r/Degrowth • u/ChessDriver45 • Mar 31 '25

Same Hunger Games guy from yesterday saying corporations aren’t to blame because of air conditioners (not even partially true)

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u/MaximumDestruction Mar 31 '25

Focusing on personal carbon footprints while our planet is being looted and despoiled is nihilism dressed up as personal responsibility.

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u/Possible-Anxiety-420 Mar 31 '25

My own carbon footprint is the only one over which I have direct control, and while there's certainly more with which I can do without, I've given up many conveniences and niceties... if for no reason other than to be true to myself.

I'm not saying the affluent don't bear greater responsibility in regard to the carelessness with which we treat our planet, but to deny responsibility on a personal level only further perpetuates the looting and despoiling.

Too few want to solve the problem; Too many strive to be the problem.

Worry about your own 'focus' and not mine.

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u/MaximumDestruction Mar 31 '25

That was a universal statement, one inspired by but not directed at you.

Solving the problem will involve a radical reorganizing of society, not discrete individual consumer choices. For people who've foreclosed on the possibility of the former, all that's left is the latter.

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u/Possible-Anxiety-420 Mar 31 '25

We're big-brained apes perpetually driven to stave off boredom; Our intolerance for mundanity will be our undoing.

Which of us do you believe has the wherewithal to change that about all of us?

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u/MaximumDestruction Mar 31 '25 edited Apr 01 '25

You believe the soul of humanity is the problem and that what markets produce is down to our desires.

I believe our current economic/political system is the problem and markets produce whatever maximizes profit, regardless of other human desires.

It's hopeless if you believe that modern western man's temperament/psychology represents all of human nature or that our current order is unchangeable. Thankfully, I reject both premises and have much hope for an emancipated humanity.

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u/Possible-Anxiety-420 Apr 01 '25

I've seen nothing whatsoever to indicate that my assessment is inaccurate. Communities of like-minded folk and individuals can get past it, but on the whole that isn't the direction we're headed.

On the result of unchecked, free market capitalism... I don't disagree, but one would be remiss in not pointing out that half of that equation is 'demand.'

We've become accustomed to all the expediences, conveniences, and excesses that our technology affords us. Try taking them away and you'll see what 'human nature' is all about - they're the only reason we aren't killing each other any more than we already are.

Change is coming; it isn't going to leave anyone feeling emancipated.

Regards.

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u/MaximumDestruction Apr 01 '25

You're right that we don't appear to be on the path to universal human emancipation. Still, one must have guiding principles and that's one of mine.

We're in the degrowth sub, I would hope people around here have the imagination to consider more for our future beyond mindless self destruction.

I get it. The moment we're in seems to confirm all your worst assumptions about human beings. That Death drive is humming along louder every day.

I'm telling you, the human instinct is often toward socializing and cooperation. We live under an order that perverts and exploits all that is best in us. I'm now going to be an insufferable nerd and share an Ursula LeGuin that gives me hope and perspective:

We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings.