A Boy Named Sue

Claiming and Naming Our Way of Life

Feb 19, 2026

Would you give your worst enemy the power to name your child?

Of course not. You’d never hand that power to someone determined to twist what you love into something shameful. Yet that’s exactly what happened with our way of life: capitalism. For more than 150 years, defenders of trade, enterprise, and upward mobility have argued for the best way forward while pointing to a sign designed to make that path look predatory.

And yes, I know how dramatic that sounds. But if you’ve ever watched a conversation tilt the instant a loaded word gets dropped on the table, you know what I mean.

A Pejorative Purpose-built for Propaganda

The defenders of economic freedom - Adam Smith and the thinkers who articulated the principles of voluntary exchange and natural coordination - didn’t call what they described “capitalism.” The Wealth of Nations (1776) doesn’t use the word. Neither do many of the classical liberals who followed. They called it commerce, liberty, free trade, a natural system of cooperation - the ordinary truth that when people are free to create value and exchange honestly, prosperity spreads.

The word “capitalism” didn’t originate with the people practicing voluntary exchange. It was popularized largely by critics - most famously Marx and the socialist tradition that sought to replace the system they were labeling. They needed a term that emphasized capital and power rather than agency and consent. They needed a word that made everyday productive cooperation sound like a machine. So they turned one of the best of human activities into an “ism” - and we’ve been arguing based on that false assertion ever since.

Here’s the trap: when you defend capitalism using your opponent’s framing, you end up defending a nasty caricature. It’s the feeling when you’re suddenly defending things you never said you supported. It’s like trying to build something with a hammer that swings back into your forehead on every strike.

The Ethical Capitalist: Adversity as Asset

“I knew you’d have to get tough or die - it’s that name that made you strong.” Johnny Cash, “A Boy Named Sue”

Full disclosure: “Ethical Capitalism” isn’t winning any elegant phrase awards. It’s sort of hulking, direct and on the nose. But that’s part of why it works.

Some names let you hide. Ethical Capitalism forces you into the open. It demands you explain what you’re doing, how you’re doing it, and why your success should be respected rather than reviled. It turns the conversation from exchanging slogans and soundbites to focusing on clear and high standards. It insists that you state your convictions plainly - and it makes you sharper every time you do.

Just like “Sue” made that boy a target, declaring that you are an ethical capitalist makes you a target for lazy thinkers. And that’s the point: it compels clarity in any debate, and focuses the discussion on a rational, coherent framework. (Also: if you have a name that does that job better, I’m listening.)

Ethical Capitalism is capitalism accurately articulated: individual agency engaging consequence through voluntary exchange. Transparency that earns trust. Accountability that links effort to outcome. The right to create value, to keep what you earn, and to rise through competence and will.

Don’t Undervalue Your Own Good

If you’re doing your best to be thoughtful and fair - whether you run a food cart, manage a portfolio, or build things with your hands - you’re already practicing Ethical Capitalism. You just didn’t have a precise name for it.

You’re not waiting for some policy change or corporate reform. You’re living it.

The food cart vendor who tells a new customer, “I’m light on chicken today - take two dollars off,” because their supplier came up short? That’s Ethical Capitalism. The contractor who opens their own shop because they want to do things the right way? Ethical Capitalism. The CFO who tells investors, “We’re investing where you won’t see immediate upside, because protecting the downside is important to my team and me.” Ethical Capitalism.

As I realize none of this is glamorous, it strikes me how often wealthy, “glamorous” people declare themselves “anti-capitalist,” go figure (leave that one to the psychologists). Virtually all of what makes a society prosperous and decent is not glamorous, so it’s hard not to think of them as free-riders.

Align with the Best of Your Nature

Critics often describe “capitalism” as if it’s only Wall Street, billionaires, and exploitation - something that happens above your head. But the truth is easy to see if you look away from their distractions: this system is made of human choices, repeated at every scale. Every time you create value and exchange it thoughtfully. Every time you build trust through competence. Every time you sense satisfaction because you did the work and delivered the result.

So when someone attacks “capitalism,” listen carefully to what they’re actually targeting: the dignity of agency. The idea that individual choice and will can shape a future - by risking, building, learning, trading, failing, improving, and trying again. We all know that what is called capitalism can be twisted into something ugly: “Crony Capitalism,” Socialism’s kissing cousin. When market power concentrates, when politics and business conspire, when fraud hides behind complexity, when costs get dumped on everyone else, “free market” becomes just another story people tell while coercion and manipulation drain resources. People are right to hate that. The mistake is calling those failures “capitalism” as if they’re its essence. They’re violations of the very conditions that make exchange legitimate: consent, transparency, accountability, and real competition. Ethical Capitalism doesn’t ask you to excuse the abuse - it gives you a strong standard to condemn it, prevent it, and refuse to benefit from it.

Reclaim the Ground you Build On

Ethical Capitalism isn’t a branding exercise. It’s a standard: if you want the rewards of the system, you accept the responsibility that makes it work best for you and everyone else. You take risk, you tell the truth, you deliver, you own the outcomes. And you refuse the shortcuts that turn a free market system into a rigged one. The propaganda worked better than it should have because we accepted the frame. They named it to weaken it. And we helped by repeating it like a spell.

“Ethical Capitalism” breaks the spell. It restores what the word should have meant all along: freedom with accountability, agency with consequence, commerce with integrity. Ethical Capitalism is how we take the ground back - not as theory, but as lived practice. By naming it plainly. By showing what it means in action - individually, in teams, in organizations - wherever humans create value and exchange it with intention.

So tell it the way “Sue” would support: you don’t get to hide behind excuses, and you don’t get to hide behind cynicism either. You stand up for your work, telling the truth, owning the outcomes, sharing what you’ve learned when it helps others.

You built on this ground, it’s yours, reclaim it.

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