Personally, I think its the pursuit of profit at all costs including whatever gets destroyed in the process.
Capitalism enables this and society has accepted a principle that the more profit you generate the more your worth to society.
That's my point. Nihilistic-capitalism
only seeks profit as the end goal; guided by nothing else, it produces and drives towards nothing else. That's why you see things like pharmaceutical companies charging insane prices for insulin while neglecting research into diseases and antibiotics that are "unprofitable" even if the long-term threat and need is evident, or why you see publishers suing the Internet Archive for making e-books available for download even when they have the express consent of the authors themselves to do so. People have to believe that there is something more to life first than making as much money as humanly possible, and when they do that attitude works its way downward into everything they do and run.
And it's not something you can check with socialism, either - because if the people in that socialist system are also nihilist, the same dehumanizing behavior works its way through, simply in different ways. A nihilistic socialist might not be seeking profit but they are not seeking the welfare of others, either; all that matters is the maintenance of the state apparatus, and on the individual level, maintaining your position within said apparatus. Socialism also doesn't check nihilistic behavior in and of itself either; if the 20th century was any indication, it only inflames it further.
I don't know that I agree that Capitalism is not guided by other goals. Without profits my business cannot donate to worthy causes in my community. Without profit I cannot support those local artists or provide goods and services to the larger community. Do you suppose I should work for zero profit and still provide those things to the larger community?
I own a business and during Covid we were fortunate to be in a good place financially. We provided free lunches for kids and food boxes for needy families in our local community. We donate thousands every year to a handful of local charity and community organizations. All because we make a profit. Without that profit we could not do any of those things.
And you're an example of capitalism as it
should ideally operate - you clearly care about something outside yourself: your community, and in its long-term health and wellbeing. If profit and profit alone was all that drives you, you wouldn't have bothered with those lunches and food boxes because it cuts into your bottom line. Call it moral capitalism, humanistic capitalism, whatever - you're the antithesis of what I'm talking about when I talk about nihilistic capitalism.
My point is that the fault is not capitalism itself - capitalism is the tool. It is a tool many are using irresponsibly because they believe in nothing but making numbers go up. Until that nihilism starts getting rolled back, from the highest echelons of society on down, it's going to get worse.
