The Environment

Moiraine said:
BRB, wealth will forever and always be involved in these discussions. Those with money have the power to do a lot of good, or a lot of bad, and everything in between.

If 5% of the wealthy are pure evil:

a) They can do a lot of damage

b) They should be stopped from doing that damage

c) The topic of how to stop it will be discussed

As for the evil poor, they're usually dealt with by the police.
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Thankyou, but that's not what the discussion was about.

The comment was basically that the poster could understand why the top 1% doesn't care about destroying the earth but doesn't understand why someone making 35,000 year feels the same way.

My point is, it doesn't matter how much money you are making, if your livelihood is drastically negatively affected by something, you are going to find people against it no matter if their reasons are logical or not or if that is a perceived reason or not.

And...BTW....there is big money on both sides of this issue.

 
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BigRedBuster said:
Moiraine said:
BRB, wealth will forever and always be involved in these discussions. Those with money have the power to do a lot of good, or a lot of bad, and everything in between.

If 5% of the wealthy are pure evil:

a) They can do a lot of damage

b) They should be stopped from doing that damage

c) The topic of how to stop it will be discussed

As for the evil poor, they're usually dealt with by the police.
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Thankyou, but that's not what the discussion was about.

The comment was basically that the poster could understand why the top 1% doesn't care about destroying the earth but doesn't understand why someone making 35,000 year feels the same way.

My point is, it doesn't matter how much money you are making, if your livelihood is drastically negatively affected by something, you are going to find people against it no matter if their reasons are logical or not or if that is a perceived reason or not.

And...BTW....there is big money on both sides of this issue.
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Halfway into the discussion you inserted a conditional statement: Given that the person thinks their livelihood is negatively impacted by Green policy. That wasn't the original discussion. Originally you were replying to:
Yeah, I get why the 1% have utter disdain for the planet and all of it's inhabitants.

It's the GOPer that earns $35k a year that goes along with it is what I don't understand.
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To which you replied:
Income doesn't have anything to do with if someone is predestined to not support environmentalism.
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The discussion wasn't about those impacted by Green policy. It was about anti-environment people in general. In general, you could still argue what you're arguing, as long as the general $35k population has the same proportion of people who think they're negatively impacted by Green policy as are wealthy people. I have no idea whether or not they are.
All of that said, maybe I was off track with my post, but it's baffling that you constantly jump to defend billionaires, out of all the other groups you could choose.

One last thing - it's not relevant that there's big $ on the pro-environment side. Anecdotes are useless here. It's tendency that matters. Do billionaires tend to favor Green policy? Are they more likely to favor it than non-billionaires?

 
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Why do you think the 1%ers have utter disdain for the planet and all of it's inhabitants?

The comment implies that they are negatively affected financially.

The second comment about the 35K crowd implied that it's puzzling why they would be against environmental policies because they don't make as much as the 1%ers.

Now....how in the heck am I supposed to take that any other way? My point is, (no matter if it's perception or reality) people of all income levels believe they are negatively affected by environmental policies financially. I even gave examples of that. If the original comment wasn't about trying to say income level makes people more or less environmental friendly, then.....why bring up their incomes? And....if that IS what was being implied, where's the proof of that?

Now....the person who made the original comments hasn't given any reasoning behind his comments.

 
And...about this comment.

All of that said, maybe I was off track with my post, but it's baffling that you constantly jump to defend billionaires, out of all the other groups you could choose.
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I will continue to challenge comments that generalize large groups of people without basis. That's no matter if it's billionaires, poor people, black people, white people, men, women, teenagers...whatever.

You believe I only do it with billionaires because it seems like it's so simple on here to chastise that particular group and so many times it's baseless.

 
I don't think it's baseless commentary to suggest that the wealthy have divergent interests from the working classes. There are legitimate reasons why their monopoly on power is a concern. Of course, no group should be demonized with a broad brush.

 
zoogs said:
I don't think it's baseless commentary to suggest that the wealthy have divergent interests from the working classes. There are legitimate reasons why their monopoly on power is a concern. Of course, no group should be demonized with a broad brush.
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Why would someone with a billion dollars be against environmental regulations more than a person making 36,000 who perceives he lost his job because of them?

