The largest farmer's protest in the world, in India, just recently partially ended after a year+ long non-violent protest with the indian government backing down and conceding to their demand to repeal farm laws that favoured corporates and didn't address farmer's concerns. ( https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/opinion/fam-laws-are-bei... ). Civil activists around the world will get a big boost and draw inspiration from this.
Trade Unions in Public Sector Units that the indian government wants to sell to private entities are also planning to go on a national strike soon.
I see all this as a natural correction of political imbalance that had shifted too far to the right, around the world, in the last 2 decades ... political unrest results when the extreme left or the right gain an upper hand.
As someone who interned at two Indian government PSUs, I can't wait for them to get privatised. You wouldn't believe the amount of inefficiency and laziness.
Please read the article I linked to, to understand why the farmer's objected to these farm laws. The biggest problem was that democratic and parliamentary norms were not followed in passing those laws. Can you believe that a game changing law like this, was passed abruptly, without any review by any parliamentary committee or even a discussion in the Parliament!? That is why people became rightly suspicious of the intentions behind the laws, and highlighted loopholes in it that seemed to be designed to benefit the corporate, at the expense of farmers and consumers.
That seems quite judgemental, each time that I see someone calling others lazy is just a case of not understanding others circumstances and hardships. Walk a mile in their shoes...
I mean interning at something seems as close to walking a mile in the shoes as one can reasonably be expected to get. Often when we condemn others or something it is because we don't understand all the factors involved, but not all the time - sometimes laziness and other bad features are primary cause of what we observe.
My dad spent his entire life as a Bureaucrat. The OP is right.
The laziness is endemic seeps through every aspect of Govt. work. He hates the laziness and corruption in the system so much, that explicitly banned both his children from ever working in anything having to do with the Govt.
A good bunch of my friends are engineers in large govt. infrastructure projects. They corroborate my dad's claims.
> Walk a mile in their shoes
Replying in kind, got it 'straight from the horse's mouth' (sorry, i was feeling cheeky)
The farm laws were among the most progressive changes the farms had seen in the last century. It was politically hijacked despite having been previously supported by the same opposition who was currently leading the agitation.
India is politically incredibly left as a nation, and IMO the right simply isn't right enough. If India can even reach a Bernie or Warren level.of capitalism, it would be a dream come true.
Sadly, we are stuck in a system that glorifies blind socialism despite it having continuously kneecapped the economy decade over decade.
I hope the PSUs get sold off. The farm bills pass (wishful thinking) and India finally manages to claw back some power from this kafkaesque beaurocracy.
What I find strange is the support that the Indian (opportunistic) left's narrative gets in US media including niche tech communities like HN. Any one who has grown up in India in the past 50 years has witnessed the devastation caused by Socialism in this country. Socialism did not make India equal - it made India's bureaucracy and politics a cesspool of corruption that did enormous damage to India's poor. Anybody on this community who wants a crisp, fair view of the situation should spend a minute reading this editorial from India's largest newspaper before commenting: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/stocks/news/swa...
> It was politically hijacked despite having been previously supported by the same opposition who was currently leading the agitation.
That's either ignorance or a plain lie. Rahul Gandhi, one of the leaders of Congress, has been a vocal opponent of the farm laws from day 1. Here's his speech in Parliament on it - https://old.reddit.com/r/india/comments/li5iey/rahul_gandhis... ... At no point has the opposition Congress ever supported the law.
In fact, it was never even given an opportunity to do so!
This law was suddenly introduced as an ordinance, and bludgeoned through Parliament with the sheer majority of the government, without even a discussion in Parliament. Despite requests, it was not even sent to any Parliamentary committees. Worse, the government hadn't even consulted anyone, and the law had a lot of glaringly loopholes for the obvious benefit of the corporate sector.
A agree completely with you that reforms are much needed in India's agriculture sector. And PM Modi could have easily implemented many of them if he had just followed democratic process and consulted everyone. The farm laws passed by him was sloppy too - many parts of these law were bound to be overturned by the Supreme Court too, as it infringed on the rights of states in our federal setup.
