to recoup all of their operating costs, plus are adding a profit, on top of their costs, to their own selling price, then the total amount of profit that is embedded into the selling price of every good and service that we buy compounds continuously as it moves along the chain of production. Now that globalization is so entrenched, raw materials, components, manufacturing and assembly operations, shipping and distribution routes, criss-cross the world many times before goods enter local retail channels. Production interdependencies alone can often loop though 10 or 20 levels. The table below reveals how dramatically embedded compound profits increase the selling price of everything we buy and indicates how far prices could fall if all profits were eliminated.



Step 1 represents the first business in a supply chain. For each and every $1 of his costs (call this the initial unit), he adds a 10% profits to his price. In step 2, the second business in the chain purchases output from the first. For each and every initial unit purchased from business 1 (which now costs $1.10), he adds a 10% profit to his price. Each and every $1.10, however, includes the 10% profit that was already added to prices by the first business. So the $0.11 profit added in step 2 is added on top of the $0.10 profit that was already embedded in the selling price of the first business. At the end of step 2, a total profit of $0.21 is now embedded in the selling price of each and every initial unit. This process of compounding profit is repeated in each successive step along the supply chain.


The effect that compound profits have on prices is identical to the effect that compound interest charges have on borrowing costs. Compound profits, however, are much more harmful to consumers. Compound interest charges take years to inflate consumer costs, compound profits inflate costs immediately. Financial advisors often use a Rule of 72 (or Rule of 70) to estimate the approximate future value of an investment. This is how it works. If you divide the rate of return, or the interest rate, into the number 72 (or 70) the number you get is the approximate number of years that it would take for your investment to double in value. For example, an investment that earns 6% per year would take about 12 years to double in value (72/6=12). An investment that earn 10% per year would take only about 7.2 years to double in value (72/10=7.2). The table above shows that the Rule of 72 can also be used to calculate how many levels of compound profit would cause prices to double at a given profit rate. The rightmost column reveals how much lower retail prices could be if all profits were eliminated entirely from the supply chain.

With an average supply chain profit rate of 10%, it takes only 8 levels to double the selling price of a product and only 12 levels to triple it. Many products produced in the labour ghettos of the Third World have profit margins that are much higher than just 10% of the selling price. At level 12, all of the wages and salaries that were paid out to workers are sufficient to purchase only one-third of the production... and this is before taxes reduce their purchasing power even further. The remaining two-thirds of the production pie is only available to corporations and individuals who have profits, dividends, capital gains, or other non-labour income to enjoy. This two-thirds fuels the vast inequality in the distribution of wealth in the world and explains why corporations and the super rich own (or consume) a perpetually growing share of the assets that workers produce.

Real estate and commodity speculation, leveraged trading & investment schemes, and compound interest add only profits to the selling price of the products that they touch. Totally unproductive themselves, these power tools of modern greed are only useful for extracting income from the economy. Profits and interest expropriate the earnings of workers and usurp the fruits of their productive labour. Profits siphon away current earnings, interest feeds on future earnings. With so much of capitalism working against them, is it any wonder that most people are simply exhausted by the struggle to survive?

If two-thirds seems too high to be reasonable, consider this. According to data published by Statistics Canada, (Financial & Taxation Statistics for Enterprises, Table 187-0003) from 1980 to 2006, for all industries combined, wages and salaries represented only 16% to 20% of all corporate operating expenses. All of the domestic wages and salaries of all domestic supply chains are already included in this total, so the remaining 80+% of the operating expenses must be a combination of imported labour costs, embedded profits, interest, or capital accumulation.


The Dynamics of The Boom/Bust Cycle :


The primary goal of Capitalism is to generate a perpetually expanding income from capital investments. A perpetually growing volume of profits & capital gains, however, requires a perpetually growing volume of debt.


All of the profits and costs of business, including debt servicing costs, are passed to consumers through prices. All of the costs of government, including debt servicing costs, are passed to consumers through taxes (any taxes that businesses pay were already taken from consumers through prices).


As the total volume of profit & debt in the economy increases, so does the total volume of interest payments. Consumers must be willing and able to carry the entire burden of debt servicing costs in the economy or else the economy will fail.


As debt servicing costs consume more and more of total personal disposable income, consumers become maxed-out and the economy weakens. Once the total burden of interest costs reaches about 50% of wages or 40% of personal disposable income, consumer debt exhaustion occurs and a recession begins. This marks the start of the Bust cycle.



The Bust Cycle :


Missed consumer debt repayment schedules trigger loan call backs which in turn trigger loan defaults. Fear builds in credit markets and new lending drops sharply. Leveraged financial investments tied to consumer credit collapse as debt securities are devalued. Credit-driven purchases of major assets decline and business inventories grow.


Layoffs occur and businesses find borrowing more difficult. Missed business debt repayment schedules trigger loan call backs which in turn trigger more loan defaults. Fear grips credit and stock markets and new lending and investment dries up. Leveraged financial investments tied to business credit collapse as corporate stocks and debt securities are devalued. Foreclosures and takeovers occur and downsizing pushes unemployment levels even higher.


Purchasing stalls as consumers worry about losing their jobs and attempt to increase savings. Trillions of dollars of wealth and debt are wiped off the books as the economy spirals downward. Eventually the carnage levels off and fear begins to subside. By this time, credit markets have been purged of an enormous amount of unrepayable debt and total interest costs are once again well below 40% of total personal disposable income. Profit expectations have moderated and prices are lower and relatively stable. This lays the foundation for the start of the Boom cycle.



The Boom Cycle :

Once the marketplace is confident that the worst is over, credit restrictions are eased and a new round of lending begins. New consumer borrowing stimulates consumption, idle inventories disappear and factories start recalling workers. As consumer demand strengthens, unused production capacity is depleted and businesses start borrowing again for expansions. The demand for higher profits is renewed again in corporate boardrooms and stock markets. Expansions fuel new wages and salaries which in turn further boost consumption levels. Those with incomes that exceed their day-to-day needs once again seek out lucrative financial investments to feather their retirement nests. The boom cycle is the battleground for wealth acquisition and the raison d’etre of Capitalism.



As long as consumers are still willing and able to absorb the profits and debt servicing costs that are embedded into prices and taxes, the marketplace will continue to grow. But inevitably, the total volume of profit and debt in the economy will once again rise to the level where the total volume of interest costs consumes about 50% of wages and consumer debt exhaustion will re-occur, causing another recession.



Capitalism doesn't want to fix this :

Although this repetitive cycle causes so much misery for the people who lose their jobs and/or retirement savings in the process, true Capitalists really don't want to fix the system. Nor do they care that Capitalism recklessly squanders our most precious human and natural resources which are the real sources of our collective wealth. True Capitalists believe that the use of unrestrained human greed in the pursuit of wealth and happiness is their birthright and that their extraordinary success in achieving it is clear evidence that God has favoured them.


