take a deep breath. I agree with you with boomers which are being completely selfish and have the nerve to patronise us.
However making us in Europe going back to travel by horse, living all in the same family house and sleep with cows to keep warm like the good old days won't solve anything to the global warming issue.
I turned 31 this month, so I can say this: grow the fuck up.
If you willfully ignore science and assume that you alone can maintain your lifestyle through a global crisis, you lose your right to blame boomers for climate change.
This is our moment to show how to be different. If we fuck this up, we own whatever happens next. You selfish god damn child.
We've known about global warming since the 1970s, when you were in your 20s. This situation is due to you, and your generation's inaction over the past 50 years.
I'm happy you can shrug it off as an "I'll be gone by the time this is an issue" problem, but I hope none of your descendants ever see this comment.
If you're of the baby boomer age group and older, it's likely you'll be gone before the worst effects of climate change are in effect, and they know that.
For them, destroying the environment is not destroying yourself. It's prioritizing short term gain at the expense of their children and grandchildren.
It's no coincidence that the majority of politicians and corporate leadership is in this age group, hence the lack of urgency in mitigating climate change.
Real talk: Maybe people over 50-60yo should really not have any saying when it comes to climate change. It's not the generation that will most likely suffer from the stupidity of white, privileged humans over the last couple centuries. Put the generation at power WRT to climate change that will need to grow up in it. We grown-ups fucked it up. Now it's time to step back and fix shit.
Don't you Europeans think that the situation this winter is a rare chance to reverse the global warming trend?
That's not going to happen. In 2021 the global total CO2 emissions were 36.3 billion tonnes. There is nothing at all that an individual can do to make a difference to that number. We can't fix climate change. Unless the overwhelming majority materialistic consumers, energy companies, and manufacturers change massively the planet is fucked.
The only rational course of action now is to find ways to live with it, which is what you're suggesting. Just don't think it'll help fix the root cause of the problem because it won't.
The earth is getting warmer. To try to guilt people about it achieves nothing. The only action humanity can take at this point is to predict the effects of global warming and build infrastructure to slow it down, mitigate it or plan for the mass migrations.
...which started 100 years ago or more. Boomers did nothing about it, sure, but don't blame climate change solely on them. And if you think your generation would have done better with the same lack of general knowledge about the problem (until the last 20-30 years), you're deluding yourself.
My own father, who is in his 60s, has said blatantly to me that he will be dead before the real problems hit, so he would rather not give up his cruises, large cars and international flights - he just doesn’t even care that his grandchildren will suffer, since he personally won’t be around for it. Completely dispicable, but ultimately, asking people to do the right thing out of altruism is never going to work. Democracy will not work either because these people vote.
At least he can admit he’s being selfish I guess. I think most climate deniers, especially the older ones, simply can’t face the idea they might be responsible for terrible things happening, and don’t want to change now, so the brain latches on to any explanation that spares them that psychological pain. Thus arguing facts is pointless with these people because it’s about feelings not actual truth (as many things are with our species). The solution is to hack peoples psyche to make them “feel good” about climate change, somehow…
[Edit] Voting me down gives me so much pleasure, it proves my world view. Thanks to all the downvoters, you've made my day. And don't we all just want to feel validated.
Consumers have all of the control.
Don't eat meat.
Switch to a green energy provider.
Buy small car.
Move to a smaller house.
Buy used clothes.
Use your phone longer.
Consume less!
With all of this there is no climate crisis.
Growing up in Germany, I understand your opinion. No one wants to take personal responsibility. After WW2 no one in Germany was responsible for anything. WW2 just happened. The others did it. I followed orders. This opinion changed when people grew up who were born after WW2 which lead to a cultural revolution. The same will happen with the climate crisis. Children born now will hold current consumers responsible in the future - and they will be angry with their parents and grandparents.
You didn't address my argument at all: that a bunch of regular people will resisit practical measures to stop global warming because those measures are painful and the reality of the long harm from climate change seems inconceivable.
You seem to be viewing this as only propaganda driven.
While we can easily blame our forefathers and their forefathers for global warming, the problem is still ongoing today and people are still stubborn about confronting it. It's not like we've said "oh yeah, we were wrong before and we're totally getting on that".
And personally? I'm a vegetarian who bikes to work. The smug emissions around my house are lethal.
Wow that's really noble of you, have you considered logging off permanently and living in a tent in the woods? You realize none of the world's problems ever get solved if you bury your head in the sand and ignore things right? I mean we could all go back and start living in caves again, that would certainly solve the climate crisis wouldn't it?
Downvote as much as you want, it's going to start a 65-70 year period of cooling down, and there's not much you little humans can do about it despite your blatant lack of humility, you'll then be able to claim that you saved the world (with Macron of course) because you planted some trees.
AND plants were dying for CO2 and the excess generated by humans is actually great for their development, earth is getting greener every year as satellite data shows.
They should be (anxious) and they're right (governments have failed them).
Unfortunately, we've spent the last few decades ignoring the science and telling people they are the ones that can fix this, by recycling or taking less car journeys or eating less meat.
And all of those things do help, but it's akin to fighting WW2 by asking everyone to write a strongly worded letter to Hitler.
Climate change is a massive global problem that cannot be solved by individual countries, let alone individual humans. And yet the leading countries (and to be fair, pretty much every other country) have done nothing meaningful about it.
I don't understand at all. Because you (in my opinion, erroneously) believe that you need to work some X% harder than the last generation to accomplish the same thing you're just not going to try?
What about pretty much every generation prior to the last, who had to toil in hard labor most days, who often didn't have indoor plumbing, who often didn't even have electricity, who went off to war, did they have any easier time being "successful" than you? Did they just give up and not try? Do you honestly believe you're worse off in 2024 than they were? That you're working harder than they were?
I'm not even going to touch the climate dread stuff as climate change is a topic that can not be impartially discussed anymore.
So, in my mind, your objections are irrelevant. There are plenty of Americans -- the so-called 99% that rich assholes would like to treat like sheeple and give Basic Income -- whose lives are in the toilet. I in no way need to convince them they are saving the world. I just need to get solutions into their hands that make their lives work better. The solutions that work are lightweight and low cost. If you can arrange your life so that you do not need a car, your quality of life can go up dramatically even if you are some "loser" failing at having a spiffy well-paid career. And then you are doing less harm to the environment even though saving the environment was not on your agenda.
I am a big believer in enlightened self interest. Our current system does not work for most people. We have a shrinking/shrunken middle class and most people's lives are just not working, even if they are doing everything the system tells them is the right thing to do.
The gig economy is growing and Millenials are insisting more on walkable neighborhoods and many of them live without a car. To the best of my ability, I try to encourage people who are failing to get a job to stop looking for a job and embrace the gig economy.
This is not a movement I need to start. It is already happening because no car and flexible work just works better for some people. But I can toss in my two cents worth and hopefully make the transition process a little easier for some folks, basically.
It's gonna take a lot of older folk. Being "green" is trendy but it's not really like younger generations are sewing their own clothes out of recycled materials. The only thing that will stop climate change is lucky geoengineering breakthroughs, no generation is willing to give anything up for it. I'm in my 20s,its easy to yell at boomers but I look at my friends throwing working phones away every year for a new one and know we wouldn't have done any better.
However making us in Europe going back to travel by horse, living all in the same family house and sleep with cows to keep warm like the good old days won't solve anything to the global warming issue.
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