Who is fed up with the "green" movement?

there is a difference between common-sense stewardship or resource management and this Earth ?ber Alles religion.

Of course. This is why I don't support green parties.

Make no mistake, this green movement *is* a religion.

Yes, it is. Most of the time. But its most basic beliefs are not as stupid as the ultra-activists make them appear.
 
Last edited:
I'm anti stupid. Which means I'm against retarded proposals from environmentalists and against flat out denial that they way we're handling things is just shangri-la okay. It's a delicate line to walk.
 
Just to point out...

This thread has filled up, over the last weeks, with the worst rantings against everything that is not "do whatever you want, waste whatever you can waste, and fuck the rest of humanity".

What is driving this thread now is no more some right point against the we-all-should-live-in-a-cavern-and-eat-our-own-s**t green fanatics, but some grim anger towards everyone telling us that some of our habits are unsustainable and must be changed, even if this is difficult, painful or not funny.

Why be so angry when someone propose to turn the lights out? Do you really think you have a "right" to burn energy and to wate it all around? You should still be thanking whichever god you believe in because you had the chance to be so wealthy as to forget the real value of things.

Turn on all the lights instead of turning them off is one of the most childish way of acting that I have ever seen.

And I'll tell you why: I'll borrow the example from Spectre; We don't have endless resources. Texas, as all US southwest (and many other places in the world, including southern italy), is paying a high price for having believed that water was free and could be used and wasted witout regard. And, let's face it, if someone thinks global warming doesn't exist(which is possible), the only conclusion is that some places on earth simply don't have enough water to have green grass and swimming pools everywhere.

It is the same for all resources: they are not endless, they are not free, they are not "ours". And I think it is vital to understand this, because, as George Carlin pointed out cleverly in his shows, we don't have to save the world, the world is fine with or without us, we have to save our a**.

I am no green, I have not turned off my lights yesterday, nor I am going to turn them off tomorrow or some other day just to make some hypocrit "save the world today, f**k it the rest of the year" thing, but I won't waste energy either, because I don't think the idiocy of the green movement should be used as a cheap justification to avoid dealing with our own errors.

But here is the question. Why should I change my habbits just because *someone* believes they are impacting the planet negatively? I mean there are people who believe that we shouldn't eat meat and I have seen them pull out the dumbest shit out of their ass such as that vegetables are easier to digest (no they are not) and that humans weren't meant to eat meat in the first place (we are omnivores you moron). They believe that killing animals for food is wrong but killing plants is fine. So taking your logic to the extreme we should all change our eating habits because *someone* thinks they are bad.

The problem is not that we waste electricity, drive cars, buy clothes, eat at fast food restaurants and buy products that have entirely too much packaging.

The problem is in the way all this stuff is made.
Electricity is made by burning coal.

Cars are laden with so much unnecessary crap that they have no choice but to up the power and increase engine size. For crying outloud the 240z was 150hp while 370z is 330 AND 1300cc larger.

Clothes are made out of materials that will be unearthed in a million years and still be recognizable.

Fast food is packaged into crap that can't even be recycled much less biodegradable.

Last time I bought a game DVD I ended up with a box and 10pages of printed guides.

Believe it or not but individual habits have a very small impact on the environment. There is alot more pollution that comes from factories, power plants (even if we don't waste electricity they still burn coal), landfills (what can we possibly do with all the packaging?) and industrial farming. I personally refuse to be told that *I* am responsible for pollution and big businesses get away with doing whatever they want because they have lobbyists that get ridiculous amounts of money.

On the note of the drought, just because a place gets droughts doesn't mean that water is mismanaged. Take any Middle Eastern state, they have huge problems with water but its not for the lack of management....
 
But here is the question. Why should I change my habbits just because *someone* believes they are impacting the planet negatively? I mean there are people who believe that we shouldn't eat meat and I have seen them pull out the dumbest shit out of their ass such as that vegetables are easier to digest (no they are not) and that humans weren't meant to eat meat in the first place (we are omnivores you moron). They believe that killing animals for food is wrong but killing plants is fine. So taking your logic to the extreme we should all change our eating habits because *someone* thinks they are bad.

It is not my logic. But there is some sense in it, covered in piles of fanatic nonsense. For example, the world is a lot more of a bad place when it's full of human-made unnecessary and abandoned things, unnecessary pollution and unnecessarily exploited places that are no more good to live in.

