I was interested by your invocation not to buy at Amazon. I buy at Amazon, but am always open to reasons not to, and you provide some, thank you. My argument for buying at Amazon has always been that they have pretty much everything I am looking for, that the prices are no more expensive than elsewhere (although you give insight as to why that might be), their delivery is fast and efficient (I know, I’ve heard complaints from others, but I’ve never had one myself and, the odd time there were discrepancies, they were cleared up immediately - a selection of oils in which one bottle was missing: I was given a full refund and told to just keep the oils that had been delivered). I was plied with arguments that Mr Bezos is a scoundrel, a profiteer and an extravagant, irresponsible businessman who is unfair to his workers. And I’m not sure whether my buying the little that I can afford to buy elsewhere would dissuade him from that path. In other words: I have little choice and make little difference.
Many of those who encourage me to shop elsewhere have, I know full well, in the course of their lifetimes made handsome contributions to the neoliberal model of which Amazon is but part. They have made their pile and have plentiful means with which to exercise a grand array of discretion when making their choice of emporium from which to purchase their necessities and their less-than-necessities. Had they, and perhaps I, exercised greater discretion when exercising our rights of vote and our purchasing prerogatives in the past, both recent and dim-and-distant, perhaps Mr Bezos would never have attained the level of predominance that he currently possesses in modern commerce. If Bezos is the type of trade we have reaped, then who, precisely, sowed the seed that gave rise to the crop we now harvest? And how certain can I be that the sources of goods that you mention do not have similar goals in petto, such as we were ignorant of also when Amazon itself was an innocuous little seller of books?
We know without question that McCarthy determined that communism was “un-American.” What to my mind remains something more of a mystery is what exactly constitutes conduct that is “American”? In recent monographs on my Substack (just a selection: https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/freedom-or-death; https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/liberte-egalite-fraternite-haiti; https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/haiti-a-communist-state-modelled), I have written about the Caribbean nation of Haiti, which at the present time seems to lurch from one dire emergency to the next. In his book “In the Shadow of the Powers”, Patrick Bellegarde-Smith talks of his grandfather, the Haitian philosopher and diplomat Dantès Bellegarde (1877-1966), who was shockingly described by the sauce-maker (appropriately enough) McIlwhenny as a candidate to sire a horse. Bellegarde determined early in his diplomatic career, in which he was charged with upholding the regard of white, western nations for this very first of Black-led nations anywhere in the world, that the way forward for the former French sugar colony that was his home was to pursue the capitalist model and eschew the communist one. The United States has for centuries exerted its heavy, Monroe-Doctrinal pressure on the Caribbean states to draw them back from the precipice of communism - whether in Cuba, Grenada, Central and South America, etc. - and retain them well within the corrall of what McCarthy must’ve designated as “American activities”. These are the activities that saw Haiti ravaged by its father-son leadership over the period 1957-86. So extreme was Papa Doc’s campaign against his own people (including the massacre of every black dog on the island of Hispaniola, in furtherance of an irrational fear of the animals, who he deemed incorporated the soul of the political opponent he had dispatched into the next world in 1956) that one is led to ponder just what level of outrage will satisfy the United States government in defining what is and is not “American activity”.
You may, should you be curious, read my views on this matter and kindly bear in mind that the word “communism” denotes two quite separate things: it denotes a political system of which the world has had harrowing experience, in which a hierarchy of self-appointed intellectuals reign supreme over a people deprived of their personal prerogatives albeit invested with certain personal rights: to work, a roof, and a society. It likewise, however, denotes a philosophy, of which the world has had and is likewise today having experience of a somewhat less harrowing nature, by which mutual care and understanding (an embrace of the philosophy of the American First Nations: to take from the land what they need, and no more; to return to the land what they can, and no less) becomes adopted as a mantra for life, in the household, as in the community, as in the commerce, as in the government. It is practically unthinkable for a nation of 350,000,000 persons like the United States to adopt such a philosophy. But, for a small community, it is much more conceivable. They exist, communities which thrive on this philosophy. They are called “communes” in some places and “kibbutzim” in others. They can have populations of several thousand, but work best with modest populaces of several hundred. They exist in China, in Mongolia, in Israel, in Italy, in the jungles of the Amazon, ironically enough, and in many other places across the globe. What my articles argue is that they could exist across a single nation, if that nation were determined enough and sickened enough with “American actvities” to realise that “un-American activities” can also hold a promise for them. I believe that, under the right leadership, such a philosophy could form not just a basis but a bedrock for the governance of a state like Haiti. I think it’s a philosophy that is in fact embedded in many of the people of Haiti and would offer a way out of the constant infighting that marks that country’s sad history.
