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It Is No Longer Possible to Escape What We Have Done to Ourselves
(www.nytimes.com)
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this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2023
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Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.
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Do you have a plant based diet, or try to reduce meat consumption to the best of your abilities?
Do you walk or take public transport when you could walk?
Do you avoid buying things you do not need?
If you answered "yes" to all that, then congratulations! You are part of a different 1%, and you are also just arguing for the sake of arguing.
If you answered "no", then you're part of the problem. You can pretend otherwise all you want, but you are one cog that keeps the system going. The system isn't magical, other wordly, or some fundamental law of the universe. The system is people and their choices.
Yes, those people are part of the problem. But reality is that those people don't need to lead the change. There are too many literal individuals involved. Tackling the problem from the head down with regulations is much more efficient.
Blaming individuals for climate change is incredibly naive. Doesn't help anyone. No vegan will save the world. And no omnivore will destroy it.
said 8 billion people in unison
Only a handful of those 8 billions actually impact the climate on an immense scale though.
what would happen if everyone turned around and said 'you know what, fuck companies that sell drinks in bottles i'm never going to be without my refillable bottle' how long would coca-cola keep producing 100 billion plastic bottles a year? what would they do with them?
But if James Quincey said 'fuck it, I'm not producing plastic bottles anymore they're bad for the planet' but 8 billion people said 'oh ok, well we're still going to regularly buy drinks in plastic bottles' the numbers of plastic bottles being made would dip slightly but only while Ramon Laguarta rushed to spend the flood of money now coming in to scale up production at pepsi co.
Yes. There's the possibility that people will actually change by acting in unison. But the probability for society to act in unison isn't really high. Just look at the world now. Some people can't even agree on weapons not being something you need to carry around 24/7. And you want them to agree on something that'd actually affect their daily life?
i could say the same thing about regulation, you really think if we can't even restrict guns you'll magic up the political will to ban something that would actually affect their daily life and earns so many companies so much money? coke pulls in 25b a year, they can afford all the lobbyists.
We need as many people as possible to have already moved away from them before we have the slightest chance at legislation.
The difference is that it doesn't need everyone to agree on one thing to make changes. "Boycott coke" requires a substantial mass to boycott one specific company. Demanding change from politics is much more broad and targets whole industries instead of specific things. Like bans on single use plastic, or pushes for EVs.
Apart from that, you most often have to create alternatives before people can abandon bad products. Could everyone stop using cars? Sure. Will it happen? No. But if we start to expand railway through politics, will more people abandon their car then cause they get around by train much more efficiently? Way more likely than without it.
I recommend Kurzgesagts video on the topic whether we can stop climate change. It goes exactly into this.
Yeah to those 3.
However, I wasn't intending to argue with someone with such a simplistic view of how the system works, anyway. If you think it's all up to the customer and the corps nor the system have no blame in comparison, it's just a lost cause, so sort yourself out.
When did I or anyone else say companies and the government do not have any blame? Can you link me the comment and quote the relevant bit?
The very first comment I replied to :). Shifting blame from the corps onto the customers. Once again, feel free to sort yourself out.
It's not shifting blame, it's pointing out they do not exist in isolation. You can put blame on the companies and still recognize that most people make no effort to avoid them, even when they have a choice.
I'll add on what someone said further above:
what would happen if everyone turned around and said ‘you know what, fuck companies that sell drinks in bottles i’m never going to be without my refillable bottle’ how long would coca-cola keep producing 100 billion plastic bottles a year? what would they do with them?
But if James Quincey said ‘fuck it, I’m not producing plastic bottles anymore they’re bad for the planet’ but 8 billion people said ‘oh ok, well we’re still going to regularly buy drinks in plastic bottles’ the numbers of plastic bottles being made would dip slightly but only while Ramon Laguarta rushed to spend the flood of money now coming in to scale up production at pepsi co.