I’m fascinated by the tricks used to convince us of the benefits of deals like the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
For example, proponents talk about removing the ‘regulatory barriers’ that restrict the ability of corporations to generate profit. But what they call ‘barriers to trade’, we call the fabric of society! Labour laws, environmental laws, privacy laws – we put these barriers up for a very good reason. It would be like removing flood barriers because the flood has calmly convinced us that we can’t reasonably expect it to destroy our homes and fields when there’s a massive wall in the way.
