• Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
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    9 months ago

    Billionaires cause infinitely more problems than death sentences.

    I think, though, that it is a simple enough affair for a billionaire to stop being a billionaire, if they are sufficiently motivated to do so.

    If we make “acquiring and retaining a billion dollars” a capital offense, the billionaires will get rid of themselves; we won’t actually have to execute anyone.

    • no banana@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      I don’t really think we need to compare them. Death sentences shouldn’t be a thing. Neither should billionaires. Billionaires are human beings, their wealth is a systemic issue we should do something about.

      • Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
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        8 months ago

        I disagree. It is not a systemic issue. It is a personal failing. They lack the self control, discipline, empathy, and compassion of fully-functional people. They have no internal sense of the harm that they are causing to all of society, and the only external feedback they get is from sycophants hyping them up to commit ever increasing atrocities.

        If there is a systemic failure, it is that we treat them as ordinary decent criminals, protecting them from oppression and discrimination, while ignoring that the only oppression they have ever seen has been the oppression they have perpetrated.

        They should be treated as hostile nations, not criminal defendants.

        • no banana@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          It’s a systemic issue in the fact that the system allows for it to happen. The system shouldn’t nurture such outcomes.

          • Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
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            8 months ago

            I’m not going to blame a system that works for ten thousand people for having been exploited by one person.

            I’m going to declare that one person a criminal exception, rather than rebuilding the entire system to accommodate him.

            The threat of the guillotine is the simplest solution to criminal affluence.