Does this weather change your attitude to climate change?

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It seems like everyone is taking about the weather but no one is thinking about their own personal responsibility to climate change as a result, AIBU to think we are all abdicating responsibility while we can see the dramatic effects all around us? I feel sometimes like in the only one concerned

Came on to say this really.
Really there’s zero chance of people meaningfully reducing carbon emissions until governments legislate. Reducing your washing machine to 30 degrees will make sod all difference in the grand scheme of things.
Also it’s really unfair to not expect the poorest in the world to want supermarkets full of cheap food, good transport infrastructure and nice homes when they’ve seen us in the west have it for years.

I wonder when we're going to get to the point that somebody in power who is committed to seriously reducing CO2 levels honestly acknowledges that the one thing that's constantly pumping out immense quantities of it is... all of us.

Will we see a more draconian worldwide version of the Chinese one-child policy? Or will they decide that we simply don't have enough time to wait for the older generations to die off and be replaced by much lower numbers of younger generations, so far more urgent and decisive 'action' needs to be taken NOW?

Will the rich be exempt from any measures and/or be able to buy their way out of the responsibilities that are forced on everybody else, as they usually do?

Who knows?

Agree with this 100x over. Morals/consciences can guide actions to a small degree but then bigger the sacrifice/inconvenience that is being required, the more you need a rules-based system with consequences (whether that's a n actual law or a tax consequence).
Let's not pretend that, for instance, when a nation goes to war, its populace can be left to its own devices to organise armies/defences etc. This is what governments are (meant to be) for.

It's our job to let them know that we really really want them to tackle this. Given that our electoral system is such a flawed and ineffective tool, I suggest anyone concerned looks to other means (I.e engage in the climate action movement at a level that suits them, be that mild, moderate or more disruptive). We won't get the leadership until we make our voices louder.

I know quite a few climate sceptics from all walks of life, but what they all have in common is an almost pathological aversion to 'being told what to do'. Which means they're also all covid sceptics. And don't like paying tax.

Yes I've found this too. Also they're all Brexiters who wanted their sovereignty back.

Sure:

https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-by-country/

https://www.statista.com/statistics/270499/co2-emissions-in-selected-countries/

The whole UK could disappear with virtually no effect on global emissions. It’s out of our hands. China and India are the problem and they don’t care.

I became disillusioned when Putin invaded Ukraine. His actions will have released millions of tonnes of GHGs into the atmosphere. At the same time we heard about the footprints of various oligarch's and their yachts. It would take me hundreds of years to rack up the emissions that they put out in just one.

I'm not going to go "fuck it" and buy a gas-guzzler, I'll still keep my own conscience clear. I'll just do my best for the planet in the knowledge that we're screwed whatever I do.

Another way of looking at it is that the carbon footprint of a British person is about 10 tCO2 per year, whereas an Indian person's is 1 tCO2 and a Chinese's is 5.
In the UK, 40% of emissions come from households; it turns out its more your responsibility than that of individual Indians or Chinese.
Obvs the UK is a low emitter because we buy most of our stuff from China. Do you think we have green lifestyles and the Indians and Chinese are energy hogs? Their emissions are yours too

This guy seems a bit of a smug twat but he's got a point.

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZGJV2UFQk/

I found this report fascinating: clear, sobering and solutions-focussed. www.unep.org/interactive/six-sector-solution-climate-change/
It repeats "Actions are required at every level: government, private sector and the public". If you want to wash our hands off it, sorry but it can't be in good conscience.
The good news is that some of the big changes are pretty painless - switch to a green utility company, and avoid food waste, for instance. (Food rotting in landfill produces methane, which is 30 times more potent than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas.) As for flying, if you want and can afford to, you can offset your flights through some charities.
There was a Covid-related improvement to the climate btw, though I don't remember the details.

I too was really hopeful, but it didn't take long for people to go back to their old habits It's always someone else's problem apparently.

Yes, it's the same where I live, less and less snow on the mountains every year. Winters here are getting milder all the time, and the flooding in parts of the country this year is next level.

I live in Greece, and I don’t have air conditioning at home. So yes, things like this do concern me, and to make me think. And yes, I have said on those threads where people are wishing the heat wave would go to the UK, would they like the fires and the people who really suffer as well?

