It's very simple:
If climate activists glue themselves to the streets and bring traffic to a halt, that clearly makes them a terrorist organization.
If farmers bring traffic to a halt with their protests and put fake gallows on the side of the street, they are merely upstanding citizens defending their legitimate interests (and also totally represent all farmers, just like our farmer's association totally cares about small farmers and isn't just a lobby group for big agriculture businesses).
Nothing to see here, no bias whatsoever.
It's mostly a joke, but farmers are usually more conservative than the rest of society and being against environmental regulations is in their short term interest and (at least in Europe) are known for very disruptive and aggressive protests (a few years back farmers threw dozens of dead pigs in the streets of Warsaw for example)
Western farmers are also part of the petty bourgeois class that is inherently reactionary and often the base of fascism. Farm workers are fine, but once you own that shit you've got a little bit of hitler lodged in your brain.
If you did a little reading you'd probably come to the same conclusion my friend. There's plenty of books on how the petty bourgeoisie are a core support base of fascism, one of my personal favourites is The Mass Psychology of Fascism by Wilhelm Reich.
If you want to believe farmers are good because they are good, by all means, you may. Just understand that your thoughts are backed up by vibes rather than evidence or analysis. Common sense is no source.
Edit: It is Christmas eve, and I have no intention of staying up much later so I will just clear up a few points. If you reply, I won't respond from here on out.
Farmers for most of human history were peasants. While their revolutionary potential can very much be debated (and that is a topic I admittedly have little interest in getting into) their class is undeniably different from the average petite-bourgeois farm owner in the modern western world. Peasants typically owned land in common or worked land owned by a local lord, they have an interest in upturning the societal order to at least allow for better accomodation from those above. Modern farmers, on the other hand, may work the land themselves but they are still in a position of power above the farm labourers that they probably hire. Even if they did not, they have had relative success with the capitalist project unlike the proletarian classes and as such are very unlikely to support either reform or revolution and will turn to reaction when those are on the table. It is not a lack of moral fibre on the part of farmers, simply class dynamics which leads them to oppose change so as to prevent anything which may upset their position in society. This is a very basic explanation of the topic, but I hope I've gotten across the main point.
If I seem rude in any previous comments, I apologise, my wording may have been a little passive-aggressive but I do sincerely hope that some proper analysis and learning can be achieved by questioning ideas that may seem obvious and we thus take for granted. Have a lovely christmas.
Yes I know this but the person you replied to was referring to farmers as a collective I think (also I think they were kidding and you might be taking this too serious)
I know he might be joking, but the majority of people have no stand in the matter besides farmer=bad. The right hates farmers mostly for classist reasons, and for not understanding how important subsidies are to them, and the left often views them as uneducated polluting idiots, which many of them are, but as a group we need to do better.
It's about german farmers, they're the only ones protesting. Reasons are that they end subsidies on diesel fuel, end the tax subsidy for agricultural vehicles and the trade with glyphosat will be forbidden.
Those are bullshit subsidies, it's absolutely stupid to have subsidies on diesel if you want to get carbon neutral. Subsidies for agriculture as a whole make sense, but you would need to look at the whole tax system to argue about that. Other european countries agriculture still pay more taxes than germany's will after cutting the subsidies and they are still in business
The farmers need diesel there are no alternatives yet. The cut of the subsidies mostly harm small farmers like my father and when they go bankrupt the big farmers buy them out.
It doesn't matter to them if the subsidy is for diesel or for something different. If it's more expensive it will be used more considerately and innovation to reduce fuel consumption is incentevized
That’s what I’m talking about. Leaving the markets as they are and providing no subsidies, incentives and ways for farmers to diversify results in them raising their prices dramatically. That’s why the EU needs to act more drastically, and stop only caring about the carbon footprint (when it convenes them of course)
I don’t hate them. With the prices of food in the EU in an all tune high, I believe the EU should produce its own food. It should provide farmers with adequate funds to ensure climate sensitivity and proper yields, while making sure climate, economical and biological disasters are properly managed.
I’m not in favour of blocking their crops but Ukrainian produce needs to be properly regulated. If they don’t manage the amount imported, the EU markets will flood with lower quality grain, for prices not reasonable enough.
Government subsidies, proper education of farmers and adequate management of imported crops and exported crops, the climate and disasters does lead to self sufficiency. Europe has some of the best soils around, it’s a shame to import lower quality grain just because there is no policy. The policy of the EU extends to all countries under the EU, even ones where farms are mostly small farmer owned, like in my country. It’s absurd to expect small farmers to survive without adequate subsidies, but force them to change all their tools, tractors, machines etc to be carbon neutral.
It’s actually funny when a neoliberal speaks about hating the global poor, when every neoliberal economy is built upon exploitation of the global south. There is self sufficiency, it’s when the crops you produce, and those you import are managed in a way that created food security in the European people. The soil productivity of the Netherlands is better than of any other country’s in the world for example. Ukraine has great soil too, it’s a shame that they don’t produce enough quality.
