EU citizen's initiative for a new law on fossil fuel ads

[asbak]

Oh dear, have the extreme shouty folk even taken over here

1) Why is it "extreme" and "shouty" to question the sanity of campaigns against the very things that sustain your entire existence?
2) Are you going to take a principled stance in support of the OP and give up all those bad things that make mother gaia cry?
3) What is your solution, explain how the Al Gore paradise will work from A to Z. Will it include magic and nice hippy vibes?

Simple questions.

[milkii]

There's no ethical consumption under capitalism.

[Largos]

I am sure most people here live in situations where the only reasonable way to get regular safe drinking water is by a solution where somewhere along the way fossil fuel usage is involved by some first, second, third etc party. Also, not everyone has an "option" to go choke a chicken by hand for dinner to not appear "hypocritical".

You are avoiding the reality that the pro "let's start banning fossil fuels" people have a choice to change their lifestyles, and change starts with them.
It's a wonderful world these people live in. They want to keep using all the benefits of the same system they want to deny to others.

There's no reality to ignore, no-one on this thread said ban fossil fuels. Otherwise you are talking about "they" which manifests itself as a figure for you to project a prejudiced standpoint on.

Right there is a beautiful example of the dream green world. There is no such thing as a 100% renewable energy supplier. It's a total fantasy made up by marketers.

Magic windmills and solar panels do not generate reliable, consistently available energy and are incapable of operating without the use of real power stations which maintain and balance the grid baseload, these power stations have to always be turned on and kept running.

40% of energy in my country is produced with renewable sources, it's entirely possible to be with an energy supplier that only buys from these sources and I am.

Follow the argument to its logical conclusion instead of being short-sighted.
Are you also not aware that the sale of ICE vehicles are to be banned quite soon in Europe?
Have you not, uh, considered what the implications - reaching way beyond cars - are going to be?

That Europe will be less reliant on oil producing countries run by various despots?

Switching to what. Do you really believe that magic electricity solutions can replace the petro-chemical industry & fossil fuels.
Things are not that simple in the real world.

I live in the UK which has replaced a third of it's electricity generation with renewable in the past 10 years and in the long term IIRC intends in the medium term to use a mix of renewable and nuclear power. So, there's some magic there.

We're living a situation where people's living costs are rising highly because of the rising costs of fossil fuels, which is one of the reasons it's really not smart to rely on these things in the long term. Fossil fuels are finite, heavily subject to markets, controlled mostly by countries foreign to those buying and that's beside any environmental concerns. All in all, they are not that reliable themselves.

[asbak]

I think some of you are missing the point.

Calling for bans on this and that is a slippery slope. Today it is advertising Shell go faster juice. Tomorrow it will be banning Shell for the typical consumer.

Official UK Govt policy as far as I know is to ban sales of the ICE car by 2030. That's 8 years from now, not much time.

For better or worse, society around us has been built up for decades and decades around fossil fuel consumption and the petro-chemical industry. It cannot be undone and changed in a short space of time without creating a situation that do-gooders will find untenable and probably even problematic to survive.

Making any particular change in such a critical sphere has massive consequences and knock-on effects, effects that have not been thought through and are not understood by the garden variety treehugger and do-gooder.

The politicians and EUrocrats are only too happy to give these astroturfed ecomobs and the sheep who follow them what they demand. In the end the ecomobs will be getting a lot more than they bargained for. There will be a price to pay.

It's a case of "buyer beware", and I'll leave it at that. Some will be smart enough to figure the rest out.

[asbak]

There's no ethical consumption under capitalism.

And under Socialism, Communism and WEF Technocracy some of us animals will be more equal than others.

It doesn't make a difference under what ideology and system society is organized because in the end they always work the same way.
An organized gang of the more equal members of society will exploit the disorganized less equal members of society.

That's the universal law.

One could fight to change this, but, no matter how hard you try things will revert back to this order just like water sloshing around a glass balances itself out once you put it down.

