We are over the edge of no return.
We should stop begging for change and act now. Politics must hurt them with reforms, taxes, and the rule of law.
We cannot stop climate change now, but we can try to de-accelerate by fighting against big oil, corrupt politics, and billionaire newspapers supporting them.
Politics must hurt them with reforms, taxes, and the rule of law.
Yeah… that’s how we ended up in this situation. How do you think these giant corporations became so powerful? They “reformed” laws until they could do whatever the hell they please - that’s what “reform” gets you.
Politicians love their bribes more than they love the planet, so that’s probably not going to happen. Dems and cons both
“bOtH sIdEs”
Fuck off
You read a comment from a person criticizing the current government for being self motivated and taking bribes under a story about climate change and how we’re all fucked and you thought this was a centrist comment?
Ya right. When has prices went over 5 dollars a gallon in the US, people there list their minds. God forbid we should drive a bit less or consume less.
This is a consumer problem not big oil. The second biggest company in the world by revenue and by far the largest by profit is Saudi Aramco. And why are they so big and countries like Russia are energy giants? Because we are tax and regulated our oil companies significantly more while increasing our consumption. Instead of buying locally, we are now buying from countries like Russia and Saudia Arabia. Look how that is working out.
Too many people believe they can just continue living like they were 30 years ago - if big oil would stop producing stuff and plastics, gas and airplane fuels would not be available anymore then people would riot
Even threatening to increase prices to a level that would make sense to limit the use to absolutely necessary levels would piss off too many people to be a viable option because everyone just wants to believe that it’s just for “the others” to change but not for themselves.
Everyone has to act and change their Livestyle…
This is the truth right there. Gas prices went up two measly dollars compared to normal in 2022, and everyone flipped the fuck out. People were prepared to elect Republicans-- fucking Republicans- to office, they were so furious about it.
And don’t @ me about “100 corporations are responsible for like 90% of emissions”. Who’s buying those corporations’ goods? Who’s refusing to vote for politicians that’ll meaningfully regulate these corporations? Who’s spending all day fantasizing about Da Revolushun^TM that’ll never fucking come (and would kill tens of millions of civilians and likely result in fascists winning and seizing control of your country, if not the whole thing splintering into a bunch of warring fiefdoms controlled by ruthless oligarchs) instead of getting to actual work trying to effect real change in the real world? And I don’t mean “direct action” (read: looking edgy and getting photos for the 'gram), I mean actually fucking getting policy passed that’ll have a real impact on people’s real lives.
It’s almost like our society is car centered, and raising gas prices directly results in worse outcomes for the majority of people. You can’t expect people to just stop using cars, but you can use the state to create massive infrastructure policies paid for wholly by the polluting industries who most heavily profit from our current situation. Use the next decade to build high speed rail, electrified busses and lightrails, subway systems, and other mass transit, and then when gas prices go up, people will have an option other than cutting back on their food to ensure they make it to work every day.
I replied to the wrong comment in this thread, but if I delete it’ll only delete from my instance, so I’m just gonna leave it.
Our society is 100% car centered. My kids’ schools are miles away from my house, my job is miles away, and you cannot convince me to ride a bike or walk when it’s over 100°F outside. Fuck that shit. I’m happy to take public transit, but any public transit available to me isn’t feasible because it would take literally 1.5-2 hours to get to work and back each way, which cuts down severely on my family time. And I can’t work from home either due to the nature of my job, which is maintaining the machines that build microchips.
Maybe don’t move somewhere that your job and kids school is hundreds of miles away? My child’s school is down the street, and I can take the subway to work in about 15min. This was a specific choice my wife and I made when we chose to live here.
Holy privilege Batman
“Just don’t live in a place like that” rofl
Oh great, let’s use privilege as a bludgeon to enforce the status quo. This is great and also happens to be indistinguishable from doing nothing.
Policy like regulating those 100 corporations?
Yes. I said so explicitly in my previous comment.
Seems odd to say
And don’t @ me about “100 corporations are responsible for like 90% of emissions”. Who’s buying those corporations’ goods?
People bringing up the 100 corporations are usually calling for regulations on them, and the “you’re the ones buying the goods” people are usually calling for Personal Responsibility and Voting With Your Wallet.
It’s possible to both think those companies should be regulated and that people are doing almost nothing personally to help, including electing people to enact those policies. For most people I talk to the “but 100 corps” is a total deflection of personal responsibility. This crisis will not be solved without a good heaping helping of both personal responsibility and aggressive government regulation. If nothing else because that aggressive regulation will never pass into law unless people acknowledge their personal responsibility and are willing to accept the sacrifices that will come with it.
