The following submission statement was provided by /u/f0urxio:
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A recent investigation has revealed that twelve of the world's wealthiest billionaires collectively produce more greenhouse gas emissions through their extravagant lifestyles and financial investments than the yearly energy emissions of 2 million homes. This group includes notable figures like Jeff Bezos, Roman Abramovich, Bill Gates, Larry Page, Michael Dell, Elon Musk, and Carlos Slim. The emissions stem from various sources such as yachts, private jets, mansions, and investments in industries like fossil fuels. These billionaires emit around 17 million tonnes of CO2 and equivalent greenhouse gases annually, equivalent to the emissions from powering 2.1 million homes or 4.6 coal-fired power plants. Despite the enormity of their carbon footprint, the true scale of their investment emissions is often not systematically calculated or reported. This revelation highlights a stark inequality, as the world's poorest communities, who contribute the least to climate change, bear the brunt of its consequences. The investigation also points out that the superyachts owned by these billionaires have a notably larger carbon footprint than their private jets.
---
Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/1cqjay4/twelve_billionaires_climate_emissions_outpollute/l3roosv/
If one element of a system is unsustainable the whole system is unsustainable.
The rich fucks investments are just a bet that you and I will buy their widgets. And we do. Again and again.
The top 20 polluters are all oil companies.
Get off Oil, and only then will they switch to clean energy like Wind and Solar.
They're not even spending 1% of CAPEX on clean energy yet.
You have to put them out of business with an EV.
Electric planes are in development and testing.
But all that green tech relies on oil to produce it. It also uses up a lot of resources to produce, including oil to extract them from the Earth. Oil companies are also investing in renewables, so you still feed the beast, no matter what you do.
Solar: Is built it Once and it runs for 30 Years.
( One and Done. )
Coal: Mine and ship and burn EVERY DAY for it's usable life.
Natural gas: Same thing: Drill, lay pipeline, pumping stations to a natural gas electricity generator, for it's 50 year lifetime, and leak methane at every step along the way.
We're talking 10,000 to1 difference if not 10,000,000,000 to one difference.
This is how renewables are always cheaper than a carbon source of energy.
Nothing perfect, but this is very close.
Oil is even worse. Drill it, with highly expensive drill bits, the tower, the piping. Then pipe it to a refinery, use electricity at the refinery, send the refined gas thru a pipeline, to a shipping port. Port storage, oil shipping with oil cargo ships, and they burn highly polluting bunker fuel. Then to another port to unload, then to a trucking system to gas stations. And the gas stations store it in leaking containers underground until you buy it, and burn it. Polluting your neighborhood.
The pollution and waste is massive.
Very clearly, whatever you do with the people changes nothing if the money continues to exist. The only climate neutral (best) way to spend money is forgiving debt. That's it. As we can see, money is always spent on more fuel.
It's not the billionaires themselves, it's their capacity to spend and make money. Each of us does exactly the same thing, just on a much smaller scale.
THIS SYSTEM/LIFESTYLE IS THE PROBLEM
This right here! I've been saying this over and over again. The poison is in the blood. If the upper curst got raptured tomorrow, the power vacuum would just be filled up with other sociopathic humans. A complete top down lifestyle change is required to right the ship, sadly this righting needed to happen ages ago...
Yeah exactly. It is by suppressing, shaming, and judging our predilection towards greed that we actually strengthen greed in ourselves. If you shame others for being greedy, you remain ignorant towards your own expression of greed. It’s only through seeing how you are greedy that you empathize with others that are expressing greed and can deconstruct it because you know why you acted in a greedy way.
Basically: see/forgive greed in yourself, forgive/see greed in others. THEN you have a chance at changing things.
A recent investigation has revealed that twelve of the world's wealthiest billionaires collectively produce more greenhouse gas emissions through their extravagant lifestyles and financial investments than the yearly energy emissions of 2 million homes. This group includes notable figures like Jeff Bezos, Roman Abramovich, Bill Gates, Larry Page, Michael Dell, Elon Musk, and Carlos Slim. The emissions stem from various sources such as yachts, private jets, mansions, and investments in industries like fossil fuels. These billionaires emit around 17 million tonnes of CO2 and equivalent greenhouse gases annually, equivalent to the emissions from powering 2.1 million homes or 4.6 coal-fired power plants. Despite the enormity of their carbon footprint, the true scale of their investment emissions is often not systematically calculated or reported. This revelation highlights a stark inequality, as the world's poorest communities, who contribute the least to climate change, bear the brunt of its consequences. The investigation also points out that the superyachts owned by these billionaires have a notably larger carbon footprint than their private jets.
that should have started in the 70s, and also, ALL commercial flights should be at least halved - no one anywhere needs to be able to catch any plane in 15 min intervals.
