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First point ("consumerism vs. repressive cultures"): reread my post, don't do amalgams. I fail to see the correlation between proponents of "authenticity" and d

by plesn 16y ago

First point ("consumerism vs. repressive cultures"): reread my post, don't do amalgams. I fail to see the correlation between proponents of "authenticity" and dictator regimes. First, in the article authenticity proponents are pictured as "anti-globalization" activists: I rarely see vegetarians as mostly concerned by marxism. Moreover it is questionnable to correlate dictator regimes with Marxism: many south-amercian or african regimes are/were backed by the US/France/etc... Finally, Marxism was mostly productivist (except Lafargue), non-decentralised (you don't have to go to Lenin and Trotsky taking over the Soviets, you already see it in the argument between Marx and Bakounin), and moreover its analysis did not insist on differentiating financial and industrial capital, which is important to understand the current crisis. All in all, as I was saying, the media industry frames all opposition as "repressive" and "brutal" and makes it diffult to find alternatives: hopefully people everywhere are creative in actions and thoughts. Second point: I was not formulating a binary centralized vs decentralized debate where transporting food is not allowed or we go back to the Middle-Age; I'm just saying that there is a need for more autonomy in the system to prevent crises like recent ones (e.g. the rice crisis in 2008). It's just common sense to say that third world countries with more food-producing agriculture (instead of say, cotton) are less fragile to speculation on food which can lead to disasters especially in bad years, or that controlling their crops vs using GMO's makes them less economically dependent on big corporations.

anamax 16y ago
> reread my post, don't do amalgams. If I misrepresented you, feel free to demonstrate said misrepresentations. > I fail to see the correlation between proponents of "authenticity" and dictator regimes. First, in the article authenticity proponents are pictured as "anti-globalization" activists: Do you really want to argue that anti-globalization folks are not (mostly) left of US center? Or that they don't idealize rather crappy third world countries? > I rarely see vegetarians as mostly concerned by marxism. Good for you, but no one said that they were. Few people, including vegetarians are "mostly concerned" with Marxism and it's quite possible to criticize consumer culture from a non-Marxist perspective. Nevertheless, a lot of such criticism is from such a perspective. That's why I wrote "FWIW, "marxist analysis" does produce a lot of railing against consumer culture which is apparently derived from their first principles. If you want to argue against market economy and consumer culture without invoking marxist principles, have at it." > Moreover it is questionnable to correlate dictator regimes with Marxism: many south-amercian or african regimes are/were backed by the US/France/etc... The existence of non-Marxist dictatorial regimes doesn't imply that Marxist regimes don't tend toward the dictatorial. Note also that western countries have supported somewhat Marxist clients. > I'm just saying that there is a need for more autonomy in the system to prevent crises like recent ones (e.g. the rice crisis in 2008). How about some supporting evidence for the "more autonomy" theory? IIRC, the rice crisis was due to a price increase that wasn't even noticed in the US. That's why I mentioned the recent corn crisis in Mexico. Prices went up more in the US, but Mexico had food riots. > It's just common sense to say that third world countries with more food-producing agriculture (instead of say, cotton) are less fragile to speculation on food which can lead to disasters especially in bad years, or I'm not interested in "common sense", I'm interested in what's actually true. If cotton gives them a GDP of $2000/year while rice gives them a GDP of $500/year, cotton gives them a much bigger cushion if the rice price doubles. Yes, a cotton failure hurts, but so does a rice failure. An extra $500/year can make a huge difference at this level. It may let them save enough to survive a bad year. > that controlling their crops vs using GMO's makes them less economically dependent on big corporations. Suppose, for the sake of argument, that GMOs double their yield and the price is equal to 10% of their crop vs a "traditional" price of 0. That still looks like a 90% benefit. Why is that bad? Of course, if the benefit is 10% but the extra cost is 50%, it's a bad deal, but foreign corps aren't in a position to force anyone to buy. (Their govts are, but that's a different problem.) If you're going to argue that someone close to the edge shouldn't do what's most profitable for them, please provide the numbers.
- plesn 16y ago
  I don't really want to continue this discussion here, as HN is not a political forum, and as I tend to agree with many of your points (the devil is in the details...), and I IMHO the problem is rather the way different actors are "in position of force" as you note.

by plesn 16y ago

anamax 16y ago

> reread my post, don't do amalgams. If I misrepresented you, feel free to demonstrate said misrepresentations. > I fail to see the correlation between proponents of "authenticity" and dictator regimes. First, in the article authenticity proponents are pictured as "anti-globalization" activists: Do you really want to argue that anti-globalization folks are not (mostly) left of US center? Or that they don't idealize rather crappy third world countries? > I rarely see vegetarians as mostly concerned by marxism. Good for you, but no one said that they were. Few people, including vegetarians are "mostly concerned" with Marxism and it's quite possible to criticize consumer culture from a non-Marxist perspective. Nevertheless, a lot of such criticism is from such a perspective. That's why I wrote "FWIW, "marxist analysis" does produce a lot of railing against consumer culture which is apparently derived from their first principles. If you want to argue against market economy and consumer culture without invoking marxist principles, have at it." > Moreover it is questionnable to correlate dictator regimes with Marxism: many south-amercian or african regimes are/were backed by the US/France/etc... The existence of non-Marxist dictatorial regimes doesn't imply that Marxist regimes don't tend toward the dictatorial. Note also that western countries have supported somewhat Marxist clients. > I'm just saying that there is a need for more autonomy in the system to prevent crises like recent ones (e.g. the rice crisis in 2008). How about some supporting evidence for the "more autonomy" theory? IIRC, the rice crisis was due to a price increase that wasn't even noticed in the US. That's why I mentioned the recent corn crisis in Mexico. Prices went up more in the US, but Mexico had food riots. > It's just common sense to say that third world countries with more food-producing agriculture (instead of say, cotton) are less fragile to speculation on food which can lead to disasters especially in bad years, or I'm not interested in "common sense", I'm interested in what's actually true. If cotton gives them a GDP of $2000/year while rice gives them a GDP of $500/year, cotton gives them a much bigger cushion if the rice price doubles. Yes, a cotton failure hurts, but so does a rice failure. An extra $500/year can make a huge difference at this level. It may let them save enough to survive a bad year. > that controlling their crops vs using GMO's makes them less economically dependent on big corporations. Suppose, for the sake of argument, that GMOs double their yield and the price is equal to 10% of their crop vs a "traditional" price of 0. That still looks like a 90% benefit. Why is that bad? Of course, if the benefit is 10% but the extra cost is 50%, it's a bad deal, but foreign corps aren't in a position to force anyone to buy. (Their govts are, but that's a different problem.) If you're going to argue that someone close to the edge shouldn't do what's most profitable for them, please provide the numbers.

plesn 16y ago
I don't really want to continue this discussion here, as HN is not a political forum, and as I tend to agree with many of your points (the devil is in the details...), and I IMHO the problem is rather the way different actors are "in position of force" as you note.