CapeXit 2

[lexity]

Q3:
You say De Beers' coercive cartel was sustained without
'direct' government help. What form of indirect government
help did it receive?

A3:


Ah, now we’re diving into the nuance—“direct” vs. “indirect” government support. De
Beers is a textbook case for seeing this distinction. Let’s go step by step.
1. Direct government help
This would mean something like:
• Laws explicitly granting monopoly power
• Government enforcement of price-fixing
• Legal protection from competitors
De Beers did not rely on these in most of the 20th century. In that sense, it was “privately
sustained.”
2. Indirect government help
This is subtler. Governments sometimes create conditions that make a private cartel
easier to maintain, even if they aren’t explicitly granting a monopoly. For De Beers, this
included:
1. Colonial control and mining rights:
• De Beers’ early growth in South Africa (late 19th–early 20th century) coincided
with British colonial rule.
• The colonial government granted mining concessions and limited new entrants.
While this wasn’t a “De Beers monopoly law,” it indirectly limited competition,
helping the company consolidate control.
2. Enforcement of property and contract law:
• Cartels like De Beers relied on the ability to enforce contracts with suppliers and
distributors. Governments provided legal systems that allowed De Beers to
punish cheating within its cartel.
• Without legal backing, agreements between independent miners could be
unenforceable, making collusion fragile.
3. Tariffs and trade policies (sometimes):
• Certain countries restricted diamond imports or imposed taxes in ways that
helped De Beers maintain global pricing. These weren’t aimed specifically at De
Beers, but they indirectly reinforced its control.
4. Global legitimacy / recognition:
• Governments, by not prosecuting De Beers aggressively for much of the 20th
century, implicitly allowed it to coordinate supply internationally. U.S. antitrust
authorities didn’t fully intervene until decades later, giving De Beers room to
operate.
Key takeaway
• Direct help: almost none
• Indirect help: yes, mostly through colonial mining rights, legal systems that enforce
contracts, and trade policies that reduced competitive entry.
• So while De Beers’ coercive pricing cartel was largely privately organized, it
benefited from a framework that governments provided, even if unintentionally.
If you want, I can make a clear diagram showing exactly which parts of De Beers’
cartel were purely private vs. which relied on indirect government factors. It makes
this subtlety really easy to visualize.
Do you want me to make that diagram?

 

[lexity]

Q4:
Right. The indirect government help is what I would
include under 'government help'. So please revise the list
so that it reflects those monopolies/cartels who were able
to sustain themselves without direct or indirect
government help.

A4:

Perfect — now we’re talking about truly private coercive monopolies or cartels, with
no direct or indirect government assistance. That is a much stricter standard, so the
list shrinks considerably. Let’s go carefully.
Step 1: Criteria
To count, a monopoly/cartel must be:
1. Coercive: consumers were harmed (higher prices, lower quality)
2. Privately sustained: no legal charter, regulatory protection, colonial concessions,
tariffs, or enforced contracts facilitated by governments
3. Long-lasting: survived enough time to have meaningful market impact
Step 2: Candidate examples
1. Some 19th-century U.S. railroad pools
• Many railroad companies formed pools (agreements to fix rates) in regions where
competition existed.
• Some succeeded briefly in coercively raising prices without direct legal support.
• Problem: these were usually fragile and collapsed once competition entered or courts
intervened.
2. Certain private commodity trading cartels
• 19th-century coffee or sugar trading cartels in Europe sometimes coordinated
supply to raise prices among merchants without relying on governments.
• Short-lived, but effective for months–years.
3. Local or regional monopolies in emerging markets
• Example: small-town grain elevators or mills in the U.S. Midwest occasionally formed
coercive local monopolies.
• These relied on geography (natural scarcity of options) rather than government
intervention.
Step 3: Key observation
Under this strict definition:
• Most famous monopolies/cartels historically relied on some form of
government framework, even indirectly (De Beers, Standard Oil eventually via
patent protections or legal limits on entry, etc.).
• Truly coercive, long-lasting monopolies without any government involvement
are extremely rare, because sustaining coercive pricing generally requires either:
1. Barriers to entry that governments enforce (tariffs, charters, patents, property
rights)
2. Market control so complete that private mechanisms (contracts, supply control,
predatory pricing) are enough
So the list shrinks to small-scale or short-lived private cartels — regional, commodity-
specific, or naturally geographically insulated. There is no major globally recognized
cartel that meets this strict standard.
Refined conclusion
• Large-scale, coercive monopolies cannot sustain themselves for long purely
through private means.
• Small-scale, local, or temporary cartels can exist privately, but they are rare and
usually short-lived.
• This supports the claim: “Coercive monopolies or cartels typically require
government help to be sustained”.
If you want, I can make a concise table showing: Monopoly/Cartel | Coercive? |
Sustained without government? | Duration, which visually shows how rare true private
coercive monopolies are. That makes the pattern very clear.
Do you want me to make that table?