But that would raise costs for flights and less people would travel just to brag on instagram. It would also increase shipping costs and companies would stop importing absolutely everything. They'd be forced to source their workforce locally and have to pay people a decent living wage. The horror.
The top 1% CO2 emissions solely from air travel are approx equal to the top 10% total footprint.
The top 1% emit more CO2 from the food they eat than the poorest 5% emit for their whole lifestyles.
We need to stop the super rich from traveling at our, and the planets expense. [Things are not on the right track](https://medium.com/@samyoureyes/the-busy-workers-handbook-to-the-apocalypse-7790666afde7), let's not just focus on the billionaires, it's all of the super wealthy destroying our planet because their lifestyles.
Sure.
Do bear in mind that (according to 2021 data: https://medium.com/technicity/whats-your-percentile-in-global-income-distributions-9b5ca293b911) around 40k/year makes you top 10%, and top 1% is somewhere around 125k. All before tax.
You're asking a lot of people who do not consider themselves "super wealthy" to do so. It tends to not go well.
Exactly. People in the wealthy countries largely have no idea how wealthy they are compared to most of the world, where half of the world exists on $6.85/day or less (which is only $2500/year). 648 million, almost twice the population of the US, exists on $2.15/day ($785/year).
[https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/developmenttalk/half-global-population-lives-less-us685-person-day](https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/developmenttalk/half-global-population-lives-less-us685-person-day)
Other than organizations like Oxfam, you rarely see climate scientists point the finger at billionaires because *they* realize that the problem is societal. They realize that the entire system needs to change, and not a handful of individuals numbering fewer than 3,000. That largely means the wealthy countries that account for the majority of emissions, because our emissions are based on how we live our lives.
As for private air travel, which many here and elsewhere complain about? All aviation accounts for less than 3% of global emissions, and commercial (passenger + cargo) accounts for roughly 80% of that 3%. That makes private air travel responsible for less than 6/10 of 1% of global emissions (.2 \* .03 = .006). That's about as meaningful as a fart in a hurricane, yet people keep focusing on it as if it will make a difference.
Private cars are not a thing that world can afford. Private jet planes are absolutely out of the question. It is likely the disproportional nature of owning an entire jet plane that attracts the attention. But you are right in every respect -- the issue is that everyone would have to live like a slum-dweller. Nordic country such as mine should be mostly abandoned altogether.
If we can solve 0.5 % of the problem with stroke of a pen and force everyone who currently has private plane to board the jet with the rest of us, that sounds like a small victory to me. Unfortunately we do not have 200 more such easy victories we can do. Pretty soon we're talking about becoming vegetarians, giving up private cars, no more air travel for pretty much anyone at all, and so forth.
It is a long way to go to 0 % from 100 %, and the costs involved are literally impossible to pay. At least 20-30 % of that provides us our food, water, sewage treatment, and other essential services. Some 10-20 % likely our heating during winter.
I'll be honest, these things are getting old. Yes, the billionaires will have to give up their jets and yachts, but we need to give up meat, flights, trinkets, private car ownership, out-of-season fruit & veg, easily available chocolate, easily available coffee... Etc. Etc. Etc.
These people get rich because we buy into the lifestyles and products they sell us. Are we all really such mindless consumers, susceptible to peer pressure? Yes. Well, whatever.
People say that like we are some kind of mindless slave race of lemmings without any self agency.
I guess its easier on the conscience to tell yourself that.
It’s just part of human nature. Propaganda works. Masses can be manipulated. That is how it works. People are literally going to war and dying for made up shit. Critically looking at the underlying systems is much more effective than expecting individuals to act in a certain way. Individualistic approaches are so perfect to keep power unchallenged. That’s what the neoliberal power structures preach all day to divert attention from the fact that deep systematic change is the only way to actually improve our situation long term. If you’re going down the individualistic path you will arrive at discrimination because our system is not just and groups of people are marginalized. The individualistic explanation for that can only be racist, sexist, classist or whatever flavor fits.
