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What I found irritating is the suggestions to vote, form a new party, or change personal habits. It is surprising to hear someone in 2023 suggesting these thing

What I found irritating is the suggestions to vote, form a new party, or change personal habits. It is surprising to hear someone in 2023 suggesting these things as these are all the things which have failed us for 20+ years. My point was not to advocate terrorism but to highlight the folly of your suggested alternatives. Your intention may have been purely to argue against terrorism but in the process you made other arguments I felt compelled to critique. I was not arguing in favor of terrorism.

hutzlibu 3y ago
" It is surprising to hear someone in 2023 suggesting these things as these are all the things which have failed us for 20+ years" But maybe it is not all because of an evil elite, but also the very common people who don't believe or care about climate change, because it would mean bad consciousness or reduced comfort? And the people who say they care, but still fly around the world for a vacation? A scientific consensus alone is not enough, it needs a general human consensus that something needs to happen. And slowly slowly it is forming in some ways. In other ways things are going backward (russia for example is thinking out loud that climate change is just caused by earths natural radiactivity). But I also fail to see how terrorism can help create such a consensus.
- TaylorAlexander 3y ago
  I am not arguing in favor of terrorism! I am arguing against the idea that voting is enough. Put simply, in between voting and terrorism is activism and legal action (that is, using the legal system and suing organizations and governments as was done recently in Montana). > But maybe it is not all because of an evil elite Our system is elite-driven, and popular attitudes are strongly driven by elite manipulation through the media. > because it would mean bad consciousness or reduced comfort It would not mean this, but we have been led to believe it would mean this by an elite that doesn't want to make these changes due to reduced profits.
  - hutzlibu 3y ago
    "It would not mean this, but we have been led to believe it would mean this by an elite that doesn't want to make these changes due to reduced profits." Flying is bad, right? And not flying reduces comfort. What does this has to do anything with evil elites?
vasco 3y ago
I felt like not adding those examples would make people think I don't believe in climate change, so I wanted to make it clear I do think there's available options for people that want to do it. I don't think it's great for you to be irritated by a suggestion of change through democratic means, that is how our society works. Maybe some of my other suggestions weren't the ones you'd choose, but I was merely making a list of things that can be done to affect change. Believe me you don't want to live in a system where any group can modify everyone else's life in the whole world in less than several decades. That system would be likely to be corrupted very easily. It takes a while to re-align our priorities as a global society. Unlike the voices that say "it isn't working", I think it is in fact working because we have more and more green parties in power and there's more and more awareness and change. If you step back from the doom voices you can see that voting does work. Of course the warming metrics will keep going up as we still have work to do and there will be a lagging effect, but voting isn't the only option, there's other things one can do as I mentioned in my comment and more even like some of the ones you mentioned. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/how-green-party-success-reshaping-global-politics https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/how-green-party-success-res... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261379423000240 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026137942... https://www.eyes-on-europe.eu/greens-in-europe-an-impressive-gain-in-popularity/ https://www.eyes-on-europe.eu/greens-in-europe-an-impressive...
- mandmandam 3y ago
  > democratic means, that is how our society works You keep missing the point that the system has been captured and perverted. Without absorbing that fact, you'll never understand the world you live in. > I think it is in fact working https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- TaylorAlexander 3y ago
  > I don't think it's great for you to be irritated by a suggestion of change through democratic means, that is how our society works There is a LOT to how our system works. It's not just a bunch of people going to their 9-5 for two years, skipping over to the ballot box, and then forgetting about politics for another 24 months. You did not explicitly say that is what we should do and I don't even believe you think that, but when someone says "the solution is to vote for change", to me as someone who believed in voting under Obama and then saw how the change we voted for gave way to the status quo, I learned how limited voting is in affecting real change. It is a component sure, but when the establishment on both sides is in agreement that we should either continue aggressively mining, selling, and burning fossil fuels, or we should continue mining and burning fossil fuels while agreeing to a very slow, scientifically disastrous slow wind down of their use, then obviously voting is not enough. And we have had 20 years to digest and reject the notion that individual changes are where we should focus. I mean sure, I am literally vegan, I believe in some sense of responsibility, but I believe more strongly that activism and agitation for broader social change, which requires MUCH MORE than voting, is necessarily required. That's why in an earlier comment I linked to the lawsuit in Montana. Young people in that state sued the state government for failing to protect the environment for the future as required by the state constitution. That's not voting or starting a new party! When someone says "the solution is to vote" it strikes me as naive. I have been voting for this for 20+ years. It is painfully clear to me that voting is not sufficient. I watched as Obama attended COP21 and failed to make any meaningful commitments. We must do way more than voting.

