sorry but how is this different from just democracy ?
we have democracy here in USA that allows NIMBY homeowners opposing any new development. Is that also just 'populist vote-grabbbing'
Democracy is still the best form of government I know of though. So if you don't live in one it is worth moving to one. Hopefully you can learn from the mistakes of those of us who have gone before and design protection for some more downside.
There's no better example of this than the discussion on health insurance here on HN a few days ago, where people with health insurance were opposing universal healthcare because they'd have to "compete with the general public for treatment access".
How do you fight it though? There's no incentive for anyone to willingly choose to have a worse personal situation for a greater good.
As an example, just in the last six months or so, I took considerable time and effort out of my day to help absolute strangers in two different occasions to change their flat tires. Both times I was soaked through in sweat by the time I was done, but I was happy to help. Does it follow from my willingness to do this that I would be in support of, say, a government program for roadside assistance (call it AAA-for-All)? Hell no.
America once excelled at civil society, but over time government has subsumed more and more of those functions; to everyone's detriment, if you asked me.
I'm not calling you prejudiced, to be clear, but your example of "we should all rely on each other to help out" is exactly what racists use to justify cutting welfare and saying communities and churches should handle it, for example, with the dogwhistle that only those "deserving" will get assistance. But "welfare queens" who dare to be Black? No support for them!
I'm not sure what part of the country you live in or what your background is, but it is my sincere belief that there are not nearly as many racists in America in this day and age as you imply. I live in a majority black city in a Deep South red state (and I myself am visibly nonwhite), and I observe nothing but pleasant interactions between people of all skin tones. It's honestly a strange difference from back when I lived in a stereotypically "coastal liberal elite" city in a blue state, where every other lawn had a BLM sign but approximately zero black people lived there. Here? Approximately zero BLM signs but people of different races being neighbors and getting along just fine.
Perhaps I'll be proven wrong, but it is my experience that outside of small pockets, there is no racism of the sort you describe, where someone may not extend private kindness to another because they're black or any other race.
In case you need a refresher of an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Ahmaud_Arbery
I'm familiar with the Arbery tragedy. You're extrapolating from this and maybe other high-profile cases to make the argument that there are racists all over the country who are willing to kill. The actual data paints a different picture, with there having been anywhere from five to ten thousand reported hate crimes annually over the past decade or so, with only a few tens of those being murders. Statistically you're about as likely to be killed by a lightning strike as someone murdering you due to your race.
Your claim that people are "discriminated against regularly", of course, is too vague for me to counter.
Elect whichever "populist" politician offends the progressive reformers the most.
But where did you get that this happened in italy . I didn't see that in the bbc article.
> sorry but how is this different from just democracy
to:
> But where did you get that this happened
Which seems like example of moving the goal-post.
I guess i don't really understand 'riling up' means.
Populism is how people react to democracy failures. It happens when people are disenfranchised.
Because of who is behind the unpopular thing, and who has power to make (thing) happen.
Nuclear weapons are also deeply unpopular.
> Won't the market quickly show that "bugs and lab-grown abominations" can't stand?
The market won't have a say when bureaucrats pass a law mandating every burger or sausage should contain a % of lab-grown meat, with the % increasing every year. If there's anything the recent years have showed is that slippery slope isn't a fallacy.
Who? The government that's currently banning it?
> Nuclear weapons are also deeply unpopular.
Consumers can't just not buy nuclear weapons and cause them to stop existing. This has nothing to do at all with a food product.
> The market won't have a say when bureaucrats pass a law mandating every burger or sausage should contain a % of lab-grown meat, with the % increasing every year.
Why would they do this? And wouldn't the people who had to do this be the same Italian government that's clearly anti-lab grown meat? If they switch to that stance won't this ban be easily rescinded anyways? If there's a lab meat boogie man with the power to make new laws what does this ban really do?
Reversing a law, especially one that would be exceptionally popular is unlikely to succeed. By contrast, so long as e.g. lab meat remains legal - there are lots of ways to work behind the scenes to achieve your ends. One of the easiest is labeling. By allowing lab meat to simply be labeled as meat, consumer choice can be largely eliminated. Pair this with artificial subsidies to the lab meat industry, and you completely undermine the market in a rather quiet fashion. It all has the same effect, without the same degree of outrage, as trying to overturn a popular law would.
> By allowing lab meat to simply be labeled as meat, consumer choice can be largely eliminated.
By making lab meat illegal, consume choice HAS been eliminated. This is literally the exact same problem that's being suggested as a slippery slope in plain view.
So if you're an American farmer, you should expect Kroger (among other WEF affiliated businesses) to treat lab meat in an unfairly preferential way. Even if you would feel comfortable competing against lab meat on a "level" playing field, this changes the game, and creates a much bigger motivation for things exactly like what's happening in Italy right now.