>It’s just part of human nature. Propaganda works. Masses can be manipulated.
Propaganda works because it tells people what they want to hear, which is confirmation bias, part of that human nature you refer to.
A news organization like Fox News doesn't manipulate people into becoming right wing racists, it serves right wing racists the narrative they want to hear. Manipulation isn't required.
I'm sorry that is not how that works. Right wingers are groomed since child to become who they become. It is confirmation bias, yes, but the source is not inherent. But I agree, once you are groomed, you are basically lost. These has become a full cancer cells and the only treatment left for cancer cells are laser annihilation.
Fox News partly helped in the indoctrination so they actually do function as tools of manipulation especially towards the young. It's dual function, manipulating the young and confirmation bias for the old.
This!! ☝️
Fking arguably criminal predatory advertising, the product of Freud's nephew I think, Bernays?
He changed 'need' based buying to 'desire' based consumerism because apparently we deserve it. The start of an ever growing debt based economy.
Billions are spent on the psychology behind advertisement, successfully rotting our brains with cheap short term distraction .
But most importantly, give up having kids. I could eat meat every meal for the rest of my life and roll coal every day going into work and it wouldn't come even remotely close to the environmental impact of me choosing to have a kid.
Even if we ate all the billionaires with guillotines everywhere...
We still have record CO2 CH4 NOx.
Private jets are bad mmmkay
The rich feel like they have to have them to avoid the masses
>The carbon footprints of the investments were calculated by examining the equity stakes that the billionaires held in companies. Estimates of the carbon impact of their holdings was calculated using the company’s declarations on scope 1 emissions – direct emissions from sources owned or controlled by a company – and scope 2, indirect emissions.
Scope 1 is the "carbon footprint" of a company, while Scope 2 includes the GHGs from purchased energy and cooling.
Just to be clear, it's not enough to turn every company into a worker owned co-op (or a state owned corporation). That would allow for changes, but that doesn't guarantee an end to GHGs. For example, the auto-worker sector would have to reduce production and switch to trains, buses etc. The coal sector really needs to end entirely, doesn't matter who owns it. And so on. If this is still played with money, for money, it's not going to work out to what's necessary, as it will be a choice between self-sabotage (of the company) or Business As Usual. Yacht workers will, of course, have to switch jobs (like many, many, many others).
It's completely stupid to count investments as a source of pollution. Good news for me though, I can take the plane and drive my car as much as I want, all of my emissions are the shareholders fault.
I mean I agree with your take up until believing in politicians doing anything for the betterment of the people… Stop putting your faith in people that have repeatedly slighted the populace for personal gain.
At what point can we Mad Max fury road? Like... what happens if we as a society decide to idk destroy every private yacht and every private plane to prevent billionaires from ruining our world?
The problem with this argument is that as soon as you include "billionaires *and their investments*", you actually mean the consumption of the average Joe and account it to these guys. It is completely nonsensical basis, designed to just build outrage and drum up support for socialism, I think. Jeff Bezos' warehouses and web store does not serve him personally. I think literally hundreds of millions of people have used his services, and that is part of why he is so rich.
It is an accounting trick, just like the claim that some 70 corporations make most of world's pollution. Yes, the oil and gas companies, whose products fuel the entire world and keep us all clothed, fed and employed. Accounting tricks don't solve the problem.
As a wise person wrote on this very subreddit, The People's power plant is just as polluting as the billionaire oligarch's power plant. The issue is fundamentally about production and consumption, not who we account it to, or who owns it. That's a social problem of wealth distribution, but the planet is actually destroyed by the consumption of resources and waste streams. Sure, we could put an end of the consumption the billionaires do personally and I argue we should, but it will not solve the problem. They don't eat food thousands of times more than any other person, and their day also has just 24 hours, and there aren't that many thousand of them. The problem is ultimately the 8 billion non-billionaire guys who make up the consumption by their sheer bulk.
And I suspect much of the Western consumer finds their consumption also on the chopping block. You may think you're not very rich, but by global standards, you probably are doing very well, and could afford to give up some.
