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It’s one banana, Michael. What could it cost, $2?
in 15 years when we can’t grow bananas anymore this meme will finally die
Or when people figure out that bananas actually cost ~20¢ each and not $2, lol
Why wouldn’t we be able to grow bananas in 15 years?
Banana Blight/Panama Disease.
All bananas are essentially clones as they have no seeds and banana trees are propagated from offshoots.
In the 1950s a fungus caused massive die off of banana trees leading to the effective death of the entire Gros Michel cultivar. We have overcome this set back by introducing the Canvendish cultivar which at the time was resistant to the fungus and was a commercially viable plant.
We now face a resurgence of the fungus which has found a way to infect the Canvendish cultivars. Being clones, they have no way to develop a defense as we can’t interbreed the banana plants to produce resistance to the fungus. This time round we don’t have a readily replaceable cultivar thats commercially viable if the Canvendish cultivar fails.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_disease
For reference the Gros Michel is still grown on a boutique scale and a 5 lbs box of Gros Michel bananas costs US$127 excluding shipping.
Also worth mentioning is that candy banana taste is based on Gros Michel which is why it doesnt taste like standard bananas
Akschwelally this is on the Wikipedia list of common misconceptions
Banana-flavored candy was not intended to mimic the taste of a formerly popular variety of banana. It tastes different from bananas because it is mainly flavored with only one of the many flavor compounds a banana has, isoamyl acetate, that is also found in a wide variety of fruits and fermented beverages.
I couldn’t find the banana part on the link you sent (on mobile so hard to search) but if it’s true I stand corrected :) I’ll check the link when I get to a computer and if needed I’ll edit my misinformation post
It’s the last bullet under the Arts and Culture : Food and Cooking subsection.
Maybe it’s a 4lb banana?
It has an organic sticker on it.
Organic bananas are actually very reasonably priced. Usually only about $0.10 a pound more.
I would buy organic bananas, but someone decided that they need a ring of packing tape around them, so I can’t separate the 2 or 3 that I need from the bushel of 6.
They did that at the grocery store for their organic peppers. Big plastic sticker around every bell pepper with ORGANIC in large print. And the sticker wouldn’t peel off without leaving glue residue.
I believe the implication is that $2 would be a fair price to pay for a banana if it weren’t for imperialism exploiting the workers where they grow
You guys pay almost 2$ for a single Banana? Looks like the people on both sides get fucked by the rich.
When I worked at Walmart, bananas were the number one selling item at $.68/pound. Then, for a week, someone set the price to $.68/banana. So a whole bunch went from like a dollar and some change to like $7 on average. Instantly killed the sales until they went back to per pound. When I was asked to change the price sign, I asked if it was a mistake and they told me no.
I live in Maryland. I can get like 5 bananas in the middle of winter for $2.
Fun fact: At least here in Germany, supermarkets almost lose money on bananas. They can’t raise the prices because the price of bananas is so ingrained into people’s minds that an increase would implicitly signal “expensive store” even if all the other prices stayed the same.
They’re like $0.35 at the grocery store here. They’re even cheaper in more affordable areas.
Yeah that’s also “under $2”
When someone says “under $2”, I’m thinking like $1.89, not $0.35. Although you’re right, and it’s technically correct.
Pretending this is the case, I would prefer not subjugating entire peoples for cheap shit.
I’m pretty sure countries without histories of imperialism can also purchase bananas…
Benefiting doesn’t require you or your country’s past participation.
Yeah just like I didn’t personally terrorise indigenous people into moving away, I am in fact benefiting from terror against indigenous people by living on Turtle Island as the offspring of settlers.
My main point was this isn’t imperialism. Words mean things, man.
Of course it is. How do these foreign companies own such large amounts of land in these countries? (Hint: US-sponsored coups). Why are these countries producing large amounts of a single crop via monoculture practices instead of solving for the nutritional needs of their own population?
Because the autonomous countries are unable to make those choices for themselves? What about places that produce bananas that didn’t have banana republics?
If you live anywhere where a banana cannot grow and get them cheaply, you’re benefitting from imperialism regardless of where the banana you actually eat is grown because it’s the cheap bananas from those banana republics that determined the market value.
Or you’re benefiting from trade agreements and/or cutthroat capitalism.
Mix in a bit of slavery, I too think it’s a form of imperialism
Can you name some examples of banana-growing exporters that weren’t undermined by the US to the point of banana republic
Côte d`Ivoire
What a wonderful “technically correct” answer.
