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It is overused, for sure, and stylistically obtuse, but nitpicking when the meaning is clear ("destructive"). And it is true: NGOs and "aid" that indiscriminate
by lo_zamoyski 3y ago
It is overused, for sure, and stylistically obtuse, but nitpicking when the meaning is clear ("destructive"). And it is true: NGOs and "aid" that indiscriminately flood a market with cheap products under the lazy and foolish belief that giving away free stuff is a Good Thing does incredible damage to economies. It's one thing to distribute aid during a crisis. It's another to keep shipping free stuff indefinitely.
In this case, free rice is having the effect of price dumping. You can't compete with free, so local agriculture and cuisine is being wrecked, and diets are changing for the worse.
Another example is the distribution of so-called mitumba, where, say, ragpickers from New Jersey ship tons of used and second hand clothing to Africa, destroying the local textile industry. This, and intentional Chinese tactics (and probably American, among others), is how, for example, Nigerian cotton and textiles were destroyed.
If you want a country to flourish, often it's a matter of fucking off and letting it develop. Investment is good, of course, as long as it's done on the basis of a partnership between labor and capital, not taking over and pumping and dumping competition so you can effectively colonize the country economically. Unregulated free trade is always promoted by the powerful, as they can easily swoop into developing economies and entrench themselves before the local industrial base even has a chance to establish itself.
- nonethewiser 3y ago> but nitpicking when the meaning is clear ("destructive") But “destructive” and “violent “ aren’t synonymous. Its not nitpicking at all.
- lo_zamoyski 3y agoThen you are not familiar with the historical range of uses of the term, because it can certainly be synonymous. To "do violence to" does not imply physical force, but damage. I already said the particular manner in which the term is used is obtuse, but it is most definitely nitpicking, especially when all the original comment has to offer is a comment on how he doesn't like this particular usage of the word (as I said, I am also not a fan), paying no attention to the much more important substance of the article.
- chaps 3y agoIndeed. Just look at phrases like "violent contrasts" [1]. That phrase has lasted throughout the entirety of its history back to 2004, too! [2] Tenebrism, from Italian tenebroso ("dark, gloomy, mysterious"), also occasionally called dramatic illumination, is a style of painting using especially pronounced chiaroscuro, where there are *violent contrasts of light and dark*, and where darkness becomes a dominating feature of the image. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenebrism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenebrism [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tenebrism&oldid=8534527 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tenebrism&oldid=8...
- nitwit005 3y ago> t's one thing to distribute aid during a crisis. It's another to keep shipping free stuff indefinitely. Everyone agrees, but Haiti is essentially in perpetual crisis. If you have to pick between economic harm and starvation, people are going to pick economic harm.
- kortilla 3y agoDon’t confuse “pumping and dumping” with “offering a cheaper product”. Nearly any time a country that has figured out how to produce something in a scalable fashion for cheaper (including shipping), it will wipe out local alternatives. It doesn’t matter to the local competitor if it’s being subsidized by a foreign government, it’s just as “violent”. It’s stupid to replace “cant compete” with “violent” when there are a lot of actual examples of competition where real violence is involved (mafia).