The good question is: "why"? Doing things, every single act, impact on something else, so we should ask ourselves why we are doing something. And answering "because it is my fun of the moment", as we all do when we buy something because of its packaging or because of the fashion (come on, we all do) is not really a serious answer. Also, saying "because the world is made that way" is only a small step better than that.

The fact is the world is made that way, full of unnecessary crap, because WE (as groups of consumers) WANT it to be that way. We can't blame someone else if we always have to buy food in big everlasting packaging; well, we could do it as individuals, IF we would actively search for something different, but we can't do it as a group, because WE are the people that all these things are created for, and we are also, essentially, the same people that are producing them.

The very sad part is that actually trying to actively avoid these things is very difficult, frustrating, time requiring, and just a little step away from becoming an active eco-mentalist.

So, basically: if you like the way this world wastes resources, you are a waster. If you don't like it, but you still accept it, you are a little better, but you can't really claim not being part of it and not being responsible for what happens. If you refuse it, as you should, you probably are so determined that you are a fanatic green activist.

-----------------

Some examples...

The problem is not that we waste electricity, drive cars, buy clothes, eat at fast food restaurants and buy products that have entirely too much packaging.

But we do, nevertheless. we can't avoid that and say the problem is somewhere else. If we were not buying them, someone else would stop producing them. So, in part, we are the reason why.

The problem is in the way all this stuff is made.
Electricity is made by burning coal.

But we burn it.

Cars are laden with so much unnecessary crap that they have no choice but to up the power and increase engine size. For crying outloud the 240z was 150hp while 370z is 330 AND 1300cc larger.

But we prefer the 370z, we think it is a better car and we'd rather have it than have the 240z (because we like POWEERRRRR!! Yes, me too).

Clothes are made out of materials that will be unearthed in a million years and still be recognizable.

But we still like to dress this way (and we all know why...).

Fast food is packaged into crap that can't even be recycled much less biodegradable.

But we still go and buy all of this. (though I admit this one is a little more complicated).

Last time I bought a game DVD I ended up with a box and 10pages of printed guides.

But you still bought it. Just like I did.

Believe it or not but individual habits have a very small impact on the environment. There is alot more pollution that comes from factories, power plants (even if we don't waste electricity they still burn coal), landfills (what can we possibly do with all the packaging?) and industrial farming.

All things that woudln't be there if their products, their energy or their services, were not sold or were not needed. And if they are, WE are responsible.

I personally refuse to be told that *I* am responsible for pollution and big businesses get away with doing whatever they want because they have lobbyists that get ridiculous amounts of money.

I understand that. The fact is that everyone hates being told "it's your responsibility, or, even worse, it's your fault". But it is. Every one of us has the responsibility for what he/she does (even when we are not aware of what we are doing), and so every one has his/her part own of responsibility for messing up our planet, even if it is a particle of the total.

Many people become eco-fanatics just because of this; because they want to avoid their responsibility, because they want to be free to blame someone else. They stick to everything, they try as bad they can to be "on the right side". Which is the same thing that we all tend to do when we refuse our part (as small as it can be). The difference is in the way they act, not in the way they think.

On the note of the drought, just because a place gets droughts doesn't mean that water is mismanaged. Take any Middle Eastern state, they have huge problems with water but its not for the lack of management....

Probably there are too many people living in there already... Water lack should have been taken into account before allowing this kind of population boom. Obviously it is not an active fault made by someone, it's just the way things are, but responsibility doesn't go away simply because you are unaware of something. You can be not guilty, but still responsible.

That said... I like cars, I like driving for fun, I like wasting THIS amount of resources, and I think everyone should be allowed a little bit of fun, as long as it is sustainable. For that reason, I try to avoid wasting, or I try to save, everything else. Without, of course, turning myself in a sort of 21st century root-eating fanatic eco-caveman.
 
Last edited:
Yes, it is. Most of the time. But its most basic beliefs are not as stupid as the ultra-activists make them appear.

