Say Anything Blog

Might be a good thing to take stock of the results of “socially responsible investing” before we endorse it fully.  To take one example, some of these funds helped to end apartheid--and made South Africa into just another third world African nation, with sky-high crime rates and a miserable economy.  Nobody listened to those who pointed out that apartheid was bad, but the Marxism of the ANC is worse.  You turn away from one evil, you’ve still got to be careful that what you turn TO isn’t worse.

And maybe instead of buying mutual funds, we might do well to look into individual stocks and other investments where we really have a say in how things are done.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m a fan of the concept.  I just think that at times, it can do more harm than good.

BB,

Results???  How dare you mention results in the context of social responsibility and moral superiority!?  Their hearts are clean, their motives are pure.  Who are you to challenge their actions by examining the consequences of what they do?  Results, indeed!!!

“Poverty of goods is easily cured; poverty of the mind is irreparable.”

...profiteering at the expense of others…

Pure Marxist bullshit.  Actually, “socially responsible investing” is an oxymoron.
When you spend money to try to obtain a social outcome, it’s spending, not investment.  It’s also manipulative.
Why are you so afraid of freedom, Davinski?

John McCain is bad for America.

Ya know, the politics of many/most “socially responsible” investors may be Marxist, but that doesn’t make it a “red” thing to do so.  To claim that it is puts one into the odd position of claiming that providing capital for the use of the bourgeoisie is somehow an action of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

It may be a dumb move.  It may be one that is intended to push companies to endorse socialistic policies.  However, I can’t exactly call it “marxist.”

I believe I put the Marxist comment in a blockquote, and it was a Marxist statement.
In our market, one may spend one’s money as one wishes, which is what “economic freedom” means.  To say, however, that one way of spending one’s money is superior to others because it is “socially responsible” or that it promotes “social justice” is definitely Marxist.  Investing is the opposite of Marxism, but social spending isn’t necessarily investing.  Everything Davinski describes is an attempt to influence the market, which is manipulative.  Investing to get a financial return is investment, but all the rest isn’t.  It’s just another attempt to rig markets for a separate agenda.

John McCain is bad for America.

To say, however, that one way of spending one’s money is superior to others because it is “socially responsible” or that it promotes “social justice” is definitely Marxist.

Promoting social justice is Marxist? Not investing in companies which pollute is Marxist? Not investing in tobacco because of health concerns is Marxist? I am choosing what I believe by my moral standards is correct. Isn’t the free market about choices? To say ones spending is superior to others may be arrogant and self-righteous but it is not Marxist.Lol. Besides, because I make SRI, does not mean I am superior to you. It means I choose to be involved with what my investments are doing to better our planet. It has nothing to do with neither arrogance nor Marxism.

You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows

Bob Dylan

Isn’t the free market about choices?

Actually, it’s about freedom of entry and exit; your so-called “social justice” attempts to manipulate markets to limit that freedom, for the purpose of imposing your ideology on the market.
The problem with “social justice” is the usual one: Who decides?  In order to impose “social justice”, you must be able to force people to do what you think is “the right thing”.  That way lies totalitarianism.

I repeat: Investing is about making money.  Trying to produce social outcomes is manipulative spending.  It’s a misallocation of resources to obtain an ideological goal.

John McCain is bad for America.

...profiteering at the expense of others…

I repeat: this is a Marxist belief.  It is based on the flawed “labor theory of value”, which holds that profits are stealing from the workers, who, Marx believed, produce all the value in an economy.  The concept is also known as the “fixed pie” belief, where one person can only get more by taking it away from someone else.  It’s wrong.
SRI is actually hypocritical, by Marxist standards, and stupid, by free enterprise standards.  It’s trying to have it both ways, to feel superior to others.
Of course, we have economic freedom here(for the time being, at any rate), so you can spend your money any way you want.  Just don’t try to claim superiority for your own agenda.

John McCain is bad for America.

First, most people have money invessted in mutual funds and no one but the fund manager can determine which stocks the fund invests.  Secondly, the only thing the typical fund investor is concern is the ROI, the return on their investment.  As r108 commented, anything else is socialist/communistic nonsense.

The Supreme Court is a bunch of black robed tyrants

A Marxist belief? So those Quakers who refused to take profits from slavery which is mentioned in the article, they were all Marxists. That was 1758, before Marxism existed. How you can take SRI and stretch it into Marxism is laughable. I can not believe we are arguing over this. Everyone who makes a socially responsible investment is a Marxist? How nutty can you be?