[sunrat]

Oh dear, have the extreme shouty folk even taken over here

They have been reading Book of Faces and Tweeter again.

I considered making a reasoned reply to highlight some of the half-truths and misconceptions posted so far, but there's not not much reasoning in those posts anyway.
Here's an interesting article about South Australia reaching 100% renewable power for 6.5 days. They are still expanding the generation and storage of which the first 4 Tesla giant battery arrays were installed in 2017 with 2 more planned.
https://reneweconomy.com.au/south-austr ... es-record/

[merlyn]

I'll just come out and say it and leave it to the insane Church of Science people ...

Anti-science, eh? No wonder you can't get a realtime kernel working.

[Loki Harfagr]

And the girl in the corner said, "Boy I want to warn you" It'll turn into a ballroom blitz
Ballroom blitz, ballroom blitz, ballroom blitz, ballroom blitz


Weeeeezeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

[asbak]

Anti-science, eh? No wonder you can't get a realtime kernel working.

lol

It worked just fine, until I tried to do things like run VMs at which point it just became a pointless chore.
Since my system already works just great without it (low latency, virtual synths, guitar fx, the world!), why keep knocking squares into round holes?

Now if I were running a CNC operation then nothing less than a dedicated machine & a RT kernel will do.

[Loki Harfagr]

Thoud I'd rather have a solid safe word than any RT kernel for your CNC op. proposal

[milkii]

There's no ethical consumption under capitalism.

And under Socialism, Communism and WEF Technocracy some of us animals will be more equal than others.

It doesn't make a difference under what ideology and system society is organized because in the end they always work the same way.
An organized gang of the more equal members of society will exploit the disorganized less equal members of society.

That's the universal law.

One could fight to change this, but, no matter how hard you try things will revert back to this order just like water sloshing around a glass balances itself out once you put it down.

Sounds like you're a cynic. I'm cynical about your understanding of how communities and politics work in general, or your ability to be constructive.

[PieterPenninckx]

@asbak, I agree with your statement that everybody on this forum somehow has some benefit from using fossil fuel. I admit using fossil fuels: I use gas for heating my home, I have bought products (clothes, food, ...) where fossil fuels have been used in the production processes and for transportation and I also use services (like this website) for which fossil fuels are used for the operation.
On top of that, if you look at my efforts to reduce my usage of fossil fuels, most of these have an immediate, personal benefit: either financial benefits (not owning a car, turning down the heat, eating less meat, being mindful about my electricity usage, buying less goods, using second-hand products, repairing stuff, eating more seasonal and local foods, ...), health benefits (using my bike instead of a car or bus, eating less meat) or both, so most of my efforts are not about giving up something.

I initially started this thread. When I read the reactions, I feel disconnected because I love this community and I like being part of this group and engage in friendly discussions. I still have some questions for asbak, but I fear asking them here would only cause more commotion. So I'll continue the discussion via PM (if that's ok for you, asbak).

[asbak]

Hi Pieter,

It's always valid to think of ways and suggestions to make improvements because things are definitely not ideal now. My personal skepticism wasn't aimed so much at making improvements but at questioning the solutions that are being fed to us, and questioning whether some of these issues are a problem really that needs a solution.

The current "flavour of the week" solutions in popular circulation and which the media promote endlessly and which so many people seem to believe in has me very unconvinced because many of them seem unworkable, poorly thought through or simply scams to achieve end results for the people who promote them that we are being kept unaware of. Not every person with power, money and influence wants to make your life better. Some of these people are evil.

Those are my views, others obviously have different ideas about these things.

If I were you I wouldn't lose sleep about upsetting a few forum members by asking questions or debating possibilities. There are too many people today who become hysterical and offended when their ideologies and cults are not worshipped. This has to end because they are creating a Dark Ages kind of society where there is only (according to them) one truth, one answer, one *science (*that has little to do with real science). That's not a world any sane person wants to live in.

