| ▲ | empyrrhicist 4 days ago | |
Your argument basically boils down to "Climate change is the most important thing, so action on any other issue is bad." I don't see you responding anywhere to the general categories of criticisms I raised: 1. Climate change isn't one thing - it's a systemic problem in a system with lots of problems. 2. It seems ludicrous to assume that suddenly people will listen to us about climate change if we ignore other issues, ESPECIALLY because doing so would make us (or at least, me) moral hypocrites. We haven't even discussed direct causal issues, like political corruption. I honestly think no meaningful action is possible in the US on climate change until we have major reforms of our electoral and media systems - where does that put me in your oversimplified schema? 3. You're completely ignoring my argument about immediate needs. This is actually kind of funny: > If your house is on fire, then put it out. But DON'T start a social movement that distracts from climate change. The fire in this metaphor IS a social problem! Putting the fire out IS a social movement!! I think we're going to have to agree to disagree, but either way - here's hoping we can do something meaningful about climate change. Have a good day. | ||
| ▲ | tac19 4 days ago | parent [-] | |
Social action has a price, both in effort, attention, and goodwill; there is no free lunch. If you are blind to the COST of social action you will fail to realize how you are hurting our chances of fighting climate change. If you honestly believe that it is an existential crisis, then you must accept that NOTHING WILL EXIST if we fail to address climate change. So any social gain we make fighting fires will be wiped out anyway if we fail to deal with climate change. That you don't see this, and that you are willing for all these other issues to share the stage with climate change, is a big problem. You want to blame the media, and the right-wing, and perhaps other things for the lack of progress, without fully comprehending your own part. | ||