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Stop. Electing. Fraudsters.
Especially when the fraudster is a convicted felon.
I'm doing better now, but 15 years ago Walmart was the only option I had for food. Local/regional grocery stores were more expensive and I was living paycheck to paycheck with growing debt.
"If people were smart they would stop buying the most cost-efficient option" is really not feasible.
"If people were smart" they would read and stop putting oligarchs in power.
“If people were smart they would stop buying the most cost-efficient option” is really not feasible.
In fact, more and more people don't have the luxury of buying more expensive options.
Of course, stealing is an option, and I think 'If people were smart' they would accept that stealing from Walmart is not an ethical or pragmatic problem, but it's a risky behavior so I wouldn't criticize people for not stealing. [edit: see Fubarberry's reply]
Stealing from walmart also isn't sustainable if many people are doing it. For example there were a ton of walmarts and other stores in the Chicago area that recently closed due to high theft at those locations. Now whole communities there are left without convenient shopping options, which can be a big problem for people with limited transportation options.
That Walmart CLAIMED were closed for high theft.
You can look up videos of some of the stores that were closed, they were basically being straight up looted.
I remember seeing the videos, and thinking to myself how I didn't understand how they could afford to stay in business like that. So when they announced they were closing those stores for theft, I didn't really think the given reason was ever in doubt.
"“The decision to close a store is never easy,” company officials said in a statement. “The simplest explanation is that collectively our Chicago stores have not been profitable since we opened the first one nearly 17 years ago.”
The stores lose tens of millions of dollars a year, according to the company, a figure that nearly doubled in the last five years despite numerous strategies to boost performance, including building smaller stores, offering local products and building a Walmart Academy training center."
Doesn't sound like theft was ever the problem here according to them?
Good point. If there aren't other local stores remaining to fill the gaps, then that would be a critical problem.
Walmart, Kroger, etc.'s entire business model is to undercut other local stores to drive them out and become local monopolies. If they exist in a location there likely aren't many, if any, local stores remaining...
Stealing isn't right.
The Walmart near me closed due to high theft. There were actually people stealing from the construction site when the store was being built, so it really was a ticking clock as to how long the store itself would even last.
Some people are just awful.
Stealing isn’t right.
I conditionally disagree. In fact, there are many real situations where stealing is the right option. There are valid reasons why folk lore glorifies figures like Robin Hood. And when it comes to international conglomerates like Walmart, which hoard astronomical wealth while others who can't afford bread starve nearby, theft of the hoard is justice in its most appropriate form (if one values human survival more than legal property rights).
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Ignoring the fact that alternative voting systems exist and there can be more then two political parties.
Voting for fascists/not voting
The obvious answer is fossil fuels, right? Few people want to cook the climate, they just can't quite fathom something that abstract and slow-moving, so they do it anyway.
Less obviously, feeding all our most sensitive data to random websites and apps. Again, the threat just doesn't look enough like a sabre-tooth tiger.
Fossil fuels is kinda a prisoner's dilemma issue. Everyone cooperating to save the planet is obviously ideal, but realistically there are always going to be companies/countries that won't. And as long as it's cheaper to not be environmentally friendly, there's always going to be someone taking that option.
For example, lets say country A passes new regulations on manufacturing to be more environmentally friendly. The new regulations take the country's manufacturing from low pollution to very low pollution. However the increase in cost causes many companies to stop manufacturing locally, and instead outsource their manufacturing to country B with low regulation and moderate pollution during manufacturing. The end result is more money leaving the local economy of country A, and increased global pollution.
It's a similar prisoner's dilemma for the individual companies involved. If your competitor is able to make their product for cheaper because their process is less environmentally friendly, then they can undercut you and put you out of business.
The tragedy of the commons is definitely part of it, but until recently there was a sort of global consensus anyway. Domestically climate change action - real action - is unpopular.
Few people want to cook the climate, they just can’t quite fathom something that abstract and slow-moving, so they do it anyway.
I don't think the problem is that people are unaware. Even people who believe they are against cooking the environment have other rationalisations, like "the economy isn't able to shut down all the coal plants yet, it'll collapse". Propaganda is a hell of a drug.
No, it's not that people are unaware, or even don't believe it, it's that they can't reason about it strategically
It's spending now to save later. If that's about military spending or emergency services everyone gets paying taxes for it, but words are as far as most will go to stop nonspecific far future weather. Even when people talk about the situation with climate change, you hear them frame it in moral terms instead of practical terms.
Case in point: Canada has a carbon tax, and a majority want to get rid of it. Denialism is not a prominent part of the campaign, just the fact that it costs something. And not even much, and it's all given back in refunds - doesn't matter, the extra gas cost people will bear is zero.
