plans to prepare for the possible outbreak of war
An "outbreak" of Europe deciding to get more openly involved in current and upcoming wars for the empire (i.e. capital).
I swear if you pick a mainstream news site in any US-aligned country you'll find multiple examples of nazi shit being said and done while the journalists and comments act as if this is business as usual. Which it essentially is.
I was speaking to someone Russian on here though and he seemed bemused by all this, like from their point of view Russia doesn't really want a war. So maybe all this stuff in the news is just western powers blowing things out of proportion for some nefarious reason like trying to force people into the army, or making us panic-buy supplies, or as an excuse to declare martial law or take away our few remaining freedoms. I guess also if it causes stock markets to crash etc then the rich would buy up everyone's assets cheaply and the masses would own nothing.
We're constantly urged to fear Russia, China, DPRK, Iran and so on. Apparently they're up to no good?
Meanwhile the U.S. empire has been waging bloody wars, terrorism, coups and other "destabilizing actions" non-stop for 80+ years.
Our ruling class has long wanted to take on Russia and China. Russia even since before WW2. So while Putin won't be starting it, there are good reasons to expect various attempts at escalation from NATO, such as the March 2024 terror attack in Moscow.
It's been quite the revelation for me, the older I've become, to realise that western countries are probably actually the baddies.
Yes, the amount of gaslighting is gobsmacking.
"societies, industries and economies win wars"
Industries create wars in order to shape societies and economies to their agenda! And that agenda always seems to be privatized, exorbitant profit and socialized losses to societies and economies!
Somewhere, in another universe that is unfortunately not ours, the UK would rapidly be developing plans to prepare for war against poverty and poor living conditions.
I'd like to transfer over to that universe, please.
Hey @DisabledAceSocialist@lemmygrad.ml isn't like the UK starving right now? I am a bit out of touch with UK events/situation.
Many people are. Many disabled and out of work people are starving because of benefit cuts, difficulty accessing benefits etc. Some disabled people, such as Errol Graham and mark Woods, famously died of starvation in the UK after their disability benefits were stopped. The food banks are no good at all. Many children are starving because their parents can't afford to feed them and many of these kids don't even receive free school meals as your parents have to earn less than £7400 a year for you to get free school meals. Even people in full time work are going hungry as wages are so low and cost of living so high. Old age pensioners are going hungry because their pensions are so low. It's not new though, it's been going on pretty much forever. I myself starved as a child and as a young adult was diagnosed with a malnutrition-related cancer which has ruined my life. And I had my disability benefits stopped and have to beg for food on mutual aid as I can't feed myself otherwise. And meanwhile the royals and other rich people are having banquets and supermarkets are throwing away unsold food. It's a sick world.
I actually work at a Foodbank and I can tell you if people are having issues getting stuff from a Foodbank it ain't because there low on stock, that's for sure.
Like seriously last Tuesday we had issues simply putting away all of the "donations" (in air quotes because most of our supply comes from Tesco's and friends, not from like dudues leaving donations or anything.) so if foodbanks are utterly incapable of doing much it ain't because we got a lack of supply.
Actually thinking about this we usually don't give out much food per donation, like, for a family of four for instance we probably make up like 4 boxes or something like that, which is basically fuck all to be honest especially for a family that size, like I guess if you wanted to be generous it would be enough for 1000 calories per day per person, which again is on the generous side of things, certainly nowhere near the recommended caloric intake for men and women.
TL:Dr, foodbanks are probably holding back on the donations they give out even when you do get vouchers, so yeah, fuuunnnnn.
My local foodbank barely even gives food, it's mostly drinks. A typical package would be a box of teabags, a jar of coffee, a large bottle of milk, a bag of sugar, and then just a very small amount of food, usually a tiny bag of pasta, a mini loaf of bread, a packet of cookies and a bag of doritos. That's it. No protein, no fruit, no veg, and it takes so long to access because you have to get a referral, which means you need someone like the GP or citizens advice to refer you and it takes ages getting them to do that, then you have to wait for an appointment at the food bank, and they have often even been closed on days they're meant to be open. So all in all it takes 2-3 weeks to actually get to use the food bank, and those cookies, doritos, bread and pasta are somehow meant to last that long. They don't even last a day. I actually developed nutritional deficiencies and fainted 4 times after living like this for months. That's why I ask for help getting food here on lemmy, it's impossible to survive on the food bank. They actually told me they're supposed to give three days worth of food at a time. I don't even consider this close to three days worth, and I think it's ridiculous anyway only giving people three days worth when it takes weeks to get back there again. Not to mention it's really difficult not being able to choose my own food as my cancer treatment has caused me to develop food intolerances, the food the food bank gives makes me ill but when you're starving you eat it anyway.
Jesus, I mean to be honest I live in the south east (aka the part of the UK that effectively leeched of the rest of britbong land when we began to enter the end stage of capitalism) and even down here I wouldn't exactly describe the situation as great, sure you do get actual protein in your food parcels here but it's only slightly better to be honest, and your certainly not getting enough food to meet your required caloric intake per month that's for sure.
To be honest I think the government is doing it on purpose, in the place I work at we have more than enough food (for fuck shake I was literally having to squeeze in what I could.) probably so that the proles will be too starved to riot (probably won't work mind you, believe me the Tsarists tried this in Russia and all it led to was for the peasants and proles to Join the Bolsheviks.) but yeah, in my opinion most foodbanks absolutely have enough food to go around it's just that the government wants to starve the proles so they don't have the energy to revolt.
Those in power would rather throw food in landfill while people go hungry than equitably distribute it.
Yes, thats why we're going to war
Lol. With what. Unless all those flags are secret drones.