Knights and Kapitalists

Marx got feudalism wrong. Medieval knights weren't cunning exploiters hoarding the means of production—they were sacrificial figures whose privilege was justified by their willingness to die in battle. In this episode, I trace the strange transition from sacred warfare to sacred shopping, revealing how European aristocrats literally traded away their power for diamond buckles (Adam Smith's words, not mine). What emerges is a picture Marx couldn't see: capitalism and communism aren't opposites but rival cults worshipping the same materialist idol through different rituals. The real story isn't class struggle—it's Christianity slowly weaning Western civilization off the violent sacred of war toward the (somewhat) less bloody sacred of economic competition. And the communists? They responded to this progress by lunging backward into the most archaic form of resolution: mob formation, scapegoating, and blood sacrifice on an industrial scale.

Part 3 of a 5-part series.