Capitalism is really like a casino. Credit and debt are the chips. The house is owned by the giants of Capitalism, the captains of industry, banking, investment, etc. They are the big players in the marketplace, the guys that everyone else must watch to try and figure out what is really going on. Their size gives them a huge advantage because their actions will trigger other reactions, and they know it ahead of time, so that they can predict and even cause future market moves before anyone else knows what’s really happening. They can pull their money out of a hand before any big losses occur, but doing so sends a signal to all of other players watching them that they too should fold. Like a self-fulfilling prophesy, as they scramble to get their money out, the value of the investment plummets and they lose their bets.


The house controls all of the chips and only lends them to players in the marketplace who have already acquired capital assets. Anyone who has tried to get a loan without having any collateral assets to pledge can attest to this. Now the House doesn't really care who wins or loses out of the gaming tables of Capitalism. It knows that the chips themselves aren't really that important. It knows that only underlying assets and the interest revenues that the chips generate really matter.


So the House provides chips (credit & loans) to the governments, businesses and consumers who want to play at the market tables. No matter who the winners are, the House collects interest payments from them while the games are being played. No matter who the losers are, the House collects interest payments from them until they go broke and then claims the underlying assets that were pledged when the players rented the chips.


If too many chips are put into circulation and the games end because the House is demanding too much interest or the players are demanding too much profit, who really cares? The winners of the game certainly don't. They simply cash out their chips and start looking for the assets of distressed companies that might be available at bargain basement prices. The House doesn't care either. It just leans over the tables and scoops up the remaining chips, then begins liquidating the loser’s assets. The total volume of money and debt that is left in circulation is as meaningless to the House as who the winners and losers were. It is easy to create new chips for the next game. The only thing that really matters is who gets control of the productive assets that were pledged or generated during the game. None of the underlying tangible assets are ever lost, they are simply redistributed to the people God has favored.


The bust cycle may actually be the most important part of Capitalism. It enables the rich to get richer and consolidate their control of the economy more quickly than at any other time. The bust cycle provides excellent opportunities for corporate mergers and takeovers. Many valuable corporate and personal assets become available for a fraction of their original cost. Tight credit markets give those with deep pockets the upper hand and governments become much more pliable and considerate of corporate needs.


Reckless government bailout packages and knee-jerk deficit spending program that increase the long term debt liabilities of taxpayers don't even begin to address the serious structural problems inherent in Capitalism. Without eliminating the need for perpetual profits and interest bearing debts, the best that society can hope for is a futile return to the beginning of yet another boom/bust cycle.

The Solution :

Once the general public fully understands that Capitalism is a crude and primitive form of social order that by design must continue forever to rely on human exploitation and war to achieve its ambitions, they will surely demand that their governments change directions. A fair and sustainable society is not only possible, it is easy to achieve once the tyranny of our monetary system is abolished forever.

3) The following formula attempts to explain the fractional reserve banking system process from the very beginning, but first let me quote what its author said:

Before trying to explain the problem with the fractional reserve banking system i would request you to go through the post once again, but not with the perspective of an economist but with the perspective of a mathematician/physicist.
the problem with the FRB system (I think!!)is very much similar to that of fluid flow through pipeline network.
water flows through a pipe due a difference of hydrostatic head i.e a difference in head is needed for its flow, which in the case of the economic system is monetary difference.
now while water flows through the pipes it is subjected to a frictional drag from the inner surface of the pipes which is termed as "Head Loss" (please go through any standard text book on fluid mechanics) now this head loss reduces the flow of fluid through the pipes considerably.
we need not have to be too imaginative to apply the same analogy in case of the "monetary flow" in the economic system.
here the frictional loss is replaced by monetary loss due to the fractional reserve.
This fractional reserve is hindering the flow of money in each step just like the head loss in the pipe line flow.
Now how much is this obstruction affecting the economy ?
well!! thats exactly what i have tried to figure out !!( please go through the second part of the post but with a standard text book of mathematics on arithmatic/geometric progression near by)
what i have found is that due to this fractional reserve system any deposit in this system can only infiltrate 50% of the population in the economy i.e the remaining 50% would not receive any portion of the deposit as it has been devoured by the fractional reserve system during its flow downwards in the economy.
Please check it out with any standard text book on arithmatic or geometric progression.
All the formulae used in the post are very standard and common.
And as regards the inherent flaw of the system itself (Even if the application of interest or fractional reserve is considered out of the equation)
I think that my effort to being as clear as it could have been would be able to satisfy your requirement in understanding the problem.
Thank you once again for your comment,eagerly waiting to hear from you soon.

Spoiler:

To understand the mechanics of the monetary system we should have a clear picture of the dynamics of the system.

Consider the following:-

Let the Initial Deposit in a bank = D

Now, Reserve requirement as per fractional reserve practice = 10% of D
= 0.1D (As documented in Modern Money Mechanics, page- 7)
Under current regulations, the reserve requirement
Against most transaction accounts is 10 percent.

So, Portion of the deposit that is excess and can be loaned out
= (100 – 10) % = 90% of D
= 0.9D

Now, considering the Initial Deposit to be = 1000$

The amount that can be loaned out in the 1st step = 0.9 x 1000 = 900$
Keeping 100$ as reserve.

The amount that can be loaned out in the 2nd step = 0.9 x 900 = 810$
Keeping 90$ as reserve.

The amount that can be loaned out in the 3rd step = 0.9 x 810 = 729$
Keeping 81$ as reserve.

And the process repeats until the amount which is remaining becomes reasonably close to zero (It can never be exactly equal to zero as that would require an infinite number of steps)

The above process can be formulated as below:-

Considering the residual amount = 0.01D (1% of Initial Deposit)

D x 0.9^N = 0.01D where N = No. of steps required to satisfy the given condition

0.9^N = 0.01

N = 43.709 = 44 times (Approximately).

So, we see that in the Fractional Reserve Banking System a certain deposit can be loaned out approximately 44 times before it reduces to an amount which is 1% of the Initial Deposit.

How much money is created in the process?

Now, based on the Fractional Reserve Banking System, the Banks do not deduct the amount loaned out from its accounts (if it did then the banks wouldn’t have created any money at all). So in every such step money is virtually created out of thin air which in turn inflates the amount of money initially deposited.

Note: Of course, they do not really pay out loans from the money they
Receive as deposits. If they did this, no additional money would be created. What they do when they make loans is to accept promissory notes in exchange for credits to the Borrowers' transaction accounts (MODERN MONEY MECHANICS, pg – 7)

Let’s check out the dynamics of the money creation process:-


In the 1st step the amount of money in the economy = 1000$

In the 2nd step the amount of money in the economy = 1000$ + 0.9 x 1000$ = 1900$

In the 3rd step the amount of money in the economy = 1000$ + 0.9 x 1000$ + 0.9^2 x 1000 = 2710$ and so on……….

