The Capitalist's Priceless Things And The Revolution-From-Within

A successful capitalist goes to Pashupatinath Temple to pray...We have heard of this, and contrary to our assumptions, he is not praying for more wealth, to make billions and trillions of dollars, to be the wealthiest man, rather, ultimately he is praying for the ability to pay for the education of his children, the health-care costs of his wife, and other such things which are important to him but do not require excessive wealth, that do not require excessive ambition/greed. Even the wealthiest capitalist prays for these things ultimately; it is not about praying for excessive money at all.

The visit to the temple shows what is considered truly important in capitalism, such as the family one has and other seemingly small and simple pleasures, comforts and attachments. The excessive wealth of billions and trillions of dollars which is attached to certain privileged names in today's capitalism can be lost or given up, this is disposable wealth for the capitalist. But what cannot be lost or given up, what the capitalist does not tolerate, is the loss of what is considered in the world today to be the capitalist's sacred things, or his priceless things.

Family, friends, personal houses and personal cars, these items are examples of the sacred things in capitalism. These things are submitted to rituals and other religious activities to produce them as sacred; one can think of the worship of a car in certain days of Nepal's Dashain and Tihar festivals, on top of the worshiping of family. The capitalist must afford to undertake these rituals that “certify” the sacredness of his things, he must afford Dashain and Tihar, and for this he must generate a basic amount of wealth. This generation of basic wealth to insert the sacred things into rituals is tolerated even by anti-capitalists, and as such not all levels of wealth are problematized by anti-capitalist protests and ideas. A basic level of greed, a basic endeavor to protect and enable the sacred, a necessary amount of wealth, these are important aspects of capitalism which even anti-capitalists think must be transferred into other systems alternative to capitalism.

What were previously revolutionary impulses to end capitalism have now become replaced by impulses to take society back to the “good capitalism” or the “basic capitalism” with a substantial sacredness at its center. Yet in truth revolution is impossible without problematizing sacred things and problematizing all levels of wealth in capitalism. Ambition and greed are not core tenets of capitalism and their problematization does not ensure that capitalism as a whole will fall. Further, the problem is that the billions and trillions of dollars are ultimately themselves not exactly disposable, but are necessary because they allow the formation of basic wealth. Excessive wealth is the necessary “side-effect” that will always allow the generation of basic wealth. 

What could bring about in capitalism a revolution-from-within is the marginalization of the rituals and activities certifying things as sacred. When sacred things, such as one's child's education, are inserted/submitted in the wider but less important economy sustaining disposable wealth, then the capitalist is frustrated and will find it irrelevant that sacred things may be submitted to valuation and be disposed just like the money he considers disposable. In the logic of sacred things, even if a sacred thing is valued at trillions after an initial valuation of billions, this does not make the thing more sacred, because the sacred thing is something which resists monetary valuation, it is priceless, it is what “money can't buy” in capitalism. It is clear that a capitalist's revolution-from-within is not a revolution against capitalism to the fullest extent, rather it sustains the core of the capitalist system while shedding what look like the excessive developments and progress it has made as a result of ambition, greed etc. But the revolutionaries-from-within capitalism will find that disposable wealth is not in fact disposable because disposing of this wealth will ultimately hurt the sacred things themselves.