this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2024
20 points (91.7% liked)
Melbourne
1871 readers
53 users here now
This community is a place created for the people of Melbourne and Victoria. We are a positive, welcoming and inclusive community. We might not agree about everything, but we always strive to stay civil and respectful.
The focus of our discussions is based around things that affect Victoria, but we are also free to discuss our local perspective on wider issues. Or head to the regular Daily Random Discussion thread to talk about anything.
Ongoing discussions, FAQs & Resources (still under construction)
Adoption Certificate for Nellie, the Daily Thread numbat (with thanks to @Catfish)
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Politics/class
I feel like Australia is increasingly becoming stratified. There are people who are still a bit more protected but the people at the bottom are left fighting each other for scraps and dragging each other down like crabs in a bucket.Occupy Melbourne was incoherent and quickly squashed but these are the living conditions that were predicted and protested
It has always been like this.
For a few decades the middle class forgot they were still part of the proletariat and weren't really independent bourgeoisie.
Occupy was a Russian front, ignore it.
What the Marxists never say, or maybe they never figured it out, is that America and Australia only had good post war living standards for the working classes because they were the only western countries that hadn't had their factories bombed to the shithouse. It meant we became primary and secondary industry powerhouses. But once industry had enough money again and factories could be built in places with cheaper labour we were doomed. That's what capitalism is.
me and my husband had to get professional jobs overseas to escape the old boy network and that was 25 years ago
Just last week, John Quiggin released a book on pretty much this exact topic, called "After Neoliberalism".
You can download the eBook for free, or order a printed copy here: https://press.anu.edu.au/publications/series/global-thinkers-series/after-neoliberalism
If you're interested in an in-depth look at the economic and government policies that erosion of the middle class happened, it's worth a read.
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
But leaves the greater villain loose
Who steals the common from off the goose.
The law demands that we atone
When we take things we do not own
But leaves the lords and ladies fine
Who take things that are yours and mine.
The poor and wretched donβt escape
If they conspire the law to break;
This must be so but they endure
Those who conspire to make the law.
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
And geese will still a common lack
Till they go and steal it back
~Late 1700s
Iβm not sure about downloading or ordering but I found this https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Aj4ha2QCX1w
Sadly itβd probably just confirm what I already have a sense of.
I know @johnquiggin@aus.social posts on the Fedi fairly regularly...
It's going to keep getting worse too. I give us about 4 years.
@melbaboutown @Seagoon_
Apparently the revolutionary French visited Australia and declared Australia practised "Socialism without doctrine". That was long ago and trades hall today is a museum of collapsed trade unions. Both left and right totalitarian systems are currently regarded as frightfully modern era and intemperate. I can't wait to see what comes after post-modernism.