The process can be formulated as below:-

Total money in the Economy (T) = 1000 x 0.9^0 + 1000 x 0.9^1 + 1000 x 0.9^2 + 1000 x 0.9^3 +………………..+ 1000 x 0.9^44




Symbolically:-

T = D + 0.9D + 0.9^2 x D + 0.9^3 x D + 0.9^4 x D +
+…………. + 0.9^44 x D

T = D (0.9^0+ 0.9^1 + 0.9^2 + 0.9^3 + ………………………..+ 0.9^44)

We can easily identify that it’s a Geometric series

So we can write:-

T = D (1- r ^ n)/ (1-r)

Therefore the general equation of the
Money Multiplier = (1 – r ^n) / (1 – r)
Where; r = factor for excess reserve and n = Number of steps

Now, r = 0.9 and n = (44 + 1) = 45 in this case.

T = ((1 – 0.9 ^ 45)/(1 – 0.9)) x D = 9.912 D
= 10D (Approximately)

Virtual Money created in the process = 10D – D = 9D where; D= Initial Deposit.


So we see that FOR EVERY DEPOSIT IN THIS SYSTEM 9 TIMES IT’S VALUE CAN BE CREATED OUT OF THIN AIR.

Now regarding the application of INTEREST and to completely understand the FRAUDULANT nature of this whole system lets start a mental exercise considering the amount which has to be paid back in order to clear all the loans in a single chain of alternate lending and borrowing.

THE MONEY INFILTRATES IN THE ECONOMY AS BELOW:-
(D) 9.70$ (1% of D)729$……810$ 900$1000$

Whose Nth term is given by = 1000 x 0.9^ (N – 1)
= D x 0.9^ (N – 1)


Now, had there been no interest then the money would have retraced its path destroying the virtual money in every step, as follows:-

1000$900$810$....................9.70$ ------------ 1

Now, considering an uniform rate of interest = 2% (which is quite generous)

The money to be returned back is shown sequentially:-

1020$918$826.19$9.90$.................... ----------2

Note: Though it seems that a deposit of 1000$ will create a deficit of only 20$ (2%) in the system but that is not the case. In fact, the deficit in each step of the above example will add up because there is no possibility of it being fulfilled from the very beginning of the contraction process.

Therefore the total deficit generated in the system
= 0.02 D x summation of 0.9^ (N -1)
= 0.02 D x Money Multiplier

= 0.02D x 10 = 0.2D (Approximately).

It is interesting to note as the money gets expanded in the system so does the interest on it!!

Therefore the total shortage of money so generated
= 1000$ x 0.2 = 200$ (Approximately)

= 10D x (R/100) = D(R/10)
WHERE; R = INTEREST RATE

So there is the mind boggling paradox!! Where will this extra 200$ come from?

There is no chance of it being created in the process; we are not printing any currency in the system nor does money reproduce like living organisms.
So who is going to make for up this deficit?

Now, consider a more detailed exercise

Let Initial Deposit = D = 1023$

Let the Population = P = 1023

So, Money available per Capita = D/P = 1023/1023 = 1$

Let the Reserve Requirement (R) = 10% of D = 0.1D

Now for total infiltration of money in the system a person in the system should receive at least 1$. In
other words the last lent out amount should be equal
to 1$.

Consider that in each step the money is getting branched in 2 paths (which is much more realistic than the linear distribution)


1023$ = 1023$


460.35$ + 460.35$ = 920.7$


207.16$ + 207.16$ + 207.16$ + 207.16$ = 828.64$

.
.
.
.


And the process repeats

How many steps can this process run before the residual amount becomes equal to 1$?

The general equation is:

1023 x 0.9^ (n – 1) / 2^ (n – 1) = 1

0.45^ (n – 1) = 1/1023

n= 9.68 = 9 times ( n is bound to be an integer)

Therefore the money infiltrates to the 9th step of the distribution process.

But there are 10 steps in the total distribution process because
P = 1023 = 2^10 – 1(now you can understand the significance of the population considered)

Therefore the number of people who received money
= 2^9 – 1 = 511 persons

And the number who did not receive any money at all
= 1023 – 511 = 512 persons

Therefore the percentage of poverty so generated
= (512/ 1023) x 100 = 50%

Therefore we see that a reserve requirement of 10% guarantees a poverty of 50% in the system. That is the money is never going to reach 50% of the lot due to this system.

If we repeat the exercise with 20%, 30% and 40% Reserve Requirement the consecutive Poverty generated would be 75%, 88% and 94% respectively

Therefore the GENERAL POVERTY EQUATION is
= [(2^n – 2^ (n – R/10)) / (2^n -1)] x 100 -------------- (P)

Where (2^n – 1) represents the total POPULATION in the system.

In other words a Reserve Requirement of 10% will ensure only 50% infiltration of the money in the system keeping the remaining 50% away from any money and thereby in poverty.

(I could have considered Trilateral branching but believe me the situation would be worse and this is the least lethal consideration!!)

Hey!! The exercise is not over yet!!

What will happen to those 50% that received the money?

The money has to be returned back with an interest.

Let us consider a uniform interest rate
= 2% (As generous as it can be)

Now the money that each receive in the 9th step
= (1023 x 0.9^9) / 2^9 = 0.77$
Therefore each person has to return back
= 1.02 x 0.77$ = 0.79$

But the money in that step is still
= 1023^0.9^9 =396.33$
Therefore number of possible returns
= (396.33 / 0.79) = 501.68 = 501 returns

So the number of defaulters = 2^9 – 501 = 11 no.

Therefore total number of subsequent defaulters
= 8+4+2+1+1+1+1+1+1+
+2+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+
+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 = 36 no.

Therefore the percentage of defaulters /debtors/slaves generated by the system due to an interest rate of 2%
= [36 / (2^9 – 1)] x 100 = 7% (leaving aside the 50% who did not even receive any money in the first place)

So we can well understand that in order to make up for this deficit the next injection of money will have to be of a higher magnitude than before but that again will create more debt in the system. So it’s a vicious cycle which perpetuates itself and constantly enhances differences and thereby concentrates the money/wealth/resources to the dwellers on the top level of the money chain. It’s like a pumping mechanism which constantly drains out wealth from the lower rungs to the upper rungs of the money chain.

The banks of our world are not there to distribute wealth it is there to increase differences and to concentrate all the money/wealth/resources into the hands of a very few on the top of the money chain.

Now considering the present world population
= 7 billions (App.)

Or 2^n - 1 = 7 x 10^9

Or n = 32.70 = 32 (App.)

Considering R = 10% (which is common for most transactions as documented in Modern Money Mechanics, p-7)

The Poverty %
= [(2^32 – 2^ (32 – 10/10)) / (2^32 -1)] x 100
= 50% (GUARANTED)

Now we have seen earlier that the distribution of the money in this system can never be uniform. It slowly decays in magnitude as we drift downwards in the money chain.
So what is the amount of money possessed by the terminal person that is the person on the top of the chain?
We can easily visualize that it is 10% of the amount injected in the system i.e. 102.3$ say 100$.