It’s a philosophy that, as I say, borrows heavily from the way of life of the native inhabitants of the Americas. It is outrageous that Joseph McCarthy should have designated it a form of “un-American activity.” For communism is in fact one of the most American of any activities to be found along the entire length and breadth of the continent, if one but paused to consider the meaning of the word “American.”
Thank you for the thoughtful reply. As regards Amazon, I'll only speak from my experience. When I was younger I was an early adopter and promoter of the site. I grew up in a pretty conservative state, and was always interested in new things on the internet and new tech in general. This was long before I understood really anything about political economy. Now I do what I can to avoid it and let others know why I avoid it. For similar reasons, and especially seeing how they treated unionizing workers, I haven't purchased Starbucks in quite a while.
I let others know in the hopes that they make their own better decisions about their consumption in the small ways that they can. Were I to truly try to live the most ethical life possible, I might become a Jainist and sweep the path in front of me as I walk to avoid killing bugs. But my view is that I can do what I can do and taking incremental steps makes it easier to make each action into a habit before incorporating the next one. Of course one person doesn't make much of a difference to such a large company, but many people do.
Regarding bookshop.org, on their about us page: https://bookshop.org/info/about-us they list their mission as a B-corp "Our mission is simple: To help local, independent bookstores thrive in the age of ecommerce. Certified as a B Corp, Bookshop.org puts this mission and the public good above financial interests, giving over 80% of our profit margin to independent bookstores. In 2022, B-Labs announced we were "best for the world": in the top 5% of all B-Corps. It is written in our governance documents that we will never sell the company to Amazon or any major U.S. retailer. As a Climate Neutral company, we are committed to operating sustainably."
At the very least, they currently are legally obligated to do what they say and have structured the company in such a way. Who knows what the future may hold. The book Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World dedicates a whole chapter to B-corps and the lofty goals of the designers of this designation to make more ethical capitalism and ends by concluding that the designers themselves realized more fundamental changes needed to be made to the idea of profit itself. They note that routinely, founders would start companies as a B-corp when it was fashionable/profitable and then vote to change their mission and designation as soon as they felt it got in the way of their profit. Your point gets to the deeper idea that "there is no ethical consumption under capitalism", which isn't to say that we can't make a difference or make more ethical choices, just that holding profit above all else always leads executives to seek monopolies and exploit their workers for the benefit of shareholders.
To me the answer is a "both/and" situation. We can both reduce our consumption/make the most informed choices about where we shop and what we buy, and we can push for the empowerment of workers and a society in which our fellow citizens are not allowed to endlessly accumulate wealth (and therefore power over us) through whatever means possible.
Regarding Haiti, if you haven't read it, The Black Jacobins by CLR James is an incredible history of the Haitian Revolution. And Gangsters of Capitalism by Jonathan M. Katz has an interesting chapter or two on the U.S. military occupation of Haiti.
The study I posted about the Communist Bloc wasn't intended to praise Stalinist Communism, just to point out that the strong possibility of a different way of doing things was enough to push legislators and communities to temper the worst accumulative tendencies of capitalism. Again I think there's a "both/and" situation with starting local and spreading good ideas. We should promote a more caring and justice centered philosophy locally and in what we do with our neighbors, and (at least in the U.S.) we need a lot of policy changes at the federal level to prevent megacorporations and the wealthy from using the law against such movements.
I haven't read either James or Katz, though I have Katz's "The Big Truck That Went By". Thank you for these recommendations. I am currently engaged in a project submission to the National Endowment for the Humanities in concert with a Haitian friend and colleague, from whom we hope to receive funding for a film about Haiti, and your research scholarship will undoubtedly prove valuable in that quest.
Thank you also for such a full and balanced response. It really is a pleasure to exchange with you, Sean. The vagaries of corporate intent, indeed: a recent article in The Guardian speaks about the rapacious nature of the Cadbury chocolate company, which is now part of the international Mondelez conglomerate, yet still cites its Victorian Quaker foundation in a bid to project some kind of ethical foundation, which has long since fallen by the wayside. In this article (https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/every-little-counts), I ponder the motivations behind the founders of many of today's brand names and in how far they would turn in their graves to see the exploitation that is today conduct in their names.
I shall review my Amazon policy most profoundly, but they do sell more than just books. Often, offers of second-hand books on Amazon, unless I'm mistaken, do in fact stem from bookshop.org or similar such firms, with Amazon seeming to function as a consignment store. Moreover, I must source my products within the EU in order to avoid unnecessary import duty, a matter whose importance will only escalate once Mr Trump is installed.