Then what is it?
…trade agreements?
At the barrel of a gun? I think that is considered to be under duress.
And again, ONE country set up banana republics, which were then overthrown. Anyone who isn’t them and can also buy cheap bananas separately. There are also places that were not ever banana republics who export bananas.
This post takes a very complicated issue and distills it down to a neat little thing by misusing words and then everyone else can be like “oh I feel smart too cause that seems clever”. It’s bullshit and makes everything worse.
Or maybe it is a reminder that these complicated legacies are still with us? Would you prefer only essays written on imperialism?
And I have no idea how just one county setting up banana Republics has anything to do with it. Would other countries still not benefit from being able to buy artificially low cost products. At the expense of the county being exploited?
Sure, ONE country did it, while about 100 cheered., And queued up for deliveries.
Everyone loves to shit on America, without acknowledging their home country’s very happy entanglement with them
What county had zero history of that?
“Maybe one of the smaller countries… like the Vatican! … Wait.”
Is this meme aimed at everyone? Doesn’t feel like it lmao.
I think you can buy bananas in Luxembourg or Bhutan
Lol
https://www.luxtimes.lu/culture/how-luxembourg-took-part-in-the-evils-of-colonialism/1338583.html
I think Bhutan is good
Fair enough, 1 for 2 isn’t bad odds. Point still stands
For sure. I’d say Bhutan doesn’t fit the meme though, as Bhutan is part of the global south, and might even grow bananas themselves? I dunno about that
Either way, the meme doesn’t know what imperialism means. The US govt over threw quite a few governments and handed it over to corporations. Thats not imperialism.
Can you elaborate? I’m curious to know why a country overthrowing another government in order to secure it’s own economic interests in the region doesn’t meet your definition of imperialism.
All bananas are the result of imperialism. Look up the banana wars. So many workers dead, all in the name of Dole, cheap bananas, and extracting every last cent of profit.
Some countries with imperialist histories grow bananas too
What if a non imperialist buys a reasonably priced banana from a former imperialist?
“I don’t see how I benefit from imperialism” typed the misguided asshole trying to make people feel guilty into his phone ironically powered by a lithium battery that was mined via slave labor provided by (drumroll) imperialism.
deleted by creator
But bananas are :D
Unless, of course, you’re a member of the banana Republic that produced the banana. Then $2 is the largest fortune you’ve ever seen and your hands get chopped off if you get caught eating a banana when you were supposed to be picking it for the sheltered, ignorant shit head that wrote this tweet.
I don’t understand what you think is ignorant about this tweet.
Right. It’s like idiots in the thread are reading it backwards or something. The fact that a banana can be purchased anywhere in the world for an excessively low price, any time of year, shows the level of subjugation used to farm the bananas and harvest them in the first place is the benefit. Labor intensive sensitive crop grown in south and Central America by workers compensated very little for their work, and then treated far less than equitably in most other ways, (banana wars). The point of the tweet is that fucking everything the dumbass eating the banana has ever touched is more than likely proof that imperialism has benefitted him.
isn’t cheap food and goods imported from around the world a benefit for those that live in the US and other rich countries?
It’s horrible for 90%+ of the world, but for those 10% they get a huge benefit and the few thousand owners get even more money for their dynasties.
They are harvested green and inedible.
Oh, Banana Co
It’s a banana Michael, how much could it cost? $10?
Image Transcription: Twitter Post
NOT Tom Hiddleston, @MusingsHistory
“I don’t see how I benefit from imperialism” he says as he peels a Dole banana that he can buy literally any time of year for under $2
So what you’re saying is, you hate cheap bananas?
The cost to humanity is anything but cheap.
The imperialists would disagree as they see a whole lot of value in it. Sure millions suffer, but hey, a few people get rich and that’s really what god wants, isnt it?
I prefer “Itchy Gorilla” brand bananas. Sure they smell funny but you can get a bunch for under a dollar on the street.
The United Fruit Company has been defunct for almost a century by now.
I still recommend buying fair trade Bananas if you can afford it, but eating a banana helps poor people in third world countries more than eating an apple, which doesn’t send a single cent to the third world.
And second, why does the OP consider eating bananas exploiting banana farmers, but eating apples is not exploiting apple farmers??
Edit: thanks for the downvotes you dumb fascists.