In the US, unless you are willing to vote third party, you don’t get the choice to vote for Anti-Capitalist politicians. And there are millions of liberals waiting in line to scold you for not voting for the parties of Capital.
Reformism will do nothing, only a revolution can.
Preach
Let me know when you hit puberty
Let me know when you get over your boot licking addiction.
capitalism can’t solve climate change :(
Nope, especially since it’s the biggest contributor to it.
Capitalism can not solve shit.
It can only provide record profits. Thats its only goal.
You can have industrialized production and consumerism without capitalism. Not that I’m defending capitalism, I just think our problem is deeper than what you make it, and human nature combined with unchecked technological ability to remodel out planet would yield the same outcome, no matter the dominant flavor of our economical structure.
I’d recommend looking into how indigenous people have historically dealt and wish to deal with climate change before claiming much about “human nature”. A lot of so-called “human nature” is just the universalisation of European capitalist values. I suggest starting by reading about the Red Deal, specially if you’re from the USA.
Although interesting, I don’t think your link is the gotcha counterexample you think it is. Previous civilizations caused environmental collapses without having capitalism to blame for it. We could switch overnight to soviet style communism and that would not solve anything if our expectation is to provide everyone on earth with their today’s living standards. We could blame greed, selfishness and that would take us closer to the truth, but even that would be very shortsighted. We would need all humans on earth to be united around a same goal and same path forward, and share the same willingness to sacrifice. No sect or religion has ever achieved that and never will (we are just so many, and spread that wide).
Looking at the world from the lens of an economic ideology alone only gets you so far. Wrong tool for the job.
It’s not a full solution, but I’d love to see more use of compostable single-use plastics coupled with municipal biochar facilities.
It’s an excellent cycle that harnesses capitalism and materialism. People buy single use plastics, then throw them away. Municipal garbage (a utility company paid for by ratepayers), picks it up, and brings it to a biochar facility. The facility pyrolizes it, making syngas (which they burn for energy which is then purchased by consumers) and biochar, which is sold as a soil amendment and happens to be carbon-negative. Excess biochar can be buried.
It’s a typical capitalist create-consume economy except it’s carbon-negative (when paired with decarbonized transportation like electric trains and delivery vans, and hydrogen powered garbage trucks). The more you consume, the more carbon you actually suck out of the air.
There’s a few proposed loops like this which instead of fighting consumerism actually harness it to make carbon negative actions. Another one that I’m very interested in is making HVAC filters that also passively absorb carbon from the atmosphere. With electric heat pumps we already have an HVAC technology that is minimally emitting. Pair that with carbon negative filters and you’re golden.
Or concrete using injected co2. It’s a real thing that exists, it just doesn’t have price parity with traditional carbon-intensive concrete. Imagine if just by building a building you could be carbon negative.
Again, it’s not a total solution but I wish I could see more use cases like this instead of the “consume less” narrative. People are not going to consume less, that’s not how people work. The only way to get people to consume less is by raising prices (which is a necessary part of the solution of course).
Oh, the capitalists didn’t do what their public relations exercises pretended they were going to do? Golly gee… no one could have seen that coming at all.
The only thing big corporations care about is next quarter’s profits. The world can quite literally burn next year if they get their big profits this quarter.
No govt will hold them accountable, so energy firms can walk forwards/ backwards/ play hopscotch on their pledges and it’ll be ignored.
Relying on businesses to self regulate doesn’t work?
I am shocked! Shocked!
These companies will not change unless they are forced to do so and our government isn’t going to do shit since most of congress is in the pocket of big oil. So what are our other options?
Everyone likes to blame individuals for not using renewables or buying an electric car, when it reality their options were limited in the first place by big oil. Most people can barely afford to put food on the table and green or renewable products are usually significantly more expensive and not really an option. Besides that, IIRC ordinary citizens only account for roughly 20% of all greenhouse gas emissions. So the onus lies on big oil to make changes and offer affordable renewable options instead of the same gas guzzling/polluting bullshit we’ve been offered up to this point. But like I said, they won’t do something like that unless they are forced to do so, they will always pursue profit over people, unless those people get in their faces and force them to pursue other options.
It’s time for radical action and violent resistance.
We’re staring into the face of human extinction and people are still quibbling about consumer choice.
it’s going to take much, much more direct and violent action to force change.
most of congress is in the pocket of big oil. So what are our other options?
Vote only for candidates against FPTP. When that’s gone, we can just vote for candidates who are against big oil.
How many election cycles can we postpone climate action for?
Their unwillingness to act on climate change is a major (if not the biggest) reason we need representation. The Democrats hand power back to Republicans who undo this session’s climate action.
