Quick quiz on your ecological effect.

[hassysmacker]

I feel articles like this WERE tailored towards the liberal crowd who seem to think that individual change is enough (liberalism being broadly defined as an outlook where the functional social unit is the individual vs. radicalism where the functional social unit is the group)

Derrick is without a question radical, but I think this article was in fact tailored towards a different crowd than his usual readers.

So that was a very long way to say i agree with you, bote!

 

[LovelyAcorns]

Derrick is without a question radical, but I think this article was in fact tailored towards a different crowd than his usual readers.

Actually, this statement helped me think bote is right. The crowd he aimed it at wouldn't know Derrick's politics. Knowing it, we can make assumptions about what he means;a liberal crowd wouldn't. Trying to look at it on its own, it does kind of come across as saying that a small group needs to take charge and fix everything- dangerous thing to tell liberals with their love of authority and vanguards.

Of course, the MEND has not expelled Shell or Chevron; for this you write them off as ineffective? Avalanches begin with a tumbling pebble. Do you instead expect that the Nigerian populace would spontaneously rise up armed? Or do you realize that the groundwork must be laid by a few in the beginning, and built-upon? Those few are not to be denied their credit (for what it's worth) in making change through their labors, simply because the most drastic changes come with many people assisting.

...

Isolated actions done once and never followed-up don't have much sustained impact, obviously.

This is actually exactly what I'm saying. Isn't your avalanche metaphor pretty much the same thing as the snowball effect? But how can you say those who assist or join in later aren't changing the world? Under that logic they have no incentive to join the fight and might as well remain spectators.

 

[veggieguy12]

...how can you say those who assist or join in later aren't changing the world?

Not saying that, don't believe I wrote such a thing.
So we're in agreement, I guess.

 

[connerR]

Based on my 2008:

7.17 earths.

Footprint = 278.11

The 40,000 miles of driving I've done in the last few years and being a carnivore didn't help out too much, I don't think, nor did the big house I live in with my father.



I do, however, feel that this quiz is too extreme in some cases.

 

[veggieguy12]

I don't agree with the notion of meat-eating being bad for the planet, and the converse implication that being vegetarian is good, or better.

Just don't think it's true; the Navajo were not vegetarian, and nobody with any knowledge is gonna assert that they were destroying the ecosystem they inhabited.

 

[RnJ]

1.88 earths.

Carbon: 3.5
Food: 19.6
Housing: 2.0
Goods and Services: 4.5
=====
Total: 29.58 - The food got me...though I find it extremely high. I've got a big stomach, but I didn't think it was THAT big.

 

[connerR]

I fear that this quiz is little more than green propaganda. I think it's far too ambiguous to adequately portray my "footprint".

 

[macks]

Agreed. We have been and are continuing to causing a mass extinction event, this is old news. What we need to start thinking about now is how to be prepared when shit hits the fan.

 

[bote]

I don't agree with the notion of meat-eating being bad for the planet, and the converse implication that being vegetarian is good, or better.

Just don't think it's true; the Navajo were not vegetarian, and nobody with any knowledge is gonna assert that they were destroying the ecosystem they inhabited.

I don`t think that meat eating is bad for the planet either, however production methods and rates of consumption are pretty different today than for the Navajo, you know the whole beef cattle leading cause of deforestation worldwide thing. As for vegetarianism being better, I also don`t agree, to me diet seems to affect the environment only insofar as production methods are concerned, but that being said, see once again brazilian rainforest depletion etc.

 

[hassysmacker]

What we need to start thinking about now is how to be prepared when shit hits the fan.

...and how to dismantle the infrastructure that's pushing shit towards the fan, so when the shit hits the fan, which it INEVITABLY will, there's less splatter, and it's generally a less smelly situation for all those still living, though they will still be covered in shit.

 

[IBRRHOBO]

I guess I'm fucked! It couldn't find a number for me. Might have something to do with the use of styrofoam peanuts to start fires or using the freon cans for target practice? Surely not the DDT and diesel mixture I use to kill those pesky trees blocking all the sun here?

 

[veggieguy12]

Careful with the chemicals on the land your lil' hellspawn (on-the-way) will presumably be inhabiting!

 

[IBRRHOBO]

got that covered. we're gonna sell the land when he's born to an unsuspecting non profit group for community gardens and use the profit to buy more land. we'll use part of the land for a home and the other part to cash in on the illegal toxic waste storage business that is BOOMING out here! bah ha ha!

hey, you'll meet the hellspawn if ur around come march. when u heading this way? and call sometime! we could elevate both r blood pressures! bah ha ha!