3 ms·

Well the real answer is large-scale political action. But the (American) political system is designed on the assumption that a tendency to do nothing is safer t

by Ardon 5y ago

Well the real answer is large-scale political action. But the (American) political system is designed on the assumption that a tendency to do nothing is safer than a tendency towards action/change. Unfortunately doing nothing isn't the safe choice now, and even worse many of the checks and balances intended to be brakes now just act as a stick through the spokes. Not helped by how many people are blatantly propagandized into objectively false positions by Fox News & similar.

peytn 5y ago
> Not helped by how many people are blatantly propagandized into objectively false positions by Fox News & similar. I dunno, I think that’s confusing cause and effect. The solutions being proposed (e.g. be vegetarian) aren’t what people want. The same goes for lots of problems it seems. In my mind, somebody turning to Fox News et al. is a kind of effect of that. People aren’t going to suddenly want to become vegetarian if Fox News goes away. There will probably always be somewhere people can listen to talking heads rant about the solutions they feel are being shoved down their throats.
- Ardon 5y ago
  I think there are, for lack of a better concept, tiers to climate change actions. Eating less meat would be something very personal, and I think you're right on there being an aversion totally unrelated to news, or propaganda of any kind. On the other hand, there are measures like increasing investment in climate research, green energy, carbon capture, etc. These have a much smaller personal effect on each individual. These two categories both, on Fox News and contemporaries, exist under the same umbrella. If the demand was really going from ground-up, then we might see segments about how eating meat doesn't really contribute to global warming next to segments about how we could create jobs with green energy investment. But we don't. Instead we see a widespread denial of climate change itself on the top level, falling back to denial of man-made climate change, then to some idea that climate change isn't worth fixing, then to climate change is real and dangerous but it's the plastic straws & personal responsibility that we need to think about. This, in my mind, strongly implies that it is not a bottom-up demand for climate change denial, but a mix of bottom-up and top-down demand, but with a heavy lean towards top-down. And much of the bottom-up demand has been created artificially (in the Manufacturing Consent style of "artificially") To be clear, I agree with the narrow point you actually made, I don't expect Fox News has some controlling factor over how many people want to be vegetarian. Vegetarianism isn't even a majority in deeply left-wing communities. Fortunately there's a lot of ground to be gained on switching to bird meats, or even just dodging the issue entirely with cultured meats. It's a shame Fox News disdains these options too.

by Ardon 5y ago

peytn 5y ago

> Not helped by how many people are blatantly propagandized into objectively false positions by Fox News & similar. I dunno, I think that’s confusing cause and effect. The solutions being proposed (e.g. be vegetarian) aren’t what people want. The same goes for lots of problems it seems. In my mind, somebody turning to Fox News et al. is a kind of effect of that. People aren’t going to suddenly want to become vegetarian if Fox News goes away. There will probably always be somewhere people can listen to talking heads rant about the solutions they feel are being shoved down their throats.

Ardon 5y ago
I think there are, for lack of a better concept, tiers to climate change actions. Eating less meat would be something very personal, and I think you're right on there being an aversion totally unrelated to news, or propaganda of any kind. On the other hand, there are measures like increasing investment in climate research, green energy, carbon capture, etc. These have a much smaller personal effect on each individual. These two categories both, on Fox News and contemporaries, exist under the same umbrella. If the demand was really going from ground-up, then we might see segments about how eating meat doesn't really contribute to global warming next to segments about how we could create jobs with green energy investment. But we don't. Instead we see a widespread denial of climate change itself on the top level, falling back to denial of man-made climate change, then to some idea that climate change isn't worth fixing, then to climate change is real and dangerous but it's the plastic straws & personal responsibility that we need to think about. This, in my mind, strongly implies that it is not a bottom-up demand for climate change denial, but a mix of bottom-up and top-down demand, but with a heavy lean towards top-down. And much of the bottom-up demand has been created artificially (in the Manufacturing Consent style of "artificially") To be clear, I agree with the narrow point you actually made, I don't expect Fox News has some controlling factor over how many people want to be vegetarian. Vegetarianism isn't even a majority in deeply left-wing communities. Fortunately there's a lot of ground to be gained on switching to bird meats, or even just dodging the issue entirely with cultured meats. It's a shame Fox News disdains these options too.