So, I was just considering the Supreme Court's decision to allow corporations to contribute unlimited amounts of funds to political campaigns. I think a majority of people are upset about this decision and too much has already been said on the subject. So, for the sake of diversification, I will refrain from using the phrases "United Corporate States of America", "a government of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations", and "this presidency brought to you by Wal-Mart". Instead, I just have a single question. What gives corporate entities the right to demand recognition as "people"? I understand the U.S. Constitution explicitly states that corporations shall not have its first amendment rights infringed upon. But I believe this refers to the employees of the organization and not to the entity itself. Corporate entities are simply not people.
Corporations are not people. The corporations themselves are not held to the same moral standards as a person is. Whereas people are expected to be socially responsible and mindful of the needs of others, corporations, as a whole, are only concerned with profit. Corporations are not required or even expected to benefit the community they profit from aside from offering employment opportunities. And even for these employment opportunities, they are not required or expected to care for their employees beyond the absolute minimum of payment and insurance for full-time employees. They are not required or expected to care for their customers beyond the absolute minimum of offering a facility for business and conducting that business in a timely manner. In fact, a majority of corporations have a complete disregard for the social needs of people, creating urban sprawl that consumes communities, cheat their employees out of benefits and payment whenever possible, and offer their products and services with known health risks for their consumers. On the other hand, people are expected to care for one another. We are expected to live up to our contracts fully, to care for the needs of others, and to embrace and carry our communities for the sake of other people.
Corporations are not people. They are not expected to care for the environment outside of the most basic of principles set by the EPA and United States law. They produce their products and complete their services in the most fiscally efficient manner, which usually involves the least environmentally mindful processes possible. Corporations often waste valuable natural resources simply for the sake of their convenience. People are required to care for the environment. We have extensive fines for littering, cannot water plants on our property during droughts, and recycle our waste.
And likewise, people are not corporations. If people were held to the same standard as corporations, there would be few laws to govern us and even fewer willing to enforce them. We could spend, consume, and waste recklessly without any mind to the consequences of our actions or any sort of punishment. If people were corporations, we would not need earth to live on or people to live with, just capital to sustain our consuming and waste. If people were corporations, there would be no people, because the very thing that defines a person is the willingness to see past ourselves and live for the good of everybody and not simply ourselves, and corporations have no such emotions or thoughts or inclinations. They have no souls, no consciousness, no connection to the world apart from the cold fiscal ties of business.
That's just it then. Corporations are vehicles for profit and business, but nothing more. They have no interest in the good of the people or the planet. Corporations are only self-interested in making profit. And granted, many people are self-interested and money-driven as well. The difference between those people and corporations is that corporations have billions of dollars in funds to influence public policy. And public policy is not meant to serve the interests of a few; it's meant to benefit the American people as a whole. That is what is wrong with that ruling. The very integrity and purpose of our government has been dissolved, and now in its place is just another avenue for the vehicles of profit.