Neither are the basic principles of christianity, but we don't make laws by them, oh wait, Americans do. :p
 
But we burn it.
But we have absolutely no control on how it is produced.
But we prefer the 370z, we think it is a better car and we'd rather have it than have the 240z (because we like POWEERRRRR!! Yes, me too).
I would take the 240z and put an RB25DET or an LS2 in it. No one is stopping Nissan from going where Audi seems to be going with their next gen S4/5 and making the car much lighter while fitting a smaller engine into it. Elise/Exige/MX-5 are some of the funnest cars on the planet and their power outputs are tiny compared to an average "family" sedan.
But we still like to dress this way (and we all know why...).
We don't necessarily have a choice. I hate wearing "business casual" but my job has a dress code.
But we still go and buy all of this. (though I admit this one is a little more complicated).
It doesn't NEED to be packaged that way. It can be packaged in something biodegradable just as easily.
But you still bought it. Just like I did.
It's the ONLY way it comes. I would prefer fully online distribution such as Steam but not everything is available. Also WHY does a DVD that is by definition a digital medium require a hardcopy guide? If you can access the DVD you can access the guide.

The problem is that we either boycott *everything* that makes life in a technologically advanced society better than it was in the dark ages or we take advantage of the amenities we have. Guess how many people will choose the latter and how many of us look at the former as if they are complete idiots.

Also don't forget planned obsolescence. I will mostly touch on electronics since that's what I know best. My friend has like 4 PCs each one of them with less power than even my older laptop (only reason for new laptop was crap screen). Some of them are on Ubuntu and some on XP and they run absolutely fine for what he wants them to do. Yes video encoding takes a while and he won't be playing games much but he doesn't need that. Now take a look at the current gen of Windows OS's. These things require something that NASA could use to land a few shuttles simultaneously while playing some video game at the same time. What will most people do with it? Check e-mail and Facebook....... Now before you pop up with all the new "benefits" take a look at OS X and Ubuntu and their system requirements. I mean you can say all you want about Linux but no one in their right mind would call OS X unfriendly yet it manages to run on hardware that is 3 generations old and not skip a beat.

This is the same thing with everything, our economy is not driven by longevity it is driven by planned obsolescence, which is the main reason why our environment is in the shape that it is right now.........
 
Last edited:
The problem is that we either boycott *everything* that makes life in a technologically advanced society better than it was in the dark ages or we take advantage of the amenities we have.

I agree completely, and I choose to take advantage of what we have. I just remember that I could have chosen differenty, so if we all have problems with pollution and resources, I have a (small) part of responsibility for that. (freedom of choice is not for free). And we all, as a society, have a much greater responsibility, and if we avoid it, responsibility might fault. We surely are individuals, but we are also part of a bigger group.

What I say then is: we have the right to use resources, we don't have the right to mess things up and destroy our world (in the sense of making it sterile and hostile for other men)., especially if it's just to have some fun.

Also don't forget planned obsolescence. I will mostly touch on electronics since that's what I know best. My friend has like 4 PCs each one of them with less power than even my older laptop (only reason for new laptop was crap screen). Some of them are on Ubuntu and some on XP and they run absolutely fine for what he wants them to do.

I agree, I wouln't have changed my pc last year if my motherboard hadn't decided to stop working completely. It was 4 year old.

Planned obsolescence is bad. But it makes things cheaper and gives a job to millions people. It's our choice again (again, a small step for a man, a giant leap for a society), not someone else's. Would you choose to live in a world where PCs, for examples, were much much more expensive and much much less powerful? where only a few people would work to produce them, where it would be impossible to have a 15 years progress leap that brought us from, as an example, 2D EGA graphics to 3D almost photorealistic environments? Not to speak of everyhting else: cell phones, cars, basically everything that is technology, but also furniture (think of IKEA), clothing, even food. Everything is generally better and generally cheaper than before. But all of this comes at a price. One part of this price is planned obsolescence. If we want to quit planned obsolescence, we also have to renounce cheap ultra-technological life.

Would you? Actually, you are, already, because you are just telling me that your old pc is still fine and there's no need to buy another one.

Well, this are some of the basics of the green movement: "there's no need for something new, as long as the old one is still working fine, is still cheaper, can be repaired, or as long as you don't need it".

Eco-fanatics are just the extremists of this movement, but they are screaming and ranting so loud that they seem to be the only people entitled to say something towards saving resources. Well, they are not, luckily.
 
Well, this are some of the basics of the green movement: "there's no need for something new, as long as the old one is still working fine, is still cheaper, can be repaired, or as long as you don't need it".

It that case, I utterly fail at the movement.

so...are we talking about the car aspect only, or all aspects...if its all aspects, should it be moved to offtopic?
 
