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I'm so very sick of this kind of comment. "Sure we could prepare for the seemingly imminent WW3 and literally save the world in the process. But are we sure we

by 1ris 5y ago

I'm so very sick of this kind of comment. "Sure we could prepare for the seemingly imminent WW3 and literally save the world in the process. But are we sure we want to? cAn We aFfoRd iT?" If you want social redistribution, implement redistribution. Do cash handouts. But don't fuck up other field of politics. These special interests corrupt everything. If you want to solve a problem, tackle it. Don't play "over gang" so some body can fill their pockets in the process.

yourusername 5y ago
I don't think anyone disagrees that moving away from hydrocarbons is a good thing. The contention is that this shock to move away more quickly is good. The lower half of incomes are really hurting. Our government (NL) is doing some quick fixes but it won't nearly compensate everything and according to the planning agencies we are looking at the biggest drop in spending power in over 40 years. That hurts if you were just barely getting by in 2020. E: This is not about gas for our SUVs being 30% more expensive, this is about your heating bill quadrupling since Q1 2021 if you have to do a new contract now.
- dtech 5y ago
  > I don't think anyone disagrees that moving away from hydrocarbons is a good thing. You'd be surprised. Mostly these arguments come from people who think the whole thing is bullshit (or have financial incentives to say so) and we should take no action at all, or even actively move back to more fossil fuels.
- paganel 5y ago
  Most of the solar cells are produced in China. China is not a democracy.
saiya-jin 5y ago
Especially in such a situation that status quo is directly financing army of dictator who openly states that all Europe all the way to the Atlantic ocean should be demilitarized, denuked and 'neutral', ie free for grab to anybody, but absolutely definitely maybe not by him. And as we saw in past few weeks he properly walks his talks, so its either acting or being weak and stupid.
- hnlmorg 5y ago
  It's neither. It's a negotiation tactic. Make an unreasonable demand so that the concessions you actually want are met. In this case it's Ukraine to be demilitarized. All of the aggression on Ukrainian can be traced back to them moving closer to the EU, NATO, and putting western hardware on Ukrainian soil. It a bit like how America would panic if Russia put military hardware in Mexico. Basically Putin is trying to create a neutral zone on it's borders. This doesn't excuse any of Putin's actions though.
  - bkor 5y ago
    > All of the aggression on Ukrainian can be traced back to them moving closer to the EU, NATO, and putting western hardware on Ukrainian soil. That's what Russian propaganda keeps saying. But they ignore the huge amounts of gas that was found in the region of Ukraine that was annexed by Russia. Further, Ukraine gave back their nuclear weapons. Meaning, Ukraine already acted to demilitarize. Ukraine moving closer to EU and NATO can be traced back to Ukraine finding huge gas reserves in 2012 and Russia attacking Ukraine in 2014.
    - hnlmorg 5y ago
      > That's what Russian propaganda keeps saying. Not really. Russian propaganda talk about liberating Ukraine because it is ruled by Nazi's. They talk about themselves as the heroes rather than wanting to destroy Ukraine "just" to create a neural zone. The gas might be a motivator too but as you said yourself Ukraine was moving closer to EU and NATO before Russia started any hostilities. Summarizing will always leave some detail out so I'll instead link to a talk that does go in depth into this point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4
      - kkfx 5y ago
        There are few issues there: Russians of course do not act for humanitarian reasons but for interests however they are right saying the NATO create a nazi gov in Ukraine and they are right saying they are not starting a war because the civil war between those nazi militias (like Pravy Sektor, C14, Azov etc) and Russian-speaking Ukrainian (30+% of the total population) was started in 2014 with the infamous Euromaidan massacre and keep going in a slow genocide since them. That's one of the real issues. Others are the fact that so far Russian do not start any war, while NATO have done that, and have done that with lie like the nonexistent Saddam mass-destruction weapons or the lie that the taliban (created by NATO BTW, to counter Soviet Union) host bin laden. Long story short: putin is a dictator BUT his propaganda have plenty fo truth to use against NATO just because the other side (USA and UK in primis, BUT others as well) are equally dictatorships only with much more hypocrisy and less symbols. The famous putin's definition of the west as the empire of lie is unfortunately actually true. The "solution" then depend on who: for us, Citizens, the solution is eradicating the neoliberal ideology will all their apical figure put to serve lifetime jail in condition sore enough to discourage anyone trying to follow their examples. For USA and UK gov. the war MUST go on though because they need to silence protests against them by their own people hit by economic crisis and Democracy destruction operated by them. China LIKE the war because for them means having plenty of Russian's natural resources, at a discounted price, and also probably access to high tech military gears, probably enough to counter USA in few years given their industrial power. Putin need a bit the war to silence protests in Russia itself, destroy the oligarch he dislike (and he actually thanks the NATO for sanctions help). So that's the issue: the solution needed by the people is the opposite of the needs of the "élites".
seer 5y ago
I'm currently listing to the recent Hardcore History podcast about slavery and this strikes me as very peculiar human nature. Apparently back in the heyday of the trans Atlantic slave trade, most people understood that it's a bad thing, that treating those people like shit will someday bite them in the ass, with slave revolts and the like. Given the sensibilities of the time - French Revolution, American Revolution etc proclaiming that people should be free etc. everybody understood this was just a matter of time. But then you have all those voices saying - yeah its bad, but "Think of the people! How are they going to raise their children and feed their families without the slaves" ... And it just sounds crazy, I wonder how future generations are going to think about all of our carbon problems. Well I guess I don't, the question is how much we're going to be condemned and called crazy.

