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this post was submitted on 13 Aug 2023
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the_dunk_tank
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It's the dunk tank.
This is where you come to post big-brained hot takes by chuds, libs, or even fellow leftists, and tear them to itty-bitty pieces with precision dunkstrikes.
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People are choosing to ignore the problem: the farmers that are planting rice aren't making as much money farming as farmers that are able to plant for profit, and the gov't isn't doing sufficient to make up for the loss of revenue while despite requiring their labor for the good of the state. As stated in the lede, "But these new plans clash with other signature directives, including pulling farmers out of poverty—and that is causing resentment and confusion." If farmers discover that they can go do other things that involve less backbreaking work and make more money doing it, then you have fewer people willing to farm in the first place. Which, of course, you can solve by using forced labor, since no one seems to give a shit about the Uyghurs.
If you believe that the state is more important than any personal rights to individual self determination, then sure, this is a totally fair policy. If you believe that the state has the right to enforce poverty on one group of people in order to ensure the comfort of a different group of people is morally justified, then it's also cool.
I would say that if the state expects people to do labor, then the state should be expected to pay for that labor. Particularly when that state has the 2nd greatest number of billionaires of any country in the world, and could not realistically be called "communist" when compared to any of the source material.
Making more profit at the expense of the general public isn't "self determination". There is no such thing as a human right to entrepreneurship. There is, however, a human right to have enough healthy food on your table, as abhorrent as that idea is to redditor liberals and AmeriKKKan pigs.
I agree there's a human right to food.
The question is, why is the burden of labor to provide human rights placed on the shoulders of just a few, while others are free to pursue profit?
Let's say that YOU were forced to grow crops to provide food for me, while I grow crops to enrich myself, and you remain in poverty despite working harder. Does that seem fair?
Seriously, it's as if you have this conception that farming and the food industry is run like an MMO. It's all very regulated and subsidized, everywhere, in every single country, with national security and sustainability in mind. Not just environmental sustainability either but financial as well. The only countries that allow their agricultural industry to turn into cash crops are places like Iraq and or the remaining French Colonies in West Africa, places that were invaded and then reformulated entirely to fulfill the economic needs of the US and Europe, respectively.
China is interested in delivering rising living standards to it's peoples. Which is why they've achieved it. Which is why they are known for supporting their farmers really fucking hard with technical and financial aid. If all China wanted to do was chase dollars, they'd still be poorer than most countries in Africa. Where people are 'free' to pursue dollars selling crops to Americans so that they can pay their debts to those same Americans, in return for further loans.
Your analogy of agriculture to fossile fuel energy is very disingenuous and stupid.
Humans don't have the option to stop growing food. Humans have the option to stop burning fossile fuels.
Known to who? Wealth inequality in China is almost as wide as the US, and globally still behind about 60 other countries.
Anybody's who's read about the subject, really. The Chinese are not alone in the sheer amount of state support it gives to it's agriculture, as that's par for the course. However one well known feature of the post revolutionary situation in China is somewhat reminiscent of France. Only for different reasons. Landownership is not consolidated. On the contrary, plots are very small. So part of industrial policy is China is making sure small farmers are as productive as possible, with technical and financial aid to implement everything from solar panels to new supply lines.
What does that have to do with State support to farmers?
Do you have a little card next to you titled 'slogans to spam at leftists' or are you a chatbot?
Ah, I see. You don't live in one of those countries that are both major food exporters and also stricken with constant famine, right? You live in one of those food importers in the International Community, right? I wonder why Iraq now needs to import food while mostly exporting pasta to the USA. Impossible, I know. Profit seeking shouldn't fuck up entire countries. And yet here we are, in reality.