Destroying the world more slowly by slightly impacting one election at a time brought us here.
I understand and support the sentiment: something needs to change. I just don’t think that re-framing electoral politics will work unless it’s backed by a mass movement of organised workers. If that happens, the question becomes, why bother with the middlemen? They can legislate for themselves without having to beg the ruling class for mild compromises.
Destroying the world more slowly by slightly impacting one election at a time brought us here.
That’s kinda what I was driving it. How many elections would it take to abolish FPTP? We’d have to wait for that and only then could we think about voting in politicians who might do something and the system would still be dominated by capital. That makes a three-step process out of a two-step process.
Seems like a request to wait for an indefinite number of election cycles—the same request of those who say to vote for this or that faction of the capitalist party and one day, just maybe, conditions will be just right for one of those parties to effect any change. Too many African, Latin American, and Asian homes and lives would be destroyed while they wait patiently for the US to get its act together.
It would take too long to work unless you know of a massive campaign across the western world to implement FPTP. If it doesn’t exist already, it must be built within the next year or so or the west will be locked into another four-ish years of no progress. And that’s just for a shot at electing politicians who might vote to abolish FPTP. Before they even come within hearing distance of, never mind face-to-face with, the contradictions of imperialism.
Currently, almost all I see in the west is how to do business as usual but in green. That means denying progress to the subjugated masses so that USians can maintain their standard of living. Oppressed people shouldn’t have to wait for the US to figure out how to tactically solve the world’s ills through an electoral technicality. Round and round we’d go with electoralism.
At this point, there is one, single option: revolution. Anything else will take too long. Luckily for humanity, whatever the US thinks or wants is largely irrelevant. The world is revolving anyway. The only question for the world is what form the revolution takes. And the additional question for USians is whether they want to be part of the change or to ruin everything out of spite and self-interest.
The Red Deal may be of interest (click drop-down menu under ‘articles’): https://therednation.org/environmental-justice/
At this point, there is one, single option: revolution
You’re the world’s biggest sucker if you think that’s even a possibility.
Or more likely, a russian/right wing shill
“Voting is useless” is right wing propaganda.
I have to admit, I did not expect this response. I’m struggling to see how an anti-capitalist argument in favour of socialist revolution is right wing.
A possibility? It’s happening as we speak. Time will tell.
It’s a spoiler, a red herring. “Don’t bother doing the thing that could actually threaten our power. Instead, focus on this other thing that has no shot of happening.”
Electoralism isn’t going to save us.
If current green companies can’t make affordable options, why in God’s earth would you think it would be cheaper if conventional energy companies join the mix?
Your entire statement is conflicting. Angry about high costs being unaffordable then suggesting oil companies to not produce low cost energy that keeps prices down while acknowledging the high cost of green energy.
I have low expectation but damn…didn’t think that they’d be that low.
We all are trying to do our parts you know, I used to like cars when I was in HS, now I don’t even consider having one. I’ll stick to public transport and will get an electric last mile transport.
These people sucks ass. They have the monetary power to make real change but decided to double down. Nowadays investments in renewables have good returns and will be viable for the next couple decades, but they care too much for their previously invested monies and want to milk the people to the last drop.
Man, you are so right. The weirdest part is, that your behavior isn’t even socially very accepted.
I, too, love engines. I admire the technology and how genius they are put together. My dream is to own a cruiser motorbike and go drive through the countryside. I don’t think this will happen, as I would hate myself to burn fuel for pleasure.
I own a very old, tiny scooter, that I only use to carry heavy stuff. I used to carry on my shoulders, but mom in law felt sorry for me and gave me her oldest, broken, rusty scooter, that nobody used for months, because she bought a new one again. I repaired it. My wife gets upset, when I don’t drive her around. For example to the market 500 meters down the road to buy a can of soda or so. I only use it for hard work.
People surrounding me think I don’t like progress. No, man, I would love to have a more convenient life! Driving to me is fun, I enjoy it! I just can’t stand myself to do something bad to environment for my pleasure, so I try not to. And people think I’m weird.
I know people like you and me don’t even make a difference. Whatever amount we save and not emit in our whole lifetime - some ignorant wealthy will blow out within 5 minutes.
I don’t think this will happen, as I would hate myself to burn fuel for pleasure.
Modify one to run off biofuel? You can even make the fuel yourself
The best part is that governments are still massively subsidizing fossil fuels.
There is no paywall here though? I had no issue reading the article at least…
No paywall for me either, plus I was able to read it without javascript.
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Revloution?
Implement antitrust laws?
Violence…