So you can well understand that if the total money in the world were to add up to 7 billion$ which is just equal to the population i.e. 7 billion, then for every 100$ that you possessed, there would be a story of 512 people who didn’t get any money because of you and 32 more who is going to get robbed of everything just because of you!!

What if you were a millionaire?

That means (1000000/100) x (512 +32) x q = 5.44q Million people would be suffering for you!
And a billionaire?

That means 5440000000q = 5.44q Billion people enslaved and in poverty just because of you.

So how much personal wealth will be required to enslave the whole world?
= (7/ 5.44) k Billion $
Where k = Money / population Ratio.
= Total base money in the economy / Total Population.
And q = (1/k) i.e reciprocal of k


By now we know that an injection of M$ in the economy creates a debt deficit of
= MR/100 x ((1 – F ^n) / (1- F))
Where F = Excess reserve factor = 0.9 for a reserve requirement of 10%.

Money injection required for the next cycle
= M + MR/100 x ((1 – F ^n) / (1- F))

= M (1 + R/100 ((1 – F ^n) / (1- F)))

So the process repeats with the next injection being higher in amount than the previous one

The general term of this process is:-

= M (1 + R/100 ((1 – F ^n) / (1- F))) ^T

Let the Population at Tth instant = P

So that the Population at any time may be given as

P = P x f (T)

Considering (M / P) = 1 at a time T we can find out the corresponding devaluation of the currency at any other time starting from that period by using the following formula:-


Cost index (C) = (1 + R/100 ((1 – F ^n) / (1- F))) ^T / f (T)


The salient points to be noted in the above examples are:-

1) EVERY DEPOSIT IN THIS SYSTEM CAN CREATE 9 TIMES ITS VALUE OF MONEY OUT OF THIN AIR.

2) EVERY DEPOSIT IN THIS SYSTEM CAN CREATE A MONEY DEFICIT EQUALS TO 10 TIMES THE INITIAL DEPOSIT x (R/100), WHERE R = RATE OF INTEREST CHARGED AGAINST LOAN.

3) THERE IS NO POSSIBILITY OF FULFILLING THIS DEFICIT BECAUSE THE ECONOMY DOES NOT CREATE MONEY OR MONEY CANNOT REPRODUCE ITSELF LIKE LIVING ORGANISMS.

4) THE AMOUNT OF MONEY ENTERING THE SYSTEM = MONEY LEAVING THE SYSTEM, SO EVERY DEPOSIT CREATES A VACCUM OF UNRECOVERED DEBT.

5) THIS NECESSITATES THE INJECTION OF MORE MONEY IN THE SYSTEM WHICH IN TURN CREATES MORE DEBT.


6) EACH DEPOSIT IN THIS SYSTEM WOULD REQUIRE A FURTHER INJECTION OF D (1 + R/10) ^N WHERE D= INITIAL DEPOSIT;
R= RATE OF INTEREST AND N= NUMBER OF INJECTIONS.

7) AN INCREASE IN THE MONEY SUPPLY REDUCES ITS PURCHASING POWER AND ULTIMATELY INCREASES PRICE OF EVERY COMMODITY.

8) MONEY IS PURELY A DEBT INSTRUMENT

9) MONEY = DEBT = SLAVERY

Part III

This part of the movie explained the Venus Project, I think it was very well put together.

For those who question using science as a the governing rule of society please think carefully about this:

The scientific method has no ego (Peter said science has no ego, I am just trying to explain what he meant): Science is based on the observation, analysis and replication of natural phenomena. Nature has strict rules that must be followed in order to survive and live in a sustainable manner in this planet. (This is why Joseph said that nature is a dictatorship) The Venus project advocates applying the scientific method for social concern in order to live in accordance with the laws of nature. If we live this way our society won't be subjected to the opinions of individuals, such as politicians or dictators who know nothing about how our world works, and ultimately end up making subjective decisions that affects us all. A world in which the distribution of resources is guided by calculators (AKA computers) instead of power hungry people will lead to a more equal and just society, free of social stratification.


Part IV

This part was about the imminent destruction of our world due to the current socio economic paradigm, such as peak oil, structural violence, and hindering of scientific development. I liked it but I found it lacking on a very important point, how to transition into the Venus Project in the first place? This continues to be the biggest problem that the movement faces. It needs a very clear transition strategy, apart from educating society on problems of our current system and how it will lead us straight to self destruction, there needs to be a very detailed plan on what to do once most of the population is aware of this system.

I don't think riots and mass protests world wide are not going to cut it, that would most likely cause society to devolve as the people in power are addicted to it and would rather die than to give it up. There needs to be a global census among people of all levels of society first.

PS: Here are 3 very interesting money related articles:

German Central Bank Admits that Credit is Created Out of Thin Air
Money Impedes Our Ability to Enjoy the Little Pleasures in Life
Dope, Dopes and Dopamine: The Problem With Money

[MeoTwister5]

I haven't had the time to watch it yet but i find many of the comments from proponents disturbing. I've read many criticisms about the film from some sectors but most of them arw being immediately rejected as preconceived conusions of closed mindedness despite the fact that they've been done with a very openminded analytical sense. If any and all negative criticism is handwaved then what's the point? Is praise the only valid reaction?

I want to watch the movie and discuss it, but if the only points that want to be discussed are the positives and not the negatives, and openmindedness equates to having to accept the entire production as some sort of gospel that is nothing but a gift to tje world, then no thanks. The entire point of discourse is to understand the text from every angle and not just to sing it praises like a collective hive mind.

[Ithekro]

From what I understand, the only way to transition to a radically different system from what we have now (includes all the various forms we have now) is basically to blow everything up and start over. That means one hell of a war with possibly as much as a sixth of the worlds population dying (either from the war or from the aftermath of the war)...then the survivors decide to try something different because all th goverments and institutions are basically broken afterwards (especially if say most monitary transactions are over computers and the war used some sort of massive EMP weapon that basically wipes out all the non-metal or printed money of the world...leaving the printed with no real value and the metal subject to whim.

I don't think most people want to have to go through that to gain Utopia. (I'll not that is exactly the pattern Star Trek uses...mass destruction followed by social changes....and advent of new science...and aliens..and it still takes 200-300 years to get to what has beem suggested.).

[GundamFan0083]

I've uncovered some interesting tidbits about ol Peter Joseph.

There's a reason these people can't take criticism, and anonymous has something to say about it.

@MeoTwister5 and Ithekro, and anyone who has questions about this group.
I strongly recommend watching the Zeitgeist movie, then coming back here and watching the following three videos which are professional analysis of Zeitgeist.

Doctor Robert Jay Lifton's analysis of the Zeitgeist movement has proven to be a most valuable series of information videos especially when combined with watching the new Zeitgeist movie.

