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International trade has given us the lifestyles we've all become accustomed to though, and it's lots of ways its a good thing as it allows all sorts of ideas, science sharing, medicine, arts and culture etc to thrive too. But yes, it's basic manufacturing premise is based on production at the cheapest levels, both for labour and materials. Which results in loads of exploitation of both poor people and the natural world.
Has it though?

Setting aside pharma and science, I’m not sure what piss cheap tat that lasts 2 washes from Primark but is that cheap no one gives a ****, has enhanced our existence. Same as being able to buy asparagus in November as it’s flown in from Nigeria.

Capitalism requires consumption, the more the better. What globalisation has brought is bigger margins, and therefore profits and shareholder dividends. Why make it here when you can do it somewhere where cost of labour is a fraction of the price?

Together with the new age of disruptive technologies, which are basically all just leeches who created an app. Uber, the biggest cab firm in the world and doesn’t own a cab, but gooses cabbies for 20% of their takings. Just eat, providing you with food you’d have bought anyway but taking a chunk of the local hardworking takeaway owners already small margins. Amazon....can’t even go there. But you get the idea.

We’ve now created a whole new breed of multi Billionaires, who live offshore, answer to seemingly no one, are largely beyond the reaches of individual Govts, and are basically doing as they ****ing like. Someone actually saw all this coming, it was Rees Moggs old man as it goes.
 
Has it though?

Setting aside pharma and science, I’m not sure what piss cheap tat that lasts 2 washes from Primark but is that cheap no one gives a ****, has enhanced our existence. Same as being able to buy asparagus in November as it’s flown in from Nigeria.

Capitalism requires consumption, the more the better. What globalisation has brought is bigger margins, and therefore profits and shareholder dividends. Why make it here when you can do it somewhere where cost of labour is a fraction of the price?

Together with the new age of disruptive technologies, which are basically all just leeches who created an app. Uber, the biggest cab firm in the world and doesn’t own a cab, but gooses cabbies for 20% of their takings. Just eat, providing you with food you’d have bought anyway but taking a chunk of the local hardworking takeaway owners already small margins. Amazon....can’t even go there. But you get the idea.

We’ve now created a whole new breed of multi Billionaires, who live offshore, answer to seemingly no one, are largely behind the reaches of individual Govts, and are basically doing as they ****ing like. Someone actually saw all this coming, it was Rees Moggs old man as it goes.
Very true points .
When I was away last year a thought bollox I'll stay another night .
Looked on Booking.com and found a decent priced hotel £121 for 3 and tried to book it .
It wouldn't go through so rang the hotel direct Instead ... £77 .
****ing £44 profit <yikes>
 
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Has it though?

Setting aside pharma and science, I’m not sure what piss cheap tat that lasts 2 washes from Primark but is that cheap no one gives a ****, has enhanced our existence. Same as being able to buy asparagus in November as it’s flown in from Nigeria.

Capitalism requires consumption, the more the better. What globalisation has brought is bigger margins, and therefore profits and shareholder dividends. Why make it here when you can do it somewhere where cost of labour is a fraction of the price?

Together with the new age of disruptive technologies, which are basically all just leeches who created an app. Uber, the biggest cab firm in the world and doesn’t own a cab, but gooses cabbies for 20% of their takings. Just eat, providing you with food you’d have bought anyway but taking a chunk of the local hardworking takeaway owners already small margins. Amazon....can’t even go there. But you get the idea.

We’ve now created a whole new breed of multi Billionaires, who live offshore, answer to seemingly no one, are largely behind the reaches of individual Govts, and are basically doing as they ****ing like. Someone actually saw all this coming, it was Rees Moggs old man as it goes.

Well, indeed.

The lifestyles we've become accustomed to are what I'm referring to as needing to change if we want to reverse the unabated consumption.

And yes the system is totally skewed towards making billionaires richer. Blood on the Streets I think it was called.
 
Some companies and banks, would sell you the premise, that they are giving jobs to what are basically third world countries. When what they are really doing is exploiting these people, and we encourage this exploitation by either buying their products or doing business with certain well known banks. They get paid fooking peanuts, at the expense of labour back in the UK or within Europe. It's not that they can't afford the labour back on home soil, it's just pure greed for bigger profit margins. So in turn they are creating unemployment back home, while feeding the peasants, chicken feed, there is no sharing of the wealth. We have seen protests across the world about slave labour 300 years ago, but what about slave labour today, under our very noses, and we all buy into it, shocking. It's always because they can do it cheaper, but no one asks, at the expense of whom? All because we want things at the click of a button, while the government has been paying a large portion of the population to sit at home for the last 3 months, accept of course maybe the sweat shops that people turn a blind eye to, no one could sniff out why Leicester might have a problem. If you run a sweat shop my guess would be you also have a lot more to hide.... https://www.theguardian.com/global-...p-sounds-alarm-over-uk-fast-fashion-factories and this is on our own fooking doorstep!
 
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We have seen protests across the world about slave labour 300 years ago, but what about slave labour today, under our very noses, and we all buy into it, shocking. It's always because they can do it cheaper, but no one asks, at the expense of whom?

<applause>
 
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So y'all gonna be buying my 3rd hand trainers on ebay from now on then ?
 
