Serious The environment asks for help, do your part!

[Myzozoa]

I'm saying that since governments and corporations do all the polluting, individual action to combat climate change such as giving up showers and having a curfew after 9pm are not gonna effectively reduce emissions enough or fast enough to meet necessary targets that would avoid significant spirals of climate change caused by positive feedback loops inherent to the earth system. This is not self-flagellation: that would be giving up showers and thinking 'meat bad' (hint ive been vegetarian longer than the person I was responding to has been alive). Self-flagellation would be me going 'we can't do anything, least of all get the corporations in check', but that is also not what I'm saying if you pay attention.

Corporations making meatless products and electric cars functions to produce profit from such trends, but does not get to companies whose business model is predicated on continuing to pump CO2 into the earth system. If you stop using water so that agribusiness can waste more of it, you're symbolically giving up your right to water in the name of preserving unregulated corporate liberties. This is not about 'corporations=bad', as you probably know ive defended supply chain shifts in other posts. Further, I don't understand your quote, you're the one saying 'capitalism is the only viable system, there is no alternative' as far as I can tell from your talk of corporate solutions, not me. My position is only that individual action on the level of reducing consumption of water and electricity will not reduce emissions past a target point that is sufficient to prevent catastrophic climate change. Regulating corporate activities and having a 'green business' project supervised by non-industry scientists and citizens is what I'm suggesting instead of taking on the burden of articulating a radical post-capitalist vision for the future in every post, which I also don't think will reach ppl. Finally, this idea that me telling someone giving the repetitive half-baked suggestion that we stop taking showers and impose a voluntary curfew that they're in fact merely just annoying, is not contributing to the rise of authoritarianism imo, but we're free to disagree.

 

[Soul Fly]

I'm not arguing that corporations pollute less than people, idk if someone else has leveled such a claim. My post was simple inasmuch it was pointing out what you have again done in your new reply - limited it to boilerplate criticisms of corporations. We all know corporate interests run contrary to our ecological needs. That corporations are making us symbolically give up our rights.

Ok, agreed so what?

Every kind of belief has collapsed at the level of ritual or symbolic elaboration. That is the nature of capitalism itself. Everyone knows it but partakes in it anyways. The corporations clearly know that the fossil fuel jig is up, because those whose business model is predicated on fossil fuels adamantly continue to block efforts to shut it down on they other hand they are actively diversifying their business assets onto other interests. They are clearly preserving their profit margin at a great cost to the environment but that's how it goes, gotta keep shareholders happy. Pro-corporate supporters also know it, to varying degrees (and find many innovative ways to justify it: refer to deck knight's post history). Others, regardless of their belief in corporations, have little choice but to engage with them anyways (unless they want to become a hermit of some kind) and thus end up contributing to their growth one way or another despite knowing that they are implicit. Please don't assume you have said anything that almost everyone here doesn't know already. Yet you face adamant defiance. Have you every thought why?

The problem is that nothing in your post provides an answer. What is beyond the horizon of capital and corporations? Why should I not settle for a half-answer to our environmental problems? If you want people to feel like they are entitled to better, then clearly and specifically articulate that vision. What does the alternative look like? If you are indeed correct in stating that individual action is so irrelevant compared to the scale at with corporations operate, then how is any kind of collective action ever going to matter? Elections are clearly failing us, and let's be honest, state power has become extreme to the point where even taking up arms against it has become pretty much pointless. You start becoming pretty one-tone if you don't dive deeper or be inclusive about these inquiries and instead keep resorting to white-lefty witticisms to find new ways of telling us the same old story of how corporations are symbolically robbing us. It is symptomatic of how much in shambles leftist discourse is.

I am sorry you couldn't comprehend the quote. I recommend you peruse chapter 1 of Mark Fisher's book Capitalist Realism. It's a 10 page read, highly educational.

 

[THE_IRON_...KENYAN?]