Part I:

Part II:

Part III:

Here is Doctor Rober J Lifton's CRITERIA FOR THOUGHT REFORM:

THOUGHT REFORM: THE PSYCHOLOGY OF TOTALISM CHAPTER 22 (Chapel Hill, 1989) THE FUTURE OF IMMORTALITY CHAPTER 15 (New York 1987)

Spoiler for It's long.:

Any ideology — that is, any set of emotionally-charged convictions about men and his relationship to the natural or supernatural world — may be carried by its adherents in a totalistic direction. But this is most likely to occur with those ideologies which are most sweeping in their content and most ambitious or messianic in their claim, whether a religious or political organization. And where totalism exists, a religion, or a political movement becomes little more than an exclusive cult.

Here you will find a set of criteria, eight psychological themes against which any environment may be judged. In combination, they create an atmosphere which may temporarily energize or exhilarate, but which at the same time pose the gravest of human threats.

(BRIEF OUTLINE)

1. MILIEU CONTROL

the most basic feature is the control of human communication withinand environment if the control is extremely intense, it becomesinternalized control — an attempt to manage an individual’s inner communication control over all a person sees, hears, reads, writes(information control) creates conflicts in respect to individual autonomy groups express this in several ways: Group process, isolation from
other people, psychological pressure, geographical distance or unavailable transportation, sometimes physical pressure often a sequence of events, such as seminars, lectures, group encounters, which become increasingly intense and increasingly isolated, making it extremely difficult– both physically and psychologically–for one to leave. sets up a sense of antagonism with the outside world; it’s us against them
closely connected to the process of individual change (of personality)

2. MYSTICAL MANIPULATION (Planned spontaneity)

extensive personal manipulationseeks to promote specific patterns of behavior and emotion in such
a way that it appears to have arisen spontaneously from within theenvironment, while it actually has been orchestrated totalist leaders claim to be agents chosen by God, history, or some supernatural force, to carry out the mystical imperative the “principles” (God-centered or otherwise) can be put forcibly and claimed exclusively, so that the cult and its beliefs become the only true path to salvation (or enlightenment) the individual then develops the psychology of the pawn, and participates actively in the manipulation of others the leader who becomes the center of the mystical manipulation (or the person in whose name it is done) can be sometimes more real than an abstract god and therefore attractive to cult members legitimizes the deception used to recruit new members and/or raise funds, and the deception used on the “outside world”

3. THE DEMAND FOR PURITY

the world becomes sharply divided into the pure and the impure, the absolutely good (the group/ideology) and the absolutely evil (everything outside the group) one must continually change or conform to the group “norm” tendencies towards guilt and shame are used as emotional levers for
the group’s controlling and manipulative influences once a person has experienced the totalist polarization of good/evil (black/white thinking), he has great difficulty in regaining a more balanced inner sensitivity to the complexities of human morality the radical separation of pure/impure is both within the environment (the group) and the individual ties in with the process of confession — one must confess when one is not conforming

4. CONFESSION

cultic confession is carried beyond its ordinary religious, legal and therapeutic expressions to the point of becoming a cult in itself sessions in which one confesses to one’s sin are accompanied by patterns of criticism and self-criticism, generally transpiring within small groups with an active and dynamic thrust toward personal change is an act of symbolic self-surrender makes it virtually impossible to attain a reasonable balance between worth and humility a young person confessing to various sins of pre-cultic existence can both believe in those sins and be covering over other ideas and feelings that s/he is either unaware of or reluctant to discuss often a person will confess to lesser sins while holding on to other secrets (often criticisms/questions/doubts about the group/leaders that may cause them not to advance to a leadership position) “the more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge you”

5. SACRED SCIENCE

the totalist milieu maintains an aura of sacredness around its basic doctrine or ideology, holding it as an ultimate moral vision for the ordering of human existence questioning or criticizing those basic assumptions is prohibited a reverence is demanded for the ideology/doctrine, the originators of the ideology/doctrine, the present bearers of the ideology/doctrine offers considerable security to young people because it greatly simplifies the world and answers a contemporary need to combine a sacred set of dogmatic principles with a claim to a science embodying the truth about human behavior and human psychology

6. LOADING THE LANGUAGE

the language of the totalist environment is characterized by the thought-terminating cliche (thought-stoppers) repetitiously centered on all-encompassing jargon “the language of non-thought” words are given new meanings — the outside world does not use the words or phrases in the same way — it becomes a “group” word or phrase

7. DOCTRINE OVER PERSON

every issue in one’s life can be reduced to a single set of principles that have an inner coherence to the point that one can claim the experience of truth and feel it the pattern of doctrine over person occurs when there is a conflict between what one feels oneself experiencing and what the doctrine or ideology says one should experience if one questions the beliefs of the group or the leaders of the group, one is made to feel that there is something inherently wrong with them to even question — it is always “turned around” on them and the questioner/criticizer is questioned rather than the questions answered directly the underlying assumption is that doctrine/ideology is ultimately more valid, true and real than any aspect of actual human character or human experience and one must subject one’s experience to that “truth” the experience of contradiction can be immediately associated with guilt one is made to feel that doubts are reflections of one’s own evil when doubt arises, conflicts become intense

8. DISPENSING OF EXISTENCE

since the group has an absolute or totalist vision of truth, those who are not in the group are bound up in evil, are not enlightened, are not saved, and do not have the right to exist “being verses nothingness” impediments to legitimate being must be pushed away or destroyed one outside the group may always receive their right of existence by joining the group fear manipulation — if one leaves this group, one leaves God or loses their transformation, for something bad will happen to them the group is the “elite”, outsiders are “of the world”, “evil”, “unenlightened”, etc.

Combine that with Sugetu's post and I'd say all of you will get a pretty clear picture of what Zeitgeist really is.

[MeoTwister5]

You can actually sum it up with one sentence:

"You're either with us or against us. There is no such things as neutrality."

Social absolutism. I've seen a good number of communist propaganda films in college and it surprises me how much I'm to tolerate before my brain kicks in and actually start thinking.

[Sugetsu]

First let me state my position the movement very clearly: I consider that this is currently the best option there is to help humanity get out of the hole it currently finds itself into. It doesn't mean however that I constantly don't try to put the strength of its ideas to the test. I personally find that its biggest flaw is not having a clear transition plan. if we don't find one soon the movement is as good as gone.
How did I come to like it so much? Well, way back when I was a kid I was heavily influenced by Carl Sagan and a south american writer called Enrique Barrios. These men constantly talked about present, past, future and extraterrestrial civilizations and their social and cultural state. Hence, the idea that in order to change society for the better a change in the system is required was already implanted on me since early age.
I consider that a person must not hold beliefs of any kind, because beliefs are connected to the ego which in turn is attached to emotion. Emotion and logic are like oil and water. It is better to hold theories instead, because as we all know, nothing is absolute. It is all matter of perspective that correlates to one's current knowledge.

