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Your evidence regarding 'most people'? Pew Research last year report that 63% of Americans say the the government is doing too little to protect animals and the
by vixen99 7y ago
Your evidence regarding 'most people'? Pew Research last year report that 63% of Americans say the the government is doing too little to protect animals and their habitat. They evidently do care about these matters.
- SomeOldThrow 7y agoIf you look at their actions, they do not care. You aren’t gonna vote or consume change into the world. EDIT: to be clear, voting is useful, but politicians facing a complacent population will follow their own agenda—you need to act outside of the voting booth to push them in the direction you want.
- ShorsHammer 7y ago"Look at what people do not what they say" is the common phrase I believe. It's very easy to blame others and tell them to improve, whether they be politicians/foreign nations/corporations. But when it comes down to any personal impact on the individual it's very clear how most people react to even tiny price increases or inconvenience.
- weberc2 7y agoSeems most likely to me that the public doesn’t know what to do or how to help. The things that are most publicized are often the least impactful (e.g., plastic straws. All we hear is that the house is burning but there’s no discernible authority telling laypeople what they can do about it. And we need an authority to weigh in because misinformation is rife and reasoning properly isn’t possible for laypeople (e.g., what uses more carbon, the shrink wrapped vegetables that stay fresh longer or the ones that go bad sooner but don’t use plastic? What about local organic produce that isn’t shipped as far but has much lower yields than its GMO counterparts? Etc etc). Personally I want to make a difference but I don’t know how and I am probably more in-the-know than the average layperson. I firmly believe that environmentalists and scientists need to build a credible information pipeline—it’s not enough to proclaim fear, they need to communicate what we should do. “Use less carbon is not actionable”.
- SomeOldThrow 7y agoWe need strikes in america. I don’t see any other way. This is a fairly useless action yourself. I also don’t have great answers, obviously.
- brighter2morrow 7y agoStrikes only work when the media portrays them sympathetically. The media will never even report a strike happened if powerful interests are against it.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- weberc2 7y agoUgh. Sorry for the typos. Missed the “edit” window...
- pfdietz 7y agoWhat matters is not what they say government should do, but how much weight they put on that when it comes time to vote. Shallow expressions of preference aren't worth much. Also, if you add up all the "goverment should do X" recommendations from polls, the results are inconsistent with what people say they want to pay in taxes. Polls that ask comparisons (should $ be spent on X or Y? Would you supprt spending $N on X if it meant raising taxes by $N?) are more informative. One example over the years was support for NASA. Asked "should the government spend money on NASA", most showed some support. But in comparisons with literally anything else, including crop subsidies and military spending, NASA comes out the loser.
- Waterluvian 7y agoThose are always nonsense polls. What percentage of that 63% will actually do something or agree to give some money? It's easy to say that the government is not doing enough about X when saying that costs you nothing.
- count 7y agoWhy does me wanting someone else to STOP doing something require me to do a thing or give money to someone? Just stop doing the thing!
- asdfasgasdgasdg 7y agoIf you don't want them to stop enough to do more than comment on the internet, can you really say you feel strongly about it? Nobody is going to stop doing anything because of a post on HackerNews.
- ozim 7y agoAsk people if they care, they will say they do. Ask people to give $100 a month for conservation out of their pocket and it will be 1%.
- notfromhere 7y agothey don't vote like it.