 

[lexity]

Q5:
Numbers 1 and 2 were short-lived. So, do not meet the
sustainable threshold. Even in the case the government
stepped in to halt their operation, this is not conclusive of
evidence that they would not have collapsed if left to the
market, alone.

A5:

Exactly — that’s the crucial point. If we impose the sustainability threshold—say, a
monopoly or cartel that lasted for decades while coercively harming consumers—then the
historical record gets very thin, because:
1. Short-lived private cartels (like the 19th-century railroad pools or commodity trading
agreements) may have lasted months or a few years. Their collapse doesn’t prove
government intervention was required—it only shows they weren’t sustainable in the
long run.
2. Long-lived coercive monopolies almost always needed some form of
government framework (direct or indirect), as in:
• De Beers (indirect colonial/legal support)
• Standard Oil eventually relied on patent law, limited liability frameworks, and
property protections
• Railroads, utilities, and telecommunication monopolies often relied on charters or
regulations to prevent competitors
So, if we define “sustainable” as long-term coercive market power, there is no well-
documented example of a private coercive monopoly or cartel that survived for
decades purely on private mechanisms without any government help.
Key takeaway
• Short-lived private coercive cartels exist, but they don’t meet the sustainability
threshold.
• Long-lasting coercive monopolies or cartels require government support, even
if indirect.
• This makes the statement:
"There has never been a monopoly or cartel that could be sustained without government
help"
…effectively true, when we define:
• coercive
• sustainable
• private
It’s a subtle but important distinction: large-scale market coercion is extremely hard to
maintain without some structural support from law or policy.
If you want, I can summarize this in a crisp framework showing: private vs coercive vs
sustainable vs government-supported, which makes the logic airtight. This is the
clearest way to see why “true private coercive monopolies” essentially don’t exist.
Do you want me to do that?

/end-of-chatgpt-replies

 

[ToxicBunny]

/end-of-chatgpt-replies

Oh so Numbers 1 and 2 and magically short lived because you decided they are?

 

[lexity]

Oh so Numbers 1 and 2 and magically short lived because you decided they are?

Don't be a twat.

You can see the original question has to do with sustainability.

When I asked it to stick to the original sustainable requirement, it removed what it labeled 'short-lived'.

 

[ToxicBunny]

Don't be a twat.

You can see the original question has to do with sustainability.

When I asked it to stick to the original sustainable requirement, it removed what it labeled 'short-lived'.

You still have explicitly answered what Numbers 1 and 2 were exactly. Were they included in a tabular or list from ChatGPT that you magically forgot to provide? or were they examples specifically from the answers that you are vaguely referring to.

Be explicit, WHAT were Numbers 1 and 2 specifically from ChatGPT.

 

[lexity]

You still have explicitly answered what Numbers 1 and 2 were exactly. Were they included in a tabular or list from ChatGPT that you magically forgot to provide? or were they examples specifically from the answers that you are vaguely referring to.

Be explicit, WHAT were Numbers 1 and 2 specifically from ChatGPT.

Some patient soul, please help him out and paste just the numbers 1 and 2 for his lordship.... who needs help in overcoming his 1-line reading comprehension limitation.

