It's dumber than that. We could do it if we cared about long term profits rather than next-quarter profits.
Yes but that would have tax implications.
Good luck with that. Have you ever met humans?
I'm not worried about humans, I'm worried about the rich
And yet, we managed to mostly abolish slavery and child labour in most countries.
It's not going to be easy, but it can be done.
Not to be defeatist, but...
We didn't abolish slavery... we just replaced it with wage slavery. Sure, the workers are free to leave - and try to survive with no other job opportunities and no money. In fact, for the employers, this is actually preferable to real slavery, because there are lower upfront costs for your slaves, they don't try to run away or rebel, you don't have to pay for their healthcare or long term care, and in many places government tax dollars will subsidize their living expenses. Employers have it WAY better with wage slaves than real slaves.
Child labour is still alive and well in many countries, and even there the ball is rolling on rolling THAT back in the US at least.
I admire your positivity, but I'll believe it when I see it.
If you really think that wage slavery is comparable to being owned by a human, then you're delusional.
Yes, slavery and child labour still exists. But if you think living in the US or China or India in 2024 is just as bad as 1850, then you are also delusional.
Some countries like Afghanistan or North Korea might be objectively worse, but those are a minority.
Okay, I can see how you got that from my post. I was a bit hyperbolic in my original post, and I apologize.
I'm not REALLY making a moral equivalence argument or saying anything about comparing the horrors of slavery to work... I'm saying getting rid of slavery was easier to enact because there was an alternative system that happened to be ultimately profitable for the rich at the same time. Yes, wars have been fought to stop abolition, but at the end of the day, after slavery was abolished, the rich found a way to stay rich almost everywhere - abolition came at very little real change to the wealth structure of society. They had a supply of labor to exploit for profit during slavery, and they had one after. The fact is that the moral and financial interests both aligned on making abolition happen - it wasn't caused by pure strength of willpower. And yes, the system we have now is MUCH MUCH better than true slavery, but it's still a stretch to use the current system as a beacon of hope.
On climate change the moral and financial interests are NOT aligned in a clear way. There are always still going to be financial incentives to screw the climate for extra money. By comparison, if slavery were somehow legal again TODAY, it's not clear it would be profitable for anybody to actually do it. That difference will make climate goals harder to enact.
There will always be winners and losers with any change.
Plantation owners definitely lost a lot of wealth due to the abolition of slavery, while the industrial tycoons gained a lot of wealth.
Switching away from fossil fuels will similarly benefit those who invest in the energy sources and technologies of the future, while shrinking the fortune of those dependent on fossil fuels.
Already, some forms of fossil energy are losing new investment.
For example, the high profile Keystone XL pipeline was never built, even though Trump approved it, because investors doubted its profit potential. Biden revoking the permit was mostly symbolic.
Now, I do otherwise agree with this more nuanced take of yours. Morality needs to be aligned with financial incentives in order to achieve change. That's just how our current world works and I don't see that basic mechanism changing.
So it makes more sense to focus on making fossil fuels less profitable, e.g. through taxation.
I agree with your conclusion, but I don't agree that it's feasible. Any tax solutions will involve legislation by a government owned by those same interests. And even if you managed it in major economies, you'd just force the climate issues into places with fewer qualms about their fuel usage. I'd love to see this problem solved, but my faith in our ability to resolve it is far less than yours.
Once the alternatives become more profitable, they will move to legislate in their favour.
Here in Europe, we already have billions in subsidies for wind and solar energy.
Will it go smoothly, or fast enough?
No, I think 3 degrees warming is basically inevitable at this point.
But it will happen, about five decades later than it should have happened.
Guess we will see in the next two decades.
I hope for everyone's sake you're right, but if that does come to pass it will come as a surprise to me.
I agree, all the evils of yesteryear are still there and active, just either well-hidden or people simply don't care/pretend not to know (cfr football world championships in Qatar, ...).
We've made enormous progress technologically, but humans are still the exact same as 2000 or 5000 years ago. We've changed exceedingly little in that time, and the few things that have changed could be reverted very quickly if shove comes to push concerning climate collapse etc.
Thank you, I needed a bit of optimism. 😀
Optimism is the enemy of progress. It just feels like delusional thinking at some point, and breeds complacency
That is 100% a lie, optimism is necessary to try to make change, optimism is the driver of progress.