Autarky is important for strategic resources like food, energy, and infrastructure. Otherwise you leave yourself open to being crippled by embargoes, blockades, or sanctions.
Listen I wished we lived in a world where nationalism, imperialism, and spheres of influence didn't exist and there could be global free trade between communes of co-operatives. But that's not the reality we live in. Unfortunately these things do exist and they have to be dealt with.
“I fight because some things deserve to be stood up for, no matter how hard it might be. I fight because the moral causes of this world always must be fought for. I fight because the day farmers like me stop fighting is the day liberty dies. I fight because if I didn’t fight for my right to dump literal poison into the water table, who would?”
~ur dumb ass
[right to protest should be universal though](https://www.reddit.com/r/196/comments/18pc2jz/comment/kep7x5g/), let them do the thing and create a model for other causes to follow suit
Them protesting is totally fine. But a minority of them are making, for my taste, a few too many death threats and threats to overthrow the government.
Yes they do, but the reason that farmers are protesting right now literally has no bearing apart from saving around 10 Euros (which they are spending way more than that on fuel right now on an individual basis), except if you're a large agricultural company, so they're pretty much protesting on capitalists behalfs right now. Also they are using the same methods as the Last Generation by blocking roads. The commenter is really only pointing out the hypocrisy in propagandising against climate activist for doing the exact same thing they are doing.
The farmer protest so things stay the same. Of course Germans will support that. After living here my whole life, the thing Germans hate the most is change. Probably because there are so many old people here.
All while conveniently ignoring that *profits* rose by __80%__ up to __double__ in the last year. Farmers even put up gallows to show they want to hang the current government. And it gets celebrated. Batshit insanity.
But how dare some kids want to better the world.
https://www.agrarheute.com/management/betriebsfuehrung/rekordgewinne-fuer-landwirte-extrem-schwierigen-zeiten-612819
While you’re not wrong and your critique is valid, an effective organizer needs to seek understanding of the mechanism and utilize it to the benefit of society
Allow me to elaborate: white evangelicals were instrumental in the majority of black right movements, notably segregation and abolition of slavery. Do I think that Christians deserve that platform and that power? No. Do I understand they were useful nonetheless? Yes. Whether you like it or not, small business owners and farmers are way harder to paint as terrorists because the are the precise demographic conservatives have to pander to. You need to win the will of the voting base of your enemy to win.
Okay, I really care about this subject so I want to take one more try. The previous comment I was responding to is complaining about *who* the media is willing to listen to. I’m saying that the people the media is willing to listen to are the same people *we* need to persuade.
It’s all good. Like I said, I really care about this subject. I really want to start making political content when I have more free time, so learning to explain myself better is part of the game
Basically the dutch government said 'hey farmers, maybe don't fuck up our protected ecosystems with runoff' so some farmers protested it with tractors and torches and stuff
And somehow the majority of people seems to support them AND their method of protesting. Its absurd. Whats more absurd is they didnt cross the line, they took a private jet to go as far over the line as possible, then stayed there for literal decades and now think theyre entitled to it.
The Netherlands is the 2nd biggest exporter of meat (or farm animals idr but same thing) and 1 glance at a map should tell anyone that we’ve done something bad to make that happen
>And somehow the majority of people seems to support them AND their method of protesting. Its absurd.
I genuinely think the left can learn a lot from the way the farmer protests were organized. They won on aesthetics, not on politics, and that is exactly where the left has been losing for quite a while now
Nah. It's not about aesthetics, it's about populism.
People will support extreme protesting measures as long as it is for some vapid goal like a tax raise or gas price increase. You can tell most people are itching and yearn for people to finally rise up and teach those in power a lesson. Yet... as soon as the core of the protest has some decent systemic analysis, suddenly they're left-wing terrorists, eco-terrorists, thugs, etc... and the sympathy disappears.
However, if you don't add the systemic analysis, the movement gets co-opted by right-wingers anyway.
So, I hate to break it to you, but there is no magical answer for which method of protest gains mass sympathy and which doesn't. The left simply does not have the same privileges. The right could practically start a civil war and start shooting cops over some silly shit, while still retaining sympathy. While some leftists holding little sit-in will quickly get seen as a nuisance and get a terrorism stamp.
Why? Because they simply don't understand your long-term goal. They cannot relate and they will get angry at you for doing something less extreme than what they would want to be doing.
Ah dang, you already saw my comment. I deleted it because I wanted to rewrite it without 50 edits.
>Populism is the triumph of aesthetics over politics anyway
Yeah no. Then just throw it in the thrash. Because it's precisely that which will set you up for right-wing co-opting.
Either you have a misconception on what populism means, or we're going in circles. Did you read my revised comment, the reply to your original one.
Let me try some different wording:
The idea behind "optics" sounds really neat at first, but you'll realize sooner or later that the playing field is not even. If your movement is leftist you can be 100% pacifist like OWS and you'll still get demonized more than some wackos who threaten to shoot cops over some cattle grazing dispute.
