Episode 10: Subordinates’ Exploitation and Rulers’ Interests

Sri Lanka and the Netherlands are experiencing an unusual assault on farming. Who is making farmers change their ways, what are the consequences, why are they doing it, and toward what ends? How is this affecting the citizens and what are they doing in response? Deb and Bill discuss the similarities of the plight of two countries, and discuss a third country with a recent history of oppression.

"Ruling classes have always sought to instill in their subordinates the capacity to experience exploitation and material deprivation as guilt, while deceiving themselves that their own material interests coincide with those of mankind as a whole.”
― Christopher Lasch (The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations)

References and further reading:

https://www.newsweek.com/popular-uprising-against-elites-has-gone-global-opinion-1722653

https://www.deseret.com/u-s-world/2022/7/7/23198400/why-tractor-riding-dutch-farmers-protesting-against-emissions-regulations-netherlands

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/11/netherlands-dutch-farming-agriculture-sustainable/

https://www.theepochtimes.com/netherlands-partnered-with-wef-to-subvert-global-food-ahead-of-farm-bans-gates-involved_4589507.html

https://www.government.nl/topics/nature-and-biodiversity/protected-nature-areas

https://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/natura2000/index_en.htm

Sri Lanka: The First Country to Destroy Itself by Going Green? - The American Spectator | USA News and Politics

Sri Lanka Has Collapsed Under the Spell of the Green Elites (independentsentinel.com)

The Rajapaksa Brothers Ruined Sri Lanka's Economy and Undermined the Rationale for Their Rule (foreignpolicy.com)

Sri Lanka's Organic Farming Experiment Went Catastrophically Wrong (foreignpolicy.com)

Trudeau's nitrogen policy will decimate Canadian farming