Yesterday was National Bike-to-Work Day, for those who care about such things (and even those who don't). As things turned out, yesterday was the one day that self the loser didn't bike to work. Naturally, of course, purity-trolls responsible for the current state of the nation would tell 3CM off for being such a hypocrite on National Bike-to-Work Day, of all days, by not biking to work. It wouldn't matter to them that the reason that I didn't bike to work was because of an event after work where it wouldn't have been practical to bike over from work, especially in 80+ degree temperatures, where had I bicycled over, I undoubtedly would have skanked up the place inappropriately. Nor would it matter to purity trolls that earlier this month, I biked to my dentist, and also to my doctor, for respective checkups, as I live within semi-reasonable biking distance of both. But then purity trolls are all big talk that accomplishes nothing, and destructive real-world action that causes horrific damage, after all.
Of course, when practical, if one can bike to work, i.e. not drive, and there is a reasonably safe bike route to work, it is good in many ways to bike to work. it's one less car on the road (big picture), not to mention good activity for the biker's health (individual picture). But it is fair to wonder how much difference it makes in the big picture. Just because I bike to work sometimes doesn't mean that other people will.
This "Comment is free" blog post from Emily Mulligan at
The Guardian rather brusquely states, whether one agrees with the idea or not, about individual actions and climate change:
"It is liberalism’s most dangerous lie that an individual’s action can solve problems of this scale."
Granted, there are other candidates for delusions about the world that liberals believe, e.g. that simply stating real facts will automatically convince Americans to vote our way, but I take her meta-point. Mulligan does comment earlier:
"It’s not surprising that in response to a problem this huge, this existential, people seek out something they can do, from using a keep cup to being fastidious with the recycling. It makes us feel better, it gives us something tangible to do, it stops us from despairing."
Or biking to work, for that matter. Mulligan does have a point that a single person's small-scale action, e.g. me biking to work and recycling as much as I can, will not halt climate change all by itself. However, the larger point is that the actions of millions, and billions, of people together, by their actions and choices, can mitigate climate change, if we choose to make those responsible choices. But, of course, we don't, as noted by Mulligan's question posited in her essay:
"So why have we, as people with everything to lose, not acted sooner?"
The answer is fairly simple, unfortunately. We, in the Western world, don't want to give up, or even cut back on, our resource-devouring, gluttonous lifestyles, because of all the conveniences that they offer. We like turning on the AC in the summer and the heat in the winter, to adjust the micro-environments in our homes to our liking, ignorant of the cost to the environment at large. We like being able to traverse distances in cars and planes that aren't practical on foot - or on a bike, for that matter. We're spoiled rotten, we like it that way, and we don't like to think about the price in terms of resources and the environment.
Using biking to work as an example, when I choose to bike to work, I accept several inconveniences and "prices" of the choices, such as:
* It will take me 4x longer to get to work on a bike than in a car.
* On a really hot summer day, I'll be dripping from the effort. So I obviously have to towel off and get changed before actually going to my work desk. (Going home, of course, that doesn't matter.)
Maybe this sounds overly cost-benefit analytical and emotionally chilly to some. And the health benefits are, in a way, hidden and not obvious, although my blood pressure from the visit to the doc (OK, the nurse practitioner) seemed reasonable.
Mulligan then goes on to say:
"So people need to act collectively. The first step is getting involved in this year’s election, when governments are most susceptible to influence. The most important thing we can do is try and influence government decisions."
Mulligan is based in Australia, and ironically enough, Labor got trounced in the Australian general election this week, partly because of its "unlikable" leader, Bill Shorten. (Sound familiar?) Or, as Kate Lyons put it
here in
The Guardian:
"It was billed as the climate change election, and the climate lost.
Despite enduring its hottest year on record and a series of environmental calamities that have brought the climate emergency into sharp relief, Australia has voted for the centre-right Liberal party and its coalition partner, and against taking forceful action on the climate crisis."
So enough Aussie voters this week proved as short-sighted and stupid as voters here in November 2016, where the "unlikability" of one party leader overrode policy issues. Of course, we’re not a country to talk, thanks to the purity trolls who offed us in November 2016, and are ready to do it all again next November, if their favored candidate isn’t the Democratic POTUS nominee. So sorry, Emily Mulligan: a plurality of your compatriots voted against your way (stupidly so, to be sure) just this week, and there’s your answer for why things won’t change at this time.
With that, time for the standard SNLC protocol, namely your loser stories for the week....