this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2025
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I could devote all my time to recycling, reducing carbon emissions, not driving, voting, not eating red meat, including forcing everyone i know to do the same - and the net result would be an iota of a drop in the ocean of change. i.e. nothing.
As others have said, until there is a global shift on how the world operates and the major oil companies, cruise lines, and airlines all shut down, nothing you or i can do will matter.
Edit: folks still don't get it. It's not a matter of apathy, it's pragmatism. You will never, ever convince enough people to make a significant change relative to the big consumers. You will be dealing with the people who literally pollute and consume out of spite, and/or principle, or ignorance. For every thing you do, someone's doing the opposite. We failed the planet a long time ago though lack of education and giving too many greedy people power. The world is too large and the snowball is over the hill.
The amount of fuel used by the cruise industry in about 1 minute, on average, is more fuel than you or I or any normal person would consume in their entire lifetime, by a lot. That's on the low end. They consume 500,000 to 1.5 mil gallons an hour. The average person uses maybe 20 to 50k gallons their entire lives. You'd have to convince millions and millions of people to stop driving completely for 40 years to offset that. Tens of millions probably.
Not gonna happen. That's just one industry.
Everyone's not gonna just stop flying. Or stop driving. Or stop eating meat. It's idealistic and impossible and frankly imaginary, no matter how much it may be necessary.
Why waste your time and energy doing things that will do nothing? Focus your efforts elsewhere. Policy change probably has the best chance of helping. But then I point back to the people actively and purposely thwarting any attempts at curbing consumption, and these people are billionaires etc. And at least in the USA, running the country.
Airlines, cruise lined oil companies are not immutable forces of nature. They have grown to their current size to meet the demand of individuals like you and me who want to buy shit and go places.
If everyone stopped flying, passenger airlines would be out of business and no longer flying planes within a year or two. Same with cruise companies. Oil is used in more things but if everyone switched to EVs or stopped driving oil production would go way down- even more if we cut our plastic usage as well.
Don't fall into the trap of thinking consumers are powerless. In a free market economy they are very powerful- that's why boycotts can be so effective.
Could you name a few successful boycotts? I did a quick search and recent examples don't seem that successful to me. Amazon is still doing amazingly well and NestlΓ© is still killing people.
Sure, let me google that for you.
https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/ethicalcampaigns/boycotts/history-successful-boycotts
In general boycotts are less about driving a company to bankruptcy and more about getting them to change their behavior. Some companies are surprisingly immune to boycotts but many others have walked back their problematic behavior. Notably in recent memory in the US I can think of Barilla, Chick-fil-a and (by conservatives) Budweiser. The Montgomery bus line boycott is the stuff of history.
A quarter of emissions is nothing? Yeah the overwhelming majority is attributable to major oil companies, but you're just being lazy and fatalistic. But sure, just sit there and wait for a paradigm shift to come save you from yourself I guess. Literally the first two search results I found:
https://www.dw.com/en/fact-check-is-eating-meat-bad-for-the-environment/a-63595148 https://www.c2es.org/content/regulating-transportation-sector-carbon-emissions/
from your article:
Right but you have to begin somewhere, and being a good example for others certainly helps as well.
I try to change my life such that it doesn't impact me much while having fairly large effect. For instance I'm basically vegan (still eat meat occasionally, e.g. when it's otherwise thrown away), I even don't want to eat meat anymore, the taste just got worse for me over time.
It also has effects on the market, e.g. Meat replacement products are quite affordable and popular.
I didn't fly for years either (nor I do possess a car), so yeah agree, or at least reduce this as much as possible.
But nutrition also has quite an impact, especially when we must consider that highly carbon rich forests still get destructed for (inefficient) food. The high amount of meat consumption in rich countries is unhealthy as well.
I'm just laughing cause you still don't get it. Nothing you do will matter. Yes, that's depressing, and it's also true. The numbers don't check out. You can wave it away all you want, nothing you do will matter. Sorry. And yes that should make you angry. But that is what I mean by pragmatism. It's a waste of time and energy to be angry. To believe you can do something about it. Instead, focus on being happy and making life better for others in ways we can, in the time we have.
Nope, you still don't get it, lol.
We lost.
The number of assumptions you make about my "principles" are ridiculous. You are reading way too far into the like 100 words I wrote. You sound super pissed and projecting a lot onto me.
All that garble to tell me no, you still don't get it.
Yeah, cruise lines opening back up and returning to business as usual after COVID, basically made me stop paying attention to a lot of this individual-targeted climate change stuff. That was a perfect and fairly natural way to end that high pollution luxury oriented industry, but everyone basically said "boomers still like cruising, so fuck the planet".
If boomers and rich people can continue to pollute at incredible rates, just give me my stupid plastic straw back. At least that way I can drink a full mlikshake before my straw turns into paper mache, while I watch the world burn.
You do you. For my part, honestly, even going over board on recycling is off the table. I'll separate bottles and stuff, but spending excessive time doing stuff like collecting grease to put in compost bins feels pointless and meaningless -- why would I put myself out, spend a buncha time doing that kinda stuff, while rich people are buying up Venice to have a Private Jet orgy, and a ton of media hypes it up as though it's awesome / they have no fall out from it? I have more respect for my own mental health than to internalise the guilt of it all, when every rich person out there is happily burning everything to the ground, and the majority of the poors are cheering them on for doing it.
Like I said in another post, even "Climate leaders" like David Suzuki owns like 4-5 houses, and jets between them for shits and giggles. It's all a joke, you may as well not punish yourself over it if you can't be fucked to do some of the small shit.
Because I have zero motivation to do so at this point.
Yes, kids would potentially be a motivator. We can see how well they motivate those tech ceos to focus on climate change issues, with their tech fascist eugenics-like breeding programs producing numerous spawn. That telegram dude with like 100 kids must be the most Eco-conscious guy on the planet.
Least I'm not stupid enough to think that I'd motivate someone on the internet by insulting them. So I must have at least one wrinkle in there somewhere ;p
Political leaders / rich people are goose-stepping around in public, rich people are having private jet fuck parties in Venice as they burn the ecosystem to the ground, "climate leaders" like Suzuki are living high-polluting lifestyles, "climate celebs" like DiCaprio are equally depraved and two-faced, "popular" celebs like the Kardashians and Taylor are well known for taking incredibly wasteful luxury private jet trips. They all likely generate more pollution in a week than I will in my entire lifetime, and the public praises these sorts from all sides of the spectrum.
I vote green (in Canada), doesn't matter. I end up with an NDP government provincially (left leaning party), doesn't matter. No political party is willing to take drastic steps on this front. Even these nation building projects Carney's on about here in Canada, are just him suppressing Canadians' rights so that US companies can exfiltrate resources like Oil - and he was the more 'progressive' pick compared to the other potential leading party.
Like I said, I ain't gonna be ashamed of bein lazy in my recycling. My personal climate footprint is tinier than most, and far smaller than those people. Even if I get that plastic straw it's still nothing compared to any of them.
people need to get over the idea of not earting farmed bugs, its more efficient and eco-friendly.
Unless there's an oil exec that lives nearby.