Do you think it was a defining moment in history when the American people accepted the legal fiction that corporations should be treated as people in a court of law?

Yes. I wonder how a corporation can get jail time, but the death penalty seems possible.

When government controls business, that is communism. When business controls government
that’s fascism. Capitalism is the narrow path between the two. When the Supreme Court decided in favor of Citizens United it sent us down a slippery slope toward fascism.

I cannot help but see the parallels between recent history and Shadowrun, where corporations were granted the rights to armed paramilitary security forces and extraterritoriality. Within a couple of decades, megacorporations overshadowed any government.

As one who sees science fiction as speculative, such precedents make me wary that fact may follow fiction.

It’s a mistake to think that “the American people” accept the fiction that corporations should have the status of people before the law. This is what the folks who effectively own the countr would prefer the residents to believe. They are of the logical mind that since they own the place, they own the courts as well, and this little gem, put in place by a lowly clerk of the Supreme Court demonstrates their intention to “make it so”. Make no mistake. This piece of magic thinking is an undisguised and very successful counter to the voting power of the “unwashed” (un moneyed) masses.

Well..the whole point is it doesn’t MATTER what we think. “We” do not exist.

I’m sorry you don’t exist @Coloma. I was getting used to your cheerful replies.

@Dan_Lyons Hey..I once signed up my goose for political propa-gander. lol
He looks like Ross Perot, and, it is time for an entirely new species in office.

Another point to consider is which religions are protected. Many judges argue that the First Amendment freedom of religion only applies to Christianity in it’s various forms. Considering how Christianity in America is far more restrictive than the Pope’s views on the faith, that’s also troubling.

If the corporations don’t take over, Christian extremists will. Either way, we are no longer “Land of the free”.

If you dig a little deeper, it’s been this way since 1819 and keeps getting reaffirmed each generation.

So if it was a turning point, we’ve been down that path a long, long way.

Anyone who has a problem with this needs to look into MoveOn.org and get involved.
The courts will never disavow corporate personhood. It will take a constitutional amendment to bring us back to reality. And in reality, you are never going to get it if you keep electing the same type of person to congress.