"We spend more on cows than the poor"
About this Quote
A line like "We spend more on cows than the poor" is engineered to embarrass a system, not to win a seminar. Gordon Brown is doing what effective social-democratic politicians do at their sharpest: taking an abstract moral argument about inequality and forcing it through a pocket-sized comparison that people can feel in their gut. You dont need to know the budget lines to understand the indictment. If a society can reliably bankroll livestock, it has already answered the question of capacity. The remaining question is priorities.
The intent is double-edged. On one side, its an attack on complacent technocracy: stop hiding behind spreadsheets when the outcome is ethically grotesque. On the other, its a tactical strike at the political bargains that make poverty persist even in rich states: agricultural subsidies, trade protections, and the quiet consensus that some forms of welfare (for industries, for owners, for the already-secure) are respectable, while direct support for the poor is treated as suspect or indulgent.
The subtext is aimed at the audience as much as the opposition. Brown is inviting middle voters to see themselves as complicit beneficiaries of a skewed settlement, then offering a moral exit ramp: you can support redistribution without feeling radical, because the current arrangement is what looks extreme. It also carries a global echo: Western farm support distorts markets and undercuts farmers in poorer countries, meaning "spending on cows" is not just a domestic absurdity but an international one.
Its a deliberately crude contrast, and thats why it works: it punctures euphemisms with a single, unignorable image.
The intent is double-edged. On one side, its an attack on complacent technocracy: stop hiding behind spreadsheets when the outcome is ethically grotesque. On the other, its a tactical strike at the political bargains that make poverty persist even in rich states: agricultural subsidies, trade protections, and the quiet consensus that some forms of welfare (for industries, for owners, for the already-secure) are respectable, while direct support for the poor is treated as suspect or indulgent.
The subtext is aimed at the audience as much as the opposition. Brown is inviting middle voters to see themselves as complicit beneficiaries of a skewed settlement, then offering a moral exit ramp: you can support redistribution without feeling radical, because the current arrangement is what looks extreme. It also carries a global echo: Western farm support distorts markets and undercuts farmers in poorer countries, meaning "spending on cows" is not just a domestic absurdity but an international one.
Its a deliberately crude contrast, and thats why it works: it punctures euphemisms with a single, unignorable image.
Quote Details
| Topic | Justice |
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