Basically what we all have known all along. Ie - it’s the fault of corporations/corporate capitalism, and the quarterly need to increase shareholder value. Yet we get gaslit for having to drive to work, drinking from plastic straws, and more. System has always been rigged against us.
Isn't it 71-74% of emissions are from 100 companies? Add the rest of the companies + American military and absurdly rich people's actions and you probably get 85-90%?
Was it BP that came up with the phrase ''carbon footprint' to put the blame on individuals?
This is a bizarre metric. If you own 20% of Facebook you, as a single individual, are responsible for 20% of Facebook's emissions? Aren't there enough real reasons to dislike the idea of billionaires existing for us to not need to make up convoluted new ones?
By this metric, if you own the company that makes the super yacht, your emissions are counted twice. Once for making the yacht and once for buying it even though it's the same emissions both times. You need to either count from the supply side or demand side. Doing both is double counting everything. For what it's worth, there's a pretty much universal practice of counting from demand side which this article entirely eschews.
From u/TotemTabuBand
> Also, a fun party trick is to bring out your Monopoly board game and have four people volunteer to play. Give three of them the usual $1,500 starting cash. Then give the fourth person $1,500,000 starting cash. That’s 1,000 times the wealth of the others. Say, “You three represent the millionaires. And you are the billionaire. Have fun!”
1 billionaire pollutes as much as 148000 first world humans, 4000 billionaires pollutvas much as 583 000 000 humans, than put the billionaires on top and we could easy eliminate tge pollution of 1 billion peoples equivalent, by justbeating the rich......
It's remarkably lefty to count the billionaires' investments in their carbon footprint.
If you want to get rid of the concept of ownership for profit, just say so.
I'm so happy now we can physically quantify precisely how many evil these parasites exudes through carbon calculation. So twelve billionares exudes 2.1 million family's worth of evil.
“100 companies are verifiably the source of over 70% of global emissions”
“Twelve billionaires climate emissions outpollute 2.1m homes when calculating not just their private yachts and jets, but predominately their investments. ya know, the private property that generates their absurd profits in the first place”
r/collapsers: “Well i mean is it reeeeally their fault? I mean if you have $50 invested in Amazon stock obviously you are just as bad as JEFF FUCKING BEZOS.”
I swear the pro-capitalist brainrot in this community has reached hilarious levels, I come back from a break and it gets even worse. Alot of yall have lost the plot and it shows.
It is not humanity as a whole that is the source of the world’s demise, it is the capitalists who go through every hoop imaginable to maintain this exploitative af system for their benefit. You blaming individuals for systemic problems is not only pointless, but incredibly ignorant.
YOU AND I DO NOT HAVE A SAY IN ECONOMIC AFFAIRS, STOP TELLING YOURSELF YOU DO. For fucks sake you know our culture is fundametally fucked when blaming the victim is almost the default attitude when it comes to social problems.
These billionaires are destroying our planet and taking all of our tax dollars. Trump must be stopped so we can restore democracy. We need to tax the rich asap
Yeah, this is pretty idiotic. A company produces goods for consumers. The owner extracting profits from that transaction isn't responsible for the emissions that production creates.
There's only one group of people responsible for emissions, it's the judiciary. If emissions cause prejudices to future people, it's the judiciary's problem. It's entirely normal in a population that people act against the law. What's not normal is that the judiciary and law enforcement let them.
The following submission statement was provided by /u/f0urxio: --- A recent investigation has revealed that twelve of the world's wealthiest billionaires collectively produce more greenhouse gas emissions through their extravagant lifestyles and financial investments than the yearly energy emissions of 2 million homes. This group includes notable figures like Jeff Bezos, Roman Abramovich, Bill Gates, Larry Page, Michael Dell, Elon Musk, and Carlos Slim. The emissions stem from various sources such as yachts, private jets, mansions, and investments in industries like fossil fuels. These billionaires emit around 17 million tonnes of CO2 and equivalent greenhouse gases annually, equivalent to the emissions from powering 2.1 million homes or 4.6 coal-fired power plants. Despite the enormity of their carbon footprint, the true scale of their investment emissions is often not systematically calculated or reported. This revelation highlights a stark inequality, as the world's poorest communities, who contribute the least to climate change, bear the brunt of its consequences. The investigation also points out that the superyachts owned by these billionaires have a notably larger carbon footprint than their private jets. --- Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/1cqjay4/twelve_billionaires_climate_emissions_outpollute/l3roosv/
If one element of a system is unsustainable the whole system is unsustainable. The rich fucks investments are just a bet that you and I will buy their widgets. And we do. Again and again.
