Comment by Eddy_Viscosity2
15 hours ago
The controversy is over whether we should learn more about it and take appropriate actions, or ignore it. This fundamental disagreement makes it a controversial topic.
Reminds me of the when all the catholic priests were molesting kids and being moved around instead of outed and prosecuted. This was also a controversial topic too for the same reasons. Some people wanted to take action, while other (more powerful) people wanted to ignore it.
In the US, sure.
In Australia we established a Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, looked at all the schools and institutions regardless of creed (and, it turned out, the Christian Brothers were the clear worst of the worst - although few came away unscathed) and then put a senior Vatican Cardinal on trial.
TBH it's been a lot harder to get the worst carbon offenders under close scrutiny in a very public eye.
Check out the timing. The sex abuse scandal broke in the US in the late 90s/early 2000s and the fight went on here for many years before it spread to the rest of the church.
The church in Rome was blowing it off as an American problem for many years.
That Australian commission was established in 2012. The battle had already been going on for well over a decade in the US.
If you want to see how things were going early on you can look at things like Sinéad O'Connor stuff from 1992:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin%C3%A9ad_O'Connor_on_Saturd...
The Australian Commission wasn't the first effort in a known problem ongoing since first landing, it was the peak response in Australia after many decades of battle ... has there been a national effort of a similar scope in the US ?
As a leading exporter of coal Australia isn't really a good example of a serious climate actor.
Australia has the highest number of solar panels per capita in the world. Australia has extremely high uptake on EV's given the cheap solar.
Australia is about as serious as you get in terms of climate action without being unreasonable. We need power, you can't switch off coal overnight. We also need the country to remain afloat, we cannot turn off all natural resource exports either.
Australia's a good example of a country that sells out its resources for a pittance NSR in exchange.
We can talk about Indian coal companies (Thermal), global steel demand (Metallurgical), US natural gas extractors, etc.
Still, at least we have the vast areas untouched by modern man: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rh9IkUUgaww
Is that better than the US response? By the time the Royal Commission started, the total amount the Catholic Church in the US had paid out was approaching a billion dollars (back when a billion dollars could buy you instagram). Dioceses have continued to pay since then and many had to file for bankruptcy protection in the US.
That seems like a more severe response than a single cardinal getting arrested.
The comment I responded to seemed to imply that the US was hung between two paths and took no action.
I'm pleased to hear a response was made and hope Eddy_Viscosity2 sees your comment.
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It's important to note that the US has the largest number of Protestants (across all denominations) among all countries.
It’s true. In the US reality itself has become controversial. Maybe the oligarchs’ lies are just as valid as objective reality? Who can say!
Everyone wants someone else to deal with it. It's like we have a live grenade and rather than defusing it or disposing of it we keep passing it around hoping it explodes on someone else.
I see no controversy there, yes we should take some very strong action since we literally crap where we live and we only have 1 self-contained room for it all, the debate (not controversy) should be about which steps are most efficient, while not ruining the economy albeit some acceptable setback is probably unavoidable.
So no to dumb fuckery EU did with biofuels (for which vast rainforests in ie Borneo had to be cut down forever), no destruction of local automotive industry while rest of the world couldn't care less. And Yes to many other, saner activities, of which some are done, in some places.
You're being downvoted, probably for being abrasive, but I agree with your overall point.
When I was younger and more naive, this > "the debate (not controversy) should be about which steps are most efficient") i
is what I thought (american) politics meant. When people talked about things being political or arguments related thereto, this is what I imagined happening.
Then I grew older and saw it was mostly people whining about gays getting married or who was allowed to have an abortion or what activities minorities were allowed to participate in.
Very depressing, frankly.