Supermarkets for the Poor: The Success Plan?

First, It was Poor Doors- now its "Poor Supermarkets" or its more PC name: Community shops. 

In principle, I fully support the idea of community supermarkets - taking surplus food that's been donated by large supermarkets [Corporates; who control food - price - more importantly profits] and then slashing the prices. It sounds far better, than its other destination - landfill or animal feed. 

This is a simple, yet effective plan and that is why more and more, voluntary and community led groups, are battling back, creating community shops, cafe's, gardens etc, which, in turn Empower people and communities - an example being

The Leeds cafe that has fed 10,000 people, using 20 tonnes of unwanted food – and started a worldwide movement

However, this particular 'community shop', is actually: a 'Company Shop'. 

John Marren, chairman of Company Shop, said: 

"Community Shop is tackling the problem of surplus food, whilst giving it real social purpose".

'Retailers and manufacturers taking part in the scheme include Marks & Spencer, Asda, Tesco, Morrisons, The Co-operative, Ocado, Innocent, Brake Brothers, Nestlé and Muller.

The scheme, the first of its kind in the UK, is backed by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson'.

Both, food waste and poverty are massive issues at present. In Britain, around 15 million tonnes of food is wasted each year and 15 million people are living below the minimum income standard – three million more than in 2008.

However, the media and politics of today are far more obsessed with creating a dangerous brand of stigma politics: shame immigrants, the poor [both working and non] and those will illnesses or disabilities. 

First they suggested Pre-paid benefit cards - now they cast the stigma net of Orwellian double-speak, even further. The scheme will force you to enrol on a government scheme, called "The Success Plan".

'They must also enrol on a tailored professional development programme – called The Success Plan – which aims to improve their confidence and help them find jobs'.

Now, opening a supermarket, with discounted produce isn't new, but [once again a mighty Orwellian but], specifically aiming it at those on benefits; attaching a government backed scheme to it, and naming it the The Success Plan - is without doubt, both crass and morally repulsive.  

When thinking of Britain today, one is reminded of the Victorian times...and this appears to meet the credentials: a new nouveau riche plan: neo-victorian in design. The article speaks of 'a Company shop': this sounds a lot like the old 'Truck' system, used by mine owners in the 1800's; as a system whereby workers were paid in goods - a form of company bondage, but mostly, it's just further stigmatisation of the poor.  

Real social purpose, would be reclaiming the corporate land --owned by the large supermarkets, which remains unused - and using it for the common good, growing crops and small animals, and in doing so, members of the local community, be they, unemployed, dis-labeled citizens, pensioners, parents and children, could reconnect with the necessity of life: food, and secondly - community.

A further indication of Britain degenerating back into Victorian times, or even worse neo-victorian - think the workhouse - is the government workfare scheme - which doesn't work, and actually prevents you finding work. Recently, Chris Hedges interviewed Noam Chomsky, and they discussed the Globalised system: where most of the working class are now service workers [modern slaves], which is capitalism reverting back to a Dickensian economic system: 

Finally. I can see one benefit of all the aforementioned neo-liberal policies: free slave labour for the corporations - who own and control the plutocrats - who vote these changes in - with no public mandate.

Must go, the 'company shop' is calling for dinner.

Just like in the mental hospital we are all given fake money in the form of credit

'Game theory was readily embraced at the RAND Corporation, the archetypical think tank charged with formulating military strategy for the atomic age, and in 1950 two RAND scientists made a momentous discovery. Called the "prisoner's dilemma," it is a disturbing and mind-bending game where two or more people may betray the common good for individual gain'(1)

I thought of the above, when reading the recent Adam Curtis blog. Betraying the common good: That's what the plutocrats,who play the role of politicians do: every day. Politicians and the media have  been designed, solely for the purpose of betraying the common good. They propagate, instill hate and fear, distract you from asking certain questions. Controlling the narrative.   

'elite group of technocrats who see people as passive beings who need to be constantly monitored and managed in order to keep them happy'(2) 

An experimental psychologist, called B.F. Skinner; explains Curtis:

'Recorded an experiment in a mental hospital in San Bernadino - California. The patients are given rewards in the form of plastic fake money if they do what the doctors consider the right social behaviour. They can then use that money at meal-times to buy their way onto a “nice” table - with tablecloth and flowers. Those without the rewards have to eat - as one of the nurses puts it, “in less elegant conditions”.

What emerges in the hospital is a new, ordered hierarchy created by a system of reward - but one where the patients don’t feel controlled - instead they feel “empowered” because it was through their actions that they received the reward. Skinner makes clear in the film that he sees this as a model for how to run a future kind of society'.

How does that social behavioral expert sound today?  Well according to Curtis - extremely accurate: 

'The accepted version is that the neo-liberal right and the free market triumphed. But maybe the truth is that what we have today is far closer to a system managed by a technocratic elite who have no real interest in politics - but rather in creating a system of rewards that both keeps us passive and happy - and also makes that elite a lot of money.

That in the mid 1980s the new networks of computers which allowed everyone to borrow money came together with lifestyle consumerism to create a system of social management very close to Skinner’s vision.

Just like in the mental hospital we are all given fake money in the form of credit - that we can then use to get rewards, which keep us happy and passive. Those same technologies that feed us the fake money can also be used to monitor us in extraordinary detail. And that information is then used used to nudge us gently towards the right rewards and the right behaviours - and in extremes we can be cut off from the rewards.

The only problem with that system is that the pigeons may be getting restless. That not only has the system not worked properly since the financial crash of 2008, but that the growing inequalities it creates are also becoming a bit too obvious. The elite isoverdoing it and - passive or not - the masses are starting to notice'.

The politicians want you compliant - a happy pill popping little consumer --who "Pays no attention to that man behind the curtain" and that's why I love Curtis - he's one of the only few, trying to expose the machinery.

Imagine, society started reading about money creation - fractional reserve lending - private central banks...then the curtains would be opened in the mental hospital and the prison doors would be closing for the plutocrats like, Cameron and Osborne, et al.  


 (1)

Prisoner's Dilemma: John Von Neumann, Game Theory and the Puzzle of the Bomb

 (2) 
HAPPIDROME - Part One

Britain pays off its World War One Debt: or did they?

PR of the exchequer: Osborne should not be talking about "extraordinary sacrifice". Leaves Oxford, with a 2:1 in Modern History - then goes straight behind enemy lines at the Conservative Party. First as a researcher, then special adviser,speechwriter, and strategist.

“This is a moment for Britain to be proud of. We can, at last, pay off the debts Britain incurred to fight the First World War. It is a sign of our fiscal credibility and it’s a good deal for this generation of taxpayers. It’s also another fitting way to remember that extraordinary sacrifice of the past.” 

then, Forbes, Adam Smith Institute [really!] and reality:

'Note that he really has said “pay off” there and that’s the part that just isn’t so. A government that is borrowing £100 billion a year and change isn’t paying off any debt whatsoever. It’s just swapping one debt for another. By the definitions that Osborne is using, in fact that WWI debt was all paid off in 1927. Which, given that we’ve still got bonds around relating to that debt shows that a refinancing is not actually the same as paying off a debt'.

Finally, here's some Modern History:

Wonder Breast Cancer Drug: kills more breast cancer patients.

'The reduced incidence of breast cancer with tamoxifen did not translate into a reduction in breast cancer specific deaths (31 tamoxifen versus 26 placebo) the researchers found. In addition, five women receiving tamoxifen died from endometrial cancer compared to none in the placebo group'.

 Guardian went with this ambiguous homage to Big Pharma:

The moral of this story: always read paragraph eight.