3abas @ 3abas @lemmy.world

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2 wk. ago

I appreciate you clarifying, there’s more we agree on than not.

You're absolutely right to emphasize the role of workers in the chain. The process from A to B to C doesn't function without their labor, and too often, they’re rendered invisible in both capitalist and state narratives. That’s a vital reminder. Any left project that doesn't center workers, from land to factory to distribution, loses its soul. And you're right: the roots of chocolate's prominence today aren't just cultural, they're exploitative. The commodity's journey is soaked in colonial extraction, and in many ways, that legacy persists.

Your mention of white supremacist funding and KKK ties to regional destabilization is important. I don’t doubt it. U.S. foreign policy, especially in Latin America, has long served as a tool for white capitalist expansion, from the School of the Americas to paramilitary support. That history deserves more light, not less.

Now, on the worry about corruption and state overreach, I hear you. The cycle you're pointing to is real: revolutionary governments co-opted, bureaucracies bloated, the people once again crushed beneath a new elite. But here's where we may differ: I don’t have blind faith in governance. I have faith in people. And that includes the right of people to shape their governments, to build horizontal structures of power, to hold any institution accountable, whether it wears a suit or a state badge.

Power can corrupt, but it also depends on how it's held. When governance is democratized, truly democratized, not just through ballots but through councils, unions, communal ownership, it doesn't have to recreate capitalist hierarchies. Projects like Zapatista autonomy in Chiapas or Rojava in Syria show that state and market aren’t the only models. People can create something else if they have the space.

Your closing line hits hard. Maybe I do have more faith than you in the potential of governance, not because mine hasn’t taken from me, but because I believe in reclaiming what it has. Governance should serve, not rule. If it rules, it’s time to resist. And if people rise when they're suppressed, then so be it. I stand with them.

it was a riot so a messy thing to investigate

You have any evidence for that beyond the IDF saying it was?

I'll check back in two weeks and confirm that nothing comes of it, we can play this game for years, and I'm confident nothing will ever come of it beyond a possible slap on the wrist to say "look we took action".

Rachel Aliene Corrie. The US doesn't give a shit about any American when it comes to Palestine.

Context, my pal. They're not talking about ALL employees of the government, they're talking about bureaucracy and ineffective governing.

Yes, we agree that it's the government's fault, we're simply disagreeing with the "fuck the kids they deserve to die, they shouldn't have voted for corrupt politicians that didn't give them accurate maps"

You're right that a lot has changed for the better, especially when it comes to legal rights for LGBTQ+ people. The AIDS crisis was devastating and compounded by the cruelty of being denied the most basic recognitions like visiting your partner in the hospital or even being allowed to stay in your home after they passed. Legal victories like Lawrence v. Texas, Obergefell, and Bostock were historic, and they represent real, hard-won progress.

But I think it's also important to recognize that legal inclusion doesn't always mean liberation. A lot of those rights are still tied to institutions like marriage, which leave out anyone who doesn't fit that mold. Marriage shouldn't be the gateway to healthcare or housing security. That just reinforces the idea that some relationships or lives are more worthy of protection than others.

Same goes for healthcare. The Affordable Care Act helped, but it still left healthcare tied to jobs and profit. Life-saving medications exist, but they’re still out of reach for many because of how expensive and inaccessible our system is. PrEP, for example, is amazing in what it can do, but the fact that it's rationed through patents and insurance barriers says a lot about who this system really serves.

And while the internet has opened up huge spaces for connection and organizing, it also turned our identities into data and our attention into profit. Social media connects, but it also surveils and exploits. So even in our victories, the system keeps finding ways to profit off our survival.

I think the pessimism today is more than just a vibe shift. People feel it because they know deep down that we’re still not free. That our progress is fragile, often built on the same systems that oppress others. The question isn’t just whether things are better. It’s whether we’re building something that won’t keep leaving people behind.

It's a bunch of nonsense. Stewart has more influence on the public, and Schumer is an actual politician with real political power and decades of experience to know how to use it. He just doesn't, because he's a Zionist neo-lib and his interests don't align with the American public's.

Dude, your post is barely coherent, why so aggressive?

ACAB is a very good slogan, but only if we understand it.

It's very specifically referring to cops like the American police system, not the concept of policing. Community policing and ensuring people are safe and have someone to help them in emergencies is a good thing, community policing makes community livable, it's a basic feature of society.

Cops in America trace their roots to violent thugs who were paid by wealth slavers to return their slaves. Their job is literally to protect the property of the rich, not to protect or serve the community as they claim.

"if you're not omniscient, you don't get to be upset when something bad happens"

Pretty dumb logic. Can't think of the children potentially impacted by manipulated flood maps if you live across the world and don't know about said flood maps.

But now that children are drowning, your response is "fuck 'em, they should have looked at accurate flood maps". WTF!

Mexico is sending rescuers to help with the efforts, while FEMA emergency funds were diverted to build domestic concentration camps.

Dude, no one is talking about you and we don't want to change the conversation to talk about you. That's weird.