To get back to your questions, it's a very complex topic. The solutions put forward by the media, celebrities, child prophets and extremely wealthy and well funded "green" organizations mostly do not work in my opinion. I suspect the only solution that will be effective - and this will be upsetting to some people to hear - is population reduction.

In short
- Population reduction
- More efficient use of resources, less waste
- Better efforts at recycling
- Clamping down on highly destructive and polluting activities everywhere, including in the food chain where processed foods are laced with additives that are unhealthy


My personal view is that a transition from fossil fuel and the petro-chemical industry to "green" is a fantasy. It is a complete and utter impossibility unless people are going to give up their current lifestyles and live off the land as it was done in the era before mass industrialisation, electrification and migrations to the cities. Not a single person on this forum will do that, even if they claim otherwise. Even if they did (personally), it would not solve the overall problem because the rest of the world are not going to copy what they are doing.

On top of that, if you look at my efforts to reduce my usage of fossil fuels, most of these have an immediate, personal benefit: either financial benefits (not owning a car, turning down the heat, eating less meat, being mindful about my electricity usage, buying less goods, using second-hand products, repairing stuff, eating more seasonal and local foods, ...), health benefits (using my bike instead of a car or bus, eating less meat) or both, so most of my efforts are not about giving up something.

In European cities we often have the possibility to get along without a car. US cities are usually not well served by public transport and populations often live in suburbs, far away from centres of commerce. The way society is arranged in the US, most people will be lost without a car. It's unfortunate and it's extremely wasteful but that is the current reality.

Outside of cities and depending on the country and society one lives in, a car may be essential.

I think some of your ideas to be less wasteful are great but I would be very careful about believing the media, government, Klaus and Greta about eating less meat and messing with your diet in other ways. This is a terrible idea imo. My advice (my personal opinion) would be to eat as naturally as you can (meat, dairy, fruit, vegetables, wheat etc) and to not listen to propaganda from dangerous people about what medicines you must take in your life and what you must do with your diet.

[raboof]

It's always valid to think of ways and suggestions to make improvements because things are definitely not ideal now.

I'm happy to see you also be able to discuss your position in a less hyperbolic style.

There are too many people today who become hysterical and offended when their ideologies and cults are not worshipped.

I agree, but to be honest it does seem a bit ironic that you would complain about this - some of your earlier posts in this thread seemed rather akin to "hysterical and offended" to me

I suspect the only solution that will be effective - and this will be upsetting to some people to hear - is population reduction.

I think this is indeed an uncomfortable truth - especially since for many people these words conjure up images of the Chinese one-child policy or dystopian worlds where either some kind of authority decides whether you're "allowed" to have children, or where only the wealthy can afford it. Let's look for other ways .

My personal view is that a transition from fossil fuel and the petro-chemical industry to "green" is a fantasy.

Maybe, but I still see virtue in moving in that direction (as long as the approach makes sense, of course). What's the alternative?

I would be very careful about (...) eating less meat and messing with your diet in other ways. This is a terrible idea imo

Why, necessarily? I agree many diets are scams. I'm often amused by the 'Paleo' diet: "eat like a hunter-gatherer" seems like a terrible starting point, since our lives today look nothing like those of the hunter-gatherers. That said, it might still be better than the "typical" diet we see today, which seems to have been heavily influenced by corporations trying to sell us shit... taking a good look at that seems like a sensible idea to me.

[asbak]

I agree, but to be honest it does seem a bit ironic that you would complain about this - some of your earlier posts in this thread seemed rather akin to "hysterical and offended" to me

It may seem so but there is a critical difference.

I'm OK with agreeing to disagree. (And yes I obviously have my own biases, beliefs and ideology too.)

Cults are not OK with this, there it is verboten because (in the modern and contemporary context) they have "science" (as interpreted by them and which has been turned into a quasi-religion) and "the facts and only facts" (according to them) on their side. In the old days the church operated the same way.

Eventually it leads to cancel culture, government fines, prison sentences and worse for the wrong-thinkers.