I once stopped at a parkinglot when one of those green fanatics came up to me asking me 'if i never considerd a more fuelefficient vehicle'.....
I responded by telling him in a realy calm voice that fuel wasnt gonna be a problem since I planned on strangling him whith my bare hands, taking his body home and throwing it in a hole while i harvested the methaangasses from his rotting corps and using that to fuel my car for the next couple of weeks.....for some reason this scared him....

I do not like the green movement and their hippocrit idea's
I do not like people who think they can tell other people how to live their lives
And I think those bloody hippies handing out panflets at intersections should get a bloody job

the solution to the green menace?
Protesting on the streets? run em over....preferrably in something that does 10mpg
Chaining themselves to a tree? rap ANOTHER chain around them so they cant set themselves free and then set that tree on fire.

God i get pissed just thinking about that stuff........
 
I once stopped at a parkinglot when one of those green fanatics came up to me asking me 'if i never considerd a more fuelefficient vehicle'.....
I responded by telling him in a realy calm voice that fuel wasnt gonna be a problem since I planned on strangling him whith my bare hands, taking his body home and throwing it in a hole while i harvested the methaangasses from his rotting corps and using that to fuel my car for the next couple of weeks.....for some reason this scared him....

I do not like the green movement and their hippocrit idea's
I do not like people who think they can tell other people how to live their lives
And I think those bloody hippies handing out panflets at intersections should get a bloody job

the solution to the green menace?
Protesting on the streets? run em over....preferrably in something that does 10mpg
Chaining themselves to a tree? rap ANOTHER chain around them so they cant set themselves free and then set that tree on fire.

God i get pissed just thinking about that stuff........
Thank you for this thought-through, balanced, reflected opinon that did not include name-calling, murdering phantasies and bad grammar or spelling, but instead included arguments, empiric data and constructive suggestions to solve ecologic problems.
 
Last edited:
Thank you for this thought-through, balanced, reflectwd opinon that did not include name-calling, murdering phantasies and bad grammar or spelling, but instead included arguments, empiric data and constructive suggestions to solve ecologic problems.

your very welcome :cool:

this topic is called 'who is fed up with the green movement' you know..... not 'save the world' :rolleyes:

as it happens......
 
Last edited:
your very welcome :cool:

this topic is called 'who is fed up with the green movement' you know..... not 'save the world' :rolleyes:

as it happens......

It ain't called "hate-mongering central" either ;)
 
agreed....

you know its not like i'm against helping the planet, my truck is converted to run on LPG or autogas (whatever they call it in other country's) so its exaustfumes are nice and clean, my house is insolated, I don't pollute more then anyone else, I recycle...... I love nature in all its beauty and think what we have left should be preserved, i'm as green as the next guy....

I just don't like beeing told what to do or how to live my life.....especialy not by people who just happend to jump on the green bandwagon because its cool nowadays.....
 
I had almost the same thing happen to me last week, Cowboy. I went to grab some delicious Chipotle with friends. One of my buddies brought this hippie chick he knows. She's being pretty critical of my truck (which has a V8 and gets ~12mpg). I decided to humor her.

So I ask her what he thinks of ethanol. She thinks it's a good idea. So I tell her my truck runs E85. That makes it "green", right? I mean for every 200 miles I drive, I'm only burning about 3 gallons of that evil gasoline. That's like getting moped mileage, right? :D

"No no no, it's still a polluting old death trap." Well I can't argue with that. But I tell her that because my truck has been on the road for 27 years, it's 'green'. I tell her that it's much, much better for the environment to just keep your old beater and keep it in good tune (which I do with my truck) than it is to buy a new car. I tell her that she's fallen for the politician's and automaker's propaganda that she has to have a brand new hybrid to save the world.

I told her that through the basic principles of "reduce, reuse, recycle", I'm doing more to save the world than she is. That confused the hell out of her. At this point my friend jumps in, cuts me off and tells her, "He can do this all day. Let it go." :lol:

That little exchange, capped with a delicious burrito and booze, pretty much made my week.
 
I told her that through the basic principles of "reduce, reuse, recycle", I'm doing more to save the world than she is. That confused the hell out of her. At this point my friend jumps in, cuts me off and tells her, "He can do this all day. Let it go." :lol:

That little exchange, capped with a delicious burrito and booze, pretty much made my week.

I love those kinds of conversations. Usually they give the :blink: look.