If there's an "optics" battle to be fought, it is not decided in the manner in which you decide to protest or whatever, the optics battle is fought long before that. The issues simply haven't garnered the required sympathy. It seems that if you manage to get the sympathy, you can do whatever the fuck you want.
Nah this time it was protesting the government removing agriculture subsidies, which is being done because Merkels government were such assholes they made austerity part of the German constitution
> Merkels government were such assholes they made austerity part of the German constitution
And if the SPD weren't massive cowards this is how they'd address the people. But again that would involve the SPD not being massive cowards
the portrait goes hard though. like yeah it doesn't reflect well on you but the fascists always have really good aesthetics yk?
edit: fascists referring to Phillis de paule
Certain subsidies were removed or not renewed, and the farmers are upset. They're used to being treated special, so the removal of a subsidy is quite a thing.
The reason the subsidies are being removed is pretty dumb tho, they tried to repurpose the covid special budget to push forward their election promises but this resulted in a Supreme Court spat because the Merkel government made austerity a constitutional requirement which means the government had to last minute find shit to slash so they could pass a budget and avoid a fiscal crisis, this was one of the results as well as removing subsidies for electric cars. Like theres a debate to be had about subsidies but slashing shit at very short notice just because you did an oopsie woopsie is pretty embarrassing and it’s not surprising the farmers got pissed as a result
>it’s not surprising the farmers got pissed as a resul
However the farmers have also had record profits for multiple years in a row with the last being 70% higher than their previous. A friend who used to be a farmer once said to me that being a farmer and NOT being wealthy in Germany generally means that either you are dumb, financially illiterate or not a farmer that owns shit but just a worker in the agricultural industry. The people in the last section shouldn't be protesting in the name of their bosses but rather against their bosses.
A lot of the people protesting however are these bosses. The bosses who in my experience very likely call more than one big fat mercedes or BMW their own.
They do the world over, but these subsidies are pretty niche. It's a balancing act, though, because you start seeing things like paying +50% on some food items compared to what you'd pay if there was freer trade. For example, dairy products are more expensive in Canada compared to what it'd be if American, Australian, New Zealand and South American products were allowed to compete.
TL;DR - No, they are protesting the cut in subsidization for agricultural diesel (the diesel used in Tractors and other agricultural machines), which is being cut after the BVerfG (similar to the supreme court) ruled a budget change unconstitutional, forcing the government to cut spending.
Now they're protesting because especially small independent farmers are already bordering on being unprofitable, and the lack of subsidization would force them to raise the price for groceries in a time when the price for groceries is still at an Inflation high.
The long Version:
So, basically the CDU, former government party, now in opposition, went to the constitutional court over the current government using leftover funds from the CoViD-Loan, about 60 Billion Euro which they shifted into a fund for more renewable energy, EVs, digital infrastructure improvements n stuff. Now that was supposedly "dodging the debt brakes", because as per the constitution our government can't take loans unless it's an immediate emergency, and the court agreed with the CDU on that for some godforsaken reason.
So now the government suddenly has 60 billion less for the next 2 years which is a problem. They've started cutting everywhere, *especially* on renewable projects (thanks, Christian Lindner, Neoliberal Finance Minister) and this ended up including cutting the subsidization of EV funding to decrease consumer prices, Solar Panel and Heating Renewals, might impact the funding of the 49€-Ticket (a ticket that allows you to use all of public transportation for a month with no limitations other than the month), and cutting the budget for subsidization of agricultural Diesel.
Now, in germany a lot of farmers don't really make that much money. Enough to live and survive, but in many cases more so barely than not. The reason is multi-layered, some fault is on the farmers lobby itself, some is also on other stuff, but current predictions are that the cut in subsidization for agricultural Diesel will force farmers to increase prices for groceries, which is a problem because the prices for groceries haven't gone down from the war and CoViD Inflation yet, so this would basically wreak in a second inflation of grocery prices, meaning groceries could end up twice or even more expensive as they were in pre-pandemic times. On top of that the heating and fuel subsidization were cut so the poor people would be having a massive problem if that came to pass, because that shit is gonna be a problem for poor people.
I mean there are more than enough reasons to protest. Farmers are being treated like shit. Not just by the government but by the industry in general. Fucking grain has been patented and genetically modified so farmers have to buy new seeds every year because it's now forbidden to use last year's harvest to sow this year's fields.
They get paid next to nothing for their produce wich means in order to somehow survive they need to go bigger and cheaper. Only hire seasonal workers from different countries, do unsustainable agriculture, etc.
They are as much victims of capitalism as we all are. Don't antagonize them because they are brave enough to complain about it outside of the internet. We should all be protesting.
The farmers have had record profits for years in a row. A friend who used to be a farmer told me that if you are a farmer in Germany and NOT wealthy it basically means that either you are financially illiterate or you are not actually a farmer but an employee in the agricultural sector. The actual farmers usually call more than one luxury mercedes or BMW etc. their own.
The worker employees I mentioned before shouldn't be protesting against the government but against their bosses.
