Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by arrrg 2495 days ago
Setting an example is great and doing what you personally can to reduce your footprint is certainly not wrong but it’s completely and utterly wrong to focus on that and talk about it. That’s just the wrong approach.

Deniers and their ilk will talk about nothing but personal failings, not systematic approaches. That’s a rhetorical strategy they are comfortable with and where they will always be able to win (since society is currently structured in a way that makes it very hard to reduce your footprint).

People might think that them personally doing something might solve the problem, which couldn’t be further from the truth. People might think that since they did something they don’t have to do anything more.

Focusing on personal responsibility is the completely wrong approach. This needs taxes, this needs bans, this needs huge political changes. There is no alternative. There is nothing you can personally do to solve this when those things don’t happen.