Plastics are generally bad in other ways. The proliferation and ubiquity of microplastic contaminants is a big one. It doesn’t help that virtually everything comes wrapped in plastic these days since, as you note, recycling of plastic is largely a joke.
I absolutely agree with your overall points though. There is a nuance and complexity to so many of these issues, but the attention economy has no patience for it and people choose the “feel good” option because it’s easy and they want it to be true. It makes it hard to have a substantive discussion about how many of the perceived risks of climate change (a Mad Max uninhabitable Earth) are not actual risks. It makes trying to consider and mitigate the actual risks much more difficult.
I had this kind of realization when talking to friends about an inquiry of mine. Why we don't source more of our own wood and coal here in the United States? No one was willing to engage with me in the idea that we could mine our own resources safer than the people we get them from.
My idea is that if our society needs wood and coal right now since we can't remove that need without some new technology yet to be invented, then we should do the mining and logging ourselves to remove the environmental responsibility that we trust in other countries like Brazil, Canada, and China.
"It’s a moral code imbued with what I call feel-goodism, the belief that emotional or moral satisfaction equals effectiveness." Unfortunately, I think it's even worse. It's not feel-goodism, it's feel-badism. You have to feel bad about the environment to stay in the activists' good graces. I think now saying that paper bags are also bad is acceptable. It's all bad! We are doomed! The worst thing you can say is that not all is bad and actually, that some of the problems with the environment can be solved. The second you say it's not all that bad, you are an ultra-right climate change denier and probably secretly hate puppies and think the world is flat.
I’ve worked in corporate sustainability for almost 10 years- I couldn’t agree with this more. Thanks for saying this so well
Plastics are generally bad in other ways. The proliferation and ubiquity of microplastic contaminants is a big one. It doesn’t help that virtually everything comes wrapped in plastic these days since, as you note, recycling of plastic is largely a joke.
I absolutely agree with your overall points though. There is a nuance and complexity to so many of these issues, but the attention economy has no patience for it and people choose the “feel good” option because it’s easy and they want it to be true. It makes it hard to have a substantive discussion about how many of the perceived risks of climate change (a Mad Max uninhabitable Earth) are not actual risks. It makes trying to consider and mitigate the actual risks much more difficult.
Greetings friend, your posts appear on my feed often, and I thought I ought to drop a comment, to say how interesting I think they are.
I thought you might enjoy one of my articles, pertaining to some strange aspects of Londons history:
https://open.substack.com/pub/jordannuttall/p/questionable-english-architecture?r=4f55i2&utm_medium=ios
I had this kind of realization when talking to friends about an inquiry of mine. Why we don't source more of our own wood and coal here in the United States? No one was willing to engage with me in the idea that we could mine our own resources safer than the people we get them from.
My idea is that if our society needs wood and coal right now since we can't remove that need without some new technology yet to be invented, then we should do the mining and logging ourselves to remove the environmental responsibility that we trust in other countries like Brazil, Canada, and China.
"It’s a moral code imbued with what I call feel-goodism, the belief that emotional or moral satisfaction equals effectiveness." Unfortunately, I think it's even worse. It's not feel-goodism, it's feel-badism. You have to feel bad about the environment to stay in the activists' good graces. I think now saying that paper bags are also bad is acceptable. It's all bad! We are doomed! The worst thing you can say is that not all is bad and actually, that some of the problems with the environment can be solved. The second you say it's not all that bad, you are an ultra-right climate change denier and probably secretly hate puppies and think the world is flat.
I think youre right in that, if you dont do what the environmental movement pushes, you will feel bad. So you stay in the groupthink to feel good.
When feelings rule the world, truth is the casualty.