S08.E02: Meatpacking Facilities

[PrincessPurrsALot]

Main topic: Meatpacking Facilities

Also: Texas Freeze/Energy Failure; People Who Went to Harvard; The People's Court under Covid

Original air date 202.02.21

[Annber03]

BRB, dying of laughter forever at that Perdue ad. What even was that? 

On a more serious note, can my state of Iowa please go back to being talked about for good things again at some point? Fuck those assholes at that Tyson plant. And sadly, on the state level, I'm not expecting much to change on that front, because of who we've got in charge right now. But that's a whole other topic unto itself. 

Texas sure didn't come out of this episode looking great, either. It's like some states are in a race to see just how awful their treatment of their citizens can be. It wasn't mentioned in the episode, but I would imagine the decline of unions is also a major factor in why so much of this crap has been allowed to go on. We really need to do more to give the labor force a lot more power to stand up to this kind of insanity and make it easier to hold the corporate bigwigs accountable when they try and pull this shit. 

And speaking of Texas, everything with this storm and the GOP's attitude and response to it is just beyond appalling. How the fuck do you get away with telling people that they would prefer blackouts over federal regulation and still keep your job? And then that mayor talking about how people shouldn't rely on the government to help them during these sorts of situations. Then why the hell are you even in office, you idiot? What do you think mayors and other government officials do? 

As for Cruz, so let's see, the guy started the year supporting the challenge to the electoral votes, voted to acquit Trump for his role in inciting the insurrection (and met with his lawyers during the trial, no less!), and now this whole insane mess with his escape to Mexico. Boy, he's really racking up the bad karma points, isn't he? Can he follow that mayor out the door? 

On a more positive note, I appreciate John mentioning FeedingTexas. I'll be going to that site and seeing what I can donate to help. And to all those of you who either live in Texas or know people who do, you and they are in my thoughts, and you all have my utmost sympathies for having to deal with this insanity. I hope things do get better for the citizens of that state very soon, and the people who totally dropped the ball, to say the very least, in handling this see swift punishment for their complete abdication of their duties. And hopefully the state will join the rest of the country in order to ensure this kind of nightmare scenario doesn't happen again. 

(Also, speaking of obnoxious people, can more advertisers pull out of Tucker's show so nobody has to hear from him ever again?)

So, people like O'Reilly, Dobbs, and Bannon went to Harvard, huh? Gee, how very elitist of them. 

[ahisma]

36 minutes ago, Annber03 said:

And then that mayor talking about how people shouldn't rely on the government to help them during these sorts of situations.

People pay utility bills and they pay taxes, so actually, yes. Yes, they should expect some freaking help. Thank you, John, for being as infuriated as this situation deserves.

36 minutes ago, Annber03 said:

So, people like O'Reilly, Dobbs, and Bannon went to Harvard, huh?

Ted Cruz went to Harvard Law, too. But he doesn’t brag on it on tv, so he can be a good ol’ boy. (Bleh)

[paigow]

1 hour ago, Annber03 said:

On a more positive note, I appreciate John mentioning FeedingTexas. I'll be going to that site and seeing what I can donate to help.

Bo Pilgrim: Double the line speed! Texas is starving!!

[Gothish520]

2 hours ago, Annber03 said:

(Also, speaking of obnoxious people, can more advertisers pull out of Tucker's show so nobody has to hear from him ever again?)

Seconded! How anyone can stand listening to him for more than 30 seconds is beyond me.

[purist]

The way Ollie told Rick Perry to fuck off was immensely satisfying.

[peeayebee]

That Perdue ad. ... What? 

I'm wondering how much the people of Texas buy into the lie that the blackout is the result of frozen wind turbines. Are some people in such a big bubble that they never hear the truth about what's happening? I mean, I know many people only listen to certain sources for news and info, but still I'd think that since people in Texas are so deeply, viscerally affected by this crisis they would hunger for as much explanation as possible. Plus I'd think the facts would leak out into public consciousness.

How meatpacking plants operate is sickening. (Literally and figuratively) The greed of the corporations is simply evil and immoral.

[paigow]

5 hours ago, peeayebee said:

How meatpacking plants operate is sickening. (Literally and figuratively) The greed of the corporations is simply evil and immoral.

[Un]Fortunately, these jobs are relatively safe from automation. Robot butchers are not worth the technological investment. Robot welders are.

[PrincessPurrsALot]

23 minutes ago, paigow said:

[Un]Fortunately, these jobs are relatively safe from automation. Robot butchers are not worth the technological investment. Robot welders are.

A friend always enjoys finding odd products in stores, so I may have a can of "mechanically separated pork".  I would suspect there is also quite a bit more product waste in trying process meats mechanically rather than by hand.  At the same time, we really need better working conditions and protections for those workers.  Many years ago my sister and her partner worked in a turkey processing plant.  Fortunately her job did not involve knives (she was on what she called squish and wipe).  Her partner sliced his hand so badly he almost lost use of his thumb.  There was almost no coverage for his injury. 

