SPATA, Greece (AP) — In an olive grove on the outskirts of Athens, grower Konstantinos Markou pushes aside the shoots of new growth to reveal the stump of a tree — a roughly 150-year-old specimen, he said, that was among 15 cut down on his neighbor’s land by thieves eager to turn it into money.
The very last line stuck out to me:
Are the thieves to blame or the system in which they live in that’s full of social inequality? 🤔 Maybe it’s not the person with the chainsaw that’s killing their history.
People may be driven to steal because of horrible circumstances… But they still choose what to steal.
If these guys were just knocking over a Target, I’d agree with you.
Kinda hard to steal in a target in a rural part of Greece 👍
Killing century old things isnt justified because youre rural 👍
Its practically tradition. People have been robbing antiquities from the Mediterranean for centuries.
Oh man, I’ve got bad news about farmers then 😂 You just not have went out in the country much!
I am a farmer, dipshit.
Well then, do you feel bad about all the shit leaking down in aquifers from you field? Or heck, directly into rivers in some cases!
How about all the people living around fields getting poisoned by roundup and other chemical shit?
Lets not forget all the centuries old trees that got cut down so you can grow soy to feed cows or corn to produce ethanol for gas while being subsidized by the government because that’s the only way the production is viable.
Farmers aren’t angels either.
We grow entirely organic, but the attempt at guilt tripping a stranger is very cute. (Thats actually not the only way production is viable, btw, we arent subsidized at all.)
Did you forget youre defending thieves who killed off the farmers livelihood?
deleted by creator
It’s a person’s entire life’s work you dick.
There are shops in rural parts of Greece.
There’s a major difference between a “shop” and Target
The thieves are. Next question.
I really blew it, didn’t I?
I mean, maybe you could have been a better role model when she was young, but also, she never really had a chance. This is what our celebrity culture does to people.
So what you’re saying is: Everything is society’s fault, and we as individuals never need to take responsibility for anything?
Uh, no. Not exactly. I was just saying that.
Yeah. I like that. I didn’t do anything wrong because I can’t do anything wrong because we’re all just products of our environment, bouncing around like marbles in the game of Hungry Hungry Hippos that is our random and cruel universe.
Wait, no, that’s not even what I’m saying …
Yeah. It’s not my fault. It’s society. Everything is because of society. Hooray! Everything is meaningless! Nothing I do has consequence!
https://youtu.be/_KCUSGMHPNg?si=ChBiq6EHlp3eiuvl
In the case where people are poor enough that it’s the kind of choice they have to resort to to live? Heck yeah society is the issue.
These are gangs killing and damaging trees to sell oil without any costs. This isn’t Jean Valjean stealing a loaf of bread to feed his family.
They’re actually making it more expensive to buy olive oil.
deleted by creator
And why do gangs exist? Let’s go back to my first comment to try and figure that out… Oh, that’s right, social problems. Thanks for agreeing with me 👍
It kinda seems like you think burning someones house and job down is justified if you steal while doing it
Its like you dont even actually understand what the societal issues are, you just overheard an adult say something kind of like that once.
It’s funny because if the victim was a known billionaire you wouldn’t be saying the same thing.
If the victim was only robbed, and a billionaire, you mean?
Killing a century old culturally signifigant tree is still a crime, and unjustified by theft.
But yeah, bud, the fact that the cultural icon of a historic tree was also the livelihood of a different struggling worker makes it a worse crime, good job working that one out all on your lonesome.
Because it’s easier to make money when you steal and have no costs than it is to build an orchard and work it.
Do you think the Mafia was just like “we’ll stop doing crime when we’re not poor anymore?”
If I leave a $50 bill on the table at a cafe or the library and go to the bathroom it’s not going to be there when I get back, someone will have taken it. It’s not because they were poor, it’s because someone could do so without consequences.
I think the people cutting down 150 year old tress are pretty clearly the ones to blame for cutting down 150 year old trees.
They wouldn’t be cutting them if Greece didn’t have a poverty rate of 20% and wasn’t one of the poorest country in the European Union. We can blame them all we want, if we were faced with the choice between not stealing or eating we wouldn’t be any better than them.
You’re missing the point that they are cutting down the tree, giving them only one harvest from it, instead of just taking the olives and letting the tree live. The thieves are not only stealing the current harvest, but ensuring that there will be no more harvests. If you’re gonna steal to survive, you don’t burn everything to the ground in the process. It literally hurts themselves.
What about the people paying them to do it?
That’s a tough one … I think I’ll go with they’re all culpable.
So what’s the remedy?
What’s the remedy when anyone steals anything?
Depends who is doing the stealing and who is doing the fencing on their behalf.
What does it depend on?