That we haven't learned more from history and keep making the same mistakes over and over.
Thinking that "being smart" means shit. We need to realize that the people who run things aren't necessarily smart. Presidents aren't necessarily smart. Professors aren't necessarily smart.
And being smart doesn't mean you're good. Evil smart is a nightmare, because destroying is so much easier than building.
What would we do if we were good? Now that's a question.
Drinking alcohol. Lots of people drink way too much and make life ruining decisions.
They would understand that socialism is not communism. Also you can have capitalism and socialism at the same time, you just have to give and take a little.
They would understand that socialism is not communism.
Socialism has so many definitions that this can be subjectively true or false. This isn't even some trivial gotcha, the terms were used interchangeably even by significant writers of the 1800s. For another example, a socialist mode of production and a capitalist mode of production are contradictory.
If one wants to make these kind of broad claims without starting pointless arguments, they'll need to use a more specific term than 'socialism'.
You're wrong about literally all of that.
Op probably thinks socialism == Scandinavian welfare states. Most online USA midwits don’t know the difference
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A person is smart. People, not so much.
Great movie
Processed food and high sugar diets are killing us.
These foods are addictive, and ubiquitous. A well informed and smart american would still have a problem switching over to whole food only. (Where the ingredient label only says one thing).
+ meat
Yeah, I said it.
I respectfully disagree, but in glad you have a diet that works for you
capitalism
Thinking that they have the "one simple trick" for everything when most matters are actually a complex network of issues where there isn't one answer.
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They'd stop believing people are stupid, especially those they disagree with, and realize that their differences are mostly made up by the ruling class to keep them in line.
Buying and carrying guns.
Stop driving (pollution, deaths, cost of living etc) and remodel cities and town around PT and AT , restricted gun ownership
How do people living with no PT or AT options stop driving?
Also, the working masses must remain armed to prevent even further class slavery.
I've joined three different unions and the only guns I've used were loaned to me by a representative of my country for a short period decades ago.
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Probably leave religion in the past, recognize the oligarchy as the source of most of our woes, legislate for a maximum income, laws to make home ownership by companies illegal, begin providing universal basic income, stop caring about the boarder and just let people in, decriminalize drugs and prostitution, criminalize bribes to politicians, break up the obvious monopolies, nationalize internet access, expand voter access and encourage everyone to vote, release prisoners from prison for non-violent offenses, close private prisons and reform tge whole court system, structure fines for laws broken as a percentage of income making them a deterent even for tge wealthy, ties minimum wage to inflation or tge gdp in some way so it can keep up without further legislation, open a new department that is not police to handle most calls more ethically, cap income within a company so no one can make more than X times more than any other employee of the company, simplify tge tax codes to close most loopholes, empower tge IRS to send citizens a bill instead of paying turbo tax, prevent civil forfeture, remove state ability to fine individuals without an income for not paying fees, expand disability benefits so you can have more than $3k in liquid assets and still get benefits, and so on.
These were all just off the top of my head.
Payday loans.
The smart part is realizing the havoc payday loans inflict on one's finances.
It's not about "smart" vs "dumb." People's ideas are shaped by their Class Interests and Material Coniditons.
Building electric car charging stations without security cameras.
About 75% of the chargers are disabled in my city. The primary method of disabling them is roll up with a sawzall and just chop the cable off. Gets you $5 worth of crack, which is always a nice incentive structure when there’s unguarded copper lying around.
The only chargers that survive are in front of 24 hour businesses.
You're not getting cashback on your credit cards yous daft cunts 😂 You're paying it in advance
Believing public figures on camera, or on a dais with a mic in front of them.
Because with stuff like this you cannot simply say "everyone should know better" they don't know btr, they don't care, they don't understand. For a myriad of reasons people will always do stuff counter to best logic, so you cannot ask them to. The only practical way to prevent stuff like this is through regulation and a government that serves the people. Lol it's nice to dream.
Yeah, and also even if there's smart people doing it, it doesn't matter. Supposed 10% of people don't use Amazon, as long as 90% are fine, it won't affect them. Most people won't look beyond "it costs me less", the whole reason thing like temu is widespread is exactly that. People don't care about other people, ethics of things, or even the long term effects of their actions. They just see low price vs high price on everyday setting.
If a chain restaurant gave half price food for a year in a loss to take out all local businesses people would gladly buy it. And then when everything is gone and that chain raises price because there's no competition they'll just blame other people, economy, whatever they can find.
In many cases it also comes from the side that people can't afford to spend more money for the right reasons. Many people are living paycheck to paycheck, and those that aren't, are still not well off and want to save as much money as they can for retirement/emergencies. You can't count on anyone except yourself for your future, so they'll take whatever costs them less now.
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this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2024
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