[1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/10/will-we-eat-lab-grown...
[1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/06/you-will-be-eating-re...
[1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/11/how-a-new-approach-to...
I also think you have the push/pull the wrong way - Kroger wants a say in WEF's decisions, it's not controlled by the WEF. It's always going to do what's best for Kroger.
Sure, but they're currently demonstrating this in the exact opposite way: the market won't have a say when bureaucrats mandate everything has a maximum percentage of lab-grown meat, and that proposed percentage is "zero".
What are you referring to?
That seems ideologically inconsistent but terribly convenient.
GM bacteria rennet.
Of course, part of why I'm vegetarian is that the idea of scraping off the stomach lining of a baby cow in order to turn milk into a convenient solid is, to me, also an abomination…
The fact that you perceive something natural as an abomination is a symptom of a society that's too successful and needs to invent problems where there are none.
If the cow could speak, I believe their opinion would be otherwise.
Humans don't generally appreciate it when lions, tigers, and bears beat them to the top of the food chain.
Perfectly natural, that hypocrisy; as natural as your face being eaten by leopards.
> The fact that you perceive something natural as an abomination is a symptom of a society that's too successful and needs to invent problems where there are none.
Lots of natural stuff has been "an abomination" to one group or another since writing existed, regardless of how successful the societies have been.
Examples in Leviticus, amongst other ancient texts.
Shellfish are natural.
Except cows... Don't speak? That's kind of the whole point. We can't apply human value judgements to other species that work in a fundamentally different way.
> Humans don't generally appreciate it when lions, tigers, and bears beat them to the top of the food chain.
It's safe to say no carnivore/omnivore denies that animals suffer. And I'd bet most of us are not happy that they do. It's just not a deal breaker, seeing as it's outweighed by many benefits.
Obviously so.
You'll note I said "vegetarian" above rather than "vegan", despite the reasons (I could quote PETA but I won't bother) that milk itself can be well described as an abomination.
Thing is though, as we become better artisans, the comparative benefits of "natural" over artificial are ever reduced.
The ban proposed in the link reminds me of the early years of motorcars, when they were limited to a few miles per hour lest they scare the horses.
That is why many rational people do not support this idea of unlimited democracy. The founders of he US knew very well the perils of unlimited democracy and that is why they not only attempted to check government power, but check the power of the majority
I dont want to be ruled by either a government in washington, nor a majority of my neighbors
Populist movements only grow because the insulated ruling class don't listen to the people(and often don't give a shit).
The Swiss do have a popular vote on things, but they aren't, for example, voting themselves free lunch and ponies for all. I don't know whether that's because the government is prohibited from providing free lunch and ponies or because the majority of people culturally value hard work and saving over immediate gratification and are educated enough to know that there is no such thing as a free lunch. Either way, it would not work out as well in places where one or both of those things are not true.
Let's pick out some recent results from Switzerland:
In 2022, voters rejected "Ban on animal and human experiments" and "Popular initiative against factory farming", and approved "Limiting tobacco advertising".
In 2021, they rejected "Federal Act on greenhouse gas emissions" and "For clean drinking water and healthy food", and approved "Ban on full facial coverings".
In 2020, they rejected "Affordable housing" and "Ban on financing weapon production" and approved "Paternity leave".
In 2019, they rejected "Stop the Sprawl", and approved "Gun control directive".
From this, I can gather that the Swiss as a whole are sensible people who understand that voting for things that sound good on the surface like "ban factory farming" or "more affordable housing" might lead to worse problems down the road than what it is they are trying to fix; and that they have a strong sense of cultural identity, as shown by the ban on full facial coverings.
I would imagine the same questions would yield vastly different results in other places. The proposition system in California resulted in Prop 13, arguably one of the worst policy disasters ever in that state, looking back almost 45 years later. Now the San Francisco city government is talking about paying every black resident a lump sum of $5mm and a guaranteed high income for the next 250 years; what do you think a binding popular referendum would do in that city?
Isolated nation of small population that is largely a monoculture with very low rate of poverty...
That model does not scale to a large culturally diverse population with widely disparate income levels.
I'm no expert on Switzerland, but can it really be described as a monoculture? There are four language groups, after all. I cannot speak to the existence of an overriding Swiss ethos that people identify with.
Likewise, there's plenty to be said about standards for food safety and quality, but legislating against lab-grown meat serves no practical purpose right now (it may in the future), other than pure political grandstanding.
Also, that's not even the worse of the things introduced by our government yesterday, administrations do not need to publish a public contract for works up to 150k euros.
Now every single administration can spend and gift corrupted money left and right without any need for any accountability and rules.
Disgusting.