I actually grew up in a banana producing country. All the leftists shitting on our produce are enemies of the people. People in poor third world countries desperately need money and selling their produce is how they earn money.
Yes, buy fair trade, that actually gives a better price to those farmers. But even without fair trade, buying tropical products helps tropical farmers.
UFC is just chiquita now it’s the first sentence on wiki
Buying bananas to help people in developing countries is like shopping at Walmart to help the employees. The vast majority of that money isn’t going to them.
Buying bananas to help people in developing countries is like shopping at Walmart to help the employees. The vast majority of that money isn’t going to them.
This is true, but at the end of the day, that’s where those people get the money they need to survive. Refusing to buy a banana isn’t going to magic them up another industry.
Sure, but don’t pretend it’s for the benefit of the people working in unsafe conditions for extreme poverty wages to provide the developed world with cheap bananas.
An individual not buying bananas isn’t going to change the industry, and neither is telling people you have to buy bananas to save the poor banana farm workers.
That’s really short sighted and screws over people.
With any product, the vast majority of money goes to rich capitalists.
But for a banana farmer, all their money comes from selling bananas. Sure, short term they could switch to manioc or rice or tobacco or some other tropical produce, but if no one buys those products, they have no income.
Longer term, they try to give their kids education so that the next generation will not be banana farmers, but that’s only possible if they have enough money to send kids to school.
Buying fair trade Bananas is the best thing we can do to help them, aside from charity. Buying normal bananas is the second best thing that can be done.
Because bananas are grown in third world countries where many mega corps are controlling many aspects of the food growing and trading.
While apple farmers, you can litterally go pick them yourself by the price set by the farmer.
This is more nuanced than that, but that’s the gist.
Buying from shitty companies that exploit a country won’t help people on that country.
Those companies do not inject money on the cities they enter. They bribe politicians for advantages, destroy the natural resources, and go as close to slave work as they can while paying no taxes.
The point is in no way is a cheap banana in new York, in the winter, a proper reflection of the “fair cost it should be” for the farmer who worked to make it
OP didn’t mention apples.
Which tells you how large of an impact they had if their legacy is still with us.
Are the apple farmers living and working in a third world country? Getting as little as possible?
Yeah pretty sure it’s mostly racism that makes people assume all banana producing countries are run by rich white men, also the assumption that people in those countries don’t want to engage in trade like everyone else does.
Reality is bananas are currently cheap because they grow well and transport easily, also because cargo is very cheap thanks to giant shipping containers. The same reason goods made in the rest of the world are available to people in banana farms - the fact no one has any reason to doubt you’re from a banana producing country is testament to the benefit two way trade has made us all. Your phone is probably newer than mine, you can use it to look up all the same information and entertainment as me living in one of the most colonialist countries - things have changed so much for the better and pretending it hasn’t is a major flaw in a lot of people’s thinking at the moment.
And of course that doesn’t change history but moving forward is far more important than whatever it is the people angry at bananas want us to worry about.
Yeah that’s not what imperialism is.
The United Fruit Company literally building a private army and overthrowing the government of Honduras isn’t imperialism?
I think if you asked them it would just be considered good business /S
No it isn’t. That is corporatocracy. Imperialism is a policy of extending a country’s power and influence through diplomacy or military force.
Let me get this right.
You don’t think the British East Indian Company’s conquest of India was imperialism either?
Because it wasn’t technically the state doing it.
Yeah, cause that’s how words work.
You know what, I deserve this conversation. I’ve trolled people with “It can’t be imperialism because we’re a republic” before, this is just karma.
On the off chance that you’re not just trolling, no, it isn’t, because your definition sucks and is deliberately limited so you can be a pedantic yet incorrect twat about some of history’s greatest crimes.
No I’m not being a troll. And it’s not my definition, it’s the actual meaning of the word. Words - especially when used in emotionally charged contexts - have meaning and when they are misused to make a nice little sound bite, it dilutes the power they have. I don’t like when people do that.
So exactly what was described?
Over a hunderd years ago… but I get the point. Also not the OP you were replying to before.
There is some pretty specific history around Dole, the US government, and Bananas.
Recommend getting your hands on a copy of Bananas by Peter Chapman if you would like to learn more!
The post didn’t mention the US
It absolutely can be… Did you think he was offering a concise definition of imperialism as “when cheap year round produce?”
Never trust a statement from someone who says ‘literally’.
They used “literally” correctly though…
Makes it a useless word in that case, actually. <-- like that one
Paradox detected.
