Shareholders are Evil

Thursday 1509hrs

I’ve said many times to many people that the system of “Shareholding” is the root of almost all evil. See, my logic is that if someone is involved as a purely financial shareholder (And not as a founding director, for example) then their only interest in the company at all is the financial performance of the company. This leads to many things. Support for wars, calls for shameless exploitation of children in the East, rapacious polluting of local rivers and streams to save expenditure on those pesky environmental regulations.

Why? For profit, of course. Altruism and decency go out of the window when an abstract EPS (Earnings per Share) becomes your sole interest.

So it’s no wonder I regard with some frustration our wonderful government turning over of essential, national supplies such as water, gas and electric to private shareholder motivated corporations. “Competition will keep prices down”, they hark, without realising that they’ve simply established a co-operative monopoly with only one interest: Profit.

See, the energy companies have a complete monopoly, even if they are acting as individual corporate entities. Why? Well the vast majority of the population have no means by which to adequately generate their own power, pump their own clean water, or supply their own clean, burnable gas. There is simply no competition, which means energy companies can do what they want with the prices and justify them however they please. In the case of these rapacious shareholders they’re claiming that freezing Grandma to death this winter is because, quote:

“This is a business that has got a million shareholders – a lot of pension funds and people have got their savings invested in British Gas shares and we have to look after them”

So clearly, their intention is to look after those people who have a stake in their company at the expense of the quality of life of the citizens of Great Britain. Is that really the attitude we want to see from the providers of essential services? The components of national infrastructure that contribute to basic qualities of life should never be placed in the hands of people who have no interest in the good of the people, it’s madness.

A democratic government has an obligation to its electorate, the majority, not the wealthy elite, yet time and time again we see them sacrificing essential public services in the name of “financial competition” and profits. As we charge headlong into plutocracy my advice to anyone out there is to get wealthy or learn how to survive without Oxygen, as sooner or later they’re going to start charging for air.

Has anyone else noticed that the volume dial on the BBC embedded iPlayer goes to 11?
It made me chuckle, at least.

Just thought I’d share this gem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeTIv9UkY8c

It’s a bloke standing up for himself against the Thought Police / Brown Shirts / NAZI Enforcement Squad / UK Security Policy.

You go mate, I just hope the rest of the mindless sheep that inhabit this green isle take to heart your example and start fighting back against the continual persecution of innocent people and the erosions of freedom within the UK under the shoddy and two-sided banner of anti-terror legislations.

If we cannot be free people in our own land under our own democracy, then I can only conclude that the terrorists, if they’re out there, have won.