The latest post from Gundam is exactly why I said I wouldn't waste my time trying to argue with people who clearly do not want to consider any other options. How do I know whom I can establish a proper channel of communication with? Simple, if the person you are talking to is emotional in his responses you know that he is heavily vested in his view of the world and getting him to listen to a new message is out of question.

Gumdan for example has called this movement every name in the book, and in the previous thread he attempted to tie in the movement to the NWO and eugenics. He seems to be on a crusade to discredit the movement as well as constantly shift his position on the arguments he brings up. Take a look at his emotional review of the movie for example, saying thing such as:

Peter Joseph is either a complete ignoramous about history (which I highly doubt) or is intentionally editing history to focus on his enemy--Capitalism. He's a Utopian Socialist-pig and too much of a coward to come right out and say it.

or

Then we get to Fresco. Ah, I can see Alzheimer's must have set in long ago because this old fart is definitely demented.

Trying to argue with someone who is emotionally involved is like trying to have a conversation with a wall.

His review of the movie shows that he wasn't listing to the message of the movie at all. For example, Fresco never said or implied that he hated any system including the present one, he stated clearly in the movie: "All systems have a life spam and are suitable for the culture of the determined time period, capitalism was good up the 1930s but it has become outdated due to the advancement of technology".

He has also deemed the movement dangerous; I honestly don't get what he means by it because he has never tried to explain his position except for trying to scare the hell of the reader. Maybe he thinks the movement is composed is zealots and its leaders are egocentric and their ethics and spiritual backgrounds are questionable.

Watch this short video, it is the most clear message I could find to express that this is not a dangerous movement:

I am still very much open to discussion, but I don't intend on going back to the cyclical arguments. We exchange ideas, we agree or disagree based on our own perceptions and then we move onto a different subject. There is just so much stuff out there to cover and I am itching for constructive criticism, because like I said before, I seek to test the strength the movements ideas. If I just wanted to convert people to my way of thinking I would have stopped long ago because these boards have a very large group of conservative members in them.

[GundamFan0083]

Originally Posted by Sugetsu

The latest post from Gundam is exactly why I said I wouldn't waste my time trying to argue with people who clearly do not want to consider any other options. How do I know whom I can establish a proper channel of communication with? Simple, if the person you are talking to is emotional in his responses you know that he is heavily vested in his view of the world and getting him to listen to a new message is out of question.

Emotional no.
Highly critical of, yes.
Get my position straight if you're going to criticize me.

Gumdan for example has called this movement every name in the book, and in the previous thread he attempted to tie in the movement to the NWO and eugenics. He seems to be on a crusade to discredit the movement as well as constantly shift his position on the arguments he brings up. Take a look at his emotional review of the movie for example, saying thing such as: or Trying to argue with someone who is emotionally involved is like trying to have a conversation with a wall.

No dear, showing how this movement is both a Utopian Socialist one and a cult has been from the very begining my point.
I haven't deviated from it one iota.

His review of the movie shows that he wasn't listing to the message of the movie at all. For example, Fresco never said or implied that he hated any system including the present one, he stated clearly in the movie: "All systems have a life spam and are suitable for the culture of the determined time period, capitalism was good up the 1930s but it has become outdated due to the advancement of technology".

What did Doctor Rober J Lifton say about people who've been absorbed by the cult mentality?
He said they will deride critics of the cult by saying they "don't understand it."
I understand Zeitgeist very clearly, and there is no doubt it is a cult in the exact same manner as the Nazis were a cult.
When I use the term cult I don't mean a relgious movement Sugetsu.
I mean a movement that centers around a charismatic leader (or leaders) who are presented as all knowing or always correct and immune from critique or invasive analysis.
Peter, Jacque, and we've now learned Roxanne, are lying to their followers.
They're presenting themselves as being outside of the corporate money system when in fact they are very much a part of it.
They're more like the Moonies than I had first thought, financially speaking.

He has also deemed the movement dangerous; I honestly don't get what he means by it because he has never tried to explain his position except for trying to scare the hell of the reader. Maybe he thinks the movement is composed is zealots and its leaders are egocentric and their ethics and spiritual backgrounds are questionable.

Any movement which calls for the forced reorganization of society without its concent is dangerous.
Any movement that advocates the abrogation of individual human rights for the collective "good" is also dangerous.
Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot, didn't come to power by declaring they wanted to murder millions of people.
They came to power by proclaiming they were going to create a paradise on Earth for their peoples and that everyone would be equal.
Zeitgeist is spouting the same kinds of rhetoric, and that's a red flag for anyone who understands the dangers of these types of movements.

Watch this short video, it is the most clear message I could find to express that this is not a dangerous movement:

I already posted that link Sugetsu, and it doesn't help Jacques image or his postions.

I am still very much open to discussion, but I don't intend on going back to the cyclical arguments. We exchange ideas, we agree or disagree based on our own perceptions and then we move onto a different subject. There is just so much stuff out there to cover and I am itching for constructive criticism, because like I said before, I seek to test the strength the movements ideas. If I just wanted to convert people to my way of thinking I would have stopped long ago because these boards have a very large group of conservative members in them.

If you're as open to discussion as you claim then let's see you absorb this.

Part I:

Part II:

Part III:

Part IV:

Part V:

The solution to debt-slavery (as illustrated in Carroll Quigley's book, VonMises books, and VonHayek's books) is the elimination of Usery--i.e. the mercantilist/corporatist banking system.

We don't need Zeitgeist for that.
There have been people and groups yelling from the proverbial rooftops about this since Charles Lindbergh Senior (a Progressive politician) wrote Banking Currency and the Money Trust long before even Fresco was born.

What we need is a return to specie money (money which has value).
It doesn't matter what its made of, so long as it is redeemable in actual assets.
Like one liter of clean water, or perhaps a gallon of gasoline, or one ounce of silver, or a pound of meat, or a pair of shoes, or a shirt...something of value.
The value must be a set weight or measure as determined by law.
The United States used to have this, until 1913 and the Federal Reserve System.

Fiat money (what the banks issue) is worthless and THAT'S why we are slaves to debt.

If Peter and Jacque actually knew this about our money system then they should have put this in their movies instead of attacking money and Capitalism.

These two are suffering from the same errors as Marx and Engles.
Capitalism redistributes wealth from the banks/corporations/and government TO the proletariat because money has actual value and thus the people of the society hold the wealth of that society in their hands/savings because the money has real value.
Corporatism redistributes wealth to the banks and corporations via a credit/debt based fiat money system (even if gold/silver is used as currency) because the banks have title [ownership] of the money.
While Socialism redistributes wealth to the government and by extension the politicians since money in a Socialist system has no value but is controlled by the state through a government central bank rather than a private one.
Guess which one of these three is the most egalitarian?
Yep, you guessed it, actual Capitalism.
You know, the system promoted by John Locke and Adam Smith.

