• Luminocta @lemm.ee
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    11 months ago

    Yes water is a basic human need. So it’s most important. However, real free cannot exist. In the Netherlands, a country that is quite social, water is not free. We have some of the purest tapwater the world knows. People work for that, big systems have to purify that water and in turn need to be maintained. It’s expensive. I don’t mind paying for water if it gets me the best quality water in the world, from my tap. It’s not expensive, in fact it’s cheap. If this becomes free to me, I think that quality wil suffer.

    Then again. I live in a country that values human life and doesn’t slave away for capitalism completely.

    • Tankiedesantski [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      11 months ago

      Except everything you’ve said is true of public roads and those are somehow free. Literally nobody is talking about this straw man of “true free”. Nobody thinks that potable water can be created, regulated, and distributed without the labor of many people. However the example of public roads, public schools, etc, show us that it is actually very much possible for essential services to be funded out of general taxes and be free and openly accessible.

      Moreover, water access activism isn’t necessarily even about drinking water in many places because agricultural water sources are being tapped unsustainably and distributed unfairly. Especially for indigenous peoples who rely on already precarious water sources to make their remaining land habitable, this has never been an issue that can be solved by going to the mall to fill up your drink bottle.

    • 420stalin69@hexbear.net
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      11 months ago

      It’s not “waaah why is it not literally free” and it’s weird that chuds on the internet interpret it that way.

      The complaint is not that it isn’t literally free. The complaint is that their water system was destroyed.

      “Water is a human right” isn’t about a few cents for tap water. It’s a demand for water systems to be protected and not exploited with disregard for the impact of that exploitation.