It clearly does make a difference. It creates a culture which converts people into changing their habits and voting for people who plan on implementing regulations, research and development, or carbon taxes via the hundredth monkey effect. We see this plainly with every store popping up organic food sections or all those aisles that have products that have shit like "made with biodegradable packaging" or whatever.

Also, even if it is hopeless - and it isnt - it still wouldnt give you the right to be a dick when you know you shouldnt be one. If you have the opportunity to not cause harm and you do it anyway, at that moment you are harming it regardless of whether its doomed or not and therefor you arent justified. Simple as that.

This is just people not wanting to change and then acting like they arent changing because of a "logical" analysis of the situation when really its just a post-hoc justification you give when the initial motivation for not changing your habits to match good moral standards is pure laziness.

 

[TheValkyries]

A lot of the "eco friendly" sustainability solutions affect no real change and are sometimes quantifiably worse for the environment than the existing structures. Encouraging further development into these harmful new structures that serve no other purpose than to create a false sense of accomplishment will not ever move us towards qualitative change. Moreover shifting focus from individualist based responses to results based policy changes focused directly on the core polluting problems is absolutely a better and more efficient way of dealing with these problems. Its weird to see effective policy be criticized because its lazy and doesn't want to take individual responsibility for systemic problems.

 

[THE_IRON_...KENYAN?]

Totally disregarding individual efforts in favor of systemic problems just gives people an out to never change their terrible habits, which people already have a pretty big aversion to doing anyway. And bullshit that most of the sustainability solutions that an individual themselves can do is more damaging than buying things packaged in plastic lmao. Buying your own fruits and vegetables instead of eating like shit. Buying bread from a bakery. If you are short on time and cant cook, you can always prepare things ahead of time, freeze it, and eat it over the course of a week. Buying things in cardboard. The list goes on. It doesnt always have to be shit like "100% biodegradable" and then actually you find out its just as wasteful as the other shit you were buying before. That doesnt even happen that often anyway because the type of person to buy something that claims to be environmentally friendly is probably consumer savvy and does their research so if the company were lying about this, they would eventually be found out pretty quickly by the person buying their product.

Moreover, you have no idea if you will ever get the right people in the right offices to make the right changes in time. The only thing you can be certain of is what you do yourself. Because of that, you have to focus first and foremost on individual action and then also try to get people elected. If you dont ever change your own habits you will on the one hand claim you dont want the planet to die while also helping the planet die by continuing your dumb habits which will make you A.) A complete hypocrite and B.) Make people not willing to listen to you because of it. Talking to people and advocating for a candidate and going to the voting booth also only takes a relatively short time, which makes it absurd to frame the situation in a way that makes it seem like you have to choose to focus on one or the other when you have more than enough time to focus on both.

There is no distinct line between what is an individual action and what is a systemic action either. Systems are just made of individuals, and bad systems are made of individuals who behave poorly. In the same way that if you hang around a place like /pol/ or left twitter and enjoy it you are likely to become either racist or woke, the same goes for individual habits regarding the environment and really any other habit you could name. You pick up and mimic what you see going on around you. Its just how human beings work. So you are obligated to put on your best face in front of your friends and family if you really want to effect a system.

There is no good argument against focusing on individual action with at least as much effort as "systemic" action. The only reason you would advocate for just electoralism or advocating for a law or whatever is because you recognize how much you personally dont want to change your habits, so you make an argument why individual action is stupid and frame it in a way that gives yourself plausible deniability when someone accuses you of advocating for this because you are lazy and actually dont care as much as you say you do.

And that my friends, is how I totally pwned everyone in this thread.

 

[Hipmonlee]

Ok, the last few pages of this thread are completely unconstructive political masturbation.

So, I am just going to bypass all that, pretend that we are all smart enough to accept that discussing individual actions is completely pointless and ask: What forms of government intervention does everyone here actually think would be the most effective? Because personally I havent actually thought particularly deeply about that and that's an oversight on my part.

 

[Soul Fly]

Ok, the last few pages of this thread are completely unconstructive political masturbation.