I'll leave you with this quote from a true Liberal like myself:

"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a moneyed aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power (of money) should be taken away from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs."
- Thomas Jefferson

[Ithekro]

Hmmm. Well on the otherhand, if we all thought the same way, the world would be an incredibly dull place. Oh we'd survive, but as nothing more than shells...sleep, eat, labor, reproduce when the system requires balance. Sure they may be some differences based on what labor is required (mental, menial, skilled, etc...), but otherwise if we thought the same....what joy is there? Everyone likes the same music...the same art...the same games...the same style everything.

Trouble is...with people thinking different and all...is that is creates conflict. Sometimes its minor like say a conflict between a large group of fans and the one guy that has Jar Jar Binks as his favorate character. It is a minor thing. Or that one guy doesn't like mushrooms on his pizza when everyone else in the room does. Minor. But then there are the things that cause wars and other things less savory. Or things that might seem simple but have been argued for generations now (I'll use a heavy one...abortion. We did that in a Political Science class and figured out what the problem between the groups was...they aren't debating....since each side has a different point that isn't the opposite of the oppessing groups. An arguement would be if they were debating two sides of the same issue....abortion isn't like that...they are debating two seperate issues that have nothing to do with each other...thus the issue cannot be resolved.) These conflicts are just something that happens because we don't think the same way. We can't think the same way...not entirely. Simply having two people in a room...they will disagree on something, eventually. It is just how we are.

As for the movie. I'm not entirely sure I want to see this. While I like Carl Sagan, I have issues with changing my world view (a reason I didn't join the military in the 1990s). Sure I'll probably get my view changed by something at some point...but I'd rather do it when I have my own way to change things.

[Sugetsu]

Never ever make up your mind based on the opinions of others, test the idea yourself and then draw your own conclusions. The movie is already an internet phenomenon that is attracting the attention of the masses unlike anything before in the movement. The reason is because it has a very appealing message that is grounded in facts and reality. Don't let Gumdan or sites such as infowars.com scare you into thinking it is some dark plot to brainwash the masses and offer them in silver platter to the New World Order

PS. By the way, it seems Google is already censoring the movie by suppressing it from the most watched videos list in youtube.

Edit: Gumdan, I have already posted the same video on money as debt in my first post. (You should probably just post the link to the first part in order to reduce spam and make this page easier to read) I have already expressed my position on why just removing interests and giving money real value based on material assets is not enough to do away with social stratification and mass consumerism, which are the biggest problems that current paradigm brings to this world. Money itself is the problem because it empowers the ego bringing it out of balance. However, I do agree on the fact that removing Usury would have massive positive effects on society, but the underlying problem would still be there. As long as we have social stratification there won't be any real change in society.

[GundamFan0083]

Originally Posted by Sugetsu

Never ever make up your mind based on the opinions of others, test the idea yourself and then draw your own conclusions. The movie is already an internet phenomenon that is attracting the attention of the masses unlike anything before in the movement. The reason is because it has a very appealing message that is grounded in facts and reality. Don't let Gumdan or sites such as infowars.com scare you into thinking it is some dark plot to brainwash the masses and offer them in silver platter to the New World Order

Sugetsu I'm very happy you brought up the New World Order, because Peter Joseph mentioned it a awhile back in an interview.

I think that for the unsuspecting viewers of this new movie it is only fair that someone show clearly and concisely what the people who made this film (and the first one) are actually like.

This interview is classic contradiction by Peter "Joseph" Merola and gives us a deeper look into what kind of person this man really is.

On the one hand he calls people who question the motives of power-groups calling for a New World Order (and that term does apply to different movements which are not the same) a "psychotic group of religious fanatics."

On the other hand he admits that the international banks have set up their own version of a New [ Economic ] World Order. He even says they already have it.
Therefore, using his own criteria, Peter has just admitted that he's a "psychotic religious fanatic" who sees capitalism as "evil."

He then moves on to defame, attack, and villify those who disagree with his views.
Dismissing them as idiots who "just don't get it."
The problem for Peter is that many of his harshest critics are well educated and do "get it."
We just don't like what we see because we've seen it before in socialistic movements of the past.

Like many charismatic socialistic-cult leaders, Peter Merola clearly exhibits many traits common in psychopathic behaviour.
I'm not saying he IS clinically psychopathic, I'm saying that he has traits they have.
Here's the checklist for psychopathy:

Other Related Qualities:

1. Contemptuous of those who seek to understand them
2. Does not perceive that anything is wrong with them
3. Authoritarian
4. Secretive
5. Paranoid
6. Only rarely in difficulty with the law, but seeks out situations where their tyrannical behavior will be tolerated, condoned, or admired
7. Conventional appearance
8. Goal of enslavement of their victim(s)
9. Exercises despotic control over every aspect of the victim's life
10. Has an emotional need to justify their crimes and therefore needs their victim's affirmation (respect, gratitude and love)
11. Ultimate goal is the creation of a willing victim
12. Incapable of real human attachment to another
13. Unable to feel remorse or guilt
14. Extreme narcissism and grandiose
15. May state readily that their goal is to rule the world

(The above traits are based on the psychopathy checklists of Doctors H. Cleckley and R. Hare.)

Peter (in his movies and his interviews) exhibits traits 1,2,3,6,7,8,9,10,11,14,15.
I'll let people here decide for themselves on just how many traits Peter has, but those are the ones that jump out at me.

As for H.G. Wells...
Joseph is being completely dishonest about H.G. Well's book The New World Order.
Here's a pdf version of it if anyone actually wants to read it:

The New World Order by H.G. Wells


It is well known that H.G. Well's was an early member of the Fabian Socialist movement (founded by George Bernard Shaw, and Beatrice and Sidney Webb).
The Fabians did in fact support Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, and other brutal leftist socialistic regimes.
Wells left the Fabians in 1908 because they were not radical enough for him.
Therefore, it is clear why Peter Joseph defends Well's vision of a New World Order (Zeitgeist mirrors it) and only further illustrates that Jacque and Peter are Utopian Socialists.

Wells himself writes (in Chapter 4: Class-War):

Collectivisation means the handling of
the common affairs of mankind by a common control
responsible to the whole community. It means the suppression
of go-as-you-please in social and economic affairs just as much
as in international affairs. It means the frank abolition of profitseeking
and of every devise by which human+beings contrive
to be parasitic on their fellow man. It is the practical realisation
of the brotherhood of man through a common control. It means
all that and it means no more than that.

A world system under the control of a socialist secretariat is precisely what both Wells and Zeitgeist are promoting.

The problem for Jacque and Peter is that they both seemed to have missed the part where Wells states:

There never has been anything on earth that could be properly
called a Capitalist System. What was the matter with his world
was manifestly its entire want of system. What the Socialists
were feeling their way towards was the discovery and
establishment of a world system.

Peter claimed he understood H.G. Wells' book.
Guess he forgot that part when he made Zeitgeist.
The real issue here is that Peter and Jacque are continuing to push the lie that Capitalism is the problem.
How can it be a problem if we're not even living under it?