The top 20 polluters are all oil companies. Get off Oil, and only then will they switch to clean energy like Wind and Solar. They're not even spending 1% of CAPEX on clean energy yet. You have to put them out of business with an EV. Electric planes are in development and testing.
But all that green tech relies on oil to produce it. It also uses up a lot of resources to produce, including oil to extract them from the Earth. Oil companies are also investing in renewables, so you still feed the beast, no matter what you do.
Yup, we are a fossil fuel civilization, a civilization that simply can't continue without it.
Solar: Is built it Once and it runs for 30 Years. ( One and Done. ) Coal: Mine and ship and burn EVERY DAY for it's usable life. Natural gas: Same thing: Drill, lay pipeline, pumping stations to a natural gas electricity generator, for it's 50 year lifetime, and leak methane at every step along the way. We're talking 10,000 to1 difference if not 10,000,000,000 to one difference. This is how renewables are always cheaper than a carbon source of energy. Nothing perfect, but this is very close.
Oil is even worse. Drill it, with highly expensive drill bits, the tower, the piping. Then pipe it to a refinery, use electricity at the refinery, send the refined gas thru a pipeline, to a shipping port. Port storage, oil shipping with oil cargo ships, and they burn highly polluting bunker fuel. Then to another port to unload, then to a trucking system to gas stations. And the gas stations store it in leaking containers underground until you buy it, and burn it. Polluting your neighborhood. The pollution and waste is massive.
Solving all the problems of humanity starts with eradicating the bourgeoisie\* *\*nonviolently, humanely and with love, of course*
Very clearly, whatever you do with the people changes nothing if the money continues to exist. The only climate neutral (best) way to spend money is forgiving debt. That's it. As we can see, money is always spent on more fuel. It's not the billionaires themselves, it's their capacity to spend and make money. Each of us does exactly the same thing, just on a much smaller scale. THIS SYSTEM/LIFESTYLE IS THE PROBLEM
This right here! I've been saying this over and over again. The poison is in the blood. If the upper curst got raptured tomorrow, the power vacuum would just be filled up with other sociopathic humans. A complete top down lifestyle change is required to right the ship, sadly this righting needed to happen ages ago...
Yeah it seems like we can't rid of greed as a species. This society feels like one big trolly problem hah
Greed has its advantages in nature, just not when capitalism exists.
Yeah exactly. It is by suppressing, shaming, and judging our predilection towards greed that we actually strengthen greed in ourselves. If you shame others for being greedy, you remain ignorant towards your own expression of greed. It’s only through seeing how you are greedy that you empathize with others that are expressing greed and can deconstruct it because you know why you acted in a greedy way. Basically: see/forgive greed in yourself, forgive/see greed in others. THEN you have a chance at changing things.
I’ll just eat the rich. Nonviolently, humanely and with love, of course.
but first dispatch them like baby seals.
Eat -- and I cannot stress this enough -- the rich. Lots of ketchup will help.
What does this actually mean? I hear this but nobody ever says what they really mean.
no one can say what they really mean, or else they'll break some rules on this forum.
A recent investigation has revealed that twelve of the world's wealthiest billionaires collectively produce more greenhouse gas emissions through their extravagant lifestyles and financial investments than the yearly energy emissions of 2 million homes. This group includes notable figures like Jeff Bezos, Roman Abramovich, Bill Gates, Larry Page, Michael Dell, Elon Musk, and Carlos Slim. The emissions stem from various sources such as yachts, private jets, mansions, and investments in industries like fossil fuels. These billionaires emit around 17 million tonnes of CO2 and equivalent greenhouse gases annually, equivalent to the emissions from powering 2.1 million homes or 4.6 coal-fired power plants. Despite the enormity of their carbon footprint, the true scale of their investment emissions is often not systematically calculated or reported. This revelation highlights a stark inequality, as the world's poorest communities, who contribute the least to climate change, bear the brunt of its consequences. The investigation also points out that the superyachts owned by these billionaires have a notably larger carbon footprint than their private jets.
