Climate change and human responsibility

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

I don't know about you, but throughout my life I've been called I've been called all kinds of things:

- communist
- marxist
- libtard
- loser
- failure
- fag
- beta
- soyboy
- cu<k
- incel
- inbred
- parasite
- leech
- waste of skin

But as soon as I reply with any pushback at all, using a definitionally correct term to describe those who are denying reality (which as been corroborated through entire mountain ranges of peer reviewed scientific research)... suddenly it's "Gasp! How dare you spread negativity and division!"

Look, I get the need for both sides to stop calling each other names. But it has to be a two-way street. It has to. As a starting point, right-wingers need to stop calling anything that isn't 100% laissez-faire capitalism, communism.

They’ll never stop. You literally had two people calling someone a “hypocrite” and an “ass” and when someone said “that rhetoric comes from people associated with climate denialism” the immediate response was to whine about name calling.

The starting point might better be something around developing stronger self awareness than a goldfish. Then they can move on to more complex asks like “stop calling everything communism.”

[troutman]

Originally Posted by belsarius

I call him Maurice

Some call him the gangster of love.

[TherapyforGlencross]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

This is extremely narrow minded and a reason that climate change is losing traction and the exact mentality that has led the USA into it's current unfortunate timeline. Calling people names only serves to unite them and rise against as we have seen with MAGA. For the longest time the big problem with trying to get the masses to accept climate change is that those preaching that the masses must change their lifestyles are the ones guilty of having the largest carbon footprints. It's simply not a good way to go about convincing the masses that they need to make all the sacrifices so the rich can preserve their lifestyle. We need to find better ways than using celebrities as mouthpieces and not resort to calling people "climate deniers" because they are hesitant to believe the rich and wealthy. It seems a lot of people here have disdain for the rich and wealthy when it comes to regular politics yet somehow when it comes to climate change the masses are supposed to do a 180 and think these people really have the best interests in mind. Suzuki has simply done a terrible job of getting his message across because he's first and foremost an ####### and secondly because he doesn't walk the walk.

The biggest thing we can take from this dark timeline in history is to ensure that we don't make the mistakes again and all your post did was show that many people still don't understand that calling people names and lumping them into groups is divisive and problems are much easier solved when people are united.

Climate change isnt losing traction in the states because it has no bearing on political or ideological stances. It just is. Climate change will continue to occur. What you’re describing is climate change action. May sound like semantics but but it’s an important distinction especially when science is being disparaged in the current political climate. Debate scientifically on climate change, but not on ideological preferences.

I don’t care if “climate change” is losing traction in the US. It’s still occurring. At the end of the day, if someone rejects the notion of climate change, based on who they follow, still makes them a denier. If i refuse to listen to wealthy individuals who say the holocaust is real, but i reject that because of their wealth, it still makes me a holocaust denier (not conflating the two, as they’re vastly different subjects, using it as an example of ideological preferences). And who in their right mind would say, “let’s go easy on the holocaust deniers everyone.” If their reality isn’t actually reality, I’m not going to sit here and coddle them to make them feel better. Some opinions are just incorrect and need to be pointed out.

Now, if someone were to debate on the scientific findings of climate change, that is much different.

[CliffFletcher]

There's a whole spectrum of beliefs around climate change.

1) It's not really happening; it's a conspiracy to yield control over our sovereignty to global elites.

2) It's not really happening; scientists have got it wrong.

3) It is happening; humans aren't the main cause.

4) It is happening; humans are the main cause; there isn't really anything we can do about it.

5) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; we (Canadians/Americans/etc) shouldn't be expected to make sacrifices and incur costs when countries like China and India are major sources of GHG emissions.

6) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; I support my government taking measures so long as I don't personally suffer any inconvenience or expense.

7) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can't do much to turn things around at this point, so efforts should be focused on developing technology to adapt to a warming climate.

8) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; to avert disaster, we need to take collective action that may entail sacrifices to our standards of living.

9) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; the root of the problem is a capitalist system built on unrelenting growth, and the only way to avert disaster is to fundamentally change our economic model.

Only 1 and 2 are deniers. 3 is ignorant, but not deniers. 4 is more pessimistic than ignorant. 5 and 6 are selfish - I'd wager they're also the most common stances on the issue. 7, 8, and 9 are different approaches to addressing the crisis.

[DownInFlames]

A lot of the professional deniers who were in categories 1 to 3 knew the reality and have moved on to 4, 5, 6, or even 7 because they know they can no longer dispute that it’s a thing, but damn it if they’re going to let that effect their bottom line.

[calgarygeologist]

I think you might have missed one category which is that climate change is happening but the weight of human impact is not understood and our ability to alter the path going forward is uncertain.

The whole system is really pretty poorly understood and complex to the point where modeling is probably not accurate. It is such a dynamic equilibrium trying to maintain homeostasis that a small trigger could set off drastic changes to compensate.

[WideReceiver]

I’ll go with door number 3.

[Mathgod]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

There's a whole spectrum of beliefs around climate change.

1) It's not really happening; it's a conspiracy to yield control over our sovereignty to global elites.

2) It's not really happening; scientists have got it wrong.

3) It is happening; humans aren't the main cause.

4) It is happening; humans are the main cause; there isn't really anything we can do about it.

5) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; we (Canadians/Americans/etc) shouldn't be expected to make sacrifices and incur costs when countries like China and India are major sources of GHG emissions.

6) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; I support my government taking measures so long as I don't personally suffer any inconvenience or expense.

7) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can't do much to turn things around at this point, so efforts should be focused on developing technology to adapt to a warming climate.

8) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; to avert disaster, we need to take collective action that may entail sacrifices to our standards of living.

9) It is happening; humans are the main cause; we can do something about it; the root of the problem is a capitalist system built on unrelenting growth, and the only way to avert disaster is to fundamentally change our economic model.

Only 1 and 2 are deniers. 3 is ignorant, but not deniers. 4 is more pessimistic than ignorant. 5 and 6 are selfish - I'd wager they're also the most common stances on the issue. 7, 8, and 9 are different approaches to addressing the crisis.

3 and 4 both involve denying directly observable reality, and fundamental facts regarding the situation. Humans are in fact the main cause, and there is in fact much we can do about it. Therefore you can put 3 and 4 together with 1 and 2.

Then you have the "it's too complicated to understand" folks. The ones who are deliberately disingenuous and deliberately obtuse, for the purpose of spreading confusion and doubt for the sake of doubt. I'd also call this denial with a slightly different coat of paint.

[The Fonz]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

I don't know what to say to someone who doesn't think billionaires are obscenely rich. Kind of like I don't know what to say to flat earthers.

My comment was quite the opposite.

Billions of people in the world would consider a middle class Canadian’s lifestyle as “obscenely rich”. Middle class Canadians are materialistic, carbon pigs.

That is why I asked, obscenely rich from whose perspective?


Clearly David Suzuki does not consider himself and his 25M net worth as obscenely rich. From his perspective, that title belongs to billionaires (“billionaires should be illegal”). From my perspective? He fits the bill. From the perspective of one of the billions below me? I fit the bill.

[Mathgod]

Originally Posted by The Fonz

My comment was quite the opposite.

Billions of people in the world would consider a middle class Canadian’s lifestyle as “obscenely rich”. Middle class Canadians are materialistic, carbon pigs.

That is why I asked, obscenely rich from whose perspective?


Clearly David Suzuki does not consider himself and his 25M net worth as obscenely rich. From his perspective, that title belongs to billionaires (“billionaires should be illegal”). From my perspective? He fits the bill. From the perspective of one of the billions below me? I fit the bill.

Billionaires can do things to upend and twist society to their will that millionaires can't. Look at Elon - he just bought the most important election in human history.

So if a poor person looks at a millionaire like Suzuki and thinks he's obscenely rich - it's honestly not relevant. Because at the end of the day, billionaires have orders of magnitude more wealth, and therefore orders of magnitude more power and influence over society, than millionaires do.

Billionaires generally want to keep growing their wealth and power while ####ing the rest of us over, and there's relatively few of them, so it's not that hard for most of them to get on the same page. Millionaires, on the other hand, are much more numerous and diverse in their views, so they aren't the same threat to society.

Of course, any line drawn between "obscenely rich" and "not obscenely rich" is going to be arbitrary, no matter where it's drawn. But that's not a reason to not draw a line at all.

[The Fonz]

I agree. A line needs to be drawn - but where do you strike it?

For example, we are obsessed with a league of thousands of people who jetset around the world, and slap a rubber disk around. How much carbon does the NHL consume? And how much carbon do us spectators consume in going to games, watching on TV, buying merch, etc? I know it sounds silly, but our entire society is a problem. We are burning disastrous levels of carbon not for food, not for shelter, but for entertainment, simply so that our lives are less boring. The entertainment industry as a whole is likely the worst climate offender there is, ironically, considering so many in Hollywood use their platform to lecture us.

I struggle to draw the line because ultimately, the way that we live is a problem for nature, as far as I’m concerned. We consume monumental amounts of carbon for non essential reasons.

[WideReceiver]

I believe we’re f’d. We’ve passed the point of no return.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by The Fonz

I agree. A line needs to be drawn - but where do you strike it?

For example, we are obsessed with a league of thousands of people who jetset around the world, and slap a rubber disk around. How much carbon does the NHL consume? And how much carbon do us spectators consume in going to games, watching on TV, buying merch, etc? I know it sounds silly, but our entire society is a problem. We are burning disastrous levels of carbon not for food, not for shelter, but for entertainment, simply so that our lives are less boring. The entertainment industry as a whole is likely the worst climate offender there is, ironically, considering so many in Hollywood use their platform to lecture us.

I struggle to draw the line because ultimately, the way that we live is a problem for nature, as far as I’m concerned. We consume monumental amounts of carbon for non essential reasons.

The line is drawn where your individual choices affect the Carbon output for you versus your choices affect the carbon outcome for thousands / millions.

We could build a society that still has the NHL as a sustainable entity. The NHL chooses not to.

[Mathgod]

Originally Posted by The Fonz

I agree. A line needs to be drawn - but where do you strike it?

For example, we are obsessed with a league of thousands of people who jetset around the world, and slap a rubber disk around. How much carbon does the NHL consume? And how much carbon do us spectators consume in going to games, watching on TV, buying merch, etc? I know it sounds silly, but our entire society is a problem. We are burning disastrous levels of carbon not for food, not for shelter, but for entertainment, simply so that our lives are less boring. The entertainment industry as a whole is likely the worst climate offender there is, ironically, considering so many in Hollywood use their platform to lecture us.

I struggle to draw the line because ultimately, the way that we live is a problem for nature, as far as I’m concerned.

Sure, we can pick on the entertainment industry. But the fact is, our entire society is based around energy consumption and, up until recently, that has meant burning fossil fuels as the sole energy source to do just about anything that we want (in many cases need) to do.

Many people work jobs that require using a personal vehicle to get around. Are they hypocrites if they speak out about climate change? You and I are using phones or computers to communicate with each other over the internet. Are we hypocrites for speaking out about climate change? We use fridges, freezers, ovens, stoves, we use heated water for showers, we use furnaces to heat our homes, many use AC systems to cool their homes. Are we all hypocrites?

The more I've thought about it, the more I've realized that all of this hysteria about supposed 'hypocrisy' is BS. Like, it's not anyone's fault that they were born into a consumption-centric and technologically driven society. To choose to live a life devoid of modern technology in a world filled with technology, involves a high level of sacrifice, and involves deliberately putting yourself at a steep disadvantage compared to the world around you.

I mean, even Greta Thunberg doesn't live in a hut in the wilderness with zero electricity. I guess she's a hypocrite too? I guess maybe only a few dozen people in the developed world are "allowed to" speak out about climate change? Or maybe this is all just a bunch of BS, an impossible standard cooked up by climate deniers to trick people into thinking "oh, those climate alarmists don't really mean what they're saying".

And here's the other thing - if all professional sports vanished from the face of the earth overnight and never started back up again, I would be sad for some time, but would get over it before too long. But asking someone to stop following sports on an individual basis, knowing that doing so would not reduce the pollution of these sports leagues at all, and also knowing that these leagues would keep humming along uninterrupted... sorry, but the answer is no. Major personal sacrifice that doesn't result in any measurable societal improvement, is not something you can expect a person to do.

As for me, yup, I do have a carbon footprint. But to not have one would mean I would have to give up my entire way of life and probably die trying to adopt a different one. This is not a reasonable thing to ask of me, or of anyone for that matter.

What IS reasonable is to ask the world's billionaires to part with a portion of their massive fortunes and invest that money into the energy transition (this involves situations where there's no guarantee of personal ROI). Something they have, for the most part, refused to do.

And don't give me the "Elon made electric cars" line. By electing Trump, he undid any of the good he did for the world, many times over.

[The Fonz]

TLDR

My opinion is that our entire society is a problem. And we will never fix the problem, because at every level, we all look to those who are well above us and we blame them. None of us accepts responsibility for our own lifestyle.

We can’t change the mindset of our entire species. We can’t convince humanity to live with only what is essential for life, as every other organism does on this planet.

On the bright side. Nature has a way of dealing with imbalance, and we’re well down the path of being dealt with. Nature will sort itself (us) out, and the world will continue turning just as it always has.

[The Fonz]

Totally unrelated, thinking of flying my family to DisneyWorld this winter. Want to get there while the kids are still at an age where it’s magical, like it was for me.

[Engine09]

I've actually never noticed the poll in this thread before, looked at it for the first time as saw the number 32 next to "Climate change is a hoax" and burst out laughing. F'ing donkeys.

[belsarius]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

The more I've thought about it, the more I've realized that all of this hysteria about supposed 'hypocrisy' is BS. Like, it's not anyone's fault that they were born into a consumption-centric and technologically driven society. To choose to live a life devoid of modern technology in a world filled with technology, involves a high level of sacrifice, and involves deliberately putting yourself at a steep disadvantage compared to the world around you.

I went to see David Suzuki talk around 2014 and this was a big thing he highlighted. He is very much aware of how much carbon footprint he has, especially in regards to his jet use for speaking engagements. He was very upfront with the idea that you still live in the current society and need to make due with tools in hand while advocating for change. He has made many personal changes to his lifestyle to try to offset, but he is the first person to acknowledge that his personal footprint is bigger than most. Not out of lack of caring, but out of necessity to do the work in the modern world.

[Cappy]

It's like calling Al Gore a hypocrite cause he flew around the world promoting "an inconvenient truth"

That guy did more for the climate change effort than any person on the planet. I'll give him a pass.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Cappy

It's like calling Al Gore a hypocrite cause he flew around the world promoting "an inconvenient truth"

That guy did more for the climate change effort than any person on the planet. I'll give him a pass.

I dunno, I think some of the exaggerations and alarmism probably did more harm than good.