You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows

Bob Dylan

Everyone who makes a socially responsible investment is a Marxist?

That’s something you just made up.  I said what I said, not what you said.  I have explained the manipulative and socialist nature of SRI twice now.  I won’t do it again, simply because you are unable to process the information.  Get off your emotional jag and read the words.

John McCain is bad for America.

You don’t have to subscribe to the labor theory of value to choose investments based on moral principles of not hurting others.

Let’s assume, for example, that one has the opportunity of investing in either a brothel or a grocery store in one’s hometown.  Given that prostitution involves a degree of slavery, drug use, and crime wherever it’s practiced (and yes this includes where it’s legal), is it somehow “Marxist” to decide that it’s better to invest in the grocery store instead of the brothel, all else the same?

In the same way, Davinski’s got a good point about the Quakers; was it somehow immoral for them to wear wool and promote maple syrup and sorghum to avoid the slave economy?  Was it immoral for them to point out that the “servant” in the South was being deprived of his rightful wages and liberty?

Good grief, 108.  You are, as you have with numerous other subjects, trying to more or less invert the usual definitions given by Webster.

Good grief, 108.  You are, as you have with numerous other subjects, trying to more or less invert the usual definitions given by Webster.

Wrong.  It’s the “activism” part, dude!  Simply investing in what you like isn’t Marxist; it’s the exact opposite, as a matter of fact.  I have explained this several times now.  When you “invest” with the intention of damaging a business that isn’t doing what you think as “right”, you are actually “profiteering at the expense of others”.
I won’t ever invest in anything connected to abortion, but I’m not trying to drive the big abortion corporations out of business on the investment level.  I’m going after them on a Constitutional basis, since Roe was blatantly unConstitutional.
See the difference?

John McCain is bad for America.

If we truly believe that prenatal infanticide is exactly that, exactly why should we refrain from trying to drive the practicioners out of business?

Please.  Free markets doesn’t mean “do anything you **** well please and can get away with.” As Bastiat writes, it includes a necessary measure of morality, or else the whole system falls apart.

Shareholder activism has been on a steady rise over the years. One example of their success is getting Home Depot and OfficeMax to stop marketing products derived from endangered forests.

This is blatant market manipulation, and is costing the investors, managers, and employees of Home Depot and OfficeMax money by interfering with the ability of those companies to make money.
If you want to save what you believe are “endangered forests”, then work on that directly; don’t fuck with a business to achieve your smug, self-righteous agenda.

John McCain is bad for America.

If we truly believe that prenatal infanticide is exactly that, exactly why should we refrain from trying to drive the practicioners out of business?

First, it’s not right, IMO, to try to impose my agenda on others; second, it’s much more effective to cut off their taxpayer subsidy money, which is wrong.  I’m just not a totalitarian, I guess.  Ultimately, if enough people are so ignorant as to support abortion corps in a free market(it means “freedom of entry and exit”; a fact I have repeated endlessly on this blog, so I do know what it means), then it’s the consciousness that needs to be raised, not market manipulation.

John McCain is bad for America.

Oh, good grief, 108; by that logic, what right do you have to protect your OWN life when it becomes expedient for your employer or your neighbors to end it?

There are certainly limits to where we should be “socially responsible,” but let’s not pretend that we don’t have the right to make our moral concerns known to others.  If we don’t, then exactly what do we make of documents like the Magna Carta, the 1689 Bill of Rights (England), the Declaration of Independence, and such?

All of these make clear a demand for change on a moral basis.  It’s OK to stick up for what you believe--whether that means to ask Home Depot to stop stocking redwood, or whether you ask the same company to tell the environmentalists to get lost.

BB: To summarize: I think it’s absolutely proper, and preferable, to put out information about investment opportunities, so that investors can make informed choices.  However, trying to rig the market to favor your choices, especially while making the claim of “social justice” is wrong, in a free country.  Coercion is outside our social contract.
Furthermore, most enviro investments are subsidized, indirectly or directly, which makes them coercive on a financial level.
Directly through confiscation and redistribution of taxpayer money.
Indirectly through favorable/coercive regulation, like the ethanol mandates, for instance.

That’s not a free market.

John McCain is bad for America.

No coercion is involved, though; it’s the right of investors to refuse to buy securities, or to promote shareholder initiatives when they own them. 

That’s called “capitalism,” not “Marxism.”

