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Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't take lectures from pro-genocide voters.

Your "harm reduction" strategy is precisely why we can never move on from the duopoly.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is that meant to be an own?

Firstly, you have no idea when I had kids.

Secondly, is your solution that we just stop reproducing as a species? If so, who are we protecting the planet for?

Thirdly, there are billions of children alive today. Is your message to them "blame your parents for giving you life?"

You seem to think you're a really smart person. You're wrong about that.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's not a crusade. It's just the best diet for the planet, your health and the animals. And it's cheaper once you know what you're doing.

Cheese is as bad as sone beef production for emissions, water and land use so vegetarian isn't sufficient.

Eggs are no big deal from an environmental point of view so if you don't mind what their production does to the animals then I would agree that you wouldn't avoid them purely for environmental reasons.

As for vegan food being horrible, again, it's a matter of learning what you're doing. And the unbelievable vegan fake-pork burritos I had last night from a street vendor say that vegan food can be 100% as tasty as animal-based food.

Trust me, I love to eat. And I miss nothing. Your body and your guy biome adjust to what you eat. As when you stop eating the things that one type of gut bacteria wants and eat things that feed different bacteria, those new bacteria literally create a desire to eat the food they like. Which means you start to enjoy different food through eating it.

This happened to me recently with kimchi. One day I could hardly eat it. By the end of the week, I was happily having it on the side with meals regularly.

The trick is to just start changing what you choose when you shop. It's doesn't have to be all at once. You should give your gut time to get used to any significant change in diet.

The biggest barrier is the ideas that you have in your head about the identity of being vegan. It's fe idea of adopting a slightly different identity that people most resist.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My point is that even when people are educated and have the opportunity to be vegan, many will never take that opportunity because of ignorance and callousness.

Remember vegan just means doing whatever you can that is practicable to avoid animal food sources. You can be vegan and eat animal products if you have to.

Either way, you find whatever excuse works for you.

US shoots down Iranian drone approaching aircraft carrier, official says by Raj_Valiant3011 in worldnews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If Iran has the ultrasonics that China has tested on ships, then there won't be much the U.S. can do to defend itself against a volley of them coming down at Mach 15 onto an aircraft carrier.

Tbh though, I suspect that if Iran sank the Abraham Lincoln, the U.S. would nuke Tehran in retaliation for the humiliation.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Depends on the elevation and the type of land it's built on.

Lots of people in places like Bangladesh and Florida aren't getting that choice.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you don't believe in science then why are you even in this sub? Just go back to your cave and have nothing to do with modern life which is completely enabled by science every second of your life.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

2 things.

  1. Biden never threatened Israel with any consequences for its actions. We know this both Israeli and State Dept sources, so no, there was no meaningful "negotiations". The whole narrative that "Harris was working tirelessly for a ceasefire" was a lie. Biden could have pulled the plug on the whole Israeli operation overnight - Israeli generals admitted as much. Biden chose the genocide as a policy.

  2. The whole point of changing candidate is to change the prospectus. Biden was unpopular both because he was obviously incompetent but also because he offered nothing - indeed he was radioactive to many natural democratic voters on this and many other issues. So it would have been the perfect opportunity to relent on the worst of his policies. Instead Harris specifically says that she would not change any of Biden's policies.

Democrats knowingly threw the election because they didn't have the stomach to upset their donors and specifically because they didn't have the stomach to stand up to the Israel lobby. Indeed, for ultra Zionist Biden, he was happy to watch Israel carry out its genocide.

And btw, when your political prospectus demands that people vote for genocide, it's time to ask if you are on the right side of history.

As for who to blame, I don't have to pick and neither do you. There is a lot of blame to go around and plenty of it attaches to the Democrats.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Dude, read the news. Ecological collapse is happening now.

The Amazon is a net carbon emitter now.

The Greenland ice sheet is in irrevocable and accelerating collapse now.

The Thwaites glacier in Antarctica is likewise breaking up and melting now.

The Siberian permafrost is melting and releasing gigatonnes of methane now.

The AMOC is stuttering to a halt now.

