streetfestival @ streetfestival @lemmy.ca

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812

Joined

2 yr. ago

Agreed. It reminds me of a headline I read in the last 48 hours about UK chemicals - pesticides, I think - that are banned for use in the UK, but UK companies manufacture them domestically and export them.

Both corporate-mediated colonialism. Like traditional colonialism, except profits never enter the public purse of the colonizing country, instead going purely to corporations.

It's really sinister. What a boring, cruel timeline.

Miez looks like an adorable furry seal pup <3

Epic Miez drop - thanks to you and Miez 🙏
Other cat: Great vid! You can tell exactly when the other cat sees Miez for the first time in the scene. Miez is looking pretty formidable lol :). I wonder whether Miez started to charge before the other cat got up (being more aggressive) or started chasing after the other cat had started leaving (less aggressive). Was Miez being jealous?
I loved the Miez in the sun video! And the swirling particles coming off the fire are really beautiful

England

I just signed! I'm doing my part meme

Yes but tobacco is among the most regulated (due to social pressure) industries in human history. I think that's what they're drawing at - let's organize to rein in big fossil fuel. But I agree with your points

Yes and - a lot of Canadian mainstream news media (130+ brands) are owned by Postmedia 🥶. The NatPo is their flagship publication though, per Wikipedia. It does a good job representing what's important to billionaires

It’s those who exploit and who concentrate and consolidate their powers and properties at the expense of everything other than profit that are the problem.

Yes.

That could be a single person with 1 or 30 properties or a corporate parasite with thousands of units.

No. A single person with one property or any entity with 30 properties, never mind 3000, tend to exploit on my different scales.

Being a landlord does not inherently make one a leech (in a discussion with any nuance). And when you have millions of dollars to put towards gaming the system to extract as much money as possible out of tenants every year, lobby regulators, divert properties from live-in to short-term accommodation to increase demand, etc., you can be a leech on a much, much larger scale. You can screw over not just individual renters, but entire populations of people seeking apartments. Not all landlords are the same ffs. Also "better at leeching than others"?! You make it sound like you admire leeching

When your rental is owned by an individual with a second property versus when your rental is owned by a multinational company and is part of investment vehicle that pays (untaxed)* dividends to investors and has mandates to extract as much money out of you is very different things. *The people benefiting from rental properties being an investment vehicle (REITs) also want to keep this untaxed income (for being societal parasites) untaxed and thus perpetuate the housing affordability crisis for profit

But being a societal leech is inherently part of being a landlord and some are better at leeching than others.

Being a landlord does not inherently make one a leech (in a discussion with any nuance). And when you have millions of dollars to put towards gaming the system to extract as much money as possible out of tenants every year, lobby regulators, divert properties from live-in to short-term accommodation to increase demand, etc., you can be a leech on a much, much larger scale. You can screw over not just individual renters, but entire populations of people seeking apartments. Not all landlords are the same ffs. Also "better at leeching than others"?! You make it sound like you admire leeching

When your rental is owned by an individual with a second property versus when your rental is owned by a multinational company and is part of investment vehicle that pays (untaxed) dividends to investors and has mandates to extract as much money out of you is very different things.

Exploitation of workers is a necessary part of wealth creation, and landlords have innovated and streamlined the process in order to squeeze their more ethical competition out of business.

Thank you for providing the 1% to .0000001% perspective. We should never lose sight of worshiping that. How silly of me to centre the perspective of the 99% on a grassroots non-corporate social media platform /s

I think this is such a dangerous misunderstanding, that abets financialization establishing itself in more Canadian industries, increasing the cost of living and wealth inequality. Your argument - explained analogically in a simpler context - is basically that the best boss and the most exploitative boss are essentially the same, from a worker's perspective, except the most exploitative boss should be regarded as better at their job. Unless you're in the oligarch class, why would you think this way?

Edit: redacted: I haven't seen the doc, but I feel like you're conflating frontline soldiers and political leadership, and are very quick to use the term "propaganda"

Showing that Russian soldiers are suffering too in Putin's war does not sound like (encouraging) sympathizing with Putin to me or undermining Ukraine's resistance. That take seems simplistic to the point of us collectively having to water down every political doc in existence.

Edit: new: While I didn't find your points compelling, the TVO documentary is the most/only cited and described example of supposed propaganda in the article. Based on these descriptions, I'd agree it's propaganda. Not correcting falsehoods in a documentary meets criteria for me

The narrative promoted in the film subtly suggests the war is Ukraine’s fault. It whitewashes well-documented atrocities committed by Russian troops against innocent Ukrainian civilians. It encourages western audiences to ignore the realities of this illegal invasion of a sovereign state in favour of a sob story that paints the aggressor in a sympathetic light.

The soldiers trot out justifications for the invasion, accusing Ukraine of fueling a “civil war.” They imply that Ukrainians are Nazis, that Russians are defending Ukrainians, and that Ukrainian soldiers murder injured Russian troops.

All of these false claims remain unchecked and unchallenged. The reality of Russia’s illegal actions and Russian soldiers’ war crimes go unmentioned.

I wasn't wrong that it might be like the Pacers

Tempo is pretty mid to me. It reminds me of the Pacers. The alliteration feels a little strange. I wonder what they'll do for a logo/mascot. All that said, I'm excited for a WNBA team to come to Canada!

University of British Columbia political scientist Stewart Prest said it is a return to Trump World, where the world is responding to his social media posts. He said Canadian authorities should know from the previous Trump administration to take the threat seriously but not literally.

You have some wild viewpoints, my friend, assuming you're not a pro troll

You make some excellent points. I agree, we'll likely see similar points raised any day now by one of our many legacy newsrooms now owned by US private equity /s

Cops don't protect public safety, they protect capital.

I will also add that military is regularly exempt from cost-related scrutiny, while healthcare is an essential service for which costs are constantly scrutinized (by the same people seeking to privatize and profiteer off it, and screw over the rest of the province/country).

I don't see this article as "partisan politics bullshit" but like you, I think, I reject the current status quo: "when we get a train ran on us by both sides but one sides plays the 'good' cop." If traditionally centre-left parties want to keep moving right, they're going to alienate their left-of-centre voters

Bristle is a great word :)

Great article. "Financialization" is a word that should be more popular. When news media and rental properties become investment vehicles, the public suffers.

In 2023, rents increased by eight per cent while wages grew by only five per cent. At the same time, the real estate sector collected $50.4 billion in profits in 2023 — a staggering 40 per cent higher than its pre-pandemic record.

Much of these wildly outsized real estate profits are being generated through corporations and financial firms. These firms own 20 to 30 per cent of purpose-built rental housing and are the majority purchasers of multi-family dwellings in Canada. In particular, real estate investment trusts (REITs) have grown to two-thirds of all real estate assets traded on the TSX.

Similar to hedge funds, REITs are trusts that must hold the majority of their assets in real estate and distribute most of their profits to investors each year. Over the past few decades, REITs have become a significant presence in the rental market. They’ve gone from owning zero rentals in Canada in 1996 to nearly 200,000 units today.

One key reason that REITs are so popular: their income is distributed to investors tax-free. In 2022, $100 million collected by the largest seven residential REITs was distributed to investors, exempt from taxation through the partial inclusion of capital gains. While the capital gains loophole was lowered in 2024, it still results in a sizeable tax break.

REIT profits must be taxed

Despite experts pushing relentlessly for the federal government to take action, the finance department quietly posted that “no changes to the tax treatment of REITs are being considered at this time” on their website in May 2024, leaving renters at the mercy of financial firms.