We are racing down a mountain at full throttle. Our children are in the back seat. The speedometer is buried. The road curves sharply ahead. On the outside of the curve is a cliff with a 200 meter drop. On the other side is a vertical rock wall.
Here are some ideas I came up with to help push people into taking action. Sure we need systemic changes like ending car dependent cities and heavily reducing fossil fuel usage. Doing nothing is smashing through the guard rail and off the cliff. Doing one is slowing enough to MAYBE survive crashing into the mountain. Doing both is slowing down enough to navigate the curve.
There are some things we CAN do.
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Start spreading the word on social media for unofficial things like moo-less Monday. Don’t eat beef on Mondays. Weather Wednesday, where you adjust or turn off your HVAC. This could be a whole other thread.
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Start getting louder and louder. Remember, we need to both act AND influence enough people for systemic changes.
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Consume less. Be as efficient with resources as possible. There tons of things you can do here that are minimal effort and barely noticeable.
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Political action. Vote. Run if you are able. Contact politicians at all levels. Talk with people about things that have benefits beyond just climate. E.g. transit reduces traffic.
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Stay strong. Don’t succumb to doomerism.
Everything sounds very good, but really, quite unlikely to accomplish. If world leaders don’t take this seriously, individual ideas are just wishful thinking.
The “vote” and “badger your reps” are the most important things by far.
We need genuine progressives in power to end things like fossil fuel subsidies.
If your only real options are “red neoliberal” or “blue neoliberal”, you need to make them know that pandering to polluting businesses will lose them their power, which means no more trough for their snouts.
And those letters and emails matter. Sure, they’ll probably dismiss them and swan off to be wined and dined by mining and oil companies.
But ultimately, they’re going to look out for their own self interest. They need to know that being soft on environmental issues will lose them more than it will gain them.