Ooh, boy. I had an incredibly long post with all the links to support my claim. Sadly, I am struggling to find it.
In the meantime, here is another comment I found, that makes the same points (just unsourced for now).
Every economic survey since 2011 said we need these laws. InterMinisterial Task Force during Vajpayee, Manmohan and Modi Sarkaars said we need these laws.
Multiple Dept of Agriculture & Farmer Welfare reports said we need these laws.
BKU leader said we need these laws. Today protesting BKU won’t accept that guy mediating. 2008 BKU protested FOR these reforms.
Most of the Farmers outside of Punjab/Haryana said we need these laws and support these laws.
PM Dr. Manmohan Singh, the best Finance Minister India has had, tried to implement these laws.
CPIM said we need these laws n got rid of APMC in Kerala. Congress said we needed these laws n put it in their 2019 manifesto.
For now, I can lay my reputation on the line and assure you that I have a fully sourced comment somewhere that makes these exact point. I will try to find it by tonight, and comment under here. (remind me if I forget)
I added all the links, and then HN failed to update the comments. SMH.
So as a next least-worst thing, I am linking to a right wing article, so don't call me out on that. But, do look at the links in there. The points themselves stand on their own and are well supported from primary sources.
It's ok without sources because you are now talking about something different entirely. (And it doesn't support your assertion). Your claim was that: It was politically hijacked despite having been previously supported by the same opposition who was currently leading the agitation.
That is an absolutely misleading (and ignorant) statement because the opposition were against the farm laws because of:
1. The shoddy laws (with glaring loopholes) that the govt. claimed was "reforms".
2. The manner in which the laws was passed.
3. The unconstitutional parts of the laws.
What you have highlighted are all the preliminary preparations that go before the process of law making even starts. This is the respective governments - NDA or UPA - considering how to make policies based on their political ideology and ground realities (as they see it). Just because the NDA or UPA agreed that reforms are needed doesn't mean they were in agreement on how these reforms need to be.
If the government had bothered to consult the opposition, and other parties that would be impacted by these laws, a good law could have been created. Instead, the law was created in secret, was made a law immediately by introducing it as an ordinance bypassing the Parliament initially, and then rushed through Parliament with the brute majority of the government without even allowing a debate.
Something like 40% of Indians work in farming. Compare that to, say, the US at 1%.
There is probably a nicer way to say it, but the strategic priority of India should factor in the end of small-time farmers. There are a lot of people working in agriculture who need to be redeployed to something more productive. Unless the plan is to live in poverty forever.
That's absurd, food is the most important product of the economy. Local food is the most important product of a local economy. Many small farm holders means more variety and less monoculture. I grow food myself, it's hard work and very important for our futures.
And go where? To other minimum wage jobs that pay 22 rupees an hour (35 cents an hour)? Most labor is relatively worthless in India. This is because India suffers from The Tragedy of the Commons.
> The article does not mention the list of countries
No, but it links to the coalition website, which does.
> Is it really 20?
If you're skeptical of the number of countries, why would this skepticism be any different if the countries were listed in the article? The reporter could just as easily make them up. Or are you suggesting that the reporter cannot count to 20?
> Are those all countries or are some US states?
So now, aside from suggesting the reporter has trouble counting, you're also suggesting the reporter cannot tell countries apart from US states? What is the basis of this seemingly random question? You could just as easily say any other seeming non sequitur like 'are those all countries or are some flowers?'
> Is it happening in my country?
Why not check the primary source, linked to in the article?
> be any different if the countries were listed in the article?
100% yes.
This is basic common sense. Is this no longer taught in school for those without common sense?
FYI: If there are any children on HN, if you want to lie/mislead people you keep facts and figures to a minimum.
This stops people fact checking. 20 countries.... What 20? If they were listed you could check them. This way it's a vague fuzzy claim, how do you disprove?
Cambodia is on the web site, it's factory workers where lied to by management. They sell to many companies and Amazon sells some of those products.
Soooo is this in the 20? They don't work for Amazon using normal common sense. They are also mostly fired, are the ones with jobs still striking? Who knows if they are even in the 20 countries? This is what adults do to muddy the waters and waste time.
The claim "Amazon employees in 20 countries will strike" is probably fiction. I wonder which Amazon oil refinery it is, I guess since the author can count we just trust it?
Amazon made it an international thing. Since Amazon started the heavy promotion of their Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales in Germany, basically every German (online) store also offers Black Friday discounts. However, they discounts aren’t typically as big as they can be in the US, at least that is what I found from my comparison
Amazon now almost has Black Friday month, since I think the 8th they had "Early Black Friday" deals, since yesterday it’s "Black Friday Week", and after BF it will be "Cyber Monday Week".
Discounts aren't typically as big because manufacturer mandated retail prices are quite illegal in the EU so retailers are competitively squeezing their margins the entire year, not just for one week in November.
Unfortunately I find eBay absolutely awful to use. More often than not eBay still just looks super sketchy for basically anything I'd consider buying online. On two occasions I accidentally ordered products from China which ended up being stuck in customs. Additionally, I found the eBay app to be absolutely awful, both as a buyer and an occasional seller.
Those problems were much worse a few years ago, but instead of eBay getting significantly better, Amazon got much much worse. Amazon is being flooded with cheap knockoff Chinese products that often seem very questionable in regards of quality and safety.
For many things that I end up buying I just use a shopping search engine such as Geizhals or idealo. It is very very rare that Amazon is among the cheapest shops for any product I'm looking for
Retail needs sales days to generate deals/content/buzz around, give them a reason to advertise to/ contact customers. It doesn’t really matter what the event ends up being called, they just jump on whatever is already associated with sales days.
I was in Paraguay ten years ago and Black Friday was a big retail event. It was odd because they were actually using the English words 'Black Friday' though everything else was in Spanish.
Headline seems to be misleading; the article itself and the primary source (https://makeamazonpay.com/) indicate that some form of protest will be going on in 20 countries; in not all of the countries is it a strike by Amazon employees.
I couldn't find an explicit list of the 20 countries, but the primary source has a map of where events will be taking place. By clicking each point on the map, I think I counted them all (I counted 21):
1 Argentina
2 Australia
3 Austria
4 Bangladesh
5 Belgium
6 Brazil
7 Cambodia
8 Canada
9 England
10 France
11 Germany
12 India
13 Ireland
14 Italy
15 Netherlands
16 New Zealand
17 Poland
18 Slovakia
19 South Africa
20 Spain
21 USA
Some of those countries don't even have any Amazon distribution centres. A lot of those are protests by activists - not workers, and not related to working conditions at all. The title is not just misleading - it's completely wrong.
oddly enough, in Italy there will be a protest, but it's none of the people listed in the article: there will be a strike from _drivers_ who deliver on behalf of Amazon[0].
Actual amazon logistics employees already have an agreement with the local unions and I assume won't protest[1].
They can be both, but in many of the listed countries there aren't really Amazon workers (at least not warehouse staff), and they are not "[striking] for better working conditions" as stated in the headline.
That is part of the #MakeAmazonPay movement, but it's not all the movement is, and saying that employees are striking in 20 countries is completely false.
> The coalition also calls for a "pay back to society" that includes enhanced sustainability efforts, increased transparency over data and privacy, and ending partnerships with police forces and immigration authorities that are "institutionally racist."
They had me right up until the end. That tells me everything I need to know. This isn't being organized by Amazon workers (or I would've heard about it through my own contacts there), but by grifters using this to engage in political grandstanding. God I'm sick of this shit. Just once it would be nice if people pretending to back labor were actually for labor instead of being obvious imperialist shills.