Unlike Jacque or Peter (well, yet for Merola) H.G. Wells came to resent and reject Marxism. He said of Marx:

Marx was a man incapable in money matters and much
bothered by tradesmen’s bills. Moreover he cherished absurd
pretensions to aristocracy. The consequence was that he
romanced about the lovely life of the Middle Ages as if he were
another Belloc and concentrated his animus about the
"bourgeoisie", whom he made responsible for all those great
disruptive forces in human society that we have considered.

Zeitgeist (even though it is Utopian) is making the same mistakes as the Marxists.
They just refuse to accept the reality of praxeology and the fact that money is not the problem.
It is the marriage of government and banks that are now and always have been the root cause of the disparity between the "Haves" and the "Have-nots."

[Kamui4356]

This whole thing is bullshit from people who watched too much Star Trek anyway. Even there the only reason their society works is because they have things like replicators making it effectively a post scarcity society where everything is effectively free. Even then, later episodes of TNG and DS9 showed pretty clearly that humans act nice and friendly, but when pushed out of their comfort zone, they're the same bastards we are today. See Sisko tricking the Romulans into a war where millions of them get killed for a good example. This will not work in real life, because we are nowhere near a post scarcity society, and even if we were, it wouldn't take much to upset the system. No new philosophy is going to change that. The cold hard physical realities of the world ensure this remains a pipedream.

Originally Posted by Sugetsu

Trying to argue with someone who is emotionally involved is like trying to have a conversation with a wall.

You do of course see the irony in you making this statement, correct?

[Jaden]

Yours is a good arguement Gundamfan, and presented in a fairly badass manner. That is a lot of material and I've just gotten through reading the thread. I'd think you want some kind of responses for all that so I'll give you mine!

"TZM and the Venus Project advocate utopian socialism"

With just the stuff those anons dug up and reading speeches between the lines, I don't think this is the case. How is Peter Joseph's full name relevant, or the fact that they have a source of income? I've heard the social security in the US isn't very good, so obviously they need some money to live?

about the classical contradiction:

When Peter called the NWO shouters names, that's in reference to the comicbook version of the story. Where the men behind the curtain are the anti-christ and the embodiment of all evil in the universe, and their plan is to kill off most people to install their new world order. This is the "misinterpretation of the NWO" as Peter called it. There exists a really vocal minority believing in such things, who see Peter as their agent and keep spamming him with emails. Also there's the comical exchange between Peter and Alex Jones about this which gained meme-like popularity and is still fresh in the memories of many people. That's why I think the "NWO" here refers to this.

The other version that Peter admits to, the economic new world order, would refer to just the universal spread of the modern banking institutions that, in a way, possess more power than goverments. I agree he should just stop talking about the NWO because it's confusing.

about the Venus Project vision being marxist and mirroring H.G. Wells' vision:

Officially their proposed model for goverment is global central planning, ran by algorithms free of any subjectivity. It's different from any past goverment model because it's a global system, doesn't involve people making opinionated descisions, is resource-based, doesn't involve currency, has a huge reduction in laws and civilian duties.

Of course, it's still science fiction and therein lies the problem. Are such algorithms even possible to make? How would they account for human values besides survival? Wouldn't the engineers of the system install subjectiveness with them? After all, machines can only do what we can, just more efficiently. Wouldn't the engineers of the system become a sort of technocracy? Even if not, what kind of leadership will we have before such a system is installed?

So this begs the question: Does the Venus Project and Zeitgeist Movement really believe in such possibilities? Can their model be refined to the point where it's actually applicable? Isn't this just sugarcoating to bring about some traditional totalitarian regime that deep in their hearts, they know it's going to be? Gundamfan made a point that this may be the case, but I still hope not.

After all there's no proof. It's always easier to hate and destroy, than to create. You could assert all kinds of slander about the people advocating specie money as well. I think it's actually a good idea, but aren't those people just plotting to raise the value of gold or something?

[Solace]

Originally Posted by Kamui4356

This whole thing is bullshit from people who watched too much Star Trek anyway.

Like it or not human technology is advancing fast enough that such a future is not impossible. There will need to be some kind of replacement for money simply due to the fact that technology is replacing our mundane, repetitive, and dangerous jobs rapidly.

Ignoring haves, have nots, or the criticisms of any social or economic system, technology is having a huge impact in the stability of the current world systems. All one has to do is look at the changes in America, Japan, or Europe in the last 60-70 years, or what so called "third world" nations are doing now.

I do agree with Fresco and Peter, that Capitalism as it exists today is not healthy for the future of the species and the general disregard for our natural resources because of the system is reaching a serious tipping point. However I also believe that the vision proposed is too advanced. There needs to be baby steps, or you'll end up producing a civilization that cannot handle the responsibilities that come with such advancements and we'll be in an even worse position than we are now.

I don't agree that we're suffering from true scarcity of things like food and energy, but rather we're suffering from market imposed scarcity. We pay farmers to not grow or destroy their crops, we have huge resistance to alternative energies because oil is still profitable, etc. Our garbage piles overflow with cyclical consumption because our recycling technologies suck and it is usually cheaper to make something from scratch than from recycled materials.

The Venus Project has lofty goals and maybe one day future generations will see that most of it isn't as bad as they feared, however we'll never arrive at that point until we pick apart the current system and address those shortcomings asap.

The problem with this movie, even though I enjoyed watching it, was that the ideas don't evolve into solutions. Basically what I got out of it was:

1. Current system sucks, let's change it
2. ????
3. Venus Project!

That's unrealistic no matter how true or false the evidence supporting the argument for change is. It's also the reason why people will continue to misunderstand or interpret the movement as a pipe dream at best and some sort of evil plot at worst.

[Kamui4356]

Originally Posted by Solace

Like it or not human technology is advancing fast enough that such a future is not impossible. There will need to be some kind of replacement for money simply due to the fact that technology is replacing our mundane, repetitive, and dangerous jobs rapidly.

The problem is you don't just need advanced technology, you need a post scarcity society. Meaning you need resources in quantities that are essentially infinite on the scale you're working on (not necessarily actually infinite), and a way to convert them into useful form in a manor that doesn't add cost. Star Trek does this with fusion power, replicators in every home, and transporters so you can quickly and efficiently get whatever you can't replicate. As I pointed out before, even then humans are still the same bastards we are today when they're thrown out of their comfort zone.

Apart from fusion power, there are laws of physics making the rest not quite impossible, but cost prohibitive if you aren't a k3 civilization. Maybe in the distant future it'll be possible, but not within our lifetimes. Technology is advancing quickly, but there haven't been many breakthroughs in fields such as mining that will give us the raw materials to build a post scarcity society. To even think about it we need well established, automated asteroid mining combined with automated processing of the mined materials and automated production of goods. The first one is the key, because we simply can't extract enough resources from the Earth to support it without turning the planet into a giant strip mine.