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24
DnD Central / Re: What's Going on in the Americas?
Last post by ersi -
Quote from: Frenzie – on
That depends on how you define farmer. They also employ plenty of people to work for them. I suppose you could say those are farmhands and not farmers, but the discourse — probably quite purposefully — rarely if ever makes such a distinction.
Must be different discourses in our respective neighbourhoods. In my neighbourhood farmhands are never mixed up with farmers. On the other hand, city folks (defined by me as anyone who is less aware about countryside life than I am) little know that farmhands are a thing. For city people, all "peasants" necessarily have their own houses in the countryside and they help each other out in a neighbourly way, basically serving as farmhands to each other. In reality, countryside people normally have neighbourly enmity, which grows in direct proportion with the size of their property and exponentially with their business acumen.

The definition of a farmer does not really depend much. It is legal and socioeconomic, fairly uniform across the Western civilisation. If you do not produce to sell, you are not a farmer, even if you have a full-blown livestock farm or agricultural machinery to till the land - and you do it too. You're a farmer when you produce to sell, but if you do not have a registered business, you're illegal. So, the complete definition of a farmer is agricultural or livestock farming (or both) producing to sell and also registered as such. Farmhands may or may not be there - they are unnecessary to the definition. Given modern mechanised production methods, absentee business owners are common, just collecting the profits while some other people do the work - and it is again unnecessary to the definition whether they do or don't get paid.

Quote from: Frenzie – on
But it's also a thing to keep in mind here in Europe: farmers are often a well-to-do class. Sure, profits aren't necessarily great every year and sometimes they might operate at a loss, but that's no different from any other business.
There's no "But" about it. Being a well-to-do business owner is characteristic to being a farmer. Any savvy business owner will whine government subsidies and bailouts to himself, no matter the business area. If you do not know how to profit from bankruptcies or you have moral objections to such profiteering, then you're unfit as a business owner.

Farmers are goaded by legal and socioeconomic arrangements to be self-profitable business owners more than feeders of the nation. This is why I had to stop farming - in current civilisation it is required to be a farmer and a business owner at the same time, and more so a business owner. I could not do it.
26
DnD Central / Re: What's Going on in the Americas?
Last post by Frenzie -
Quote from: ersi – on
The next point the rural dude makes is stronger: Farmers are not working class. They are property owners, little corporate bosses. They think about things like investment returns, inheritance tax, and bailouts - things that normal people have no reason to think about. Thus they are not normal people and have no reason to break out of their one-sided media bubble, but have all the reason to bubble up more firmly in the pro-corporate propaganda.
That depends on how you define farmer. They also employ plenty of people to work for them.[1] But it's also a thing to keep in mind here in Europe: farmers are often a well-to-do class. Sure, profits aren't necessarily great every year and sometimes they might operate at a loss, but that's no different from any other business.
1 I suppose you could say those are farmhands and not farmers, but the discourse — probably quite purposefully — rarely if ever makes such a distinction.↵
27
DnD Central / Re: What's Going on in the Americas?
Last post by ersi -
Another American rural dude came online to explain why farmers vote Trump.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSuAhQ2YZvA

Ignoring his misapplication of Plato's allegory of the cave, the answer is: Media propaganda. Talk radio and podcasts - normally right-leaning - have brainwashed American rural people.

It could very well be that American media outlets keep information levels low. However, I'd say that it testifies to people's lack of curiosity about the world if they do not notice the one-sidedness of their media intake. Surely you peeps at least know about the other party and you cannot simply believe that the other party is just demons...

The next point the rural dude makes is stronger: Farmers are not working class. They are property owners, little corporate bosses. They think about things like investment returns, inheritance tax, and bailouts - things that normal people have no reason to think about. Thus they are not normal people and have no reason to break out of their one-sided media bubble, but have all the reason to bubble up more firmly in the pro-corporate propaganda.

There are more points in the video, such as lack of Democrat outreach in rural areas. This may very well be where the Dems have dropped the ball.
29
DnD Central / Re: U.S. military might…
Last post by jax -
There has always been infighting, Trump likes that, Like a certain chancellor of inter-war Germany, he finds a Social Darwinian pleasure and utility in that. But unlike Trump 1.0, surrounded by "adults", and even beginning of Trump 2.0, he seems to be losing control. If that is the case, the wild ride in 2025 may become wilder in 2026.
30
DnD Central / Re: Time the BBC went into history
Last post by jax -
Whatever the lowest common denominator, you can always go lower. Not an Overton window, an Overton floor.

Shoddy journalism is a threat to any organisation that tries to be reputational, so obviously the BBC must intervene. But there has always been shoddy journalism in the BBC and in every other news organisation. Probably more than ever because of resource constraints. The goal is to destroy all independent journalism, in the Trump regime's War on Facts.

Trump administration moves to deny visas to factcheckers and content moderators

Basically the Putin game plan two decades later.