I’m getting a lot of ‘but my car is more convenient’ arguments lately, and I’m struggling to convey why that doesn’t make sense.

Specifically how to explain to people that: Sure, if you are able to drive, and can afford it, and your city is designed to, and subsidizes making it easy to drive and park, then it’s convenient. But if everyone does it then it quickly becomes a tragedy of the commons situation.

I thought of one analogy that is: It would be ‘more convenient’ if I just threw my trash out the window, but if we all started doing that then we’d quickly end up in a mess.

But I feel like that doesn’t quite get at the essence of it. Any other ideas?

  • LvxferreEnglish
    1•8 months ago

    Being stuck in traffic is a bad example because it’ll only affect you if you’re driving. Better examples focus on things that’ll affect you regardless of you driving or not, like:

    • air pollution - the fact that you are breathing all that NOx and ozone produced by the others’ cars
    • wasting urban space - that bakery could be next door, but it’s further away because all those car drivers need lots of lanes and parking spots for cars
    • risk of being run over by a car - or, one of the reasons why your kids can’t play outdoors, like you did in your childhood
    • etc.

    Beyond that, both are rationally equivalent. But their rhetoric power is different, as one plays along with your desire to live a better life, another with your conscience (most people don’t give a shit about the others).