So, I am just going to bypass all that, pretend that we are all smart enough to accept that discussing individual actions is completely pointless and ask: What forms of government intervention does everyone here actually think would be the most effective? Because personally I havent actually thought particularly deeply about that and that's an oversight on my part.

Yes, thank you.

The obvious answer appears to be the strengthening the environmental protection agencies of all governments in order to enforce greater regulation on private use of natural resources and standards of emission aimed towards the safety and longevity of human society.

But I don't think this is going to be effective. Most nation-states, especially the US are deeply implicated into the profit motives of its market, which is why the government will favour erring corporations even at the detriment of the welfare of its citizens on the long term (eg: 2008 bailout, relaxing of environmental laws in favour of development etc etc). Therefore I think any regulatory arm of the government will always be under attack, regardless of the regime in charge, and never be effective enough to check corporations or preserve nature. Of course you can argue that electing a critical mass of ecofriendly political representatives can counteract that, but all election systems are also a machine beholden to money (especially in the US where money counts as speech), and designed to keep such politicians out. Instead, representatives who can bend over to accommodate corporate interests consistently seem to get more funding, better opportunities, and more important appointments in the government and the executive.

So unless there is some way to dramatically undo the wealth gap and reduce the clout of money, and in doing so loosen the corporate stranglehold over elections, I think any hopes of effective government intervention are a pipe dream.

Therefore at this point, this becomes, for me at least, an economic problem. Policies that repair wealth parity, coupled with the sanitisation of the electoral process can actually end up being a much more effective forms of governmental intervention. I imagine that to be a much fertile area to exercise our imaginations in, as opposed to being stuck in the vicious cycle of discussing environmental regulations and individual responsibility. That would be my answer.

 

[orch]

Ending corporate welfare for fossil fuels and moving that money to a mix of ethanol and solar powered electrical grid would be a solid start.

 

[Myzozoa]

this idea that ppl are totally disregarding individual efforts pretty much assumes that ppl itt posting about regulating corporations aren't taking steps as individuals or in their communities to reduce their carbon footprint, which is entirely fallacious. some would speculate that it is actually a wild projection by such posters...

soul fly is imo correct that this is mainly an economic problem. addressing climate change, because many aspects of climate change need to be addressed through collective action and strengthening communities, will also entail a restructuring of the economy around much greater access to housing, childcare, food and food services. An electoral project will involve working on closing legal and economic problems that cause regulators to fail, and even beginning on that project will imo involve another significant project to address voter suppression and gerrymandering. I can't really fully articulate the principle of the regulatory framework, but one thing that comes to mind is that you can't have an illegal corporate business model, so if there is some way of making it illegal to have a carbon footprint beyond a certain scale or something.

The Poor People's Campaign is the largest project that I am aware of working on these issues on a 'communal' and national level but nothing is perfect probably https://www.poorpeoplescampaign.org/demands/.

 

[Mimas]

not sure about 'virtue signalling like alexander orcazio cortez' but uh.... do you realise how little personally changing your habits impacts global warming? we dont live in a randian utopia where one persons actions can significantly alter the way things are going. it is much more important that the pressure be put onto governments / corporations to make significant changes such as in how energy is produced or how we produce food. its good you think you're doing your bit but if u truly care start looking at the bigger picture.

I follow the idea that the most important thing is for everyone to do their part, even if it does not make such a big impact, because it does not cost anything to help the environment anyway.

 

[Mimas]

Corporations don't pollute for fun. They do it bc it enablesconsumers to purchase their products cheaply. So, individual action can and will drive corporate action. Saying mmmm yes it's all those corporations at fault, I can't do anything! is just complacently participating in the corporate world

Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Nestlé are the companies that most contribute to ocean pollution with disposable plastics, according to a Break Free from Plastic study that has cleaned the coast of 42 countries worldwide. They are followed in the ranking of the most polluting companies by Danone, Mondelez, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, Perfetti Van Melle, Mars Incorporated and Colgate-Palmolive, all multinational companies engaged in food, hygiene and household cleaning products.