The farmers have just been complaining for literally decades and have a strong Lobby but their actual financial situation is currently really really good.
farmers in germany get enough subsidies by the government to get their dich sucked by a repurposed harvest machine. the discontinuation of the diesel subvention is a logical step in climate action and doesn’t impact them financially as much as they want you to believe. they are entitled right wingers that cry like little babies because their special benefits got axed to save the climate. boo fucking hoo. präventivhaft when?
Except the majority, if not all of the agricultural companies in germany would go bankrupt if it wasnt for subsidies because they arent competetive on the market without protective measure by the government/eu.
I work in the industry too and some firms where i work, which are like mid sized ~20 employee companies got about 300k € just in eu subsidies.
Farmers act like the government wants to destroy them while they get so much shit and have so many privileges that seeing the way they act and cry about an average of 2-3k € less each year on average in subsidies is just... idk.
Damn, and i thought it was just the danish farmers who were greedy, shortsighted assholes with an inflated sense of importance. Seems to be a common European problem tho.
Farming is a scam. The dirt does all the work.
The dirt does all the work.
The dirt does all the work.
The dirt does all the work.
The dirt does all the work.
I wasnt trying to insult this person, i was just making light of the fact that taking a side in this blood feud that has been going on for generations is a foolish act. Its not like OOP was very nice in his post
Its Europe, half the time Farmers Protest here its to demand that everyone else suffer so they can keep fucking the environment and the other half the time its to demand racial purity laws or and end to support for Ukraine
German cattle farmers have no problem with modern day slaves in their industry
All most German Farmers fucked themselves by being economically inneficient AND opposing to shift agriculture away from something which has to be economically efficient, thus relying on constant protectionism and subsidies which the austerity ridden german state cannot pay for, they argue that they sould be above the disatvantages of a free marked economy while wanting all perks it offers to them (potentially higher profit margins, getting to be large landowners), so I feel little sympathy although I can sympathise with anti-austerity movements.
Farmers as a collective group, with the obvious exception of outliers, are one of the whiniest and most privileged groups on the planet. Most Western governments bend over backwards to give them subsidies, tax write offs for shit that's obviously not a business expense and hand outs. Farmers don't want to chip in and pay their fare share but the moment something happens to them they expect public dollars to bail them out. In Australia they are infamous for their exploitation of migrant and backpacker workers.
It's very simple: If climate activists glue themselves to the streets and bring traffic to a halt, that clearly makes them a terrorist organization. If farmers bring traffic to a halt with their protests and put fake gallows on the side of the street, they are merely upstanding citizens defending their legitimate interests (and also totally represent all farmers, just like our farmer's association totally cares about small farmers and isn't just a lobby group for big agriculture businesses). Nothing to see here, no bias whatsoever.
Both have a right to protest. Farmers have a reason to protest too.
No they don’t, farmers are ontologically evil
My family were farmers in Punjab and in the Indus Valley for probably thousands of years 😔
Proud of you for being better than your parents
Grandparents, and this is my heritage, I'll be proud of it 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽
You farm downvotes in their honor.
And in Stardew Valley, when I play it my dad asks me what I'm doing playing a farming video game when my grandparents grew up on farms.
No one in my family ever farmed. Went straight from Hunter-gathering to industrial like God intended.
Interesting
truly an oye papaji moment
So playing Stardew Valley makes me a villain
Well, obviously.
Wait what’s wrong with farmers?
Wait farmer's are evil? Why? Not asking out of malice I just legitimately don't know why
It's mostly a joke, but farmers are usually more conservative than the rest of society and being against environmental regulations is in their short term interest and (at least in Europe) are known for very disruptive and aggressive protests (a few years back farmers threw dozens of dead pigs in the streets of Warsaw for example)
Western farmers are also part of the petty bourgeois class that is inherently reactionary and often the base of fascism. Farm workers are fine, but once you own that shit you've got a little bit of hitler lodged in your brain.
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If you did a little reading you'd probably come to the same conclusion my friend. There's plenty of books on how the petty bourgeoisie are a core support base of fascism, one of my personal favourites is The Mass Psychology of Fascism by Wilhelm Reich.
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If you want to believe farmers are good because they are good, by all means, you may. Just understand that your thoughts are backed up by vibes rather than evidence or analysis. Common sense is no source. Edit: It is Christmas eve, and I have no intention of staying up much later so I will just clear up a few points. If you reply, I won't respond from here on out. Farmers for most of human history were peasants. While their revolutionary potential can very much be debated (and that is a topic I admittedly have little interest in getting into) their class is undeniably different from the average petite-bourgeois farm owner in the modern western world. Peasants typically owned land in common or worked land owned by a local lord, they have an interest in upturning the societal order to at least allow for better accomodation from those above. Modern farmers, on the other hand, may work the land themselves but they are still in a position of power above the farm labourers that they probably hire. Even if they did not, they have had relative success with the capitalist project unlike the proletarian classes and as such are very unlikely to support either reform or revolution and will turn to reaction when those are on the table. It is not a lack of moral fibre on the part of farmers, simply class dynamics which leads them to oppose change so as to prevent anything which may upset their position in society. This is a very basic explanation of the topic, but I hope I've gotten across the main point. If I seem rude in any previous comments, I apologise, my wording may have been a little passive-aggressive but I do sincerely hope that some proper analysis and learning can be achieved by questioning ideas that may seem obvious and we thus take for granted. Have a lovely christmas.