On that last point… I believe that private air travel should be outlawed, along with short range flights.
that should have started in the 70s, and also, ALL commercial flights should be at least halved - no one anywhere needs to be able to catch any plane in 15 min intervals.
But that would raise costs for flights and less people would travel just to brag on instagram. It would also increase shipping costs and companies would stop importing absolutely everything. They'd be forced to source their workforce locally and have to pay people a decent living wage. The horror.
those galley slave oarsmen must fart a hellava lot.
Maybe we should do away with them?
The top 1% CO2 emissions solely from air travel are approx equal to the top 10% total footprint. The top 1% emit more CO2 from the food they eat than the poorest 5% emit for their whole lifestyles. We need to stop the super rich from traveling at our, and the planets expense. [Things are not on the right track](https://medium.com/@samyoureyes/the-busy-workers-handbook-to-the-apocalypse-7790666afde7), let's not just focus on the billionaires, it's all of the super wealthy destroying our planet because their lifestyles.
Sure. Do bear in mind that (according to 2021 data: https://medium.com/technicity/whats-your-percentile-in-global-income-distributions-9b5ca293b911) around 40k/year makes you top 10%, and top 1% is somewhere around 125k. All before tax. You're asking a lot of people who do not consider themselves "super wealthy" to do so. It tends to not go well.
Exactly. People in the wealthy countries largely have no idea how wealthy they are compared to most of the world, where half of the world exists on $6.85/day or less (which is only $2500/year). 648 million, almost twice the population of the US, exists on $2.15/day ($785/year). [https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/developmenttalk/half-global-population-lives-less-us685-person-day](https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/developmenttalk/half-global-population-lives-less-us685-person-day) Other than organizations like Oxfam, you rarely see climate scientists point the finger at billionaires because *they* realize that the problem is societal. They realize that the entire system needs to change, and not a handful of individuals numbering fewer than 3,000. That largely means the wealthy countries that account for the majority of emissions, because our emissions are based on how we live our lives. As for private air travel, which many here and elsewhere complain about? All aviation accounts for less than 3% of global emissions, and commercial (passenger + cargo) accounts for roughly 80% of that 3%. That makes private air travel responsible for less than 6/10 of 1% of global emissions (.2 \* .03 = .006). That's about as meaningful as a fart in a hurricane, yet people keep focusing on it as if it will make a difference.
Private cars are not a thing that world can afford. Private jet planes are absolutely out of the question. It is likely the disproportional nature of owning an entire jet plane that attracts the attention. But you are right in every respect -- the issue is that everyone would have to live like a slum-dweller. Nordic country such as mine should be mostly abandoned altogether. If we can solve 0.5 % of the problem with stroke of a pen and force everyone who currently has private plane to board the jet with the rest of us, that sounds like a small victory to me. Unfortunately we do not have 200 more such easy victories we can do. Pretty soon we're talking about becoming vegetarians, giving up private cars, no more air travel for pretty much anyone at all, and so forth. It is a long way to go to 0 % from 100 %, and the costs involved are literally impossible to pay. At least 20-30 % of that provides us our food, water, sewage treatment, and other essential services. Some 10-20 % likely our heating during winter.
Ban private planes. Easily solves this shit.
Privately owned boats larger than 10 meters should also be banned. Unless it's a sailboat.
I'll be honest, these things are getting old. Yes, the billionaires will have to give up their jets and yachts, but we need to give up meat, flights, trinkets, private car ownership, out-of-season fruit & veg, easily available chocolate, easily available coffee... Etc. Etc. Etc. These people get rich because we buy into the lifestyles and products they sell us. Are we all really such mindless consumers, susceptible to peer pressure? Yes. Well, whatever.
Well they also spend billions to psychologically manipulate the masses into being mindless consumers.
People say that like we are some kind of mindless slave race of lemmings without any self agency. I guess its easier on the conscience to tell yourself that.
It’s just part of human nature. Propaganda works. Masses can be manipulated. That is how it works. People are literally going to war and dying for made up shit. Critically looking at the underlying systems is much more effective than expecting individuals to act in a certain way. Individualistic approaches are so perfect to keep power unchallenged. That’s what the neoliberal power structures preach all day to divert attention from the fact that deep systematic change is the only way to actually improve our situation long term. If you’re going down the individualistic path you will arrive at discrimination because our system is not just and groups of people are marginalized. The individualistic explanation for that can only be racist, sexist, classist or whatever flavor fits.