Pessimism causes apathy.
So it's the exact opposite of what you claim.
Agree to disagree. I think optimism is exactly why weve done nothing. Fear is a powerful motivator.
Slavery still exist in USA. 13th. In the south they still have kids working legally on farms.
Did we, when?
Humans are wonderful. Not always good, not always reasonable, but wonderful.
We are rich, nuanced, vibrant beings. A small portion of us are defectors but by and large we are community focused and willing to give when we feel we are not being taken advantage of.
Unless you think all your friends, yourself, and your family are garbage it is inconsistent to assume a random sampling of humans would not display the same prosocial traits you find in them.
The one thing we are incapable of doing though is handling power.
So we're doomed then
The whole world: We need cheap EVs for the regular people.
China: I got you fam.
The world: Tarifs.
It's a bit more complicated than that. You don't want total reliance from one country (especially one as questionable as China) over a whole big ass sector of your economic. And China being super cheap will cause a monopoly of their EVs. That's bad.
A monopoly is not inherently bad. A monopoly removes the incentive for pricing pressure, yes, but that requires consolidation in a single company, not a single country. China's only been able to sell EVs so cheap because every company that couldn't drive prices this low got blown the fuck out of the market. That's competition, not a monopoly. By extension, if EV prices go back up, those competitors can pretty easily restart given the billions of venture funding swimming around in China.
A monopoly isn't inherently bad, but a monopoly by a state is pretty bad. It means they can exert political pressure over you using that sector's influence.
Heck, look at Russia and gas. It impacted tons of people all over the world, and if the world hadn't collectively said "fuck you Russia we'll handle ourselves without you" - then countries like Germany wouldn't have a choice but keep buying Russian Gas.
That's a political power you really don't wanna give to anyone, especially not China.
Yes, competition could restart, but that'd take time. And you don't always have that time. Again, see Russia and gas as a nice example for that.
Sure, I agree, but your claim hinges on the fact that the Chinese EV market lacks competition (like, say, Russia with Gazprom and nobody else).
That's easily disprovable.
But we actually need a sensibly planned public transport and Zoning.
"trump" in this context has lost all of its former meaning.
The trump card lost its meaning the moment it got the orange man in jail
The solution requires a new ideological paradigm, but transitioning into the right paradigm would be extremely difficult and it would likely take a very long time.
I think the US is already in the process of transitioning to a new paradigm, away from neoliberalism, which was the dominant paradigm over the past half century or so, to something else. However, I'm not sure we are transitioning into the "right" paradigm. I think the paradigm we are transitioning into is more protectionist than neoliberalism. We are moving away from globalization and towards something more like the cold war era, where the world was divided along ideological lines into a "first world" and a "second world." I expect the new paradigm we are shifting into to be more antagonistic toward "unfriendly" nations. I wouldn't be surprised if this were to lead to some kind of major conflict.
Of course we're to that: the US is doing very little to slow climate change at all, is anything it is accelerating it. The natural result of this will not be food insecurity in the USA: it will be famine in South and Central America. Climate migration will see tens of millions of immigrants at our borders.
And the government has 0 intention of helping them. It military will directly cause a mass casualty event at the border before the turn of the century.
What are you talking about? Nobody's moving away from neoliberalism. The right perhaps, but whenever the left also moves to fill in that void, it doesn't really change much.
Best I can do is a token effort as long as it doesn't upset the shareholders.
Too bad I associate the word trump these day with stupid.
don't look up
Headline is a good demonstration of why it's so difficult to set up a keyword filter to get rid of the childishly vapid American politics from your feed lol
Let's see:
✅ Climate issues
✅ World News
✅ Human Rights
What's exclusively American about this...?
Something is going to hurt Trump's profits?
If you filter "trump" from your feed, you miss this
I miss so many articles about masculine musky aftershaves
The hard part morally is whether future human rights trump present ones. But we can't even get to those issues since they're all trumped by maximum short term profits all the time.
End of the world party it is
A community for discussing events around the World
Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed. Sources that have a Low or Very Low factual reporting rating or MBFC Credibility Rating may be removed.
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF 10/19
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
News !news@lemmy.world
Politics !politics@lemmy.world
World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world
For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/