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It changes the cost-benefit analysis away from buying an SUV. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/07/stereotype-of-chelsea-tractor-reflects-realit

It changes the cost-benefit analysis away from buying an SUV. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/07/stereotype-of-chelsea-tractor-reflects-reality-of-urban-suv-sales-says-report https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/07/stereoty... say 10% of the new cars in Chelsea are Land Rover SUVs and "Three-quarters of the 360,000 SUVs sold in 2019 in the UK were bought by people living in towns and cities" If all six thousand SUV owners paid their several thousand pounds and kept their SUVs, while 5% of potential new SUV owners switched to another petrol car ("2019 average emissions of petrol SUVs were 134g/km compared to 121g/km of other petrol cars") then the overall carbon consumption decreases. > At least here in the US, you have to not give a shit about having a nice car in the city I think it's fair to say the owner of a Land Rover SUVs who stereo-typically uses it "for the school run", gives a shit about having a nice car. You'll need to get the side swipes/mirror fixed by the next MOT test.

giantg2 4y ago
"It changes the cost-benefit analysis away from buying an SUV." How? Aren't people forced to pay restitution? Isn't there insurance? "I think it's fair to say the owner of a Land Rover SUVs who stereo-typically uses it "for the school run", gives a shit about having a nice car." So it sounds like they won't be deterred if the argument is that they want what they want.
- eesmith 4y ago
  > How? Aren't people forced to pay restitution? Isn't there insurance? My views of this topic are shallow. I've seen the Philosophy Tube video I linked to, and read a few related essays. If you really want the "how", I'm the wrong person to ask for details. The video references Malm's "How to Blow Up a Pipeline: Learning to Fight in a World on Fire" - perhaps look there instead. My shallow views on this specific example of keying SUVs are: 1) not everyone will be caught, 2) what happens if the activist doesn't have the money to pay full restitution?, 3) insurance goes up if this becomes a wide-spread practice, 4) the SUV will be in the shop to get fixed, adding some nuisance overhead, and 5) the the bubble the SUV owners live in will get smaller. A DDG search for anti-fur protests, which included throwing red paint onto fur clothing, gluing locks shut, and more, found https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1989/03/11/animal-rights-groups-harass-fur-wearers/13d66093-53f6-4a4a-a988-1c8d928180d1/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1989/03/11/a... with a related argument: "giving selfish people a selfish reason to stop wearing fur coats, even if they don't give a damn about the animal". So, this might all be summarized as "giving selfish people a selfish reason to stop driving SUVs, even if they don't give a damn about CO2 emissions." > So it sounds like they won't be deterred if the argument is that they want what they want. What they want is a nice car. There are other nice cars besides Land Rover SUVs. Including ones with lower CO2 emissions.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    I assume many of those cars don't have as much seating or as much room (if you're tall). I kind of doubt the red paint thing made much if an impact- it wasn't that common. In the end, condoning illegal acts of violence is likely to escalte. For example, those frustrated people who are assaulted with paint or have their car keyed are likely to beat the shit out of the person if they catch them, maybe even kill them. Extreme tactics beget extreme opposition.
    - eesmith 4y ago
      > I assume many of those cars I earlier estimated that a 5% shift more than makes up for the additional CO2 emissions caused by replacing the damage. Are you arguing that >95% of the population who bought an SUV did so because of seating or room or other essential feature that isn't possible in another car? If not, then my hand-waving response to your earlier objection at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32217386 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32217386 stands. > I kind of doubt the red paint thing made much if an impact- it wasn't that common. Things don't need to be common to have an impact. Look at the widespread worries about "stranger danger" when abductions of children by strangers is extremely uncommon. And the Grey Lady appears to disagree with you: "For years, we’ve watched videos of screaming animals and seen red paint splatter fur coats. With these in-your-face and highly visual tactics, the activists helped win the culture war over fur." - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/31/style/peta-fashion.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/31/style/peta-fashion.html But really, I think you're missing my point. I pointed to a half-dozen or more political movements with a militant component. (I'll add unionization, and anti-unionization, to the list. And Irish independence.). These are people who deliberately broke the law to advance their cause. The use of militant activism does not negate the validity of the political goals of the movement. There's wide agreement that women suffrage is correct, even though the suffragettes carried out illegal acts of violence - and expected extreme opposition. My point is to highlight these questions: 1) where is the equivalent militant arm among climate activists? 2) why are their actions so mild compared to the other movements I pointed out? 3) is there a point where militant activism (King's "a riot is the language of the unheard") would justified? 4) your observations (eg, "Extreme tactics beget extreme opposition") also apply to other militants - why didn't it didn't stop the suffragettes or others? Now that I think about your phrase, ExxonMobil deliberately used extreme tactics to promote fossil fuel use even though their scientists knew about global warming back in the 1970s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExxonMobil_climate_change_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExxonMobil_climate_change_cont... . If "Extreme tactics beget extreme opposition" then where is the extreme opposition to ExxonMobil? (Or do you want to argue that a multi-decade multi-national conspiracy to delay acceptance and action on global warming is not an extreme tactic?)

