"Why aren't people rioting in the streets?"

Marching and protesting is easy, but where are the alternative proposals that actually make sense and might work. Does anyone know a way out of the mess that would actually work and that won't cost billions???
 
Does anyone know a way out of the mess that would actually work and that won't cost billions???
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Unfortunately the damage has been done. The best we can hope for now is some degree of damage limitation. Try to stop the government making things worse.

Overheating the property bubble with cheap credit, land rezoning and tax breaks.
Then when the bubble pops, the bank guarantee, followed by Nama and bank bailouts. One bad thing after the next. All to try to save a certain 'elite'.
 
This rhetoric about fat cats and the elite just does not stack up for me.

There is no exploitation of the working classes on the scale that existed in the lock-outs of 1913, etc.

If anything, the years of cheap credit were a great leveller giving everyone the chance to better themselves, where previously only the rich had access to such opportunity.

We have a decent minimum wage and relatively generous social welfare system.

70% of us vote FG or FF who would handle things in exactly the same manner. A further 20% of us would vote labour who are also too mainstream to deviate from the establishment.

If you want some kind of violent revolution to overthrow the mainstream polictical parties you'll just have to do it without the popular support of the people - I don't know if that's something you really seem to care about....
 
DerKaiser said:
There is no exploitation of the working classes on the scale that existed in the lock-outs of 1913, etc.
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Funnily enough, I'm reading a book on the 1913 lockout at present. Whilst obviously the social situation has moved on immensly in terms of housing and employment rights, there are many parallels with the current situation. In particular, the control of the media by employers and the concerted anti-union agenda in the media (complete with Shane Ross-style expose of union leader salaries) are remarkably similar.
 
90% of the people voted in the last general election then did they?

Many people don't vote because there is no one worth voting for.
 

If you were a real socialist you would think differently. Bring on the revolution!
 

I've read quite a bit about that time as well since family members were very actively involved in the foundation of the trade union movement in Ireland and I see very few parallels. Then again there are very few parallels between the trade unions founded then and the self-serving protectionist middle-class unions that leech off their members now. Yes, it’s quite a while since the unions betrayed the ideal they were founded upon. The fact that the public sector, sorry; public service broadcaster is blatantly pro-union does serve to let them off the hook though I can see why some union fat-cats are sore about the (still leftwing) Irish Times moving a little more to the centre now that it is no longer willing to be their mouth-piece.
 
Until I see 2 million people storm leinster house (as opposed to 100), I'll choose to believe that the people in this country prefer democracy to anarchy
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You seem to be very quick to generalise.
 

Researching family history at the minute and what I find interesting is the reaction to evictions back in the 1900s and the reaction to banks seizing houses nowadays. My own ancestors lived in an area where when the landlord went to evict tennant farmers for non-payment of rent, the locals fought pitched battles with the police as a result. It wasn't a question of not being able to pay, more a belief that the landlord was exploiting the situation.

Whilst I wouldn't agree with your analysis of the media in Ireland and see no reason why union leaders salaries shouldn't be exposed, there are indeed parallels with what is happening now and what happened historically in Ireland.
 

I'm sorry this just takes the absolute biscuit. The only parallel is that there was strike and dispute, that's it. You can add in "the social situation has moved on immensely" to attempt to temper what you've said, but this is one piece of hyperbole too much.

There is no parallel with the slums and absolute poverty then or the reactions of the employers, police, church, etc to some negative equity and an average Public Sector wage of 49K. There's been no lock out, there's been negative and positive press. There's not even the mass support for the dispute outside your own unions that there was in 1913 (which even spread to the TUC in Britain).

Every single one of those involved in 1913 would be turning in their graves to even think there was an attempt to draw a comparison between their plight and an average salary of 49K and a few with negative equity.
 

Maybe in 100 years time people will look back and think to themselves, 'aren't we lucky we didnt live in those times when bankers held a noose around the necks of the world and got away with it, and to think they drove around using oil instead of water which is found everywhere, one would wonder what kind of idiots were in charge back then. Surely no-one could have been so evil to adopt a system where the majority of people struggled just to keep a tiny minority Elite in their comforts zone'.

Maybe.
 
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redbhoy said:
Surely no-one could have been so evil to adopt a system where the majority of people struggled just to keep a tiny minority Elite in their comforts zone'
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You just have to have perspective on who the people struggling and who the elite are.

I would argue the poorest people in this country are in the elite compared to the majority of people on the planet. All these moral crusaders focussed a transfer of wealth within Ireland should maybe broaden their horizons. Go out and march for a better deal for Africa or the kids in the sweat shops in Asia if you want to make a difference to social injustice.

If we do insist on focussing just on our country, we also need to see that the public sector trade unions represent people who are doing relatively well on average and it would be naive to think that any concessions they get will be (or even could be) at the expense of the so called fat cats as opposed to the budgets for health, education and social welfare (which hurt the more vulnerable in this country at least).
 
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