No, the comment you’re replying to says “If you’re forced to rent because you can’t get on the housing ladder, you should be allowed to have an animal as a pet. Full stop”

They’re agreeing with you, I think you must have misread should as shouldn’t or something like that. It’s easily done :) I was just a bit confused reading the comment and reply.

I think you misread the comment you’re replying to?

Federal Trade Commission is maintaining its opposition to the deal but it cannot prevent Microsoft and Activision from completing it

Wasn’t the FTC specifically created to block/prevent corporate mergers to stop companies from becoming too big?

I reckon you’re 100% on the money here. The big tobacco companies push all this drama and concern about the health effects so that everyone thinks the industry needs to be more regulated, that allows them to kill off the smaller competition and push up prices.

Our society is fucking falling apart. A massive cost of living crisis, food bank usage is at an all time high, the gap between rich and poor has never been higher, entire generations are completely unable to buy a home, each year breaks through the ceiling for “hottest year on record”, we’re completely blasting past the paris climate accords, still massively subsidising fossil fuels, inflation is absurd, the NHS is falling apart, along with every other public service, and Brexit is not only hugely unpopular but is actively damaging our opportunities.

And what bold, decisive answers does Labour have to solve these problems?

close ties with business and a “competitive tax regime” to solve the housing crisis

not go back into the EU

not rejoin the single market or a customs union

not re-establishing freedom of movement

not committing to investing in renewables or other green policies

prioritising “””efficiency””” in the NHS, refusing to increase funding until they’ve undertaken an assessment

focusing on “””economic growth””” rather than green policy (which means sacrificing the environment for the benefit of the wealthy)

“getting people back into work rather than increasing their benefits“

“Deploy the power of artificial intelligence“ to help fix the NHS

ruling out any sort of wealth tax or increasing taxes for the wealthy

Labour under Starmer inspires no hope or enthusiasm whatsoever. They’re literally the party of, “I guess they’re technically not the Tories”. But make no mistake, they’re running on a right wing platform.

Labour claim to be “for the many, not the few”, but that’s not true. They’re “for the money, and none for you”.

If you want to vote for them because they’re better than the far-right Tories, you go ahead and do that, be my guest.

But I’m not going to be voting for a right wing party next election.

Got it, and replied. Sorry for the delay!

There really should be a law requiring companies which provide online services to be required to release self-hosted server software once they discontinue the provision of the service.

I’m honestly quite surprised - this is very, very close to my view of how things should work - much closer than anyone else has come to expressing the same views as I have.

I think the only gap between us is generally the details of how it would work, but also, how we get there. For the latter, I have a few suggestions which I have shared on Lemmy before. For the former - the only real difference is I kind of don’t trust the concept of “digital” direct democracy, I’m far more inclined towards delegates representing much, much smaller groups (100-150ish people) whom can be recalled immediately. I wrote a bit about how I think it should work elsewhere.

Anyways, I think we probably have quite a bit in common, you should drop me a message so we can chat more. :)

The problem is that any suggestions like this are impossible to achieve without a broader solution to the real problem, which is the fact that our entire society is basically held hostage by wealthy elites. Before we can solve the problems which they have caused, we need to get rid of them, and the source of their power, first. Otherwise, they will block any progress.

I don’t understand how anyone can witness this and not realise that the issue we have is a systemic issue, rather than an issue specifically with the PM or even with the Tory party.

Politicians are literally giving the middle finger to a public inquiry with complete impunity. If they can get away with this, then what force can hold them accountable? The voters? They lie about their policies and positions, get voted in, then do whatever they want for years. The media, completely controlled by the wealthy ruling elite, makes it impossible for any politician who would be a threat to their interests to get elected by running constant smear campaigns and puff pieces.

Electoral politics is at a dead end. The best it can accomplish is avoiding the worst possible outcomes. For a truly better world, we need massive changes which happen outside the system.

Fuck building new lines designed for speed, invest that money in making the existing network better.

Building new, modern railway lines is one way to improve the network. I don’t really understand why anyone who advocates for investment in the railways has a problem with building new lines. I agree that they shouldn’t be private anymore and that we should massively increase funding, but building new rail and replacing old rail with new rail seems like a great way to improve the network

The ruling class know fine well that funding public transport would solve a lot of problems, but the problem is that it would also reduce profit for a lot of industries. So that’s why it doesn’t happen and why it won’t happen, if anyone was wondering.