I mean precisely what I said. Invariably in this day and age whenever you encounter someone who claims to be doing something for the people they are, in point of fact, doing it as agents of the state. Whatever lies they tell others (and themselves) they are, in no uncertain terms, seeking to perpetuate the system that privileges them above others. They can pretend they're fighting the good fight all they like, but it's a sham. It's a grand carnival used to distract people from the man behind the curtain... a veritable sleight of hand intended to convince you that their designated scapegoats, and not they themselves, are the real cause of all your woes... whether that scapegoat is white people, jews, or whatever. They're hucksters, plain and simple, and should be mocked wherever they are found.
55 comments
[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 123 ms ] threadThe largest farmer's protest in the world, in India, just recently partially ended after a year+ long non-violent protest with the indian government backing down and conceding to their demand to repeal farm laws that favoured corporates and didn't address farmer's concerns. ( https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/opinion/fam-laws-are-bei... ). Civil activists around the world will get a big boost and draw inspiration from this.
Trade Unions in Public Sector Units that the indian government wants to sell to private entities are also planning to go on a national strike soon.
I see all this as a natural correction of political imbalance that had shifted too far to the right, around the world, in the last 2 decades ... political unrest results when the extreme left or the right gain an upper hand.
Please read the article I linked to, to understand why the farmer's objected to these farm laws. The biggest problem was that democratic and parliamentary norms were not followed in passing those laws. Can you believe that a game changing law like this, was passed abruptly, without any review by any parliamentary committee or even a discussion in the Parliament!? That is why people became rightly suspicious of the intentions behind the laws, and highlighted loopholes in it that seemed to be designed to benefit the corporate, at the expense of farmers and consumers.
That seems quite judgemental, each time that I see someone calling others lazy is just a case of not understanding others circumstances and hardships. Walk a mile in their shoes...
The laziness is endemic seeps through every aspect of Govt. work. He hates the laziness and corruption in the system so much, that explicitly banned both his children from ever working in anything having to do with the Govt.
A good bunch of my friends are engineers in large govt. infrastructure projects. They corroborate my dad's claims.
> Walk a mile in their shoes
Replying in kind, got it 'straight from the horse's mouth' (sorry, i was feeling cheeky)
The farm laws were among the most progressive changes the farms had seen in the last century. It was politically hijacked despite having been previously supported by the same opposition who was currently leading the agitation.
India is politically incredibly left as a nation, and IMO the right simply isn't right enough. If India can even reach a Bernie or Warren level.of capitalism, it would be a dream come true.
Sadly, we are stuck in a system that glorifies blind socialism despite it having continuously kneecapped the economy decade over decade.
I hope the PSUs get sold off. The farm bills pass (wishful thinking) and India finally manages to claw back some power from this kafkaesque beaurocracy.
That's either ignorance or a plain lie. Rahul Gandhi, one of the leaders of Congress, has been a vocal opponent of the farm laws from day 1. Here's his speech in Parliament on it - https://old.reddit.com/r/india/comments/li5iey/rahul_gandhis... ... At no point has the opposition Congress ever supported the law.
In fact, it was never even given an opportunity to do so!
This law was suddenly introduced as an ordinance, and bludgeoned through Parliament with the sheer majority of the government, without even a discussion in Parliament. Despite requests, it was not even sent to any Parliamentary committees. Worse, the government hadn't even consulted anyone, and the law had a lot of glaringly loopholes for the obvious benefit of the corporate sector.
A agree completely with you that reforms are much needed in India's agriculture sector. And PM Modi could have easily implemented many of them if he had just followed democratic process and consulted everyone. The farm laws passed by him was sloppy too - many parts of these law were bound to be overturned by the Supreme Court too, as it infringed on the rights of states in our federal setup.
Ooh, boy. I had an incredibly long post with all the links to support my claim. Sadly, I am struggling to find it.
In the meantime, here is another comment I found, that makes the same points (just unsourced for now).
For now, I can lay my reputation on the line and assure you that I have a fully sourced comment somewhere that makes these exact point. I will try to find it by tonight, and comment under here. (remind me if I forget)So as a next least-worst thing, I am linking to a right wing article, so don't call me out on that. But, do look at the links in there. The points themselves stand on their own and are well supported from primary sources.
https://dynastycrooks.wordpress.com/2020/12/03/all-the-hypoc...
