100% convinced our decedents will look back in this age and laugh 2 things : domestic recycling as an attempt to save the the planet , and the fact that we did nothing unless there was a profit in it.
It will probably be an alien species who will find a dead planet and wonder how and why so much toxic material was spread around the planet .... and also wonder why there is an orbiting space station filled with gold, paper money and the greyed out decaying bodies of a humanoid species.
Humanity will survive the climate apocalypse. Life is incredible at adaptation. But our present society won't survive and our descendents will curse us for sitting idle while their future was sacrificed for the sale of lethargy.
I remember reading a fun fact:
A single day (it might have even been an hour but let's err on the side of caution) of the bigger cruise ship engine use pumps out the same amount of pollution as all of the cars in Europe do combined for a while year.
Why on fuck do we bother with the small stuff when the big ones have such a huge weight on the problem.
One cruise ship has carbon emissions roughly equivalent to 12,000 cars. Maybe if you're specifically looking at sulphur oxide pollution, since modern cars emit so little of it. But there's a lot of other stuff coming out of tailpipes, sulphur oxide is just a single pollutant.
Humans are no different now than they were thousands of years ago and will be no different if they survive another couple thousand, I don't think they'll be any more moral in the future
yeah anytime i see anyone talking about some little change they made in their lives to be more eco friendly it makes me incredibly, deeply sad. especially if it's at more expense or more effort for them -- they're trying their best but it's literally completely pointless
Many of us do it for sport tbh. A healthier way to gamify life sorta. I've been vegan since 2015/16 and it does increase the difficulty setting somewhat, but also it's unlocked a million fun mini games for me along the way and provided much needed community.
Exactly. It's only pointless as long as other people think it's pointless. If everyone made changes we could see a noticable impact happen.
Billionaires need to change too, they do more than their fair share of polluting, but it doesn't mean we are all off the hook. We should hold them accountable and also each of us strive to be better.
Does one person saying that they voted for change in the government make you incredibly, deeply sad? Just one vote in millions after all. Little things can collectively add up to something big.
It isn't pointless, it's our thinkings that makes it pointless. "It wouldn't do much if it's just me living eco friendly", yes it doesn't do much since alot of people thinks the same, and that leads to no progress.
It drives me crazy, this performative enviornmentalist bullshit. I have to pay 10c (on top of 300% food cost increase don't forget) for a plastic bag at the grocery when i forget my canvas ones. In these bags i must pay for i can place fruit individually wrapped in plastic.
Every time something gets worse, we must be the ones to pay. This whole environment-saving-by-paper-straw phenomenon is so insipid that I would rather believe that it's actually a deliberate corporate strategy. At least that would make sense. If they keep us thinking that something is being done, they don't have to change a thing, and if it's "all of our jobs" (read: not theirs), to save the world, we'll never take them to task for their (greater) part of the waste.
It is actually a deliberate corp strategy. Plastic straws were never a real concern, save for that ONE turtle. Plastic straw make such a negligible amount of plastic waste that stop using it will have virtually zero measurable impact in amount of plastic waste we create. All it ever was intended for was to make us feel like something was being done while doing absolutely nothing.
That's not to say all plastic reduction initiatives are pointless. But the straws definitely belong in the least environmentally impactful category.
All it ever was intended for was to make us feel like something was being done while doing absolutely nothing.
It certainly does help a little bit. But it's of course still not a coincidence that companies are pushing for it instead of more effective measures... It's not just cheap but it also pushes people to believe that measures to save the environment are all useless and annoying, and makes them less likely to want more to happen.
What's worse is we haven't replaced plastic straws with a good alternative. Paper straws fucking blow and I'm not going to carry around and wash a silicon straw with me at all times.
Nothing beats collection of beer/cola can's pull tabs for recycling competition at schools. That forces children to ask parents to buy more of the six packs so that they could have the tabs.
You're treating it like a hypothetical but that is in fact exactly what's going on.
Corporations and the politicians they own are hyperfocused on (relativee to centralised) inefficient end user recycling and regular people taking responsibility for the environment and climate change to distract from the fact that maybe 95%+ of it are the fault of corporations, not their customers.
Even consumer waste is many times worse than it would be if companies didn't for example use all that plastic and design electronics to become obsolete if functional at all in as little as a single year just to squeeze as much money out while spending as little as possible.
Not only the billionaires, even the millionaires, and all the people taking the plane more than once a year. It is an ecological crime the pollution of air transport.
Edit #2: ICE is a type of train in germany. I mistook "ICE cars" as meaning trains and was wondering how flying is supposed to be more efficient than trains. Hence my confusion.
OG comment (invalid, see Edit #2):
Where are these numbers coming from?
I cannot find any source for the 3-4l/passenger/km claim. I cannot find any source for the claim that planes are more efficient. Nothing comes even near this claim.
Edit #1: I just want to add that my old combustion car (VW Up! / Seat Mii / Skoda Citigo) burned around 4.2l/100km. So I according to you, if I had another person with me, I'd beat both planes and trains with what stands uncontested as the most inefficient form of transport?
efficient ICE cars consume ~6l per passenger per 100km.