The obsession with technical solutions (like these self-driving buses) is because it gives them an excuse to funnel more wealth to the wealthy.

That’s what it’s all about, it’s what it has always been about. If we want to improve our world then the people with power need to be stripped of that power, completely and utterly.

Yep, this is a solution looking for a problem really. Either that, or it’s a really bad solution to the car problem.

You’re blaming the wrong people, it’s not working class baby boomers that are responsible for our problems, it’s the wealthy ruling elite.

I suggest joining the IWW, getting involved in direct action and mutual aid and working within your communities to build alternative structures. Start or join a housing co-op or a workers co-op (or both), try to make changes to your living situation which make you more self-sufficient (growing your own food, getting solar panels) and just being helpful, generous and kind.

I think what should come after is a world where people work together to provide everyone with what they need without any abusive structures of power.

I don’t think they are saying the taxes are bad

Come on, stop arguing that black is white. The article calls the report damaging and even you said that it highlights how badly the country is performing. The article very clearly has the message of “isn’t it bad how much the Tories have raised taxes?”

Why are you like, arguing about this? I don’t really understand.

There are biases beyond who funds the report. Neoliberalism is biased against taxes, economists are overwhelmingly neoliberal and the think-tank is a group of economists. It’s not that complex, really.

I literally just said I’m not talking about direct democracy. It was just an example of an alternative, and one that I specifically said I didn’t support.

All cards on the table, since you’re trying to understand my position, I’m a libertarian socialist. I support the abolition of money, the police, prisons, social classes, states and all unjustified hierarchies. I believe that power ultimately corrupts anyone who wields it and the only solution is to abolish all forms of power as far as is possible.

I think a good way to structure society would be groups of approximately 50-150 people (but absolutely no more than 200) represented by someone in their community in a council of delegates where decisions are made. The representative would not make decisions on behalf of their community but rather would act as a liaison between the community and the larger council. Proposals made at meetings of the council would be brought back to the communities to be discussed and for consensus to be built and a decision to be reached (or for a request for more information / clarification) and then that feedback would be brought to the council, where the delegates would share the feedback/decisions made by their community and they would make amends to the proposal to make it work. The barrier for approval for a proposal to be accepted would be high - something like 90% but certainly no lower than 75% - meaning that true consensus has to be reached, rather than a tyranny of the majority.

This is the model used by some cool groups such as workers/housing co-operatives, and I think it would work well for larger societies. Maybe it’s been used by large societies, I honestly don’t know.

“Causing harm to us” was my short-hand interpretation - I’m just a guy writing internet comments, they don’t have to be perfect - but I don’t think it’s an unfair reading of the article.

Acting like their analysis is unfeeling and unpolitical is classic IFS bullshit. Raising corporation tax, energy profit levy and top rate income tax are all good things and you want me to complain about it just because the Tories are doing it? Is tribalism more important than policy?

I’d call out this crap regardless of who’s in power because it’s just typical neoliberal “taxes are always bad” bullshit. Tax the shit out of corporations and the wealthy, please.

No, it doesn’t, that’s a very narrow perspective - I’m guessing that you’re quite young and you’re not familiar with alternative systems of organising society.

There are many alternatives, but I like the idea of consensus based decision-making. It’s a little bit like direct democracy - instead of voting for people to represent you, instead you directly get to support or block decisions made about the society you live in.

For example, currently, we elect politicians to represent us, and we try to elect a politician who would solve climate change. But that doesn’t seem to work. Imagine if, instead, we could all directly vote on an idea - whether or not we should end fossil fuel subsidies, for example? That’s direct democracy, but it gets rid of electoral politics. For full context, I don’t support that kind of direct democracy, but there are countless alternatives to representative democracy, I just wanted to share one which was simple and easy to explain.

No. Nothing to do with voting. Just forget that voting exists. Imagine that the politicians are unelected. How would you go about changing the system in that scenario? That’s how you need to be thinking, because that’s essentially the situation that we’re in.