The Tortoise and the Hustler
Radicalised from: The Tortoise and the Hare
A long, long time ago, there lived a hustler in the forest, who always boasted of his hard work and his years of hustle that had made him successful. Often he would tease the tortoise for being uninspired and slow. “Jeff Bison and Elon Moose both have the same twenty four hours as you, yet they use their hours to do ape meetings and create cool companies like Amazon Primate. Unlike you, who wastes time with friends on weekends. That’s why you’re a failure. Because you don’t hustle!”
One fine day, he dared the tortoise to a race to the top one percent. Fed up with the hustler’s bragging, the tortoise accepted the challenge and decided to compete. On the day of the race, all animals gathered in the forest to watch them go. Just as they were about to begin the race, the hustler mocked the tortoise again, “You do not even have coffee when you feel sleepy, you just sleep. Get out of your shell, or you will never become as successful as me.” The tortoise kept silent and paid no attention to the hustler’s motivational speeches.
The race began at the count of one, two and three! The hustler immediately gulped his iced black coffee, snorted his Adderall, and started running. The tortoise was slow as usual. Soon the hustler had reached a long way ahead and was just a few minutes from the finish line. He felt mentally exhausted but he had heard stories of a lazy rabbit who would sleep in between the race, and loose! He knew better, and so, he kept running. He crossed the finish line and started looking around for the millionaire status that he felt he deserved.
Suddenly, a very shattered Jeff Bison appeared. He looked at the hustler and said, “oh, you don’t know, do you? The tortoise read a lot of theory, he organized the entire workforce and now they have taken over all means of production.” The hustler was shocked. Vertigo hit and he realised he had shown false class solidarity with the billionaires while he had been a worker all along, and instead of promoting toxic positivity and hustle culture, and instead of competing against his colleagues, he could have worked with them to attack the root cause of all misery: the concentration of wealth under capitalism. He turned and saw the tortoise and all his friends celebrating, and at once, understood that the real hustle was the struggle against the bourgeois.
Moral of the story: Slow and unionized win the race.
The Boy Who Cried Capitalist
Radicalised from: The boy who cried wolf
Once upon a time, there lived a shepherd boy named Karl Marx. He was bored watching his friends working like sheep, seven days a week, at the garment factory. To amuse himself, he began observing and studying their relationship with their boss. He realised that the boss was super rich because, while his friends did all the hard work, the boss owned the factory they worked at, and so he kept all the profit he made from their hard work. The boy shouted, “Capitalist! Capitalist! The workers are being exploited by the capitalist!”
Concerned, the workers came running to the boy, united and agitated. But the boss was smart. He announced, “from today, weekends are off! Enjoy time with your family.” The workers looked at the boy. “Don’t cry ‘exploitation’ when there’s no exploitation, boy!”, they said angrily and left.
After a while, Karl got bored again. He observed and realised that the boss was using his profits to buy more land and set up more factories. The boss would then work with politicians to force people out of their homes and farmlands. Then these landless people would have no option but to work at the factory, just to be able to buy food to stay alive. The boy shouted, “Capitalist! Capitalist! The poor are being exploited by the capitalist!”
Concerned, the poor came running to the boy. But the politician was smart. He announced, “from today, I will tax the boss a little more, and use that money to make healthcare and food cheaper for you poor people.” The poor people looked at the boy. “Don’t cry ‘exploitation’ when there’s no exploitation, boy!”, they said angrily and left.
After a while, Karl got bored again. He observed and realised that the boss was using his profits to privatize the healthcare and food system, making it way more expensive for anyone to be able to stay alive. The boy shouted one more time, “Capitalist! Capitalist! The world is being exploited by the capitalist!”
But this time, no one turned up. The boy wrote a long, boring, and very dry book called Capital. He used fancy words like bourgeois and proletariat, instead of boss and worker. So no one could get past the first two sentences of this thousand page book. But the poor kept getting poorer, the boss kept getting richer. And then one day someone found his book and finished it, and understood how the world worked. But it was 2080, the capitalists had cut all trees for short-term profits and as he finished the last page of Capital, this well-read, patient person was submerged under the very high but still rising sea level.
Moral of the story: Capitalists suck. You really should be googling anarcho-syndicalism.
Twinkle Twinkle Little Tsar
Twinkle, twinkle little tsar
Why you dragged us into war
Monarchies are built on lies
Come workers, we’ll socialize
Two Friends & the Bear
Once upon a time, in a village far away, lived two friends, Mr Wall Street and Mr Sabhya Samaaj. They had been the closest of friends for decades, and used to go on adventures together. They had even promised to be there for each other in their hour of need. One day they decided to go trekking together.
When they had come too deep into the forest, they heard some heavy footsteps behind them. They turned to find a big, angry and ferocious virus running to get them. It had come so close they realised they had nowhere to go!
While Samaaj was figuring out how to save both their lives, Wall Street quickly climbed up a tree, and it climbed so high that the virus could not reach it! He had forgotten his promise to help his friend and had left him at the mercy of the virus, all while being at an all time high.
Scared, Samaaj just fell to the ground, and holding his breath pretended to be dead. For what felt like eternity, the virus smelled Samaaj, poked around his face, and eventually decided to leave. Once the virus had gone away for good, Samaaj’s friend climbed down.
“It seemed like the virus was whispering something to you. What did he say in your ear?”
Samaaj was feeling betrayed, and he was very angry. He replied, “the virus told me that a friend in need is a friend indeed. And he also told me that despite what sugar daddy philosophers will explain in long ass twitter threads, the stock market really is a zero sum game. It creates no actual value for society. It is indeed a form of glorified gambling. Money can never create money. Labour creates value, people’s hard work creates value. So the stock market is just a theft of people’s labour. All financial assets and derivatives have been carefully designed to exploit this zero sum game and make money as fast as possible without doing anything. The system is rigged against the masses and--”
“Alright, alright. Geez, why are you being so passive aggressive?”, asked Wall Street.
“Don’t you dare gaslight me,” Samaaj said with dead cold eyes, as he walked away.
Moral of the story: Wall Street will suck in all the productive capital that helps society develop, and make it all speculative capital, and if you complain, it will gaslight you.