[ SECRET POST #3971 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3871 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



__________________________________________________



02.
[Orphan Black]


__________________________________________________



03.
[ Dota 2 Esport ]


__________________________________________________



04.


__________________________________________________



05.
[George R.R. Martin]


__________________________________________________



06.
[Black Books]


__________________________________________________



07.
















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 14 secrets from Secret Submission Post #554.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

Re: If you had extreme political power

[(Anonymous)]

That's fine. Not everyone has to be an agricultural laborer. But there are plenty of people who don't mind signing up for a CSA with a few hours of labor and their money; there are lots of people who would love to work on the land and don't have the opportunity. There are people who pay money to pick their own apples, and there's a strong longing for a better connection with nature among a lot of young people. Whether that means devoting one's life to it is another thing, but some labor, as a way to learn adn connect with nature, is not outside most people's reach if big business isn't allowed to strangle it in the cradle.

Re: If you had extreme political power

[(Anonymous)]

I'm mostly onboard with the idea but honestly just dump a ton of research and money into automation, because the sheer amount of poorly paid toxic backbreaking labor required to feed people without food prices skyrocketing can't be made up by volunteers.

Re: If you had extreme political power

[(Anonymous)]

Just spitballing here. I wasn't actually saying it all had to be volunteer labor. I think more community-oriented farms could make a huge difference from factory farms. I think many people seek some connection to the land. I think people are healthier and happier if they grow at least something. (Seriously there are studies that show dirt works as a kind of antidepressant.) So...more community agriculture? More gardens instead of lawns? Think about it: during WWII in the USA, people grew "Victory Gardens" and fed themselves a lot more than they do now. If we could do better back then, why not make some changes now and have people be more directly involved in food production now? Big business running everything is not really sustainable, much less healthy for the average eater. It also isn't what people did for most of history. And yes, I realize food insecurity was a big problem then, with famines and poverty...but we still have famines, we still have hunger. There can be a middle ground between "everyone is a subsistence farmer" and "big corporations own it all and decide what we eat--if we can pay their prices." I'm not sure I know where the exact balance will lay. Automation could well be a part of it.

Re: If you had extreme political power

[(Anonymous)]

So I suck at math, but circa 2012 (most recent census figures) there were 915 million acres of farmland under cultivation in the US. Current US population is ~323 million, so every person in the country would have to cultivate and harvest ~2.83 acres of land, which is apparently just under two city blocks' worth. But that includes the babies and elderly and disabled, so it'd actually be more per person.

I'm also assuming that's farmland--producing crops--and not rangeland, producing meat. But presumably some of those crops are growing forage, and with portable electric fencing you can run animals on pasture (instead of having to transport food to them) and over harvested crop stubble and get better yields and tastier meat (saith the suburban vegetarian). And most people in the US don't need as much meat as they eat.

Also, a lot of that food is grown/raised for export, and a lot of corn is grown for ethanol. But then, field corn harvesting is mostly mechanized already, cutting those crops and their subsidies wouldn't add many workers to the labor pool. I think staple grain planting, growing, and harvesting should stay as mechanized as possible, while trying to keep the use of fossil fuels and fuel-derived fertilizers a lot lower.

Re: If you had extreme political power

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

I appreciate that, I'm just not sure it's enough to allow us to rely on it for all our food production