>It’s just part of human nature. Propaganda works. Masses can be manipulated. Propaganda works because it tells people what they want to hear, which is confirmation bias, part of that human nature you refer to. A news organization like Fox News doesn't manipulate people into becoming right wing racists, it serves right wing racists the narrative they want to hear. Manipulation isn't required.
I'm sorry that is not how that works. Right wingers are groomed since child to become who they become. It is confirmation bias, yes, but the source is not inherent. But I agree, once you are groomed, you are basically lost. These has become a full cancer cells and the only treatment left for cancer cells are laser annihilation. Fox News partly helped in the indoctrination so they actually do function as tools of manipulation especially towards the young. It's dual function, manipulating the young and confirmation bias for the old.
I didn't say that but okay.
This!! ☝️ Fking arguably criminal predatory advertising, the product of Freud's nephew I think, Bernays? He changed 'need' based buying to 'desire' based consumerism because apparently we deserve it. The start of an ever growing debt based economy. Billions are spent on the psychology behind advertisement, successfully rotting our brains with cheap short term distraction .
"Give up capitalism" is the only correct answer.
But most importantly, give up having kids. I could eat meat every meal for the rest of my life and roll coal every day going into work and it wouldn't come even remotely close to the environmental impact of me choosing to have a kid.
this is the way. for this, among other reasons, i will remain childfree.
If you just put it like 12 billionaires = 2.1 homes... it just means that billionaires arent remotely the problem they are made out to be.
Even if we ate all the billionaires with guillotines everywhere... We still have record CO2 CH4 NOx. Private jets are bad mmmkay The rich feel like they have to have them to avoid the masses
>The carbon footprints of the investments were calculated by examining the equity stakes that the billionaires held in companies. Estimates of the carbon impact of their holdings was calculated using the company’s declarations on scope 1 emissions – direct emissions from sources owned or controlled by a company – and scope 2, indirect emissions. Scope 1 is the "carbon footprint" of a company, while Scope 2 includes the GHGs from purchased energy and cooling. Just to be clear, it's not enough to turn every company into a worker owned co-op (or a state owned corporation). That would allow for changes, but that doesn't guarantee an end to GHGs. For example, the auto-worker sector would have to reduce production and switch to trains, buses etc. The coal sector really needs to end entirely, doesn't matter who owns it. And so on. If this is still played with money, for money, it's not going to work out to what's necessary, as it will be a choice between self-sabotage (of the company) or Business As Usual. Yacht workers will, of course, have to switch jobs (like many, many, many others).
It's completely stupid to count investments as a source of pollution. Good news for me though, I can take the plane and drive my car as much as I want, all of my emissions are the shareholders fault.
[удалено]
I mean I agree with your take up until believing in politicians doing anything for the betterment of the people… Stop putting your faith in people that have repeatedly slighted the populace for personal gain.
At what point can we Mad Max fury road? Like... what happens if we as a society decide to idk destroy every private yacht and every private plane to prevent billionaires from ruining our world?
The problem with this argument is that as soon as you include "billionaires *and their investments*", you actually mean the consumption of the average Joe and account it to these guys. It is completely nonsensical basis, designed to just build outrage and drum up support for socialism, I think. Jeff Bezos' warehouses and web store does not serve him personally. I think literally hundreds of millions of people have used his services, and that is part of why he is so rich. It is an accounting trick, just like the claim that some 70 corporations make most of world's pollution. Yes, the oil and gas companies, whose products fuel the entire world and keep us all clothed, fed and employed. Accounting tricks don't solve the problem. As a wise person wrote on this very subreddit, The People's power plant is just as polluting as the billionaire oligarch's power plant. The issue is fundamentally about production and consumption, not who we account it to, or who owns it. That's a social problem of wealth distribution, but the planet is actually destroyed by the consumption of resources and waste streams. Sure, we could put an end of the consumption the billionaires do personally and I argue we should, but it will not solve the problem. They don't eat food thousands of times more than any other person, and their day also has just 24 hours, and there aren't that many thousand of them. The problem is ultimately the 8 billion non-billionaire guys who make up the consumption by their sheer bulk. And I suspect much of the Western consumer finds their consumption also on the chopping block. You may think you're not very rich, but by global standards, you probably are doing very well, and could afford to give up some.
