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To me, this is the epitome, the Magnum opus of propaganda. Corporations convinced the public to vote against green energy, and the public does! Democracy woul
by Shorel 4y ago
To me, this is the epitome, the Magnum opus of propaganda.
Corporations convinced the public to vote against green energy, and the public does!
Democracy would be much better if our brains were equipped against such practices.
- woodruffw 4y agoSee also: the invention of “jaywalking” to criminalize pedestrians and elevate car traffic over foot traffic[1], and the successful effort to dismantle the US’s streetcar systems[2]. [1]: https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history [2]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_con...
- jimmaswell 4y agoJaywalking is an example of this power being used for good. Traffic flow is more important than being able to cross anywhere you want when we have crosswalks.
- eropple 4y agoNah. Cars can slow down and cars can wait. And, preferably, be removed from populous areas during human-active hours (modulo assistive vehicles). Massachusetts has a thunderous $1 fine for your first, second, and third jaywalking offense ($2 for those subsequent), and the world has not ended.
- jimmaswell 4y agoIn Tokyo it's uncommon to jaywalk and it's still considered the #4 most pedestrian friendly city. It's more efficient and safe for everyone this way.
- woodruffw 4y agoJaywalking has been exported to the rest of the world, but Tokyo is not a great example: they’ve successfully applied just about every urban design technique that allows cars and other traffic to coexist, to the uniform detriment of cars.[1] In other words: the restrictions that Tokyo places on urban car traffic would make the average American driver scream bloody murder. [1]: https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/10/1/lessons-from-the-streets-of-tokyo https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/10/1/lessons-from-t...
- fooker 4y ago> Cars can slow down and cars can wait. How about emergency response vehicles of any kind?
- eropple 4y agoFire and rescue? Turn on a siren and people will move. This works in other places. It can work here. You're right that police in many areas can't be trusted with that responsibility, though, and maybe we'll have to think about how to deal with that.
- woodruffw 4y agoNobody thinks that traffic flow isn’t important. What’s striking is the prioritization of one form of traffic over another, largely at the expensive of neighborhoods and the people who live in them.
- ahipple 4y agoOne could just as easily say that "[foot] traffic flow is more important than being able to [drive] anywhere you want", and in some locales that attitude may serve to benefit more people than the inverse. It's not a given that cars must be the default mode of transportation, but the idea that this _is_ a given is ingrained in the public conversation about infrastructure due to precisely the sort of propaganda the original commenter in this thread was talking about.
- thebradbain 4y agoIn what context? In New York and many other pedestrian-oriented cities around the world, more people get around via walking than driving for intra-city trips — the cars are the ones blocking traffic flow there. Nevertheless, I’m of the persuasion that people who live in a neighborhood/city/region should be prioritized more for quality of life purposes than those merely passing through on a commute. Thus I would argue a pedestrian-hostile six lane road has no purpose going through a residential area, and in the same way I think there’s as many places where pedestrians should be prioritized highly above cars, such as neighborhoods, school zones, and dense commercial corridors. It’s all contextual.
- jimmaswell 4y agoThere's a crosswalk at every intersection in New York. It would be unecessary and inefficient for the streets to be constantly crowded by pedestrians. The pedestrian's trip would be marginally faster while traffic would be backed up considerably.
- woodruffw 4y agoThis is the sort of language we’re talking about: pedestrians aren’t (and rightfully wouldn’t be) “crowding” anyone. Pedestrians have been crowded onto sidewalks, to the advantage of a relatively small (and substantially less dense) class of drivers. Driving in NYC should be a matter of necessity, not pure expedience. If and when our policies match that fact, those drivers that need to drive will find that they’re stuck in less traffic as a result.
- eropple 4y ago"Traffic" has no inherent right to not be backed up. If you are able to walk and you aren't carrying cargo, you should be walking. (EDIT: cyclists who can cycle at pedestrian-safe speeds are welcome, too!) The overwhelming majority of a city's residents fit into this category and the ridiculous amount of square footage allocated to car-asphalt is in defiance of this. And every able-bodied person who drives into the city for an office job should be dissuaded by geometrically increasing parking costs for increasing that unnecessary traffic load. I live in on the edge of the suburbs and my car's gotten sixteen thousand miles on it in the last five years. Almost all of which is going to Home Depot and back or visiting people significantly outside of the city.
- carapace 4y agoFWIW, check out "A Trip Down Market Street", filmed in 1906 in SF just before the earthquake. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oubsaFBUcTc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oubsaFBUcTc Upscaled and colorized: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO_1AdYRGW8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO_1AdYRGW8 You can see pedestrians, horse-drawn carriages, and early automobiles all "flowing" together.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- avgcorrection 4y agoYou call a system a democracy where corporations can spend tens of billions on propaganda. And conclude that our brains are the problem.
- patrickthebold 4y agoOf course people's brains are the problem. Who do you think is deciding things?
- avgcorrection 4y agoGoing by the amount of money spent: the corporations, obviously.
- actually_a_dog 4y agoCorporations don't just run themselves.
- avgcorrection 4y agoCorporations are run as command economies by a small handful of people. Corporations indirectly run society. Hence a small number of people run society. Which means that democracies are not run by the people. Hence democracy in name only.
- hyperhopper 4y agoGiven the incentive structures of society, they pretty much do. Employee tries to go against the flow? Management replaces them Management tries to go against the flow? Ceo replaces them. Ceo tries to go against the flow? Board replaces them. Board member tries to go against the flow? They are outvoted or stock price crumbles.
- warning26 4y agoSure, so how do you stop that? As long as it’s possible for individuals to decide things via voting, there will be an incentive to convince those individuals to vote in particular ways.
- labster 4y agoI have seen it in action, though. PG&E bought enough propaganda to convince Yolo County not to switch to a public utility. They convinced everyone to take a worse deal that would cost more money, by repeating the lie so many times that the other side cost more. Most human brains are not equipped to make rational decisions, but simply make social decisions based on perception of group opinion.
- roamerz 4y agoCorporations? That hardly the case. People make up their own minds about green energy and make decisions about about voting themselves. People are seeing the affects right now of what happens when they vote for politicians that are doing their best to shut down oil - $6 a gallon gas.