That is an absolutely misleading (and ignorant) statement because the opposition were against the farm laws because of:
1. The shoddy laws (with glaring loopholes) that the govt. claimed was "reforms". 2. The manner in which the laws was passed. 3. The unconstitutional parts of the laws.
What you have highlighted are all the preliminary preparations that go before the process of law making even starts. This is the respective governments - NDA or UPA - considering how to make policies based on their political ideology and ground realities (as they see it). Just because the NDA or UPA agreed that reforms are needed doesn't mean they were in agreement on how these reforms need to be.
If the government had bothered to consult the opposition, and other parties that would be impacted by these laws, a good law could have been created. Instead, the law was created in secret, was made a law immediately by introducing it as an ordinance bypassing the Parliament initially, and then rushed through Parliament with the brute majority of the government without even allowing a debate.
There is probably a nicer way to say it, but the strategic priority of India should factor in the end of small-time farmers. There are a lot of people working in agriculture who need to be redeployed to something more productive. Unless the plan is to live in poverty forever.
Link in profile.
No, but it links to the coalition website, which does.
> Is it really 20?
If you're skeptical of the number of countries, why would this skepticism be any different if the countries were listed in the article? The reporter could just as easily make them up. Or are you suggesting that the reporter cannot count to 20?
> Are those all countries or are some US states?
So now, aside from suggesting the reporter has trouble counting, you're also suggesting the reporter cannot tell countries apart from US states? What is the basis of this seemingly random question? You could just as easily say any other seeming non sequitur like 'are those all countries or are some flowers?'
> Is it happening in my country?
Why not check the primary source, linked to in the article?
100% yes.
This is basic common sense. Is this no longer taught in school for those without common sense?
FYI: If there are any children on HN, if you want to lie/mislead people you keep facts and figures to a minimum.
This stops people fact checking. 20 countries.... What 20? If they were listed you could check them. This way it's a vague fuzzy claim, how do you disprove?
Cambodia is on the web site, it's factory workers where lied to by management. They sell to many companies and Amazon sells some of those products.
Soooo is this in the 20? They don't work for Amazon using normal common sense. They are also mostly fired, are the ones with jobs still striking? Who knows if they are even in the 20 countries? This is what adults do to muddy the waters and waste time.
The claim "Amazon employees in 20 countries will strike" is probably fiction. I wonder which Amazon oil refinery it is, I guess since the author can count we just trust it?
Those problems were much worse a few years ago, but instead of eBay getting significantly better, Amazon got much much worse. Amazon is being flooded with cheap knockoff Chinese products that often seem very questionable in regards of quality and safety.
For many things that I end up buying I just use a shopping search engine such as Geizhals or idealo. It is very very rare that Amazon is among the cheapest shops for any product I'm looking for
This was the first year I've noticed it in Europe.
Right before Black Friday or Christmas the Amazon employees (in Europe?) announce they're striking.
I couldn't find an explicit list of the 20 countries, but the primary source has a map of where events will be taking place. By clicking each point on the map, I think I counted them all (I counted 21):
Actual amazon logistics employees already have an agreement with the local unions and I assume won't protest[1].
[0] https://www.open.online/2021/11/13/amazon-sciopero-black-fri...
[1] https://www.corriere.it/economia/lavoro/21_settembre_15/amaz...
People can be (and probably are) both.
That is part of the #MakeAmazonPay movement, but it's not all the movement is, and saying that employees are striking in 20 countries is completely false.
It elicited the desired feelings and therefore it was completely true.
They had me right up until the end. That tells me everything I need to know. This isn't being organized by Amazon workers (or I would've heard about it through my own contacts there), but by grifters using this to engage in political grandstanding. God I'm sick of this shit. Just once it would be nice if people pretending to back labor were actually for labor instead of being obvious imperialist shills.
Somehow Amazon has shrugged these massive strikes off in the past though