Comic Strips

I believe the theory goes something along the lines of feudalism being centered about renting (ie land) and with manafacture that shifted to a product-based economy. With time, renting has regained dominance and is reaching a whole new level now that most capital is tied up in the cloud (AWS, azure etc.)

Kind of. American Proletarians have a unique position of enjoying the benefits of a super-exploited class of domestic immigrants paid lower wages via threat of deportation, and Imperialistic hegemony, but are also enslaved by vast amounts of debt. This is very different from standard Capitalism, but not quite feudalism. It depresses the revolutionary potential of the American Proletariat for as long as Imperialism is the status quo.

The question then is, why do people choose the way they do, both when buying and when running a company? To me it seems, they don't because of some external pressure (like monarchy requires).

The ideas that people have are shaped by their Material Conditions, and people generally act in their best interests. People will buy what is available in the market, and Capitalists work to accumulate more and more money in an M-C-M' circuit.

The point can be summed up as a question: Why don't people run (more) non-capitalist services and productions, and why don't they prefer them when looking to satisfy their demand?

These are 2 questions.

1. People generally don't run Socialist services as frequently because in the framework of Capitalism, it is excessively difficult to gain the Capital necessary to start one, and furthermore the people with access to Capital continue to act in their own interests and accumulate more profit off of ownership.

2. People do not care where their commodities come from, largely, as they work for their income and thus their access is limited by the money they have.

These non-capitalist things exist, it's certainly possible. But as far as I know, they are all very niche. Like a communal kitchen, some solidary agriculture or housing project. Heck, entire villages of this kind exist.

This is known as Mutual Aid, which is a big cornerstone of Anarchism. The issue is that Anarchism generally relies on individuals making the right decisions due to their horizontal structures and has issues with scaling horizontally. These structures tend to have great success locally, such as Food Not Bombs feeding people, but without strong organization scaling becomes difficult and action becomes unfocused.

So the alternative is there, but it requires actual commitment and work. I don't see how capitalism could be abolished in an armed uprising (in contrast to monarchy). But it can be replaced by alternative projects. Partially. Why are they so small and few?

Why don't you think Capitalism could be abolished via revolution? It's been done before.

Secondly, it is not simply capable of being replaced entirely via parallel systems because that depends on individuals outcompeting the immense resources of the Bourgeoisie. It's certainly possible at a local level, but at a state level takes enourmous power and unity.

This is my personal opinion without any real evidence than my experience and knowledge of what I read somewhere:

1. People are stupid and lazy mostly. The education is going down for most industrial countries. Changing habits is stressful and avoided if possible.

2. Manipulation works. Media and advertisements successfully change people behaviour without them noticing. If you put enough money into a campaign people think they are responsible for your co2 emissions.

3. As long as you don't drive people too fast and too deep into an existential crisis they will tolerate a lot!

4. The system is rigged. People who are honest and social are pushed down. While greedy and lying people are being pushed on top.

♫ monopoly duopoly oligopoly cartel ♫

♪ anti-trust, pork barrel, propaganda lobbying ♪

♫ economies of scale, information asymmetry, regulatory capture and personal responsibility ♫

♪ unions, pinkertons, labor theory of value and the CIA ♪

♫ rent seeking, georgism, tax incentive, scarcity ♫

♪ free trade, minimum wage, petrodollar and the MIC ♪

♫ we didn't start the fire, it was always burning since the world's been turning ♫

~provided~ ~as~ ~is,~ ~no~ ~warranty~ ~in~ ~regard~ ~to~ ~serving~ ~any~ ~particular~ ~rhyme~ ~or~ ~meter,~ ~express~ ~or~ ~implied,~ ~consult~ ~a~ ~licensed~ ~physician~ ~before~ ~attempting~ ~to~ ~sing~ ~along~

In what manner has Marx been wrong? Where in the history of Marxism has democracy not been core to the central ideas of it, especially when compared to Capitalism?

That's why there's been an entire century of revision to that model to incorporate more democratic forward values

How is a representative election every 4 years in a system where mass media are owned by the capitalist class more democratic than the ideas of Marx? The Soviet Union started out as the name implies, as a union of republics in which soviets, or worker councils, had the decision power. The fact that international interference and civil war (such as 14 countries invading the USSR militarily and many more sponsoring the tsarist loyalists or the anti-revolutionary Mensheviks) didn't allow for a high degree of work democracy without extreme risk to the stability or the country, has more to do with the material and historical conditions of the USSR than it has to do with the ideas of Marx and Lenin.

Part of the problem is that, while Marx writes well regarding the economic flaws of capitalism, he isn't as good at writing about the politics of change.

When induced by the body politic, we see that some of the economic surplus can be reallocated to the workers provided there is political pressure. It can come in the form of state backed rights, progressive taxation, and even direct welfare payments.

It probably isn't the perfect system Marx envisioned, but enlightened liberalism is able to make subtle shifts over time in a way that absolute monarchies can't.

Now everyone can understand why Twitter is being dismantled

#Metoo ruffled some feathers

You've described liberal democracy. The combination of individual freedom plus democracy is supposed to provide a framework for curating precisely the kind of political agency you describe.