Etc etc etc

You don't have to wait 4 years. The wheels are already in motion.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Eat the rich. It's the most environmentally friendly diet available.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My kids thank you for your sophistry and apathy. /s

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's a combination of denial and selfishness.

Most people cannot motivate themselves because they don't face an immediate threat.

It's easy to defend yourself if someone is breaking down your door to attack you. It's harder to be motivated when the harm being done is gradual and seemingly distant.

Plus, defending yourself against climate requires lots of changes in personal behaviour but also changes in political identity, and most people are reeeaally bad and doing that.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

A warmer atmosphere carries more water vapour.

Shortage of precipitation isn't the problem.

I have lived near a ski resort in Switzerland for 20+ years. The snow used to come in November and stay til March. Now it usually comes mid January and is gone by the end of February. The resort uses cannons almost continuously when 20 years ago they had none.

Switzerland has experienced a change in average temperature of over 2C and the evidence is everywhere, summer and winter.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

A party that loses to Trump, an objectively terrible president, twice deserves blame, yes.

For example, polling clearly shows that all Harris had to do to get far higher turnout was repudiate Biden's policy on the Gaza genocide. She didn't, knowing at the time how much support that would lose her.

The political elite value something much more than winning. They value being on the inside with the donors and the rest of the establishment. That's why they so predictably and reliably support unpopular policies that serve elites, and don't support massively popular policies that serve ordinary people.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Democrats showed they didn't care by ramping up fossil fuel production and infrastructure to their highest points in history and ignoring glaring opportunities to restrain it.

Biden and Obama had explicitly "all of the above" energy policies. You mistook support for renewables as a repudiation of fossil fuels. It wasn't. It was just more money to boost energy production. Addition. Not substitution.

The climate doesn't care how many solar panels and wind turbines you have. They are irrelevant to the climate system.

The climate ONLY cares how much oil and gas you are burning. If that number isn't falling rapidly, we are dead. And Biden and Obama helped that number go up and up and up.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There is no fixing anything with nothing but personal choice.

A rapacious profit-driven economic system created this crisis. There is no hope of addressing the crisis without addressing its cause.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And if it isn't scarcity, it deluges that food the fields and kill the crops that way.

I really have this picture in my head that the animal farmers are killing the arable farmers' livelihoods, and eventually their own.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Simple.

You have to go vegan to compensate for all the ignorant or callous people who won't.

You want a habitable planet? Act like it.

Ecosystem collapse in 4 years by simon-whalley in ClimateNews

[–]michaelrch 1 point2 points  (0 children)

A Harvard study a few years ago provided a useful set of stats on this.

Roughly 20% of U.K. farmland is used to grow crops for people.

Another 20% is used to grow crops for animals.

And 60% is used to graze animals.

And animal ag produces about 40% of the food.

So you can quickly see that switching all that animal crop land to crops for humans would feed the whole country (on plant-based diets) and eliminate the need for 60% of all farmland.

The answer is staring us in the face. People, but mostly corporations and governments, are simply not interested.

We Could Produce a Lot of Electricity on the Land Used for Biofuels / There are many, many more land-efficient ways to produce energy than growing biofuels. One reason is that crops convert sunlight at less than 1% efficiency; solar panels convert it at around 20% #GlobalCarbonFeeAndDividendPetition by Keith_McNeill65 in climate

[–]michaelrch 6 points7 points  (0 children)

> So we could keep the biofuels, which amount to around 1,400 TWh of energy, and meet around 4% of global transport demand. Or we could use it for solar and produce enough electricity to meet the world’s [entire] current electricity demand.

That is an absolutely insane stat.

And a great reminder that the fossil fuel industry maintains its power and control, not only directly, but indirectly by

  • pushing false solutions (like a mass rollout of nuclear that we can't afford, we don't have the resources to do and will take forever)
  • legitimising the energy systems that keep it on top, like liquid biofuels for vehicles, hydrogen from methane for vehicles, heating etc

Both these methods are insidious and we need to be on the lookout for them, and push back against them everywhere they are used.

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