Dear Sean,
I was interested by your invocation not to buy at Amazon. I buy at Amazon, but am always open to reasons not to, and you provide some, thank you. My argument for buying at Amazon has always been that they have pretty much everything I am looking for, that the prices are no more expensive than elsewhere (although you give insight as to why that might be), their delivery is fast and efficient (I know, I’ve heard complaints from others, but I’ve never had one myself and, the odd time there were discrepancies, they were cleared up immediately - a selection of oils in which one bottle was missing: I was given a full refund and told to just keep the oils that had been delivered). I was plied with arguments that Mr Bezos is a scoundrel, a profiteer and an extravagant, irresponsible businessman who is unfair to his workers. And I’m not sure whether my buying the little that I can afford to buy elsewhere would dissuade him from that path. In other words: I have little choice and make little difference.
Many of those who encourage me to shop elsewhere have, I know full well, in the course of their lifetimes made handsome contributions to the neoliberal model of which Amazon is but part. They have made their pile and have plentiful means with which to exercise a grand array of discretion when making their choice of emporium from which to purchase their necessities and their less-than-necessities. Had they, and perhaps I, exercised greater discretion when exercising our rights of vote and our purchasing prerogatives in the past, both recent and dim-and-distant, perhaps Mr Bezos would never have attained the level of predominance that he currently possesses in modern commerce. If Bezos is the type of trade we have reaped, then who, precisely, sowed the seed that gave rise to the crop we now harvest? And how certain can I be that the sources of goods that you mention do not have similar goals in petto, such as we were ignorant of also when Amazon itself was an innocuous little seller of books?
We know without question that McCarthy determined that communism was “un-American.” What to my mind remains something more of a mystery is what exactly constitutes conduct that is “American”? In recent monographs on my Substack (just a selection: https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/freedom-or-death; https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/liberte-egalite-fraternite-haiti; https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/haiti-a-communist-state-modelled), I have written about the Caribbean nation of Haiti, which at the present time seems to lurch from one dire emergency to the next. In his book “In the Shadow of the Powers”, Patrick Bellegarde-Smith talks of his grandfather, the Haitian philosopher and diplomat Dantès Bellegarde (1877-1966), who was shockingly described by the sauce-maker (appropriately enough) McIlwhenny as a candidate to sire a horse. Bellegarde determined early in his diplomatic career, in which he was charged with upholding the regard of white, western nations for this very first of Black-led nations anywhere in the world, that the way forward for the former French sugar colony that was his home was to pursue the capitalist model and eschew the communist one. The United States has for centuries exerted its heavy, Monroe-Doctrinal pressure on the Caribbean states to draw them back from the precipice of communism - whether in Cuba, Grenada, Central and South America, etc. - and retain them well within the corrall of what McCarthy must’ve designated as “American activities”. These are the activities that saw Haiti ravaged by its father-son leadership over the period 1957-86. So extreme was Papa Doc’s campaign against his own people (including the massacre of every black dog on the island of Hispaniola, in furtherance of an irrational fear of the animals, who he deemed incorporated the soul of the political opponent he had dispatched into the next world in 1956) that one is led to ponder just what level of outrage will satisfy the United States government in defining what is and is not “American activity”.
You may, should you be curious, read my views on this matter and kindly bear in mind that the word “communism” denotes two quite separate things: it denotes a political system of which the world has had harrowing experience, in which a hierarchy of self-appointed intellectuals reign supreme over a people deprived of their personal prerogatives albeit invested with certain personal rights: to work, a roof, and a society. It likewise, however, denotes a philosophy, of which the world has had and is likewise today having experience of a somewhat less harrowing nature, by which mutual care and understanding (an embrace of the philosophy of the American First Nations: to take from the land what they need, and no more; to return to the land what they can, and no less) becomes adopted as a mantra for life, in the household, as in the community, as in the commerce, as in the government. It is practically unthinkable for a nation of 350,000,000 persons like the United States to adopt such a philosophy. But, for a small community, it is much more conceivable. They exist, communities which thrive on this philosophy. They are called “communes” in some places and “kibbutzim” in others. They can have populations of several thousand, but work best with modest populaces of several hundred. They exist in China, in Mongolia, in Israel, in Italy, in the jungles of the Amazon, ironically enough, and in many other places across the globe. What my articles argue is that they could exist across a single nation, if that nation were determined enough and sickened enough with “American actvities” to realise that “un-American activities” can also hold a promise for them. I believe that, under the right leadership, such a philosophy could form not just a basis but a bedrock for the governance of a state like Haiti. I think it’s a philosophy that is in fact embedded in many of the people of Haiti and would offer a way out of the constant infighting that marks that country’s sad history.
