201–210 of 901 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What do you think Norway’s primary export is, speaking of blaming the right people?
They are at fault for being suppliers? If they don't supply oil someone else will. Like blaming prostitutes instead of johns
I would also suggest it’s more akin to blaming drug users instead of drug dealers, but whatever metaphor floats your boat.
Like almost every other goddamn problem we face, the solution is boring as hell: campaign finance reform. If politicians actually represented their constituents, they would be able to effect the policy changes required. But they don’t, because campaign finance is broken, allowing the richest, most blood-sucking elements of society to have the biggest influence. If you have the opportunity to vote for someone who beli…
> represented their constituents How would they know what the views of their constituents are? They'd require either require exhaustive, expensive but representative polling on every topic or wait in call back mode - the constituents with the most to lose or gain will call back and help them form an opinions. The first is impossible and actually goes against the notion of representative democracy and conscious indiff…
The number of representatives in the US House needs to be expanded. The proportion of citizens to representatives is way out of whack. Having more representatives with smaller districts would allow representatives to better know and support their district’s interests and views.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It also suggests that up to >20 billion mammals are killed by those cats each year. Quick Google search says that there are fewer than 60 million domestic pet cats in the US, and about the same number of feral cats. So on average domestic cats kill up to >150 mammals a day? And since not all of them are allowed outdoors, those supposed killer outdoor cats would practically kill an animal every few seconds. Looking at…
You said it yourself - domestic vs unowned. People aren’t counting unowned cats en masse, and domestication is the root cause of those feral cats. Also, their range is lower bound 3* your numbers, so there’s no need to cherry pick the highest end of all ranges here. Whether they’re right or not, it’s plausible and probable that cats are a problem. Biggest problem? Who knows
It's not plausible to me that cats kill 10-30 other animals per day if they go outside.
When Alfred Hitchcock filmed "The Birds" in Texas, his production company brought in grackles. These are the black birds in that movie. They promised to clean them up afterwards, but grackles are birds and can get away. Grackles are an invasive species in Texas, and have almost exterminated our native bird population. I blame Hollywood, not warming for bird extinctions.
as far as i can tell, every part of this comment is fabricated. grackles are not invasive in texas, nor have they driven other birds to near-extinction, neither were they brought in by hitchcock, neither was the film produced in texas. where did you get this idea?
Hollywood studios have a lot of power to change the "facts" that are on the Internet, and to shove truth down the Memory Hole.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is none of your solutions are viable either. Even if they were executed the results are usually negligible. In fact most of your solutions end up making us feel better about ourselves. But this is all illusion. For these huge environmental problems humanity is facing, I'm sorry to say the only way it to do huge drastic unrealistic changes that will never occur because humanity doesn't have the will power…
I know you think you're being a pragmatist and a realist, but 'tis you who are suffering the illusion. Localism has incredible antifragile second- and third-order effects in the face of wider catastrophe.
One thing I dislike the most about these problems – and the information/media/activism around them – is the "solutioning". Yes, we should recycle and reduce carbon emissions and learn to live in a more integrated fashion with earth. But the problem is so diffuse and requires substantive work against powerful forces (government, business, apathy). What I'd like to see more of, when presented with these sorts of proble…
What would be the bottom-up way to handle, say, the acid rain crisis, which was caused by excessive sulfur dioxide emissions and was resolved by top-down legislation.
Or alternately, what would be the bottom-up solution to World War 2?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> At least with government, you just need to win once and inertia means that it likely sticks. This isn't remotely true. Regulatory bodies are chronically underfunded and undermined in north America because they're villainized by corporate donors and the politicians they pay for.
That means they take a long time to write a rule. Same with a legislature. But once written, how often do they go away?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. Regular individuals: vote for city, county, state, and federal candidates who acknowledge the scope of the problem and want to solve it. Vote against people who deny the crisis’s existence.
I think people have been doing this since the 60s and it hasn't had much of an effect, which is my point. If the political solution is ineffective, pivot.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Individuals cannot solve this. I leave trees up, dead or alive. I plant native plants. I remove invasive species. I only keep invasive bushes if they house birds. I don't spray for insects except around the base of my house, I don't kill off chipmunks, voles, squirrels, rabbits, etc. How can this compete with the dozens of neighbors in a half-mile radius that have removed in excess of hundreds of trees, big ones like…
In some areas humans actually increase the biodiversity. My area is mostly desert most of the time. We get our water from the California aqueduct. On my property I have squirrels, rabbits, and chipmunks. I've seen red tailed Hawks and Owls. Cats can't be outdoor here. I've already seen a cat's head discarded on my property. I have so many types of birds here all the time. The open space here has a ton of animals and…