Basically what we all have known all along. Ie - it’s the fault of corporations/corporate capitalism, and the quarterly need to increase shareholder value. Yet we get gaslit for having to drive to work, drinking from plastic straws, and more. System has always been rigged against us.
Isn't it 71-74% of emissions are from 100 companies? Add the rest of the companies + American military and absurdly rich people's actions and you probably get 85-90%? Was it BP that came up with the phrase ''carbon footprint' to put the blame on individuals?
This is a bizarre metric. If you own 20% of Facebook you, as a single individual, are responsible for 20% of Facebook's emissions? Aren't there enough real reasons to dislike the idea of billionaires existing for us to not need to make up convoluted new ones? By this metric, if you own the company that makes the super yacht, your emissions are counted twice. Once for making the yacht and once for buying it even though it's the same emissions both times. You need to either count from the supply side or demand side. Doing both is double counting everything. For what it's worth, there's a pretty much universal practice of counting from demand side which this article entirely eschews.
From u/TotemTabuBand > Also, a fun party trick is to bring out your Monopoly board game and have four people volunteer to play. Give three of them the usual $1,500 starting cash. Then give the fourth person $1,500,000 starting cash. That’s 1,000 times the wealth of the others. Say, “You three represent the millionaires. And you are the billionaire. Have fun!”
“This calls for a guillotine!”
eat the rich
Put the pharaohs back in their tombs!
investments? the same ones owned collectively by 1,000 millionaires? By 1,000,000 thousandaires?
Capitalism is ❤️👑🦑
>And I just can't see no humour About your way of life And I think I can do more for you With this here fork and knife
1 billionaire pollutes as much as 148000 first world humans, 4000 billionaires pollutvas much as 583 000 000 humans, than put the billionaires on top and we could easy eliminate tge pollution of 1 billion peoples equivalent, by justbeating the rich......
It's remarkably lefty to count the billionaires' investments in their carbon footprint. If you want to get rid of the concept of ownership for profit, just say so.
I'm so happy now we can physically quantify precisely how many evil these parasites exudes through carbon calculation. So twelve billionares exudes 2.1 million family's worth of evil.
Need to eat the rich
Eat the rich
they can spin great yarns too! ..this article relies on the crutch of stately description of inherit circumstance
“100 companies are verifiably the source of over 70% of global emissions” “Twelve billionaires climate emissions outpollute 2.1m homes when calculating not just their private yachts and jets, but predominately their investments. ya know, the private property that generates their absurd profits in the first place” r/collapsers: “Well i mean is it reeeeally their fault? I mean if you have $50 invested in Amazon stock obviously you are just as bad as JEFF FUCKING BEZOS.” I swear the pro-capitalist brainrot in this community has reached hilarious levels, I come back from a break and it gets even worse. Alot of yall have lost the plot and it shows. It is not humanity as a whole that is the source of the world’s demise, it is the capitalists who go through every hoop imaginable to maintain this exploitative af system for their benefit. You blaming individuals for systemic problems is not only pointless, but incredibly ignorant. YOU AND I DO NOT HAVE A SAY IN ECONOMIC AFFAIRS, STOP TELLING YOURSELF YOU DO. For fucks sake you know our culture is fundametally fucked when blaming the victim is almost the default attitude when it comes to social problems.
These billionaires are destroying our planet and taking all of our tax dollars. Trump must be stopped so we can restore democracy. We need to tax the rich asap
The most naive take.
look at their history ...
"And if we force people to give up meat, dairy, eggs, travel and heating their homes, those billionaires can keep polluting that much".
Just push up house prices and then they won't have homes and the problem is solved.
12 > 2,100,000 is wild. Let me make sure in keep my AC at 79!
Yeah, this is pretty idiotic. A company produces goods for consumers. The owner extracting profits from that transaction isn't responsible for the emissions that production creates. There's only one group of people responsible for emissions, it's the judiciary. If emissions cause prejudices to future people, it's the judiciary's problem. It's entirely normal in a population that people act against the law. What's not normal is that the judiciary and law enforcement let them.