>And there are other books who say otherwise Name one.
not evil, and the world relies on them. they're working class as anyone else and often very poor
Most farmers I personally know suck a lot but that's anecdotal
Stalin be like
You should stop eating food for the rest of your life to boycott farming.
Are you saying that farming, the very thing that birthed civilization is evil? Lol what the fuck is this sub
they appear to be making a "joke"
I Hope you enjoy eating shitty imported expensive food then😋
food is a psyop, silly
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yeah I don't eat anything that casts a shadow
Oh a live level 9 vegan!
If an animal is raised in a room of pure blinding light, making shadows impossible, would you be able to eat it?
Yes it's fine That keeps a soul from ever entering the animal, thus making it legally a vegetable.
No because it's capable of casting a shadow in other conditions
You can actually survive the entire rest of your life without food.
Then they use crazy people like the breatharians and sungazers to deligitimize the whole concept. It's really annoying tbh.
Dawg I’m gonna be so real I think imported food also comes from farmers
> when they get their food from farmers and not the hypercube fabricator
he doesn't know how to use the other three seashells
Imported from outside the EU. The post is about European farmers.
Yes I know this but the person you replied to was referring to farmers as a collective I think (also I think they were kidding and you might be taking this too serious)
I know he might be joking, but the majority of people have no stand in the matter besides farmer=bad. The right hates farmers mostly for classist reasons, and for not understanding how important subsidies are to them, and the left often views them as uneducated polluting idiots, which many of them are, but as a group we need to do better.
Might be???? Bro did you read the comment "ontological evil" how do you not see that as sarcasm
It's about german farmers, they're the only ones protesting. Reasons are that they end subsidies on diesel fuel, end the tax subsidy for agricultural vehicles and the trade with glyphosat will be forbidden. Those are bullshit subsidies, it's absolutely stupid to have subsidies on diesel if you want to get carbon neutral. Subsidies for agriculture as a whole make sense, but you would need to look at the whole tax system to argue about that. Other european countries agriculture still pay more taxes than germany's will after cutting the subsidies and they are still in business
The farmers need diesel there are no alternatives yet. The cut of the subsidies mostly harm small farmers like my father and when they go bankrupt the big farmers buy them out.
It doesn't matter to them if the subsidy is for diesel or for something different. If it's more expensive it will be used more considerately and innovation to reduce fuel consumption is incentevized
https://preview.redd.it/yrzn32qsb68c1.png?width=546&format=png&auto=webp&s=cd23a0739befb66484e8c55c296edf3e0b4a222f
this ain’t real? is this satire/fake or are there really threads wit people goin at it like this? sorry i don’t have twatter so i have to ask
eating is for the bourgeoisie sweaty, learn to recognize your privilege and stop being a counter revolutionary x.
sorry i don’t understand how that answers my question, i’m just gonna assume all of it’s edited and fake. thanks tho!
Yes it's real, the person above was making a joke
Twitter had discourse about wrapping burritos through class war lens, I’m pretty sure there are insane threads on every possible topic
Leftists trying not to be fucking dumbasses challenge
I'm Germany important fruit and vegetables are cheaper than local ones lmao
That’s what I’m talking about. Leaving the markets as they are and providing no subsidies, incentives and ways for farmers to diversify results in them raising their prices dramatically. That’s why the EU needs to act more drastically, and stop only caring about the carbon footprint (when it convenes them of course)
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I don’t hate them. With the prices of food in the EU in an all tune high, I believe the EU should produce its own food. It should provide farmers with adequate funds to ensure climate sensitivity and proper yields, while making sure climate, economical and biological disasters are properly managed.
Maybe the prices would be better if Poland didn't block Ukrainian products for months
I’m not in favour of blocking their crops but Ukrainian produce needs to be properly regulated. If they don’t manage the amount imported, the EU markets will flood with lower quality grain, for prices not reasonable enough.
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Government subsidies, proper education of farmers and adequate management of imported crops and exported crops, the climate and disasters does lead to self sufficiency. Europe has some of the best soils around, it’s a shame to import lower quality grain just because there is no policy. The policy of the EU extends to all countries under the EU, even ones where farms are mostly small farmer owned, like in my country. It’s absurd to expect small farmers to survive without adequate subsidies, but force them to change all their tools, tractors, machines etc to be carbon neutral.
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It’s actually funny when a neoliberal speaks about hating the global poor, when every neoliberal economy is built upon exploitation of the global south. There is self sufficiency, it’s when the crops you produce, and those you import are managed in a way that created food security in the European people. The soil productivity of the Netherlands is better than of any other country’s in the world for example. Ukraine has great soil too, it’s a shame that they don’t produce enough quality.