Currently, plastic production has reached 320 million metric tons per year and in the next decade is expected to grow by 40%, which will increase exponentially the release of greenhouse gases, since 90% of plastics are produced from of fossil fuels and pollutants. In addition, 80% of the 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic produced since 1950 still remain in the environment, fundamentally in the oceans.

 

[Mimas]

Where you spend your money also speak louder than words. You as a consumer can force corporations to comply to your environmental principles simply either spending less, boycott or giving your money to their competitors obviously. So if you want them to pollute less, actually do something and don't give them your money. This forces them to either evolve their ways of production either via cleaner energy sources or produce less. On the other hand getting your kids to skip school to join some extremely meaningless climate protest does absolutely nothing if you still don't reduce your own household carbon footprint. (seriously, just ask yourselves, what exactly has the climate march and the Paris Climate Accord exactly achieved throughout the years Hint: hardly anything)

So yes, ultimately there isn't a way to combat pollution and promote environmentalism if individuals do absolutely nothing on a personal scale. Actions really speak louder than words.

Companies are indeed the main contributors to the increased pollution in the environment, contained, many of them manage to bring a positive impact, for example, the Chinese government has invested heavily in air purifiers in leisure regions such as parks and squares, in the capital Beijing is the world's largest air purifier, capable of purifying up to 30,000 cubic meters of air every hour.

China provides an example of how technology can minimize the impact of carbon emissions and particulate matter from industrialized countries, but most nations still resort to restrictive solutions. In Paris, an emergency car ban was introduced in days of excessive pollution. When the air quality is in critical condition, an emergency carriage veers the access of half of the cars to the center of the city. In December last year, the ban lasted three days in a row and the city council articulated schemes with bicycles and free electric buses for the population.

 

[Mimas]

Ok, the last few pages of this thread are completely unconstructive political masturbation.

So, I am just going to bypass all that, pretend that we are all smart enough to accept that discussing individual actions is completely pointless and ask: What forms of government intervention does everyone here actually think would be the most effective? Because personally I havent actually thought particularly deeply about that and that's an oversight on my part.

One of the first procedures to be put into practice is increased birth control, especially in developing countries, such as China, which has about 1.3 billion people. Birth control allows both an environmental and social improvement, since it avoids an increase in the extraction of resources, as well as a decrease in the supply of labor, which favors wage growth, as companies would have to struggle to achieve workers, would facilitate the deployment of quality public services, among many other benefits.

Another factor that can be extremely efficient in the conservation process is inserted in the context of education. This form occurs in the construction of an education related to quality, not quantity. Forming environmentally conscious people from specific environmental education classes enables the production of positive results in the medium to long term, the positive side of this item is that change occurs at the base of society (young people), causing people concerned about problems related to environment.

In the case of water, there is a process of depollution of polluted water sources, preservation of water resources and control of their use, strict treatment of sewage, residential, commercial and industrial implantation of water recycling, recovery of areas where the riparian forests are degraded.

Repeating again, the set of measures that contribute to the improvement of environmental conditions in the world requires the participation of all countries, this is indispensable, nevertheless, individual measures can contribute to the improvement of the world in social and environmental aspects, that is, each individual does your part.

 

[GatoDelFuego]

Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Nestlé are the companies that most contribute to ocean pollution with disposable plastics, according to a Break Free from Plastic study that has cleaned the coast of 42 countries worldwide. They are followed in the ranking of the most polluting companies by Danone, Mondelez, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, Perfetti Van Melle, Mars Incorporated and Colgate-Palmolive, all multinational companies engaged in food, hygiene and household cleaning products.

Currently, plastic production has reached 320 million metric tons per year and in the next decade is expected to grow by 40%, which will increase exponentially the release of greenhouse gases, since 90% of plastics are produced from of fossil fuels and pollutants. In addition, 80% of the 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic produced since 1950 still remain in the environment, fundamentally in the oceans.

Ok