this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2025
70 points (82.4% liked)

Political Memes

9954 readers
1162 users here now

Welcome to politcal memes!

These are our rules:

Be civilJokes are okay, but don’t intentionally harass or disturb any member of our community. Sexism, racism and bigotry are not allowed. Good faith argumentation only. No posts discouraging people to vote or shaming people for voting.

No misinformationDon’t post any intentional misinformation. When asked by mods, provide sources for any claims you make.

Posts should be memesRandom pictures do not qualify as memes. Relevance to politics is required.

No bots, spam or self-promotionFollow instance rules, ask for your bot to be allowed on this community.

No AI generated content.Content posted must not be created by AI with the intent to mimic the style of existing images

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Rooki@lemmy.world
automodbeta@lemmy.world
Tenthrow@lemmy.world
JonsJava@lemmy.world
Lasherz12@lemmy.world
FauxPseudo@lemmy.world
70
Ethical consumption, 1860 (jlai.lu)
submitted 1 day ago by Bad@jlai.lu to c/politicalmemes@lemmy.world
16 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

[orange character is smiling smugly, doing a finger gun, in front of the “1860 WEEKLY SLAVE MARKET” in which a crowd of people are browsing slaves, while some slaves ask “please help…”]

There is no ethical consumption under capitalism bro, everything is equally bad

I won’t stop buying slaves until the state compels me not to, until then to each their own and let’s agree to disagree and I’ll have you know my family needs their labor

It’s great that you can live without slaves though, keep being an anti-slavery activist it’s awesome!

You’re the best!

https://thebad.website/comic/no_ethical_consumption

top 16 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 5 points 17 hours ago

This perfectly describes how YES, these systemic issues will never ever ever change until there are systemic changes.

Legal chattel slavery ended in the US because of systemic changes.

The same types of systemic changes is what will actually work with other trends today that we shame individuals about instead of forcing systemic changes.

[–] tomiant@piefed.social 18 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

I have said for years, the argument "vote with your wallets, folks!" is bad because:

"Hey if you don't like slavery, just don't buy slaves! Then everyone gets what they want."

[–] owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca 25 points 23 hours ago (3 children)

"Vote with your wallet" is valid and often effective, but it's not enough on its own. Also vote with your voice, your democratic power, and when all else fails, bricks.

[–] lauha@lemmy.world 5 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Do we have to have trillionaires before we get to vote with our guillotines?

[–] Bad@jlai.lu 5 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

Historical usage of the guillotine mostly targeted nobles who were in the way of the bourgeoisie, leftist revolutionaries, and proletarian criminals.

As much as we romanticize the guillotine, strikes, sabotages, and bricks are the tools of the working class. They have a pretty good track record.

Although I can't lie, I always smile when protesters bring out a mini guillotine and the ruling class media starts panicking :)

[–] lauha@lemmy.world 1 points 18 hours ago

Guillotine is just a humorous reference. I am not imagining seriously toppling western oligarchy by rolling a guillotine on wall street.

[–] Tar_alcaran@sh.itjust.works 8 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Breaking windows got women the right to vote and everyone the right to unionize.

[–] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 5 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

Also in GB, it got the common man the right to vote at the same time, since they were fighting WWI at the time and the parliament couldn't really argue against it anymore.

.

.

.

.

.

Lesson: angry women get what they want.

/s

[–] null@piefed.nullspace.lol 7 points 22 hours ago

The classic 4 boxes of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo.

[–] sorrybookbroke@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (3 children)

You are using technology. Technology uses lithium and cobalt from conflict zones and areas using slave labor.

You are a hypocrit.

No moral consumption means that it's impossible to interact with this society without supporting some awful shit. It doesn't mean do whatever lol doesn't matter haha

Owning slaves wouldn't count. That's pretty direct harm.

[–] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 17 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago)

Based on their past work, OP/the artist is not a hypocrit, they're intentionally making the character sound like an asshole.

[–] null@piefed.nullspace.lol 12 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah, this misses the mark for sure. "No ethical consumption under capitalism" is the response to someone calling you a hypocrite for being critical of capitalism while still necessarily engaging in it. Which the OP is doing, as you pointed out.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 7 points 17 hours ago

The point is that just because there's no ethical consumption under capitalism doesn't mean we should drop all pretense of trying, because there are still levels of unethicality.

[–] Kobibi@sh.itjust.works 2 points 16 hours ago

The better analogy would be a 19th C American using products derived from cotton picked by slaves

Or the other way round, in the modern day the slave owners are the owners of the cobalt mines or whatever

[–] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

TBF it would be really hard to compete in a market where your competition relies on slave labor, unless you have a lot of ethically-minded consumers who can afford to pay more for ethically produced goods. Though I honestly don't know how big the price difference would have been, it's not like agricultural workers would have gotten high wages ...

[–] jbloggs777@discuss.tchncs.de -2 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

I'm sure gulags / laogai / reeducation / forced labor camps are much more ethical... /s