Here’s a fun fact: if you’re one of those people who thinks killing people is the correct solution to the climate crisis, you should know that you only have to kill one American to get the same reduction in pollution as killing ten congonese people. Please use this information however you like.
Here is another fun fact, killing people is one of the favorite deliberate mischaracterizations of the degrowth movement that advocates for a lower population through fewer births. Not murder. We don’t even have to force it. It’s hapening already if you look at birth rates.
Personally, My interpretation of degrowth is more bicycles and less plastic crap. I don’t think legislating birth rates will ever be an efficient strategy.
No one said legislating neccessarily. We’re doing it now anyways. Most people have the sense that the future won’t be kind to their kids and choose to jave fewer/none.
No. I’m saying we don’t need to be heavy handed with reproductive rights because people are making the right choices here. Some policy encouragement would be helpful, but people can be free to choose for themselves.
We need a lot of policy work on lowering average consumption. Income inequality/poverty, planned obsalescence, right to repair, fossil fuels, food production, building codes and municipal design standards, public transit and electrification, habitat restoration, chemical and pollution regulation etc, all still need a lot of work.
Getting to true sustainability is increadibly difficult, let alone for the 8-10 billion people on earth. But, if you build a sustainable civilization for 2-4 billion people, it is much easier to achieve, and ypu can return a lot of land back to wilderness to allow the rest of earth’s species to flourish. Its an essential component.
Ecologists talk about it in terms of I=PAT. Impact = people x affluence x technology. If you cut the number of people, everything becomes easier.
That’s why I’m skeptical of degrowth actually doing something to effectively reduce consumption. Because some individuals consume 3, maybe 4 orders of magnitude more resources (and the accompanying pollution or ecological destruction, however you want to measure it), I’ve always believed that reducing population runs a significant risk that the remaining smaller population will use far more resources than the previous larger population.
You see it in rich countries. We have low birth rates and high consumption rates, and our consumption grows exponentially even as our population does not. We run a serious risk of being very destructive childless retirees, and consumption and pollution and emissions and ecological impact need to still be worked on, even if we do shrink the population.
If we start with those that consume the most and pollute the most then we might not need half, right? So that means we start with the wealthiest, yes?
I guess so yes yes
Sure. Just don’t eat them.
That’s junk food, and eating junk food is bad. Instead, compost and eat the veggies
Here’s a fun fact: if you’re one of those people who thinks killing people is the correct solution to the climate crisis, you should know that you only have to kill one American to get the same reduction in pollution as killing ten congonese people. Please use this information however you like.
Here is another fun fact, killing people is one of the favorite deliberate mischaracterizations of the degrowth movement that advocates for a lower population through fewer births. Not murder. We don’t even have to force it. It’s hapening already if you look at birth rates.
Personally, My interpretation of degrowth is more bicycles and less plastic crap. I don’t think legislating birth rates will ever be an efficient strategy.
China would agree.
It’s both fewer people and less consumption.
No one said legislating neccessarily. We’re doing it now anyways. Most people have the sense that the future won’t be kind to their kids and choose to jave fewer/none.
So you’re saying the degrowth movement doesn’t need to do anything because people are having less kids anyway?
No. I’m saying we don’t need to be heavy handed with reproductive rights because people are making the right choices here. Some policy encouragement would be helpful, but people can be free to choose for themselves.
We need a lot of policy work on lowering average consumption. Income inequality/poverty, planned obsalescence, right to repair, fossil fuels, food production, building codes and municipal design standards, public transit and electrification, habitat restoration, chemical and pollution regulation etc, all still need a lot of work.
Yeah. All of that is ten times as worth the effort as worrying about birth rates.
Getting to true sustainability is increadibly difficult, let alone for the 8-10 billion people on earth. But, if you build a sustainable civilization for 2-4 billion people, it is much easier to achieve, and ypu can return a lot of land back to wilderness to allow the rest of earth’s species to flourish. Its an essential component.
Ecologists talk about it in terms of I=PAT. Impact = people x affluence x technology. If you cut the number of people, everything becomes easier.
That’s why I’m skeptical of degrowth actually doing something to effectively reduce consumption. Because some individuals consume 3, maybe 4 orders of magnitude more resources (and the accompanying pollution or ecological destruction, however you want to measure it), I’ve always believed that reducing population runs a significant risk that the remaining smaller population will use far more resources than the previous larger population.
You see it in rich countries. We have low birth rates and high consumption rates, and our consumption grows exponentially even as our population does not. We run a serious risk of being very destructive childless retirees, and consumption and pollution and emissions and ecological impact need to still be worked on, even if we do shrink the population.
Now do billionaires.