I like the idea in cases of extremely offensive behavior.  Abortion for instance is an example extremely offensive behavior.  Given the fact that abortion is nothing less than cold blooded, violent murder, avoiding companies who support abortion would be one way to counter this atrocity.  The fact that we have a free market means the product and services the offending company provides are available elsewhere, and that consumers are free to go elsewhere.

That’s called “capitalism,” not “Marxism.”

No; “social justice” is a Marxist concept. When you attempt to destroy a business because it doesn’t fit your personal standards, that’s coercion.  It’s what SRI does.  Simply choosing how to invest your money isn’t coercion.  It’s the activism, stupid!

John McCain is bad for America.

Oh, baloney, 108.  To coerce is to use force--most specifically, physical force or the threat thereof. 

In contrast, what these guys propose is strategic investing and the use of proxy votes to influence the companies that they OWN.  What they’re doing may be stupid at times, but it’s purely capitalistic.

What they’re doing may be stupid at times, but it’s purely capitalistic.

It’s your baloney, BB.  I’ll repeat the quote:

Shareholder activism has been on a steady rise over the years. One example of their success is getting Home Depot and OfficeMax to stop marketing products derived from endangered forests.

Coercion and manipulation.  BTW, coercion doesn’t always involve physical force; in this case, it’s the threat of economic loss.  You should know that.

John McCain is bad for America.

The problem with “social justice” is the usual one: Who decides? 

The people with the money decide.  That is why it is capitalistic.  It is a free market solution.  Sometimes it is unfair and counterproductive, but that is why I don’t support a totally free market.  I believe that government regulation is sometimes warranted and desirable.

Just because they are not investing their money the way you think they should, does not make it marxist.  It just makes you hypocritical.  Don’t you usually come down on the side that it is their money, they can spend it how they want.

Just because they are not investing their money the way you think they should, does not make it marxist.

I repeat: the Marxist part is the statement about “profiteering at the expense of others”.  I have already explained this several times now, so I must assume you are incapable of understanding plain English.  It’s the activism to which I object, a point which I have also repeated multiple times.

I notice you failed to address the “who decides?” part of what I said.

BTW, there is no such thing as a “totally free market”, in that “free market” means freedom of entry and exit.  In your ignorance, you must be one of those morons who think “free market” means “no rules”, and you are just wrong.  Before you comment, you might learn something about the subject at hand.

John McCain is bad for America.

Just because someone talks about “profiteering at the expense of others” doesn’t make them a Marxist, unless you would accuse everyone who has ever worked to abolish slavery of the same.

And again, what this article is about is about the OWNERS of the company deciding to do things.  If you would speak against this, you can see a Marxist in the mirror--or at least someone who adheres to the outside control of privately held firms.

Just because someone talks about “profiteering at the expense of others” doesn’t make them a Marxist, unless you would accuse everyone who has ever worked to abolish slavery of the same.

This makes no sense, but if you want to understand what I meant, refer to my earlier comments, where I explain why “profiteering at the expense of others” is sourced in Marxist ideology.

SRI is about buying into companies in order to control their operations, which is market manipulation, as I have said many times now.
It is intended to push a social agenda, which is socialism.  I repeat again and again, I am against rigging the market to try to coerce a social outcome; I’m not against investing to make money.  Get it?

John McCain is bad for America.

All of these make clear a demand for change on a moral basis. It’s OK to stick up for what you believe--whether that means to ask Home Depot to stop
stocking redwood, or whether you ask the same company to tell the environmentalists to get lost.

I see your confusion, but I don’t know why you remain confused.  Again I say: these people are trying to manipulate the market to get their agenda over that of others, and they justify it with a smug, self-righteous assumption that they possess the ultimate truth.  In fact, redwood is a renewable resource, and is not “engangered”; they are lying about that one.  Young redwoods grow very fast.
They have no right to impose their morality on the market.  It’s just wrong.

John McCain is bad for America.

108, can you think of a better example of someone profiting off the back of someone else in an unfair manner than slavery?

Let’s be serious here; there are those who would use whatever power they have--whether it be monopoly market share, government set-asides, or whatever--who would use that power over others to abuse them.  This kind of thing is why unions started, and investors are right to act as a “brake” on this kind of behavior.  If executives seem to have no conscience, their employers, the shareholders, can install a new board of directors.

Again, it’s called capitalism.  You should try it.

You don’t have to subscribe to the labor theory of value to choose investments based on moral principles of not hurting others.