hutzlibu 3y ago

" It is surprising to hear someone in 2023 suggesting these things as these are all the things which have failed us for 20+ years" But maybe it is not all because of an evil elite, but also the very common people who don't believe or care about climate change, because it would mean bad consciousness or reduced comfort? And the people who say they care, but still fly around the world for a vacation? A scientific consensus alone is not enough, it needs a general human consensus that something needs to happen. And slowly slowly it is forming in some ways. In other ways things are going backward (russia for example is thinking out loud that climate change is just caused by earths natural radiactivity). But I also fail to see how terrorism can help create such a consensus.

TaylorAlexander 3y ago
I am not arguing in favor of terrorism! I am arguing against the idea that voting is enough. Put simply, in between voting and terrorism is activism and legal action (that is, using the legal system and suing organizations and governments as was done recently in Montana). > But maybe it is not all because of an evil elite Our system is elite-driven, and popular attitudes are strongly driven by elite manipulation through the media. > because it would mean bad consciousness or reduced comfort It would not mean this, but we have been led to believe it would mean this by an elite that doesn't want to make these changes due to reduced profits.
- hutzlibu 3y ago
  "It would not mean this, but we have been led to believe it would mean this by an elite that doesn't want to make these changes due to reduced profits." Flying is bad, right? And not flying reduces comfort. What does this has to do anything with evil elites?

vasco 3y ago

I felt like not adding those examples would make people think I don't believe in climate change, so I wanted to make it clear I do think there's available options for people that want to do it. I don't think it's great for you to be irritated by a suggestion of change through democratic means, that is how our society works. Maybe some of my other suggestions weren't the ones you'd choose, but I was merely making a list of things that can be done to affect change. Believe me you don't want to live in a system where any group can modify everyone else's life in the whole world in less than several decades. That system would be likely to be corrupted very easily. It takes a while to re-align our priorities as a global society. Unlike the voices that say "it isn't working", I think it is in fact working because we have more and more green parties in power and there's more and more awareness and change. If you step back from the doom voices you can see that voting does work. Of course the warming metrics will keep going up as we still have work to do and there will be a lagging effect, but voting isn't the only option, there's other things one can do as I mentioned in my comment and more even like some of the ones you mentioned. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/how-green-party-success-reshaping-global-politics https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/how-green-party-success-res... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261379423000240 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026137942... https://www.eyes-on-europe.eu/greens-in-europe-an-impressive-gain-in-popularity/ https://www.eyes-on-europe.eu/greens-in-europe-an-impressive...

mandmandam 3y ago
> democratic means, that is how our society works You keep missing the point that the system has been captured and perverted. Without absorbing that fact, you'll never understand the world you live in. > I think it is in fact working https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
TaylorAlexander 3y ago
> I don't think it's great for you to be irritated by a suggestion of change through democratic means, that is how our society works There is a LOT to how our system works. It's not just a bunch of people going to their 9-5 for two years, skipping over to the ballot box, and then forgetting about politics for another 24 months. You did not explicitly say that is what we should do and I don't even believe you think that, but when someone says "the solution is to vote for change", to me as someone who believed in voting under Obama and then saw how the change we voted for gave way to the status quo, I learned how limited voting is in affecting real change. It is a component sure, but when the establishment on both sides is in agreement that we should either continue aggressively mining, selling, and burning fossil fuels, or we should continue mining and burning fossil fuels while agreeing to a very slow, scientifically disastrous slow wind down of their use, then obviously voting is not enough. And we have had 20 years to digest and reject the notion that individual changes are where we should focus. I mean sure, I am literally vegan, I believe in some sense of responsibility, but I believe more strongly that activism and agitation for broader social change, which requires MUCH MORE than voting, is necessarily required. That's why in an earlier comment I linked to the lawsuit in Montana. Young people in that state sued the state government for failing to protect the environment for the future as required by the state constitution. That's not voting or starting a new party! When someone says "the solution is to vote" it strikes me as naive. I have been voting for this for 20+ years. It is painfully clear to me that voting is not sufficient. I watched as Obama attended COP21 and failed to make any meaningful commitments. We must do way more than voting.