It’s a philosophy that, as I say, borrows heavily from the way of life of the native inhabitants of the Americas. It is outrageous that Joseph McCarthy should have designated it a form of “un-American activity.” For communism is in fact one of the most American of any activities to be found along the entire length and breadth of the continent, if one but paused to consider the meaning of the word “American.”
Yours sincerely,
Graham
Thank you for the thoughtful reply. As regards Amazon, I'll only speak from my experience. When I was younger I was an early adopter and promoter of the site. I grew up in a pretty conservative state, and was always interested in new things on the internet and new tech in general. This was long before I understood really anything about political economy. Now I do what I can to avoid it and let others know why I avoid it. For similar reasons, and especially seeing how they treated unionizing workers, I haven't purchased Starbucks in quite a while.
I let others know in the hopes that they make their own better decisions about their consumption in the small ways that they can. Were I to truly try to live the most ethical life possible, I might become a Jainist and sweep the path in front of me as I walk to avoid killing bugs. But my view is that I can do what I can do and taking incremental steps makes it easier to make each action into a habit before incorporating the next one. Of course one person doesn't make much of a difference to such a large company, but many people do.
Regarding bookshop.org, on their about us page: https://bookshop.org/info/about-us they list their mission as a B-corp "Our mission is simple: To help local, independent bookstores thrive in the age of ecommerce. Certified as a B Corp, Bookshop.org puts this mission and the public good above financial interests, giving over 80% of our profit margin to independent bookstores. In 2022, B-Labs announced we were "best for the world": in the top 5% of all B-Corps. It is written in our governance documents that we will never sell the company to Amazon or any major U.S. retailer. As a Climate Neutral company, we are committed to operating sustainably."
At the very least, they currently are legally obligated to do what they say and have structured the company in such a way. Who knows what the future may hold. The book Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World dedicates a whole chapter to B-corps and the lofty goals of the designers of this designation to make more ethical capitalism and ends by concluding that the designers themselves realized more fundamental changes needed to be made to the idea of profit itself. They note that routinely, founders would start companies as a B-corp when it was fashionable/profitable and then vote to change their mission and designation as soon as they felt it got in the way of their profit. Your point gets to the deeper idea that "there is no ethical consumption under capitalism", which isn't to say that we can't make a difference or make more ethical choices, just that holding profit above all else always leads executives to seek monopolies and exploit their workers for the benefit of shareholders.
To me the answer is a "both/and" situation. We can both reduce our consumption/make the most informed choices about where we shop and what we buy, and we can push for the empowerment of workers and a society in which our fellow citizens are not allowed to endlessly accumulate wealth (and therefore power over us) through whatever means possible.
Regarding Haiti, if you haven't read it, The Black Jacobins by CLR James is an incredible history of the Haitian Revolution. And Gangsters of Capitalism by Jonathan M. Katz has an interesting chapter or two on the U.S. military occupation of Haiti.
The study I posted about the Communist Bloc wasn't intended to praise Stalinist Communism, just to point out that the strong possibility of a different way of doing things was enough to push legislators and communities to temper the worst accumulative tendencies of capitalism. Again I think there's a "both/and" situation with starting local and spreading good ideas. We should promote a more caring and justice centered philosophy locally and in what we do with our neighbors, and (at least in the U.S.) we need a lot of policy changes at the federal level to prevent megacorporations and the wealthy from using the law against such movements.
I haven't read either James or Katz, though I have Katz's "The Big Truck That Went By". Thank you for these recommendations. I am currently engaged in a project submission to the National Endowment for the Humanities in concert with a Haitian friend and colleague, from whom we hope to receive funding for a film about Haiti, and your research scholarship will undoubtedly prove valuable in that quest.
Thank you also for such a full and balanced response. It really is a pleasure to exchange with you, Sean. The vagaries of corporate intent, indeed: a recent article in The Guardian speaks about the rapacious nature of the Cadbury chocolate company, which is now part of the international Mondelez conglomerate, yet still cites its Victorian Quaker foundation in a bid to project some kind of ethical foundation, which has long since fallen by the wayside. In this article (https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/every-little-counts), I ponder the motivations behind the founders of many of today's brand names and in how far they would turn in their graves to see the exploitation that is today conduct in their names.
I shall review my Amazon policy most profoundly, but they do sell more than just books. Often, offers of second-hand books on Amazon, unless I'm mistaken, do in fact stem from bookshop.org or similar such firms, with Amazon seeming to function as a consignment store. Moreover, I must source my products within the EU in order to avoid unnecessary import duty, a matter whose importance will only escalate once Mr Trump is installed.