More like 6L per 100km, whatever the number of passengers, I suppose. So it's usually still less than planes.
And there are better alternatives like trains or buses, which can be actually efficient for long distance travels (high speed trains, night travel. Works well from city centre to city centre)
There is also the additional issue of contrails which are a massive factor of greenhouse effect
Is that planes that are packed to the gills or private planes that actually have space that people aren't crammed into?
Also, 3-4/6 liters of what? ICE cars and modern planes aren't burning the same fuel, so I'm not sure what this is intending to portray by directly comparing how much of each (in liters) that they burn (serious question, no snark)
Yeah gotta agree with you. I have to fly a good amount, both families live over 2000 miles away, it's unavoidable. But I change what I can in society, I am switching to an EV, I pay extra on my electricity to pay for green sources, and I overall try to lower my carbon footprint.
As soon as they come out with an alternative fuel airline I'll be flying on that as much as possible, but until there are alternatives I'm stuck flying.
I feel like this is a whoosh. The environmental impact of our collective straw use is so insignificant compared to the effects of so many other things. The fact that people focus on straws is just evidence that the average person has no idea what to do, in order to decrease their environmental impact and will also complain about the mildest of inconveniences.
I don't use straws at all, but this isn't really the point. There are much more impactful ways to reduce your carbon footprint like biking, walking, public transport, but all this pales in comparison in the massive environmental pollutions that billionaires and corporations do to our waterways and air.
This resonates hard. Also incredibly fun to watch companies get to abuse loop holes and continue operations as always, then get told we need to sell our cars and turn off our heating to survive this environmental disaster.
ANY effective, long-term collective change REQUIRES that the large majority of people CHANGE THEIR CONSUMPTION HABBITS.
While not great, the private plane stuff is exactly as pointless as the paper straws. Both are ways for everyone to point the finger at everyone else, and not have to change.
If the government implemented the "correct" laws tomorrow, but the populace doesn't want to change their habits, they will vote in people that give them back their old, bad things.
If a company implemented to "correct" processes, but the consumers don't want to pay the necessary price, they go bankrupt, and the company with the "incorrect, but cheap" processes wins.
ALL COLLECTIVE ACTION IS A COLLECTION OF INDIVIDUAL CHANGE. There is no alternative!
You don't solve this by just recycling harder - you solve this with legislative intervention to minimise packaging, ban private jets, retire fossil fuels, and stop massive food waste.
Pointing your finger at the masses and demanding they muster the will to change enough that entire supply chains are forced to retool entirely is naiive to the point of stupidity - people will go for cost and convenience just as predictably as companies will burn down the world for an extra dollar. The systemic change makes that shift quickly and (for the consumer) easy.
Obviously, there are those of us who like to leave their v8 running while in the grocery store and they absolutely need to stop. No emptying the ashtray on the street or going to starbucks every day and get a one use cup every time. But still, I‘m done listening to people telling me I‘m not doing enough.
You’re talking about two different ways to screw the environment. One is the rampant plastics pandemic, the other is carbon emissions. Paper straws are meant to combat the first, not the second.
While that's true, I think the complaint here is that the the law deliberately harms poor people only. Instead of banning individual plastic applications, we should be taxing literally all plastics and letting consumers decide what's worth it. And if we are to take a case-by-case class warfare approach, we should be going after the excesses of the wealthy - like private jets.
It's not that they're the same thing, it's that they both hurt the environment and are treated very differently.
hey here's one some concession we can do to make the planet slightly better.
Most people in the US:
if it doesn't t solve all of our problems 100% I'm not going to think about doing so. What it only makes life slightly better for us? Nope fuck that it means I have to be slightly inconvenienced for it, I'm not willing to do that. Come back when it'll fix everything 100% and then I'll find more excuses to why I don't have to change.
In my area I can sometimes find these light blue colored ones that are super rigid, I think they're made of agave? Regardless of the material, I think they're actually just better than plastic for once.
You get your first ticket as a part of the gift hamper you receive when you earn your first billion through honest hard work and never taking a sick day in your life. Each subsequent ticket is gained through deals shifting help desk call centres to India, The Phillipines or China.
Obviously, the tickets are very sort after but on-selling them is only legal if you list them as “TICKET FOR TAYLOR SWIFT CONCERT!! Serious offers only!!! #swifty #taytay”.
I don't even want a straw, I prefer drinking from the side of the cup and save the environment even a little more bringing my own fave cup and asking for no straw!
And yes, billionaires really do go brrr while I do all this
It all depends on what you people want. Do you want lower carbon emissions? Literally change your whole life and consuming habits. Do you want less warm climate m industrialize as fuck to create giant satellite mirrors to stop light from reaching earth. And so on
I don't really care but when Wendy's got paper straws and then replace all the paper cups with thick plastic cups right after it's clear company's are doing it just to pretend they care about the environment.
I disagree that this is a right wing talking point, but whether it is or not is irrelevant. If it's a problem, it's a problem. There is no "buying into it."