Is climate change something you care about?

[Teacher Terry]

I am wondering if my condo building will have recycling. In the old days I kept a bin in my guest bedroom and drove it to a recycling place. Those drop off centers no longer exist because people have their recycling picked up at their homes.

[ApatheticNoMore]

I hate recycling so much. But it goes back to the small things, you can completely burn yourself out on small things. When even from a personal perspective a few things have the biggest impact: having less kids (I don't have kids), flying less (it's been over a decade since I flew - some people seem to have the impression this is because I can't afford to fly - LOL that's not true), living without a car (ok I regard this as completely impractical but good if it works for someone), what kind of car you drive if you do have one, plant based diet (I'm an omnivore). Recycling (if it does any good at all) is way below all that.

Education and government recommendations miss the most effective individual actions:
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/1...48-9326/aa7541

But yea I hate recycling with a burning passion. No options are provided for renters to recycle, there are no recycling places, no recycling bins. Literally the only option is to find a HOMEOWNER that will take your recycling.

But if one actually enjoys the little things that's another matter. And species preservation (by planting native plants etc.) has some value independent of the climate change issue.

[iris lilies]

In my city house we have giant recycling cans in the alley. At my condo we have one giant can designated for recycling.

In Hermann, we have the option of driving our recyclables to the town’s recycling center, about a 5 minute drive.

Good options all around.

[catherine]

I have a great interest in nature. Our cattails are disappearing at a fast rate, an invasive grass is replacing them. Oh how pretty those look to many. I see sadness as my beloved red wing blackbirds are disappearing due to nesting space gone in cattails. I have no snakes at my home I moved too, toads are zero, monarchs were gone last year. So I have planted a large patch of milkweed seeds so maybe they will visit. I have ready broken flower pots to set in the gardens for maybe snakes and toads. I have assorted bird boxes ready to hang when the weather breaks for the screech owls, wrens, bluebirds. Small things but I will feel better.

I wonder if climate change activists have their ladder against the wrong wall--or perhaps we need two ladders.

Bill McKibben built his activism on 350ppm in the atmosphere, but how relevant is that to people? It's a number--a theoretical number at which time what will happen?? Will we fall into some dystopia suddenly? Will the earth burn up? Will we be in survival mode? Maybe all those things are true, but how do you get buy-in from people who are facing "armageddon"on a daily basis in terms of just getting their basic needs? How do you get buy-in from people on the other end who would rather have status in the way of Prada bags and big kitchen islands--a desire which is more real to them than some number up in the clouds? And when I say "them" I mean me, too. When I shop at the supermarket, do I buy the $10/lb grassfed beef or the $4.99/lb regular 80/20? I'm trying to downsize my debt and get ready for retirement. So do I "vote with my dollar" or do I put $20 towards my debt? (Just for the record, I try to "vote with my dollar" but DH isn't always on board.)

In market research we always try to uncover the "higher order end benefit" of people. So why do you want Crest toothpaste? Because it's a whitening toothpaste. Why do you want a whitening toothpaste? Because my teeth are getting yellow. Why do you care that your teeth are getting yellow? Because I saw myself in a picture and I was surprised at how yellow they looked. Why does that matter to you? Because I'm embarrassed. Why are you embarrassed? Because all my friends will think I'm old and ugly. Why does that matter to you? Because I want my friends to like and respect me.

So you're not buying toothpaste: You're buying respect and social validation. All marketers know that.

Getting back to how that relates to the environment, the 350.org/climate change movement appeals to fear--people don't want to lose anything--their coastal homes, their food supply. But I think you've hit on another thing, BikingLady: the loss of the natural world, the beauty of it, the diversity of it, the wonder of the balance of nature is something that many cherish and strive to protect, but others are more removed from it.

In answer to your question: I care more about the loss of diversity the way you beautifully described it than this weird number we better not exceed or we're screwed. Both two sides to the same coin.

I'm reading that same book about forest bathing that dado potato recommended, and it's amazing the health benefits that are derived in nature. But those benefits are lost on the people who are in the urban jungles all over the world. People have been flocking to the cities (at least until COVID) and they lose touch with nature. They get entangled in culture and fashion and the latest and greatest gadgets and people to impress, etc.

I couldn't find snowshoe poles in the local sports stores. They were all out of them. I'm thinking that maybe one good thing about COVID is people who are itching to do SOMETHING but can't go to movies, or out to dinner, or to the arcade or slot machines, or shopping till they drop will rediscover the joy of nature. This is a teachable moment--if we can remind them that invasive are dismantling our ecosystem, and plastic has turned the ocean into a killing field, and once the bees are gone, how much food will be available to them, maybe things will change.

What "higher order end benefit" will reconnect us to nature?

[razz]

Well spoken from both of you. If people who care feel overwhelmed with the size of the problem, they feel paralyzed and helpless so apathy sets in.

I wonder how well this effort will succeed. I am all for recyclables and this effort includes corporations. Until corporations and their shareholders become part of the solution, it will be a slow process. Financial institutions reward their leaders based on shareholder returns as do many other corporations.

[bae]

I wonder how well this effort will succeed. I am all for recyclables and this effort includes corporations. Until corporations and their shareholders become part of the solution, it will be a slow process. Financial institutions reward their leaders based on shareholder returns as do many other corporations.

I like the approach laid out by Ray Anderson of Interface:

Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise: The Interface Model (1998)
Confessions of a Radical Industrialist: Profits, People, Purpose: Doing Business by Respecting the Earth (2009)

I tried to implement some of these ideas in Silicon Valley, but it was a hard sell with the customers, even with a noticeable savings in cost and bother for them.

[razz]

I like the approach laid out by Ray Anderson of Interface:
later
Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise: The Interface Model (1998)
Confessions of a Radical Industrialist: Profits, People, Purpose: Doing Business by Respecting the Earth (2009)

I tried to implement some of these ideas in Silicon Valley, but it was a hard sell with the customers, even with a noticeable savings in cost and bother for them.

That sounds like a winner approach all round for our world. Sadly, from one of the reviews in 2014, it appears that Ray C. Anderson passed away a few years after publishing this 2009 book.