Have this article read out loud.
American Gandhi ON CAPITALISM:
“It’s just not economical!”
When the original Gandhi became a lawyer, he picked a vocation highly regarded by the law- obsessed English. As his opposition to the Empire developed, he found that the best way to get its attention was to disobey its law – civilly of course.But what if Gandhi had been born under the heel of the American Empire instead of the British? Since, money, not law, is the American obsession, I think our American Gandhi would have started out as a Banker.As a lawyer, Gandhi was rather a failure until he developed a few unorthodox quirks. He didn’t like to defend clients who actually committed a crime. Restitution was his solution just as he preferred mediating conflicts rather than litigating them.As a banker, he would similarly have flirted with bankruptcy before he developed his innovative quirks.- such as debt forgiveness, no interestloans, alternative currency and the gift economy. In his conventional
economic days, our American Gandhi would have had his taste of the Global Economy and Wall St., maybe even the Harvard Business School. But in the end, his experience of American capitalism could be summed up by his oft repeated judgment: “It’s just not economical.
Instead he would have embraced something he dubbed “Christian economics”
- reminding people of Jesus’ 1st law of economics: “Cast your bread upon the waters and it will return 7 fold.” Gandhi would often remark that Jesus here was actually being conservative since the return was closer to 100 fold - if gifts were given without a greedy heart..
Our American Gandhi would have pointed out that for Jesus economics was strictly for the Birds – since they take no concern about what to eat or what to wear and still “his father in heaven” took care to note the fall of every one of them.Often called a communist by the orthodox free marketers, Gandhi would have countered by stating Jesus’ 2nd great law of economics: “Give all youhave to the poor and come follow me.” This was a depressing command forthe young rich man who perhaps hoped his money could buy a place at Jesus’side.
Gandhi was particularly annoyed with the failure of Christianity to uphold the pure, anti-property communism that Jesus and his followers practiced for hundreds of years. Despite his nonviolence, Gandhi admitted that he sympathized a little with the New Testament executions by the Holy Spirit of not one but two people who tried to hold back some of their property.
He often lamented the straightforward purchase of Christianity by the urban moneyed classes under the guise of “Reformation Calvinism.” He called it “serving God as Mammon.” So bad did the situation become that a totally cash corrupted Europe could only recover its Christian economics by stepping outside Christianity to re-invent this communism as an atheist and materialist philosophy.
Banker Gandhi would have restored medieval economic collectivism through a Monasticism without walls in interdependent Communities. He would have been particularly effective in redirecting the energies of the vast numbers of homeless and poverty stricken people into a disciplined common life. (The decline of the auto in a post-petroleum world put many motels up for use by the nomadic new monks.)
He would have been unremittingly critical of Capitalism’s exaltation of competition - itself a violation of the basic Christian practice of humility. Our American Gandhi liked to point out that not only Pride but all of 7 deadly sins are servants of American capitalism.
As for the wannabe rich syndrome, Gandhi believed “it’s not just wasteful, its positively delusional, given Jesus’ warning that you are just giving moths and thieves a target when you try and store up wealth .” He would take out a needle and squint down it when he lectured to the rich.
Faced with the Western Prison system, Gandhi of course would point out how uneconomical it was to pay all that money to warehouse and torment an ever-increasing number of people. He called on people to take Jesus’ words literally about visiting the imprisoned. That’s why he would have initiated a Home Imprisonment Movement with the purpose of emptying the prisons right into the homes of Christians. “It’s easier to visit them that way,” he explained.
As for the perpetual warfare state that has become the capitalist solution to its boom and bust cycles, Gandhi would have thrown up his hands.
As with nuclear power, he would have demanded adequate insurance. “The only Just war is fully insurable. Isn’t that obvious? How can you afford to burn down cities and massacre endless numbers of bystanders without “just compensation for the damage.” It’s not just reckless madness – it’s just not economical!”(This Eric Blair Report prepared by Paul Encimer) Biographical Postscript:: Born in Philadelphia in 1950, our American Gandhiwas named J.P. Gandhi (after John Pierpont the eminent Americanfinancier) by his mother - an Economics professor - and his father - a millionaire real estate speculator. Gandhi weathered the sixties at Stanford and later Harvard, worked briefly for the World Bank and then went to work in Wall Street. before returning to India to set up a local bank of his own..