I did like that LWT did this on the working conditions.  We overlook so much of this in lower wage jobs in particular.  

[peeayebee]

26 minutes ago, PrincessPurrsALot said:

Many years ago my sister and her partner worked in a turkey processing plant.  Fortunately her job did not involve knives (she was on what she called squish and wipe).

Eww.

I understand that automation isn't feasible, but the plants could certainly slow down production, space workers out, allow restroom breaks and other breaks. The profits would go down (unless they raised consumer prices), but I suppose that would mean someone would make only, what $15M instead of $20M. (I have absolutely no idea how much money the bigwigs make; I just picked a random number.)

[Annber03]

18 hours ago, ahisma said:

Ted Cruz went to Harvard Law, too. But he doesn’t brag on it on tv, so he can be a good ol’ boy. (Bleh)

Speaking of Cruz, I have to say, too, that I like how everyone's like, "He threw his daughters under the bus!" in response to this whole Cancun debacle. This is the same guy who, after Trump said awful things about his wife during the 2016 campaign, instead of telling him where he could stick his crude remarks, decided bending over backwards to support and defend him and do his bidding was a much better use of his time. So putting the blame on his daughters for this seems pretty on brand for the guy. 

[swanpride]

Leaving his poor dog at home, too….

[ebk57]

14 hours ago, swanpride said:

Leaving his poor dog at home, too….

At least he got to spend time not being with Ted Cruz  (I think that was a Colbert line... )

[paigow]

The dog realized that some freezing me-time was better than none. Maybe Biden will rescue him.

[RedbirdNelly]

That Perdue ad was something else. I thought that guy was going to sell precooked guinea pig to eat for dinner. It would have been more logical than the actual ad (and they do eat guinea pigs in Peru, as I learned when youngest went on a trip there and came home proud of himself for having tried some)

My husband worked at a Tyson kill plant one summer but thankfully got himself moved to cardboard box making. Much safer and no chicken guts involved. 

Plenty of people have fallen for the "green energy caused it" lie. Early in the crisis my FB feed had several posts from my right wing acquaintances telling me "see what solar and wind power do! get used to no power." Took me a bit to figure out what/why I was supposed to blame green energy. 

[swanpride]

Mmm, I even heard the lie parroted over here in Germany, which is patently ridiculous, because we already get 50% of our electricity from renewables and also had a heavy winter storm two weeks ago, and guess what didn't happen. Plus, Texas doesn't even participate in the green new deal or anything like that. Turbines are used in countries with very cold temperature, too. Plus, there are way more renewably than just wind and solar. Pretty much everywhere where the nature is moving something you can draw energy out of it. You can for example also use the tides.

[Lantern7]

Another painful episode. Yeah, the Perdue commercial was crazy and funny, but John followed that by telling us about the people who work in the meatpacking industry, and how fucked they are in general. And, of course, COVID makes things infinitely worse. Once again, John shines the light on a dark corner of society, and we're better for it.

Not much else to add, aside from John taking about two seconds to take a swipe at the passing of Rush Limbaugh. Probably because Ted Cruz outdid himself in . . . Ted Cruz-ing. That poor state.

[swanpride]

My pity is limited. They voted for this after all.

[Annber03]

Eh, some did, yes, but there's also plenty of people in that state who didn't (there's a reason there's been a lot of talk about Texas potentially going blue in the coming years, after all). I mean I live in Iowa, and a lot of voters here are frustrated with the people we have in charge. Yet they're still in office, because of things like gerrymandering and voter suppression and so forth. 

[swanpride]

Sure, but Texas isn't exactly a swing state is it? Outside of the Huston area there is very little voter suppression needed. That's not Florida which would have under normal circumstances swung blue a long time ago.

[Hanahope]

This meatpacking episode just highlights another reason to be a vegetarian.

 

[b2H]

On 2/22/2021 at 10:24 AM, peeayebee said:

That Perdue ad. ... What? 

I'm wondering how much the people of Texas buy into the lie that the blackout is the result of frozen wind turbines. Are some people in such a big bubble that they never hear the truth about what's happening? I mean, I know many people only listen to certain sources for news and info, but still I'd think that since people in Texas are so deeply, viscerally affected by this crisis they would hunger for as much explanation as possible. Plus I'd think the facts would leak out into public consciousness.

How meatpacking plants operate is sickening. (Literally and figuratively) The greed of the corporations is simply evil and immoral.

A dear friend moved to San Antonio ten years ago, ultimately bringing his adult children and his aging parents along.  After this all happened, I told him that wind energy was about 13% of the total output.  He told me he honestly did not know this.  And he is a very bright guy.