Title says it all. I’m in a country that has public health care, and in many aspects it is very good. Only downside is wait time. There’s also less and less funding every year, less and less quality, the whole process to destroy and later privatize what is a natural monopoly (such as water, electricity, etc) and a basic necessity for human life and dignity, and so on.

With that said, is it wrong for me to benefit from what is essentially a better service (because of factors mentioned above, not because private = “better”) because it is a capitalist enterprise? Same debate could arise from private energy companies, private transport providers, etc.

  • miz
    32·
    9 months ago

    individual consumer choices are not politics. boycotts are a useful tool in concert with an organized political movement (like BDS or a union of striking workers) but can be ultimately counterproductive on their own:

    The revolution will not be bought: Ethical consumption is seductive but dangerous to the values ethical consumers seek to promote

    In short, a strong belief that ethical consumption will lead to ethical practices is not warranted – purchasing as voting is a weak feedback mechanism at best and there are other actors who are able to influence the system. The danger, however, comes in believing that this mechanism can make substantial political change. Ethical consumption gives the individual the illusion of contributing to progress; of “doing their part” by making purchasing decisions. This illusion can detract, and probably has detracted, from trying to put forward an avowedly political agenda that seeks to mobilise people collectively to make the changes they support. Instead, it individualises ethics, it individualises politics and it reaffirms us as consumers rather than citizens – it is a part of the profit-maximising, pathologically-externalising neoliberal market system that has caused many of the problems ethical consumerism seeks to alleviate, rather than being an alternative.