I’m concerned about climate change. I spent 20 years not driving, buying locally, going to protests, organizing my local political party, avoiding flights, and trying to work for NGOs.
It kinda sucked. I missed out on things. I didn’t have much money. I spent time trying to figure out how to do the right thing. I didn’t have a car, so getting around sucked. My stuff sucked because I thrifted.
When I had kids, I went mainstream. I got a car. Started traveling on my vacations. Bought stuff new. Got a job with a corporation. Life is so much easier. The only thing I miss is volunteering.
I still vote my conscience, and try to buy sustainably, but I did my time. I’m done sacrificing my quality of life while assholes are living it up.
Yeah that is the thing. Even if everyone did what you were doing, the main pollution is still not coming from people but large companies and the like. It’s like recycling. Make your life shittier but nothing really changes. Your life just sucks and you feel better about the environment even though no noticeable change happens but you did your part.
Those companies polluting are making products that people are buying, they don’t just pollute for the hell of it. If everyone actually changed their buying habits these companies (and most of the global economy) would collapse.
But how am i able to stop people from buying boxes full of random shit from shein and amazon?
That is the problem. I have no impact on other peoples spending choices.
Take for example video games. I don’t preorder and i don’t buy microtransactions. Vote with your wallet right? But then there are people spending all their money on it and it just gets worse.
The only thing i can think of that i can have a tiny impact on is being vegan. Cooking vegan for people so they see its tasty and hopefully they replace their meat based dinner with a vegan one every few days.
But besides that i don’t know what to do to stop people from feeding bad things in the world.
Im doing the sacrifice thing but not really. I don’t like cars to begin with and live near transit, new things suck and I can find quality thrift stuff, the not traveling I can get but I have a lot of nice things to appreciate in my area. I don’t organize or protest though and work based on pay and perks. I have a sick wife so I have enough on my plate and if someone thinks im not doing enough they can walk a mile in my shoes and then tell me what they think. Of course I vote though as your nuts to not in a democracy. Like many things its nice to experience them while you can. (“you guys remember federal parks. oh yeah those were great. and voting. that was so cool.”)
Do what works for you and what feels right. When my kids are older, I’m going to get back into volunteering. I miss the people and shared goal - that was easily the best part of that lifestyle.
Thanks. She has a lot of things that are just not going to get better so its mostly a mitigation strategy as well as a prioritizing of medical issues. Mostly we are just appreciating the heck out of the simple things while we got them. Roof over head, food in belly, bills paid, its the bomb. Im almost glad about enshitification in the sense it makes it so easy to do this stuff. I mean I tell you im not super tempted to take a vacation involving a flight right now.
It’s hard to know what to do.
I’m concerned about climate change. I spent 20 years not driving, buying locally, going to protests, organizing my local political party, avoiding flights, and trying to work for NGOs.
It kinda sucked. I missed out on things. I didn’t have much money. I spent time trying to figure out how to do the right thing. I didn’t have a car, so getting around sucked. My stuff sucked because I thrifted.
When I had kids, I went mainstream. I got a car. Started traveling on my vacations. Bought stuff new. Got a job with a corporation. Life is so much easier. The only thing I miss is volunteering.
I still vote my conscience, and try to buy sustainably, but I did my time. I’m done sacrificing my quality of life while assholes are living it up.
Yeah that is the thing. Even if everyone did what you were doing, the main pollution is still not coming from people but large companies and the like. It’s like recycling. Make your life shittier but nothing really changes. Your life just sucks and you feel better about the environment even though no noticeable change happens but you did your part.
Those companies polluting are making products that people are buying, they don’t just pollute for the hell of it. If everyone actually changed their buying habits these companies (and most of the global economy) would collapse.
But how am i able to stop people from buying boxes full of random shit from shein and amazon? That is the problem. I have no impact on other peoples spending choices.
Take for example video games. I don’t preorder and i don’t buy microtransactions. Vote with your wallet right? But then there are people spending all their money on it and it just gets worse.
The only thing i can think of that i can have a tiny impact on is being vegan. Cooking vegan for people so they see its tasty and hopefully they replace their meat based dinner with a vegan one every few days.
But besides that i don’t know what to do to stop people from feeding bad things in the world.
You can’t, and that’s irrelevant to what I was responding to.
Spot on…
Time for Eco-sabotage to become mainstream.
Im doing the sacrifice thing but not really. I don’t like cars to begin with and live near transit, new things suck and I can find quality thrift stuff, the not traveling I can get but I have a lot of nice things to appreciate in my area. I don’t organize or protest though and work based on pay and perks. I have a sick wife so I have enough on my plate and if someone thinks im not doing enough they can walk a mile in my shoes and then tell me what they think. Of course I vote though as your nuts to not in a democracy. Like many things its nice to experience them while you can. (“you guys remember federal parks. oh yeah those were great. and voting. that was so cool.”)
I hope things work out with your wife.
Do what works for you and what feels right. When my kids are older, I’m going to get back into volunteering. I miss the people and shared goal - that was easily the best part of that lifestyle.
Thanks. She has a lot of things that are just not going to get better so its mostly a mitigation strategy as well as a prioritizing of medical issues. Mostly we are just appreciating the heck out of the simple things while we got them. Roof over head, food in belly, bills paid, its the bomb. Im almost glad about enshitification in the sense it makes it so easy to do this stuff. I mean I tell you im not super tempted to take a vacation involving a flight right now.