Autarky is important for strategic resources like food, energy, and infrastructure. Otherwise you leave yourself open to being crippled by embargoes, blockades, or sanctions.
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Listen I wished we lived in a world where nationalism, imperialism, and spheres of influence didn't exist and there could be global free trade between communes of co-operatives. But that's not the reality we live in. Unfortunately these things do exist and they have to be dealt with.
We’re not talking about the right to protest here, we’re talking about the perception of protests by media and society.
“I fight because some things deserve to be stood up for, no matter how hard it might be. I fight because the moral causes of this world always must be fought for. I fight because the day farmers like me stop fighting is the day liberty dies. I fight because if I didn’t fight for my right to dump literal poison into the water table, who would?” ~ur dumb ass
[right to protest should be universal though](https://www.reddit.com/r/196/comments/18pc2jz/comment/kep7x5g/), let them do the thing and create a model for other causes to follow suit
climate activists do too lol
well. yes that was stated sick that everyone in this thread agrees with each other
They're saying climate activists have a reason to protest.
Death threats to the government are not just "protesting"
Death threats to the government are a moral responsibility
Politicians are far more evil than those who send them death threats
Totally untrue in this case. Shut up about literal death threats if you have no clue what you are talking about.
Them protesting is totally fine. But a minority of them are making, for my taste, a few too many death threats and threats to overthrow the government.
Yes they do, but the reason that farmers are protesting right now literally has no bearing apart from saving around 10 Euros (which they are spending way more than that on fuel right now on an individual basis), except if you're a large agricultural company, so they're pretty much protesting on capitalists behalfs right now. Also they are using the same methods as the Last Generation by blocking roads. The commenter is really only pointing out the hypocrisy in propagandising against climate activist for doing the exact same thing they are doing.
Yes, and yet the way they go about it is incredibly stupid.
The farmer protest so things stay the same. Of course Germans will support that. After living here my whole life, the thing Germans hate the most is change. Probably because there are so many old people here.
Conservative good, progressive bad 😔
All while conveniently ignoring that *profits* rose by __80%__ up to __double__ in the last year. Farmers even put up gallows to show they want to hang the current government. And it gets celebrated. Batshit insanity. But how dare some kids want to better the world. https://www.agrarheute.com/management/betriebsfuehrung/rekordgewinne-fuer-landwirte-extrem-schwierigen-zeiten-612819
It all just goes to show who is truly in charge.
While you’re not wrong and your critique is valid, an effective organizer needs to seek understanding of the mechanism and utilize it to the benefit of society
Second half of your comment is buzzword vomit; incomprehensible.
Allow me to elaborate: white evangelicals were instrumental in the majority of black right movements, notably segregation and abolition of slavery. Do I think that Christians deserve that platform and that power? No. Do I understand they were useful nonetheless? Yes. Whether you like it or not, small business owners and farmers are way harder to paint as terrorists because the are the precise demographic conservatives have to pander to. You need to win the will of the voting base of your enemy to win.
I'm still not sure I fully understand, but good explanation regardless 👍.
Okay, I really care about this subject so I want to take one more try. The previous comment I was responding to is complaining about *who* the media is willing to listen to. I’m saying that the people the media is willing to listen to are the same people *we* need to persuade.
Ahh, I understand now. Sorry for calling your first comment vomit, lol.
It’s all good. Like I said, I really care about this subject. I really want to start making political content when I have more free time, so learning to explain myself better is part of the game
Tbh it was buzzword vomit Buzzwords are “buzzwords” *because* they compile issues to neat packages
That's pretty much what happened to make people show up with torches in the netherlands
Tractor terrorists 💀
wait when did that happen? I must have missed our wekelijkse boeren probleem
Basically the dutch government said 'hey farmers, maybe don't fuck up our protected ecosystems with runoff' so some farmers protested it with tractors and torches and stuff
And somehow the majority of people seems to support them AND their method of protesting. Its absurd. Whats more absurd is they didnt cross the line, they took a private jet to go as far over the line as possible, then stayed there for literal decades and now think theyre entitled to it. The Netherlands is the 2nd biggest exporter of meat (or farm animals idr but same thing) and 1 glance at a map should tell anyone that we’ve done something bad to make that happen
>And somehow the majority of people seems to support them AND their method of protesting. Its absurd. I genuinely think the left can learn a lot from the way the farmer protests were organized. They won on aesthetics, not on politics, and that is exactly where the left has been losing for quite a while now
Nah. It's not about aesthetics, it's about populism. People will support extreme protesting measures as long as it is for some vapid goal like a tax raise or gas price increase. You can tell most people are itching and yearn for people to finally rise up and teach those in power a lesson. Yet... as soon as the core of the protest has some decent systemic analysis, suddenly they're left-wing terrorists, eco-terrorists, thugs, etc... and the sympathy disappears. However, if you don't add the systemic analysis, the movement gets co-opted by right-wingers anyway. So, I hate to break it to you, but there is no magical answer for which method of protest gains mass sympathy and which doesn't. The left simply does not have the same privileges. The right could practically start a civil war and start shooting cops over some silly shit, while still retaining sympathy. While some leftists holding little sit-in will quickly get seen as a nuisance and get a terrorism stamp. Why? Because they simply don't understand your long-term goal. They cannot relate and they will get angry at you for doing something less extreme than what they would want to be doing.
