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Oh.. So you want to go back to the old scapegoats..

by anu7df 7y ago

eropple 7y ago
"Scapegoats" is a fascinating description for "the people who literally knew about world-wrecking climate change in the 1970s and proceeded to tell no one and embark on disinformation campaigns to try to keep that genie in the bottle."
- anu7df 7y ago
  We could debate this a long time. I work for an oil company. So I suppose I will be biased, and that makes things difficult. But, I will leave you with this. Are you sure every oil company did this? And by "this" I mean, convinced that the science in the 1970s was certain and unambiguous as to the impending destruction of the planet, decided to hide that information. Also, keep in mind that whenever they did break the law (as it existed. Yes I know of regulatory capture.) they were punished. We can quibble on the magnitude of the fines, but then again that is indeed what the current article is about. Hence my comment about the equivalence of the scapegoats. Keep in mind, I am not a climate change denier. I am just saying that it took the acceleration of the effects to clarify the cause and effect to a point that it is unambiguous and it was not the case back in 1970. Now contrast the messy science of climate change with very controllable A/B testable situation with privacy violations and echo chamber amplification and large scale social engineering that is happening with Twitter Facebook etc. I would argue that they know exactly what they are doing and choose to continue only because... profit.
  - eropple 7y ago
    > Are you sure every oil company did this? Fines? Come on. Were there justice we'd have people shot dead in the square then buried unmourned and in unmarked graves for what they did to us as a society and as a race. Continuing to assess fines as the magnitude of their betrayal of society and of the human race would be getting off light. Because here's the thing: if they weren't sure in the seventies they were damned well sure by the eighties and they're damned well sure now and they still fight to put profits over the future of the human race. They are the counterpoint to the ghastly unfettered capitalism that some people still think is a good idea and they're going to end billions of humans because of it. "Not all oil companies"? Get out with that. There is no exclusion from this betrayal of the human race and there is no oil company in existence today not blighting us by their continued operation. If some hypothetical oil company doesn't want to be strung up? I dunno. How about 100% renewable energy by 2035--which is probably still too late, because we are screaming over the cliff, but hey!--and externally-validated commitments to that, with failure to meet those commitments resulting in revocation of their corporate charter, forcible seizure of all assets, and jail sentences long enough to see the sea rise they caused for their executive tier? That seems equitable to me. Sigh. A violated society should act, but we are passive.

Oh.. So you want to go back to the old scapegoats..

by anu7df 7y ago

Oh.. So you want to go back to the old scapegoats..

"Scapegoats" is a fascinating description for "the people who literally knew about world-wrecking climate change in the 1970s and proceeded to tell no one and embark on disinformation campaigns to try to keep that genie in the bottle."

anu7df 7y ago
We could debate this a long time. I work for an oil company. So I suppose I will be biased, and that makes things difficult. But, I will leave you with this. Are you sure every oil company did this? And by "this" I mean, convinced that the science in the 1970s was certain and unambiguous as to the impending destruction of the planet, decided to hide that information. Also, keep in mind that whenever they did break the law (as it existed. Yes I know of regulatory capture.) they were punished. We can quibble on the magnitude of the fines, but then again that is indeed what the current article is about. Hence my comment about the equivalence of the scapegoats. Keep in mind, I am not a climate change denier. I am just saying that it took the acceleration of the effects to clarify the cause and effect to a point that it is unambiguous and it was not the case back in 1970. Now contrast the messy science of climate change with very controllable A/B testable situation with privacy violations and echo chamber amplification and large scale social engineering that is happening with Twitter Facebook etc. I would argue that they know exactly what they are doing and choose to continue only because... profit.
- eropple 7y ago
  > Are you sure every oil company did this? Fines? Come on. Were there justice we'd have people shot dead in the square then buried unmourned and in unmarked graves for what they did to us as a society and as a race. Continuing to assess fines as the magnitude of their betrayal of society and of the human race would be getting off light. Because here's the thing: if they weren't sure in the seventies they were damned well sure by the eighties and they're damned well sure now and they still fight to put profits over the future of the human race. They are the counterpoint to the ghastly unfettered capitalism that some people still think is a good idea and they're going to end billions of humans because of it. "Not all oil companies"? Get out with that. There is no exclusion from this betrayal of the human race and there is no oil company in existence today not blighting us by their continued operation. If some hypothetical oil company doesn't want to be strung up? I dunno. How about 100% renewable energy by 2035--which is probably still too late, because we are screaming over the cliff, but hey!--and externally-validated commitments to that, with failure to meet those commitments resulting in revocation of their corporate charter, forcible seizure of all assets, and jail sentences long enough to see the sea rise they caused for their executive tier? That seems equitable to me. Sigh. A violated society should act, but we are passive.