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by nimbius 1226 days ago
Unsurprising. Even the love canal disaster in the US faced massive disinterest before it was quietly revealed to have been a cataclysmic environmental contamination. It boils down to this:

- rail fired a ton of employees a while ago and is now seeing serious issues due to mismanagement

- government oversight is a moderate Republican masquerading as a liberal democrat and just wants the clout from successful negotiations but the concep of most government oversight in the US is hold music at best.

- this city does not threaten harm or inconvenience elites.

- reporting this issue harms and threatens elites and could see a ripple effect during a recession. Rail is a primium mobile for most of wealths investments at some level.

2 comments

Quibble: "uninterest". "Disinterest" means "impartiality". Disinterest is good.

I can't quibble with any of the rest of your argument, though.

Also add on that the rail workers tried to strike over the issues and Biden was like "lol nope"

It's just capitalism being capitalism in the end

For all of you who down vote:

https://time.com/6238361/joe-biden-rail-strike-illegal/

> Biden decided the broader economy was a bigger priority than 100,000 freight rail workers having any paid sick leave in their next contract. After campaigning as the most pro-union presidential candidate in history, Biden signed into law a measure that makes a rail strike illegal.

Forcing it like that is not capitalism.

...Sounds like a great opportunity for everyone to resign simultaneously.

Sure be a pity if you couldn't find enough people to hire to do all that train work needing to be done. Not a strike if everyone just says "Fuck it" and leaves.

It would be catharthic but they might have children and mortgages
Set up a gofundme. I'll donate.
The greatest trick capitalism ever pulled is convincing people that it's not a form of government.
Among its greatest modern hits is “gofundme.com”. Crowdsourcing social policy! It’s the New New Deal—-we took everything great about helping the unfortunate, but without any of the pesky oversight, collective participation, democratic processes, or predictability of your grandparents New Deal. Welcome to the Welfare State II - The Reapportioning! This new social fabric is fresh, capricious, and heavily favors those who bring an existing marketing and outreach apparatus…y’know, the needy people with a solid PR firm.

Public school teacher can’t afford treatment for their cancer? Go Fund Them! Favorite politician indicted for criminal fraud and campaign finance violations for paying for their previous indictment’s legal fees using campaign donations? Go Fund Them! Local dive bar threatened with closure unless they install flushable toilets in the restrooms? Go Fund Them! Single mother of three facing another night in the cold without enough to eat? Our thoughts go out to them, maybe if their mother can pass a urine screen and remain at a single address long enough to fill out the requisite forms and has successfully completed their probation on that loitering charge then they might get a few bucks from Uncle Sam…you never know, because with Go Fund Me anything is possible!

That's exactly the thing, get people to hyper focus on the individual and they miss the forest for the trees.