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>Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. And individual action has switched to just
by WarmWash 1mo ago
>Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative.
And individual action has switched to just holding governments and industry responsible. Which basically amounts to giving up.
"Welp, just gonna buy this truck, enjoy my burgers, set the AC at 68 and fly on all vacations this year because it's nothing compared to Big Oil."
- jkahrs595 1mo agoDon’t forget eating meat, the easiest thing to stop doing (people needs cars and trucks for work, they don’t need cheeseburgers). People can’t be bothered to make any changes, it’s always someone else’s problem. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/27/meat-gas-emissions-reporting https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/27/meat-gas...
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- benfortuna 1mo agoEven cutting back on meat can have an impact. Halving quantities in cooking etc. really is hardly noticeable.
- tyre 1mo agoYeah I think this is a much better path. If you mix chicken with jackfruit 50/50 in tacos, for example, it’s barely noticeable. We’re not going to convince Americans to give up meat, but if we can reduce consumption when they do eat it, we can make incremental change.
- WarmWash 1mo agoYeah, good catch, thanks.
- jezzamon 1mo agoPeople need cars... But not trucks for work :)
- sagarm 1mo agoPeople need cars because we designed our environments to require them. It was a choice, not an inevitability.
- drfloyd51 1mo agoAnd here we are. Needing cars. Unless you want to spend the big money of rebuilding cities.
- chrisnight 1mo agoTo be clear, the money is already being spent, it’s just a question of what we make the priority. Even just keeping the current roads useable costs billions of dollars, let alone the amount of money spent on highway expansion (which, due to induced demand, causes even more traffic). In 30 years, every road that exists currently will have been replaced. The question is if it should be replaced with another road, or should some of them have larger sidewalks, bike lanes, bus lanes. Amsterdam has been doing this for decades and it’s going very well. They spent money that would’ve been spent rebuilding a road on making it a better general transportation option.
- Smoofer 1mo agoUhh a lot of people need trucks for their work
- b40d-48b2-979e 1mo agoYeah? We need millions of personal, individual trucks? For work, of course, ignore all those white collar job parking lots full of extended cab pickups that get 10mpg.
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- guy200 1mo agoEven mildly advocating for veganism as a vegan would be infuriating if it wasn’t so comedic. The mental contortions that even intelligent people will put themselves into in order to either avoid the topic or keep their head in the sand are truly something to behold. And ultimately it often feels like arguing with a past version of yourself, who perhaps held some of the same views.
- hallole 1mo agoI just don't advocate, at least not without prompting; it's too maddening. That I'm vegan often becomes known naturally, and once it's established, people in the know tend to start bringing it up on their own. I hardly ever go into advocacy unprompted. I think this is more effective. Just by being present, you might spark the thoughts that lead someone to changing their mind... :)
- guy200 1mo agoYeah, I have noticed this too. and I’m much the same now, over time my “advocacy” is mostly stating my reasons when asked. And sometimes bringing it up in online spaces. it can be difficult, at least for me, to politely model in the face of what I see as a great injustice. But as you say, it can be maddening to do otherwise and still see no change. So I do understand and support those who participate in a less passive advocacy as that can be effective for a different group. And keeps “our” voice in the mainstream, even if it is often vilified by popular culture.
- dopa42365 1mo agoMore specifically, beef and lamb. https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local https://ourworldindata.org/food-choice-vs-eating-local Replacing those with basically any other meat (pig, chicken, fish) would make a huge difference already. And it's far more realistic than no meat. Indirect demand destruction (from cost increase) through carbon credits or something like that in the future?
- ddalex 1mo agoWhy should I stop eating meat, just so that Taylor Swift can fly everywhere with two jets !? Fuck that, we're on this boat together, and we'll all go to the bottom together.
- jkahrs595 1mo agoWow great thanks for the intelligent reply
- zhann_dc 1mo agoWell, truth be told.. It _is_ nothing compared to Big Oil.