by 1ris 5y ago

yourusername 5y ago

I don't think anyone disagrees that moving away from hydrocarbons is a good thing. The contention is that this shock to move away more quickly is good. The lower half of incomes are really hurting. Our government (NL) is doing some quick fixes but it won't nearly compensate everything and according to the planning agencies we are looking at the biggest drop in spending power in over 40 years. That hurts if you were just barely getting by in 2020. E: This is not about gas for our SUVs being 30% more expensive, this is about your heating bill quadrupling since Q1 2021 if you have to do a new contract now.

dtech 5y ago
> I don't think anyone disagrees that moving away from hydrocarbons is a good thing. You'd be surprised. Mostly these arguments come from people who think the whole thing is bullshit (or have financial incentives to say so) and we should take no action at all, or even actively move back to more fossil fuels.
paganel 5y ago
Most of the solar cells are produced in China. China is not a democracy.

saiya-jin 5y ago

Especially in such a situation that status quo is directly financing army of dictator who openly states that all Europe all the way to the Atlantic ocean should be demilitarized, denuked and 'neutral', ie free for grab to anybody, but absolutely definitely maybe not by him. And as we saw in past few weeks he properly walks his talks, so its either acting or being weak and stupid.

hnlmorg 5y ago
It's neither. It's a negotiation tactic. Make an unreasonable demand so that the concessions you actually want are met. In this case it's Ukraine to be demilitarized. All of the aggression on Ukrainian can be traced back to them moving closer to the EU, NATO, and putting western hardware on Ukrainian soil. It a bit like how America would panic if Russia put military hardware in Mexico. Basically Putin is trying to create a neutral zone on it's borders. This doesn't excuse any of Putin's actions though.
- bkor 5y ago
  > All of the aggression on Ukrainian can be traced back to them moving closer to the EU, NATO, and putting western hardware on Ukrainian soil. That's what Russian propaganda keeps saying. But they ignore the huge amounts of gas that was found in the region of Ukraine that was annexed by Russia. Further, Ukraine gave back their nuclear weapons. Meaning, Ukraine already acted to demilitarize. Ukraine moving closer to EU and NATO can be traced back to Ukraine finding huge gas reserves in 2012 and Russia attacking Ukraine in 2014.
  - hnlmorg 5y ago
    > That's what Russian propaganda keeps saying. Not really. Russian propaganda talk about liberating Ukraine because it is ruled by Nazi's. They talk about themselves as the heroes rather than wanting to destroy Ukraine "just" to create a neural zone. The gas might be a motivator too but as you said yourself Ukraine was moving closer to EU and NATO before Russia started any hostilities. Summarizing will always leave some detail out so I'll instead link to a talk that does go in depth into this point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4
    - kkfx 5y ago
      There are few issues there: Russians of course do not act for humanitarian reasons but for interests however they are right saying the NATO create a nazi gov in Ukraine and they are right saying they are not starting a war because the civil war between those nazi militias (like Pravy Sektor, C14, Azov etc) and Russian-speaking Ukrainian (30+% of the total population) was started in 2014 with the infamous Euromaidan massacre and keep going in a slow genocide since them. That's one of the real issues. Others are the fact that so far Russian do not start any war, while NATO have done that, and have done that with lie like the nonexistent Saddam mass-destruction weapons or the lie that the taliban (created by NATO BTW, to counter Soviet Union) host bin laden. Long story short: putin is a dictator BUT his propaganda have plenty fo truth to use against NATO just because the other side (USA and UK in primis, BUT others as well) are equally dictatorships only with much more hypocrisy and less symbols. The famous putin's definition of the west as the empire of lie is unfortunately actually true. The "solution" then depend on who: for us, Citizens, the solution is eradicating the neoliberal ideology will all their apical figure put to serve lifetime jail in condition sore enough to discourage anyone trying to follow their examples. For USA and UK gov. the war MUST go on though because they need to silence protests against them by their own people hit by economic crisis and Democracy destruction operated by them. China LIKE the war because for them means having plenty of Russian's natural resources, at a discounted price, and also probably access to high tech military gears, probably enough to counter USA in few years given their industrial power. Putin need a bit the war to silence protests in Russia itself, destroy the oligarch he dislike (and he actually thanks the NATO for sanctions help). So that's the issue: the solution needed by the people is the opposite of the needs of the "élites".

seer 5y ago

I'm currently listing to the recent Hardcore History podcast about slavery and this strikes me as very peculiar human nature. Apparently back in the heyday of the trans Atlantic slave trade, most people understood that it's a bad thing, that treating those people like shit will someday bite them in the ass, with slave revolts and the like. Given the sensibilities of the time - French Revolution, American Revolution etc proclaiming that people should be free etc. everybody understood this was just a matter of time. But then you have all those voices saying - yeah its bad, but "Think of the people! How are they going to raise their children and feed their families without the slaves" ... And it just sounds crazy, I wonder how future generations are going to think about all of our carbon problems. Well I guess I don't, the question is how much we're going to be condemned and called crazy.