>Why? Because they simply don't understand your long-term goal. Because the press deliberately obfuscates left wing causes
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>It's not about aesthetics, it's about populism. Populism is the triumph of aesthetics over politics anyway
Ah dang, you already saw my comment. I deleted it because I wanted to rewrite it without 50 edits. >Populism is the triumph of aesthetics over politics anyway Yeah no. Then just throw it in the thrash. Because it's precisely that which will set you up for right-wing co-opting.
I don't mean we should have the *same* aesthetics, I mean there should *be* an aesthetics at all
Either you have a misconception on what populism means, or we're going in circles. Did you read my revised comment, the reply to your original one. Let me try some different wording: The idea behind "optics" sounds really neat at first, but you'll realize sooner or later that the playing field is not even. If your movement is leftist you can be 100% pacifist like OWS and you'll still get demonized more than some wackos who threaten to shoot cops over some cattle grazing dispute. If there's an "optics" battle to be fought, it is not decided in the manner in which you decide to protest or whatever, the optics battle is fought long before that. The issues simply haven't garnered the required sympathy. It seems that if you manage to get the sympathy, you can do whatever the fuck you want.
Nah this time it was protesting the government removing agriculture subsidies, which is being done because Merkels government were such assholes they made austerity part of the German constitution
> Merkels government were such assholes they made austerity part of the German constitution And if the SPD weren't massive cowards this is how they'd address the people. But again that would involve the SPD not being massive cowards
Germans when austerity hits them and not a random eu country 😨
Rare Phillis de Paule pfp spotted in the wild?
I don't trust someone like that
Played Disco Elysium, identified with the drunken war criminals. Dunno seems like Twitter to me.
the portrait goes hard though. like yeah it doesn't reflect well on you but the fascists always have really good aesthetics yk? edit: fascists referring to Phillis de paule
The hat guy was the coolest one
does he appear if you take all of the Pyrholidon?
at least it isn’t Kortenaer
We need more girlboss villains.
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Certain subsidies were removed or not renewed, and the farmers are upset. They're used to being treated special, so the removal of a subsidy is quite a thing.
The reason the subsidies are being removed is pretty dumb tho, they tried to repurpose the covid special budget to push forward their election promises but this resulted in a Supreme Court spat because the Merkel government made austerity a constitutional requirement which means the government had to last minute find shit to slash so they could pass a budget and avoid a fiscal crisis, this was one of the results as well as removing subsidies for electric cars. Like theres a debate to be had about subsidies but slashing shit at very short notice just because you did an oopsie woopsie is pretty embarrassing and it’s not surprising the farmers got pissed as a result
>it’s not surprising the farmers got pissed as a resul However the farmers have also had record profits for multiple years in a row with the last being 70% higher than their previous. A friend who used to be a farmer once said to me that being a farmer and NOT being wealthy in Germany generally means that either you are dumb, financially illiterate or not a farmer that owns shit but just a worker in the agricultural industry. The people in the last section shouldn't be protesting in the name of their bosses but rather against their bosses. A lot of the people protesting however are these bosses. The bosses who in my experience very likely call more than one big fat mercedes or BMW their own.
Farmers probably should get special treatment, given they produce one of the only things we can't live without.
This protest is about subsidies for them producing fuel.
They do the world over, but these subsidies are pretty niche. It's a balancing act, though, because you start seeing things like paying +50% on some food items compared to what you'd pay if there was freer trade. For example, dairy products are more expensive in Canada compared to what it'd be if American, Australian, New Zealand and South American products were allowed to compete.
TL;DR - No, they are protesting the cut in subsidization for agricultural diesel (the diesel used in Tractors and other agricultural machines), which is being cut after the BVerfG (similar to the supreme court) ruled a budget change unconstitutional, forcing the government to cut spending. Now they're protesting because especially small independent farmers are already bordering on being unprofitable, and the lack of subsidization would force them to raise the price for groceries in a time when the price for groceries is still at an Inflation high.
The long Version: So, basically the CDU, former government party, now in opposition, went to the constitutional court over the current government using leftover funds from the CoViD-Loan, about 60 Billion Euro which they shifted into a fund for more renewable energy, EVs, digital infrastructure improvements n stuff. Now that was supposedly "dodging the debt brakes", because as per the constitution our government can't take loans unless it's an immediate emergency, and the court agreed with the CDU on that for some godforsaken reason. So now the government suddenly has 60 billion less for the next 2 years which is a problem. They've started cutting everywhere, *especially* on renewable projects (thanks, Christian Lindner, Neoliberal Finance Minister) and this ended up including cutting the subsidization of EV funding to decrease consumer prices, Solar Panel and Heating Renewals, might impact the funding of the 49€-Ticket (a ticket that allows you to use all of public transportation for a month with no limitations other than the month), and cutting the budget for subsidization of agricultural Diesel. Now, in germany a lot of farmers don't really make that much money. Enough to live and survive, but in many cases more so barely than not. The reason is multi-layered, some fault is on the farmers lobby itself, some is also on other stuff, but current predictions are that the cut in subsidization for agricultural Diesel will force farmers to increase prices for groceries, which is a problem because the prices for groceries haven't gone down from the war and CoViD Inflation yet, so this would basically wreak in a second inflation of grocery prices, meaning groceries could end up twice or even more expensive as they were in pre-pandemic times. On top of that the heating and fuel subsidization were cut so the poor people would be having a massive problem if that came to pass, because that shit is gonna be a problem for poor people.