giantg2 4y ago

"It changes the cost-benefit analysis away from buying an SUV." How? Aren't people forced to pay restitution? Isn't there insurance? "I think it's fair to say the owner of a Land Rover SUVs who stereo-typically uses it "for the school run", gives a shit about having a nice car." So it sounds like they won't be deterred if the argument is that they want what they want.

eesmith 4y ago
> How? Aren't people forced to pay restitution? Isn't there insurance? My views of this topic are shallow. I've seen the Philosophy Tube video I linked to, and read a few related essays. If you really want the "how", I'm the wrong person to ask for details. The video references Malm's "How to Blow Up a Pipeline: Learning to Fight in a World on Fire" - perhaps look there instead. My shallow views on this specific example of keying SUVs are: 1) not everyone will be caught, 2) what happens if the activist doesn't have the money to pay full restitution?, 3) insurance goes up if this becomes a wide-spread practice, 4) the SUV will be in the shop to get fixed, adding some nuisance overhead, and 5) the the bubble the SUV owners live in will get smaller. A DDG search for anti-fur protests, which included throwing red paint onto fur clothing, gluing locks shut, and more, found https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1989/03/11/animal-rights-groups-harass-fur-wearers/13d66093-53f6-4a4a-a988-1c8d928180d1/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1989/03/11/a... with a related argument: "giving selfish people a selfish reason to stop wearing fur coats, even if they don't give a damn about the animal". So, this might all be summarized as "giving selfish people a selfish reason to stop driving SUVs, even if they don't give a damn about CO2 emissions." > So it sounds like they won't be deterred if the argument is that they want what they want. What they want is a nice car. There are other nice cars besides Land Rover SUVs. Including ones with lower CO2 emissions.
- giantg2 4y ago
  I assume many of those cars don't have as much seating or as much room (if you're tall). I kind of doubt the red paint thing made much if an impact- it wasn't that common. In the end, condoning illegal acts of violence is likely to escalte. For example, those frustrated people who are assaulted with paint or have their car keyed are likely to beat the shit out of the person if they catch them, maybe even kill them. Extreme tactics beget extreme opposition.
  - eesmith 4y ago
    > I assume many of those cars I earlier estimated that a 5% shift more than makes up for the additional CO2 emissions caused by replacing the damage. Are you arguing that >95% of the population who bought an SUV did so because of seating or room or other essential feature that isn't possible in another car? If not, then my hand-waving response to your earlier objection at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32217386 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32217386 stands. > I kind of doubt the red paint thing made much if an impact- it wasn't that common. Things don't need to be common to have an impact. Look at the widespread worries about "stranger danger" when abductions of children by strangers is extremely uncommon. And the Grey Lady appears to disagree with you: "For years, we’ve watched videos of screaming animals and seen red paint splatter fur coats. With these in-your-face and highly visual tactics, the activists helped win the culture war over fur." - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/31/style/peta-fashion.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/31/style/peta-fashion.html But really, I think you're missing my point. I pointed to a half-dozen or more political movements with a militant component. (I'll add unionization, and anti-unionization, to the list. And Irish independence.). These are people who deliberately broke the law to advance their cause. The use of militant activism does not negate the validity of the political goals of the movement. There's wide agreement that women suffrage is correct, even though the suffragettes carried out illegal acts of violence - and expected extreme opposition. My point is to highlight these questions: 1) where is the equivalent militant arm among climate activists? 2) why are their actions so mild compared to the other movements I pointed out? 3) is there a point where militant activism (King's "a riot is the language of the unheard") would justified? 4) your observations (eg, "Extreme tactics beget extreme opposition") also apply to other militants - why didn't it didn't stop the suffragettes or others? Now that I think about your phrase, ExxonMobil deliberately used extreme tactics to promote fossil fuel use even though their scientists knew about global warming back in the 1970s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExxonMobil_climate_change_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExxonMobil_climate_change_cont... . If "Extreme tactics beget extreme opposition" then where is the extreme opposition to ExxonMobil? (Or do you want to argue that a multi-decade multi-national conspiracy to delay acceptance and action on global warming is not an extreme tactic?)