Congoisbleeding🇨🇩

LiveLoveLaugh

[Sizwe SikaMusi @SizweLo]

People defend capitalism because they confuse it with commerce. They believe “capitalism” is when people start businesses and sell things.

If people understood that the thing they call capitalism and love so much is actually just commerce and that it’s not the same thing as capitalism, they would feel very different.

This is because a local baker selling bread, a mechanic fixing cars, or an artisan selling wares on a digital storefront is a sign of commerce in a market economy, which is simply a mechanism for exchanging goods and services based on supply and demand.

Needless to say, this has existed for thousands of years before capitalism was created.

As economic historian Fernand Braudel pointed out, commerce and capitalism are not only distinct; but historically, they have often operated at cross-purposes.

According to Braudel, ordinary commerce is competitive and transparent, while capitalism is anti-competitive and deliberately opaque, making it a zone of privilege held by a small elite who bend the rules in their favour.

Braudel further argues that commerce, or the market, is horizontal, transparent, and competitive and as old as civilization itself. It involves individuals or small groups trading goods, where barriers to entry are low, no single player dominates, and profit is a reward for fulfilling a specific need.

Capitalism, meanwhile, is a specific institutional arrangement that emerged relatively recently in human history, around the 16th to 17th centuries. It is NOT just people “trading stuff”. It is instead the legal and financial system where the means of production are privately owned, and the primary objective is the continuous, infinite accumulation of capital.

Because of this accumulation-obssessed nature of capitalism, when it scales up, it seeks to eliminate the free play of commerce to protect its investments. True market competition is risky for massive capital as it drives prices down and threatens profit margins.

Braudel contended that capitalism only begins where commerce ends. It is the zone of high finance and state collusion. Because it operates across vast distances such as the 17th-century spice trade, information takes months to travel, which creates a deliberate lack of transparency.

Braudel noted that the great capitalists of the early modern era in Madeira and Venice or the Dutch East India Company, never wanted to compete in a fair, transparent market because competition slices profit margins to the bone. Instead, they secured royal charters, exclusive trading rights, and naval protection. At the same time, the state granted them legal monopolies, effectively outlawing competition.

Therefore, capitalism naturally trends toward creating monopolies and securing state interventions like bailouts, subsidies, and regulatory capture to shield itself from the very market forces it claims to champion. In fact, the most important takeaway from Braudel’s analysis is that capitalism is NOT the natural evolution or the highest form of the free market, it is its dark shadow.

So, when our lizard overlords use “free market” and “capitalism” interchangeably, they’re deliberately hiding this distinction and using the moral legitimacy of the hard-working, transparent business owner to defend the structural privileges of the protected financial elite and its regulatory capture.

If ordinary people could comprehend these distinctions, many self-described “capitalists” would realise they are just pro-commerce, and actually anti-capitalist, because it would be clear that defending “capitalism” means defending the right of a small parasite class to bypass the market entirely.

[Mohamad Safa @mhdksafa]

Believing that billionaires and trillionaires are fighting for the working class requires an almost comical level of delusion.

[daughter of the east. @mbae_12]

also, polygamous men expecting monogamy in return is so interesting to me.

[Luna M ✨ @tiredfeminist_]

“I’m better than you and could never be abused” Olympics.

[Mhlongo da Herbalist 🍃 @Qokani]

The King receives public funding from the South African government, which ultimately comes from taxpayers.

So you can't tell people who aren't Zulu to stay out of his affairs. He is a public figure and the engine of his office runs on fuel called tax. 😂🙆🏾‍♂️💀

[‏ً @omgsidewalks]

MY GREATEST ADULT DISAPPOINTMENT WAS DISCOVERING THAT BAD PEOPLE GET AWAY WITH EVERYTHING.

[Gontse Chauke 📝 @_BlackZA]

Please don't date me if you won't talk with me everyday. There are people you can date, I'm not one of them.

[Public Protector South Africa @PublicProtector]

@CapeTimesSA

[dante🏳️‍⚧️ @lgtsfan]

@occamschainsaaw Yess. hey I just wanted to share that I remembered this article after reading your tweet: https://t.co/Yrl9ekZEVn

And there's an interesting book that also concerns the subject, "The Invention of Women" by Oyèrónkẹ Oyěwùmí

[Books Behind Borders @MHTruthUltra]

If you say you hate the Iranian government, nobody accuses you of hating the Iranian people. But if you hate the Israeli government, somehow you’re accused of hating all Jews worldwide. How does that work? 🤔

[SABC News Radio @SABCNews_Radio]

[LISTEN] The City of Cape Town has failed to provide adequate services to townships like Langa and Khayelitsha. This was revealed in a report released by Public Protector Kholeka Gcaleka.

🔗https://t.co/TuBW6UGcR5

#UpdateAtNoon #sabcnews

[maMvelase ❤️ @Nocylove123]

You cannot treat people like garbage and worship God at the same time.

[Gontse Chauke 📝 @_BlackZA]

Remove age from your plans, it adds unnecessary pressure..

[Gcobani Ndzongana @gndzongana]

The face of corruption.

[Mhlongo da Herbalist 🍃 @Qokani]

Feelings, beliefs, and personal opinions are not diagnostic tools. By that logic, someone could just as easily diagnose your opinion instead. 🤦🏿‍♂️

[Uma @uwouma]

Apply for as many jobs as you can. Target roles that are above your qualification. Go to the interviews that scare you. You will gain so much confidence from that experiece that you'll naturally become a better candidate. This is one of the things that job hunting taught me.

[Sentletse 🇿🇦🇷🇺🇵🇸🇱🇧 @Sentletse]

If what is Tony Leon is lobbying, equally the Guptas were merely lobbying as well.

[Legendary 🇿🇦 @Yandisa87376189]

@LacedUpReport He must reject Napoli if he wants to be treated as a human being.

[Business Day @BDliveSA]

The Constitutional Court has given the Western Cape government a three-month deadline to draft policies for the provision of affordable housing in Cape Town after finding the province failed to redress apartheid's spatial injustices in its economic hub.

https://t.co/m4MD7qOPrc

[Nolwazi Tusini @NolwAzi_Tusini]

This shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what the SAHRC is, its mandate& what it exists to do. We cannot sit back & allow any grouping to attack Chapter 9 institutions for doing their work,especially not in the name of hate and xenophobia. Protect @SAHRCommission at all cost!