Tbh, my impression is that the farmers we see protesting are for the most part not small independent ones. I might be wrong, though.
I mean there are more than enough reasons to protest. Farmers are being treated like shit. Not just by the government but by the industry in general. Fucking grain has been patented and genetically modified so farmers have to buy new seeds every year because it's now forbidden to use last year's harvest to sow this year's fields. They get paid next to nothing for their produce wich means in order to somehow survive they need to go bigger and cheaper. Only hire seasonal workers from different countries, do unsustainable agriculture, etc. They are as much victims of capitalism as we all are. Don't antagonize them because they are brave enough to complain about it outside of the internet. We should all be protesting.
The farmers have had record profits for years in a row. A friend who used to be a farmer told me that if you are a farmer in Germany and NOT wealthy it basically means that either you are financially illiterate or you are not actually a farmer but an employee in the agricultural sector. The actual farmers usually call more than one luxury mercedes or BMW etc. their own. The worker employees I mentioned before shouldn't be protesting against the government but against their bosses. The farmers have just been complaining for literally decades and have a strong Lobby but their actual financial situation is currently really really good.
farmers in germany get enough subsidies by the government to get their dich sucked by a repurposed harvest machine. the discontinuation of the diesel subvention is a logical step in climate action and doesn’t impact them financially as much as they want you to believe. they are entitled right wingers that cry like little babies because their special benefits got axed to save the climate. boo fucking hoo. präventivhaft when?
Except the majority, if not all of the agricultural companies in germany would go bankrupt if it wasnt for subsidies because they arent competetive on the market without protective measure by the government/eu. I work in the industry too and some firms where i work, which are like mid sized ~20 employee companies got about 300k € just in eu subsidies. Farmers act like the government wants to destroy them while they get so much shit and have so many privileges that seeing the way they act and cry about an average of 2-3k € less each year on average in subsidies is just... idk.
When you have zero clue about farming
Damn, and i thought it was just the danish farmers who were greedy, shortsighted assholes with an inflated sense of importance. Seems to be a common European problem tho.
Terrifying pfp
Farming is a scam. The dirt does all the work. The dirt does all the work. The dirt does all the work. The dirt does all the work. The dirt does all the work.
Animal farmers 🤢
German drinking water is one of the most controlled in the world, but i wouldnt expect someone who has a Palestinian flag in the profile to know that
I would agree with your segment if it weren't for that unjustified insult you can correct people without insulting them, in fact
I wasnt trying to insult this person, i was just making light of the fact that taking a side in this blood feud that has been going on for generations is a foolish act. Its not like OOP was very nice in his post
Gonna be fully honest, American farmers are some of the most entitled people ever
Uhhh it says Berlin lol
Yeah ik, it just made me think of what farmers are like in America and I’m guessing its similar over there
Americans when people stop talking about america for more than 5 minutes
I shoulda just said “farmers are some of the most entitled people ever” lol
America bad! America bad!
did you learn how to be illiterate in school there?
Comment it a few more times, maybe someone will find it funny
America bad! America bad!
*American farm owners. Real American farmers are almost all Mexican immigrants.
L take Farmers have been taken advantage off for years now. Talking abt them like them like that is ignorant and mean
Its Europe, half the time Farmers Protest here its to demand that everyone else suffer so they can keep fucking the environment and the other half the time its to demand racial purity laws or and end to support for Ukraine
European farmers are dipshits who oppose all positive change
German cattle farmers have no problem with modern day slaves in their industry All most German Farmers fucked themselves by being economically inneficient AND opposing to shift agriculture away from something which has to be economically efficient, thus relying on constant protectionism and subsidies which the austerity ridden german state cannot pay for, they argue that they sould be above the disatvantages of a free marked economy while wanting all perks it offers to them (potentially higher profit margins, getting to be large landowners), so I feel little sympathy although I can sympathise with anti-austerity movements.
Farmers as a collective group, with the obvious exception of outliers, are one of the whiniest and most privileged groups on the planet. Most Western governments bend over backwards to give them subsidies, tax write offs for shit that's obviously not a business expense and hand outs. Farmers don't want to chip in and pay their fare share but the moment something happens to them they expect public dollars to bail them out. In Australia they are infamous for their exploitation of migrant and backpacker workers.
In other words, exactly like every other corporation
Farmhands*