I've never seen you as a hippy. I expect you live in a nice house, in a nice location, driving a nice vehicle, riding a decent bike. You are part of that consumer based economy, I'm not really sure, why you see yourself any different. I used to grow all my own garden fruit and veg, it certainly never made me a hippy, just because I grew courgettes.


If I grow courgettes and listen to Hawkwind occasionally, does that make me a hippy?

As an ex punk rocker, these things are important. Could get thrown out of The Clash fan club for less.
 
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If I grow courgettes and listen to Hawkwind occasionally, does that make me a hippy?

As an ex punk rocker, these things are important. Could get thrown out of The Clash fan club for less.

You're probably closest to a hippy on here, said in an endearing way.

You grow your own veg, you lived through the 60's and 70's. You criticise middle and upper class values. You appear to value what you have, without the need for expensive or environmental polluting material things. Oh and you don't own a surf board :cheesy:

Piskie don't even come close to you mate!...

You must log in or register to see images
 
Last edited:
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You're probably closest to a hippy on here, said in an endearing way.

You grow your own veg, you lived through the 60's and 70's. You criticise middle and upper class values. You appear to value what you have without the need for expensive or environmental polluting material things. Oh and you don't own a surf board :cheesy:

Piskie don't even come close to you mate!...

You must log in or register to see images


Wolfie weren’t a hippy mate - he was a yeti <ok>


Other than that, swap the Fulham scarf for a Saints one, and that’s me in 1975
 
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You're probably closest to a hippy on here, said in an endearing way.

You grow your own veg, you lived through the 60's and 70's. You criticise middle and upper class values. You appear to value what you have, without the need for expensive or environmental polluting material things. Oh and you don't own a surf board :cheesy:

Piskie don't even come close to you mate!...

You must log in or register to see images

<laugh>

I mentioned the other day that I'm good mates with Chris Hines who co founded Surfers against sewage. A few years ago I was working with him on some eco surfboard materials. Quick bit of background, most surfboards are made from polyutherene expanded foam, fibreglass cloth and polyester resin. So basically really noxious materials that are very polluting.

So Chris, a chap called Tris at a company called homeblown and myself were experimenting with some new materials, a biofoam made from extruded plant based oils, hemp fibre cloth and a plant based resin. The first boards looked and felt great, they sanded back just like normal resin and as a bonus the foam was found to be hydrophobic, so if the boards got dinged and started letting in water (bad news for traditional constructed boards) then the foam wouldn't soak up water.

Anyway, what nobody had bargained for was that the plant based oils in the resin reacted with the salt in the sea water and must have broken down the polymers. So the first tests ended up with the resin breaking up and sticking to surfers wetsuits. I remember taking one of these boards out and proudly telling everybody what we were doing, only to end up paddling back to the beach with this ****ty sticky resin all over me, which then stuck to the sand on the beach. It was a ****ing unholy mess <laugh>
 
<laugh>

I mentioned the other day that I'm good mates with Chris Hines who co founded Surfers against sewage. A few years ago I was working with him on some eco surfboard materials. Quick bit of background, most surfboards are made from polyutherene expanded foam, fibreglass cloth and polyester resin. So basically really noxious materials that are very polluting.

So Chris, a chap called Tris at a company called homeblown and myself were experimenting with some new materials, a biofoam made from extruded plant based oils, hemp fibre cloth and a plant based resin. The first boards looked and felt great, they sanded back just like normal resin and as a bonus the foam was found to be hydrophobic, so if the boards got dinged and started letting in water (bad news for traditional constructed boards) then the foam wouldn't soak up water.

Anyway, what nobody had bargained for was that the plant based oils in the resin reacted with the salt in the sea water and must have broken down the polymers. So the first tests ended up with the resin breaking up and sticking to surfers wetsuits. I remember taking one of these boards out and proudly telling everybody what we were doing, only to end up paddling back to the beach with this ****ty sticky resin all over me, which then stuck to the sand on the beach. It was a ****ing unholy mess <laugh>
Was that the end of the venture then ?
 
Was that the end of the venture then ?

It was for that plant based resin.

The blanks are really popular still (the foam bit that you shape the board from) They are waterproof so they have been a big success for Homeblown
 
I think it's opened a lot of people's eyes to the castle made of sand that is the consumer based economy. We are constantly drip fed the narrative of buying **** that none of us really need. It's ingrained into shaping who we are, how we value ourselves and how our social status is measured. And all of it is bollocks.

When you look around the world something like 3 billion people live on less than $1 per day, that's nearly half of the world's population. The disparity between rich and poor is ****ing obscene, and yet most people in wealthy countries are blind to it all, slavishly following the corporate messages of 'buy buy buy'

And where has it got us ? We have a disgustingly disfigured distribution of wealth where the 1% own more than half of the world's wealth and the constant drive to consume more and more has left the planet on the precipice of ecological disaster.

We have a bit of a laugh on here at my rock spotting, second hand trainer wearing, Courgette growing, seaweed foraging, hippy ways. But that's me doing things differently. I don't claim to be outside of the system, but I'm actively working to make sure myself and my family are not completely reliant on 'the system' as this all unfolds in the future.
you could bore a rock to sleep ffs.