 
I'm not arguing that there doesn't exist people at different income levels who have specific reasons for arriving at the same preferences. I'm arguing that it seems reasonable to suggest that highly disparate groups have different interests and policy priorities as a whole.

To the question -- I don't know. Probably because they're a Republican?
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zoogs said:
I'm not arguing that there doesn't exist people at different income levels who have specific reasons for arriving at the same preferences. I'm arguing that it seems reasonable to suggest that highly disparate groups have different interests and policy priorities as a whole.

To the question -- I don't know. Probably because they're a Republican?
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That is all I said. I said it's BS to claim billionaires have a reason to hate the Earth and someone making 35,000 doesn't.

 
Ah, I see.

I do think there are large numbers of poor/working/middle class people who don't fit the parameters you defined who nonetheless are ferociously opposed to climate action. Don't you find that baffling? These people don't have a financial incentive before them. If anything, it's the other way around: climate change impacts the poorest first and most.

I mean, I think the underlying theme here is that it's generally and primarily political affiliation at work.

 
zoogs said:
Ah, I see.

I do think there are large numbers of poor/working/middle class people who don't fit the parameters you defined who nonetheless are ferociously opposed to climate action. Don't you find that baffling? These people don't have a financial incentive before them. If anything, it's the other way around: climate change impacts the poorest first and most.

I mean, I think the underlying theme here is that it's generally and primarily political affiliation at work.
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And, I gave an example of coal miners. Coal has decreased because of many reasons. One in particular being that NG has become much more available and cheaper. BUT....that's not what those people hear. They see all the talk about how dirty coal is and how it's causing global warming and how we all need to move away from coal.

They see THAT as the reason they lost their jobs and can't find new ones in their area. This election is a prime example of that. They voted for Trump because he claimed he was bringing coal jobs back after Obama cut coal....in large part because of climate change issues.

It's baffling on why this is so hard to see when there are very clear examples of it happening. When something negatively affects you financially, it doesn't matter if you are a billionaire or someone making 35,000. You tend to be against it because it hurts you financially.

PS....and also....the "hate the earth and all it's inhabitants" is total BS too. Just because someone is against some environmental issues doesn't mean the hate the earth and all it's inhabitants.

 
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Slightly confused. I'm talking about the people who aren't coal miners. I'm sure you'll agree that your examples are a small subset of non-wealthy voters who are against climate action.

 
zoogs said:
Slightly confused. I'm talking about the people who aren't coal miners. I'm sure you'll agree that your examples are a small subset of non-wealthy voters who are against climate action.
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The coal miners are just one example.

Farmers are affected by environmental regulations too. It's reasonable that they may feel negative feelings.

Workers in steel plants.

Workers in Oil companies who are affected by not being allowed to drill for more oil.

The list can go on and on.

There are certain plastics that are more expensive to produce here than in China because of the processes they are allowed to use there compared to here.

How about anyone who goes and buys a car that's way more expensive because of environmental regulations on emissions controls? I've heard multiple times a mechanic complain about those f'ing emission controls he has to work around to get a job done...or, not even being able to work on certain parts of cars because of it.

Now.....like I said....I'm not saying that all of these feelings are logical or based on reasonable facts. But, those feelings are throughout various income ranges.

 
BigRedBuster said:
And...about this comment.

All of that said, maybe I was off track with my post, but it's baffling that you constantly jump to defend billionaires, out of all the other groups you could choose.
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I will continue to challenge comments that generalize large groups of people without basis. That's no matter if it's billionaires, poor people, black people, white people, men, women, teenagers...whatever.

You believe I only do it with billionaires because it seems like it's so simple on here to chastise that particular group and so many times it's baseless.
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The problem with this explanation is that's almost never what happens in these topics. Regardless of context or whether there's any generalization at all, if anyone mentions anything related to wealth or income, you're there to tell them they hate rich people.
 
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