The cost of running air conditioning here is quite high, so even when people do have it, they only use it for a short amount of time each day and use the fan in the morning if they can, or do their best to just get by. People have been told if they work in a bakery in the heat is too hot, the bakery can shut between 12 and 5 PM if the temperature goes over 40°, so habits do have to change.

in general, people eat seasonally here, so very hard to find fruits and other things that are not in season. The way of life is very different here, more relaxed, and I think in a lot of ways people are more conscientious about what they do and how they live. Not everyone of course, but many.

we can all do our part to help the planet, but people don’t act unless it really affects them and people in the UK who see our heat wave I just think it’ll be OK because we’re only in it for a week, don’t realize the impact it has on the people who live in those places. Someone said to me when I moved in, oh where are the air conditioning vents?? News, but most places in Spain, France, Italy do not have air-conditioning and in Greece there are so many homes you don’t have air-conditioning

Lifetime Labour voter, want to Torries out, but I might vote for the Greens in the next election regardless of tactical voting considerations or any other aspect of the Green Party’s platform.

A sudden swing in support towards the Green Party is, I suspect, the only thing that will make politicians prioritize climate change.

And yes, I’m aware that we’d need similar to occur across many other countries but it would be a start…

Personally I see it as a waste of time and a tax theft and I will be dead before I care, let me explain.

If we went 100% renewable and recycled everything, at best 2% of global emissions, so all the third world wanting better facilities make it a waste of time.

First world oversight with third world pollution reduction better value at scale.

I would rather buy a hybrid or set fire to money, than buy an EV.
The EV battery has dubious third world practices
The EV new out of my price range and for depreciation I can buy and run a second hand car
The fuel is more expensive and less convenient
My old car still has same range as new.
EV written off for, slight battery damage in accident, take 14% longer to repair and if crashed 15m between EV in storage yard or scrap yard.

I'm convinced every decade I have been alive some mass hysteria to keep people in state of fear- simply don't read the news it's all hysterical.

The pandemic working in less than ideal circumstances, concluded if you were elderly or Co-Morbid-watch out, otherwise travel by road higher risk and higher deaths per 100,000 in my lifetime in UK.
😉 Google image search "Build Back Better"
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/build-back-better-our-plan-for-growth

Exactly.
You can either live on every hysterical news article of tune out of the narrative for the decade.
Allegedly there will be mass flooding, but councils and government allow new houses on flood plain predicted areas🤔

Electric cars weren't developed to save the planet. They were developed to save the car industry.

If you want a green way of getting about, you need to walk/cycle/use public transport in that order.

No, I could not have a smaller "carbon footprint" if I tried. It's not my fucking fault. I blame all of you (kidding). Apart from that I don't care, there's literally fuck all I can do. I do think the blame has been purposely shifted on to individuals, whilst the people at the top jet about, fuck them all.

I also think people at the top would give more of a shit if it was real. It's the next thing to virtue signal about now covid has been done to death.

Agree, bloody Obama buying beachfront property whilst my kids are being brainwashed that the whole of the UK will be under water 20 years from now cunts.

Agreed
I've had several V8 cars and paid for them in fuel duty.
It seems that society needs to have a constant hysterical narrative and Facebook look at my crappy life that is slightly less crap than yours.

Invest time in family and friends, make happy memories, don't get dragged into a narrative designed to make you unsettled and craving next virtual addiction hit.

Stopped consuming media, the world didn't end and better for it, news media and governments keep people unsettled and manipulated.

👏👏👏

If someone has been teaching your kids that the UK will be under water in 20 years, show them maps of predicted sea level rises by 2100. To my eye, that looks like about 5% of the UK in ~75 years. Of course, rising sea levels isn’t the only negative effect of climate change.

The Obama’s Martha’s Vineyard property shouldn’t be affected by sea level rises during at least his or his children’s lifetimes. No doubt it’s also insured. Someone deciding to live near the coast isn’t an act of climate change denial.

Gosh you can complete climate change denial bingo in this thread!

I advocated for change in the 80's and 90's when it was a hole in the ozone we were worried about. Now I'm starting to think that this is how it's meant to be, we are the masters of our own demise and that's natures cycle. We are such a tiny blip on this small blue dot in the middle of something we can't even measure to its fullest extent. Maybe we are just meant to have this fleeting moment and the universe will go on without us. Sad as that prospect is maybe in 65 million years we will be the dinosaurs.