The whole point of statements by the likes of DWS is to signal to Americans that someone is trying to do something on their behalf. She described it as an internment camp and said it needs to be shut down, surely as a high ranking politician it means she'll be doing something to shut it down... It's just a pacifier for people's anger.

The Democrats are not your friend, they have the same overarching goal as the GOP: exploit workers and make capitalists richer.

Alligator Auschwitz serves that goal. They just make noise but as a party they are locked in, just like they made noise about children in cages under Trump the first term but completely forgot that it got even worse under Biden.

"launch an invasion"

You always jump to extremes when making decisions?

Here's the official statement from the US government: they are actively investigating it: https://www.ice.gov/news/releases/canadian-national-ice-custody-passes-away

And the embassador tweeted: My team is following the death of a Canadian citizen while in @ICEgov custody. We will keep the Canadian government informed as ICE completes its investigation. I trust in ICE's commitment to transparency and to providing a safe environment for all individuals in its care.

Do you find as Israeli government page saying we're investigating it? Not they I think ICE or Israel would investigate themselves properly, but at least they still put up the facade that diplomacy matters.

Did US media create a touching profile for the victim?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canadian-died-ice-custody-lawyer-1.7573184

The US is funding and backing a genocide of Palestinians by Israel, and Israeli settlers murdering Palestinians is perfectly acceptable and happens every day. You'd think it would be different if it's a US citizen, but it's not, if you are killed by Israelis as a Palestinian or as a citizen of the US or its allies standing up for Palestinians, they treat you with the same contempt.

So focused on hate

Cope better. There was no hate.

The lower price would mean lower quality traditionally yes

No no no, it's not lower quality, it's just not luxury. It's better than the $5 Hershey bars available to you in the US. This is not a law of economics, it's a capitalist assumption. Lower prices can mean lower quality in for-profit contexts because companies cut costs to maximize profit. But in a nonprofit, state-run model, the goal is different: providing a high-quality public good at an accessible price. This is a de-commodification of a necessity or cultural staple. Chocolate in Mexico has deep indigenous and historical roots.

Then creating regulation as a governance is expected the lowest prices. Did they circumvent regulations, taxes, etc.

I don't know, did they?

The insinuation here is that the government is cheating the system. But if the government is the one setting or adapting the regulations, this is not circumvention, it's governance. State-run enterprises often don't need to chase profit margins because their revenue model isn't extractive.

HENCE, how could a capitalist compete

Correct, that’s the point. The state provides a baseline to protect people from price-gouging and artificial scarcity. Capitalists can compete, but they must add value, not by suppressing wages or cutting quality, but by genuine innovation or diversification.

This is similar to how public healthcare in many countries sets a baseline: if private healthcare wants to exist, it must offer more, not extract more.

Over extension of power leads to suppression of the workers, field owners, and consumers. With capitalism winning.

This is incoherent nonsense. Capitalism "winning" through the suppression of workers is not a bug; it's a feature. State efforts to offer goods affordably often arise precisely to counteract capitalist suppression.

The idea that public chocolate production suppresses workers more than Nestlé or Hershey's, companies with notorious labor violations, is laughable.

You have so little experience with the pain of the world that you can only dream your comforts.

That’s just a rhetorical grenade, you’re not engaging with what I said, you’re trying to discredit me personally. And honestly, it’s frustrating. You’re implying that lived suffering and collective solutions can’t go hand in hand, but that’s just not true. Some of the fiercest, most committed advocates for public goods come from deep struggle, especially across the Global South.

Actually, I have my entire code base documented in obsidian, and I literally tell cursor to refer to the documentation. It works amazingly well, and then I have it draft documentation for the new features it's creating. I can do in a day what I used to do in a week, and it's not because it's doing anything advanced, it's just takes care of so much of the brain draining tedious tasks.

The entire file! My biggest frustration with cursor is that it doesn't support reading from multiple projects at once so it can see the context of how the projects interact or how interfaces are implemented.

What? Why would a job in Mexico pay enough to live in the US... That makes no sense. Cost of living isn't even the same across the US.

It is. They've got you conditioned to accept that government is just there to hurt you, it's supposed to make society worth living in.

Americans have such a shitty life that they're addicted to drugs and can't stop buying them, but sure, it's Mexicans sneaking it in.

However ideology like this leads to issues in reality.

Issues for who? The consumer? Or the capitalists?

If a competitor gets lower prices would hint at some questionability.

It would hint that it's a shitty product, presuming no foul play by the government and the product is not overpriced (doesn't appear to be).

Government correction becomes suppression. Suppression leads to . . .?

Government correction how? From suppression I think you mean lowering their price? The scenario you're laying out doesn't make sense.

The point of this kind of product is to be the baseline, no capitalist should be able to afford to offer the same product for less, because the government already has the lowest possible margin.

You start by making a better product, and you can charge whatever people decide the improved product is worth. It's a good thing that an asshole capitalist can't market a $7 bar of chocolate when a very good quality one is $1. At that price difference, your chocolate better be amazing.

That's objectively not true.