- WarmWash 1mo agoSpoiler: It's individuals who are driving that demand. The impact of the decisions of big oil are nothing compared to the collective decisions of individuals. Big oil isn't going to kick down your door when you buy an EV and switch to solar. There is no rancher in the grocery aisle slipping steaks in your cart.
- collingreen 1mo agoSpoiler, the oil and other energy industries have done a world changing amount of lobbying and regulatory capture in order to drive decisions that cause more and more fossil fuel use. This includes everything from subsidies to industry stagnating regulations to reduced enforcement to suburban sprawl. Look at how the current US administration shills for big coal. Pretending they haven't shaped the world around the consumers is either naive or bad faith. Yes, consumers have to stop funding these companies and behaviors. Also, the governments that operate on behalf of those consumers have to drop their corruption and start protecting those people they represent. Both virtuous and nonvirtuous conservatives know neither of these are going to happen, which is why they see massive terraforming technology as the only way out - if someone with power can't get rich(er) fixing it then it won't get fixed.
- tekla 1mo agoSpoiler, you exist in incredible luxury because YOU benefited from paying for goods and services made extremely cheap from oil. You also have the oil on your hands, and its not washing off easily.
- WarmWash 1mo ago>The impact of the decisions of big oil are nothing compared to the collective decisions of individuals.
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- dreamworld 1mo agoActing politically for what matters is not giving up :) Though, as always, we can and really should do both.
- nkohari 1mo agoGovernments and industry are responsible. Personal consumption/waste is not the primary driver of climate change, no matter how much corporations tell us that using paper straws is the solution. It's tough to expect average people to take major action when corporations are essentially given carte blanche.
- WarmWash 1mo agoAnd who is buying all that stuff from corporations? Who is actually the one consuming? We can quibble about edge effects like "induced demand", but by and large, people just love cheap energy, cheap calories, and can shift the moral burden by playing "not my responsibility" games.
- myaccountonhn 1mo agoFrom the IPCC report, 2/3rds of all global emissions are directly tied to consumption.
- nkohari 1mo agoWell, yeah. Corporations aren't just nefarious evil entities, dumping carbon into the atmosphere for no reason. They're doing it to sell goods. The problem is that a lot of the environmental costs for the manufacture and transport of those goods are externalized and go unpaid. It's difficult to put the blame for that on the consumer, who has no visibility into manufacturing or logistics, and who has vanishingly-small options for not participating. Buying domestic goods is very difficult or impossible, and goods which are manufactured in more environmentally-safe ways are significantly more expensive (because the costs I mentioned earlier weren't externalized). If a consumer is presented with two options, one that costs $X and has unknown environmental costs, and one that costs $2X and is marketed as being environmentally safe, the majority will choose the first. This is especially true as economic forces continue to squeeze average people. Consumers absolutely participate in the problem, but the only process by which it could be corrected is regulation, and the only entity capable of that is the government. (Democracy being what it is, you can however place more blame at the feet of voters.)
- sagarm 1mo agoGovernment is the means by which the electorate acts collectively. Pushing for policy changes is not giving up.
- jmclnx 1mo agoIf the Gov stopped Oil Subsidizes, incentivize the move to renewals and nuclear instead of promoting Oil say 20 years ago, we could keep our A/Cs and 60 degrees (~16C) if we wanted to. The sames goes to flying and beef, make it expensive. So yes, Governments share by far most of the blame for this. A specific individual is not going to change their life stye unless forced to, that is human nature. Instead we have had governments in the US being too afraid to do the right thing. The only possible US President that was willing to make big changes climate wise had his election stolen by the Supreme Court in the year 2000. So here we are still with no politician willing to really force changes on people's life style in the "first world". All they are doing is trying to keep the price of oil low. One final thing, in the US, if you try to use electricity from all renewals, the price is much higher. And in some cases electricity you receive is still generated from fossil fuels.