I never asserted anything of the kind, and have made that clear a number of times here already.  Can’t you read?

As a free enterprise society(not “capitalism”, which is a pejorative term incorrectly assuming that capital is more important than anything else), we hold to the doctrine of the Invisible Hand.  We trust that overall, the aggregate of the self-interested actions of free people is superior to any centrally-controlled efforts to achieve directed outcomes.  All the evils you describe are not from the free market, they are from govt interference.  No monopoly can exist for any length of time, unless the govt makes it so.  Free entry and exit to the market would produce almost immediate competition to take advantage of the higher profits, thus keeping prices low and supply high.  If you think central control and manipulation is necessary for “social justice”, you are a Marxist.

John McCain is bad for America.

108, can you think of a better example of someone profiting off the back of someone else in an unfair manner than slavery?

Central control of markets is just another form of slavery.  Rigging markets to produce a social outcome is “profiteering at the expense of others”.  I’ll keep repeating this until you get it.

John McCain is bad for America.

So markets are “rigged” when the “owners” of a company petition the board of directors to take a course of action?

Got it.  You’re a Marxist.

So markets are “rigged” when the “owners” of a company petition the board of directors to take a course of action?

Wrong again.  It’s hard to have a discussion with someone who doesn’t read what I write, and then makes up things that I didn’t say.
I’m not a Marxist, but you may be.  Marxists also lie about what other people say, especially those who advocate “free people making free choices”, like I do.
You seem intolerant of any other views but your own, and resort to personal attack to try to get your way, instead of using facts and logic.  Good luck with your “social justice”, comrade.

John McCain is bad for America.

And, of course it isn’t all the owners, just the ones who want to rig the way the company does business to fit their smug, self-righteous agenda.  You lie again.

John McCain is bad for America.

God, Robert, you’re so wrong here it’s not funny…

1. Closely cropping Davinski’s quote to make it sound like Marxism is dishonest:

Throughout history there have been religious denominations struggling with moral problems of profiteering at the expense of others. In 1758, Quakers refused to except profits derived from the slave trade.

Considering that it goes on to mention slavery (which was indeed profiteering on the expenses of others), Davinski is talking about social justice (which is a Christian term as well).

2. A business is responsible to it’s share holders.

3. By calling it totalitarian to restrict abortion, you undermine your entire argument.

4. Everyone who disagrees with you is now a Marxist.

The equivalence of Che Guevara and Adolph Hitler is a valid one. And in many ways Che was a worse monster. While Hitler sat back and let underlings do his dirty work, Che did much of the killing himself and personally trained the execution squads who did the rest. He personally murdered political opponents, whereas Hitler outsourced that duty.

When we look at the “socialist paradise” that is Cuba, we must remember that a sizable share of the misery those people suffer is directly attributable to Che Guevara bringing Castro into power, and giving him many of the policies that have caused so much pain. The real symbol of Che should be the raft, to remind us of all those who have died on rafts in the ocean trying to escape the Cuban nightmare and get to freedom. And had he not been killed, begging for his life like a coward, he would’ve done the same thing again and again in countries all throughout Latin and South America. His actions have inspired terrorists across a continent and caused countless deaths.

Every leftist who celebrates Che is celebrating a murderer, a monster, and a Marxist who is directly and indirectly responsible for wide spread murder, starvation and fascist states. They may as well worship Hitler, because the two men shared not only an ideology, but results. And Che never got the trains to run on time.

Kenny R108 is lost because he took so many twists and turns on this one.
Poor guy!

Kenny: You’re 0 for 4, bud.

The idea of “profiteering at the expense of others” is a Marxist concept, and I gave the derivation of it earlier.  My comments about Marxism were restricted to this statement, which I also stated earlier.

Since we outlawed slavery in the US 150 years ago, it isn’t relevant to today’s investment environment.

I clearly stated that I have no objection to not investing in companies that don’t do things you like, or that do things you don’t like.  As I also stated, I do that myself.  It’s an individual choice.

My objection is to investing in companies that you don’t like, for the purpose of changing their business model, as a collective act. That’s collectivism, coercion and manipulation.

Understand yet?

4. Everyone who disagrees with you is now a Marxist.

Wrong.  Everyone who follows Marxist ideology, and who tries to coerce others to follow it, is a Marxist.  Duh.

John McCain is bad for America.

BB: I apologize for my personal remarks about you earlier; I let my frustration get the best of me.
Again, I apologize.

John McCain is bad for America.

I forgive you for that.