 

[ToxicBunny]

Some patient soul, please help him out and paste just the numbers 1 and 2 for his lordship.... who needs help in overcoming his 1-line reading comprehension limitation.

Yes please, cos I've read them all and I don't see a Number 1 is X and Number 2 is Y in the responses.

I'm clearly too stupid for this.

 

[lexity]

Yes please, cos I've read them all and I don't see a Number 1 is X and Number 2 is Y in the responses.

I'm clearly too stupid for this.

From #2202:

Step 2: Candidate examples
1. Some 19th-century U.S. railroad pools
• Many railroad companies formed pools (agreements to fix rates) in regions where
competition existed.
• Some succeeded briefly in coercively raising prices without direct legal support.
• Problem: these were usually fragile and collapsed once competition entered or courts
intervened.
2. Certain private commodity trading cartels
• 19th-century coffee or sugar trading cartels in Europe sometimes coordinated
supply to raise prices among merchants without relying on governments.
• Short-lived, but effective for months–years.

 

[ToxicBunny]

From #2202:

Fsck me he can answer a question sometimes... It's a miracle.

The railroad example was broken by the big evil genocidal state.. You know that hey?

 

[lexity]

The railroad example was broken by the big evil genocidal state.. You know that hey?

Which one?

 

[Grant]

so @lexity , you have been going on and on, page after page about uninvited 3rd parties a threats of violence by "the state".

please give me examples of just 2 nations who's citizens are exempt from all the threats you continually set out, and have the freedom of choice you claimed is denied to us, where monopolies do not / cannot exist.

lets look at those two nations

 

[lexity]

so @lexity , you have been going on and on, page after page about uninvited 3rd parties a threats of violence by "the state".

please give me examples of just 2 nations who's citizens are exempt from all the threats you continually set out, and have the freedom of choice you claimed is denied to us, where monopolies do not / cannot exist.

lets look at those two nations

Why?

You keep doing this, Grant.

If I can't show you 2 nations in which rape no longer happens, I should no longer make the argument against rape(/for consensual sex), on the 'Exit Rape' thread?

Why?

 

[Brian_G]

Why?

'Cos we'd like to model RoWC on it / them?

 

[lexity]

'Cos we'd like to model RoWC on it / them?

If I gave you a theoretical model, you would just say....

.... "but lexity, nobody's done it before."

I know because I already gave you one.

 

[Brian_G]

I know because I already gave you one.

I sort-of remember. What makes that theoretical model so sound, that it's considered by some to be gospel?

 

[Cray]

If I can't show you 2 nations in which rape no longer happens, I should no longer make the argument against rape(/for consensual sex), on the 'Exit Rape' thread?

If you were making a claim that you could prevent rape from happening then yes, you should either be able to point to an example of somewhere where rape does not occur or make a compelling case as to how your solution would solve it.

We know you can't show us even one actual, state with your magical free market so the alternative is for you to make a reasoned and logical argument as to why Lexistan would be the best society for everyone involved. One that solves the problems of consumers getting screwed by shoddy products, them having to conduct their own verifications of food hygiene, health and safety etc. One that solves the issues of big businesses acting with impunity for short term profits....

 

[lexity]

I'll bet there were those plantation-employees, in the South, who when they heard abolitionists going 'on and on' about ending slavery... and yet couldn't show 2 plantations in which slavery had already been abolished, thought they were proving something, when they asked the same question Grant and Brian_G are asking.

 

[Cray]

I'll bet there were those plantation-employees, in the South, who when they heard abolitionists going 'on and on' about ending slavery... and yet couldn't show 2 plantations in which slavery had already been abolished, thought they were proving something, when they asked the same question Grant and Brian_G are asking.

Terrible analogy is terrible. Banning slavery would involve a law to that effect right, as in, intervention from the state, you know, that thing you hate?

 

[lexity]

I sort-of remember. What makes that theoretical model so sound, that it's considered by some to be gospel?

Beggers can't be choosers.

Why do you need proof before you look at a theory?

Are things not bad enough?

That's most probably the case, for you personally, right Brian_G?