Now if you just throw some new rings, higher compression heads, and a new performance intake manifold and carb you could probably gain some mileage and make it faster :thumbsup:
 
anyone get todays ebay message and Join the GREEN TEAM
 
Well here is one sensible dude:

http://www.bigbutton.com.au/%7Efenwickelliott/diary.html

Best bits:-

"The point is not so much who is right and who is wrong; it is that we have moved into a polarised state where, on the one side, people are saying that it is settled that man-made climate change is an imminent disaster, and on the other, people saying that it is a beat-up.

In the USA, there is now a relatively even split between those tho think it is a beat up, and those who don't, according to a recent Gallup Poll, with the skeptics at their highest level for 10 years. There is precious little real debate between the two sides, any more than there ever has been between religious dogmatists and skeptics. The IPCC crew have got hold of the notion that the science is settled, that anyone who contractdicts them is bad, mad and dangerous to know (Quicky would ban them perhaps?). It seems that the issue is not so much one of science these days, but more a question of where you stand, or as the Americans like to say "narrative". "

"
I picked up an old philosophy book the other day, on the subject of logic. It contains a detailed analysis of syllogisms. You know the sort of stuff:
  • All men are mortal
  • All Englishmen are men
  • Therefore all Englishmen are mortal.
tn_margaret_thatcher.jpg
And so I started wondering about the syllogisms of climate change. They might be different for different viewpoints. Thus for the government of Margaret Thatcher (which was at least partly responsible, says Lord Lawson) for kicking the whole thing off, it might be:
  • All Trades Unions are a bad thing, especially the National Union of Mineworkers
  • We cannot break their stranglehold on the economy as long as they enjoy public support
  • Therefore we should put it publicly about that burning coal is a bad thing.
All of that was coupled, of course, with the notion that we could and should be using more nuclear energy instead. Which is not the usual line of the socks and sandals brigade. Their syllogism is more like:
  • All rich people use a lot of energy.
  • Rich people are bad.
  • Therefore using energy is a bad thing.
For climate change scientists, it might be different again:
  • All scientists need research grants
  • We only get research grants if people worry about climate change
  • Therefore we should put it publicly about that climate change is a bad thing. In fact, very bad. Very bad indeed. Oh yes.
This last point might sound somewhat sceptical (or as Jeanie would say, being a New Zealander, sciptical). Let us look at the hypothesis that the climate change business might be heavily infected by woo-woo.

Woo-woo

This is a great term to describe nonsense of all kinds. It is used by skeptics, including the admirable James Randi, the professional conjurer who has performed a great public service by exposing people like Uri Geller and Peter Popoff (see below), to mean irrational belief and quackery of all kinds.
Precisely what you categorise as woo-woo will depend, of course, on your own analysis. The list might include things like witch-doctory, creationism and other religious beliefs, mysticism, homoeopathy, reincarnation, spoon-bending, astrology, fung sui, talking to dead people, faith-healing,chiropractic and even wackier stuff than any of these.
Is the climate change package woo-woo?

The climate change thing is not a single proposition, but a series of propositions, something along the following lines:
  • The world is getting much hotter;
  • That change is caused by mankind releasing carbon into the atmosphere, by burning fossil fuels;
  • The temperature change will cause sea levels to rise dramatically;
  • These two changes will render the earth significantly less habitable;
  • Mankind could and should fix all of this by releasing less carbon.
All of these propositions are said to be ?settled science?; they come as a package in support of a range of measures that have been advocated and, in some cases, implemented.
A typical feature of woo-woo (apart, of course from a fundamental implausibility) is that someone else stands to gain from it in some way. Faith-healers, chiropractors and the like make a living out of peddling their particular brands of nonsense. Some might say that this is OK; they are providing a service, and if people want to buy it, well, good for them. It is less attractive in the case of people like Peter Popoff, a televangelist who got cash out of people by pretending to be getting supernatural messages, but who was actually getting short-wave radio messages through a concealed earpiece from his wife, who was rummaging through his audience's ?prayer cards?.
The fact that climate change scientists stand to gain from their beliefs does not make it all woo-woo, of course. But it is enough to make a sceptical nose start twitching.
The Denial Tag

It is also a feature of woo-woo for its proponents to discount opposition. There are many examples; I like this one. James Randi quotes Yuri Geller as saying
"Is he [Randi] still alive? If so, he does not interest me, because I disconnect from negative people?
Brilliant! In the same way, we get the tag that anyone who doubts the climate change message is a ?denier?. This sounds fun ? lingerie seems pretty harmless ? but it just a breath away from ?holocaust denier? which is not fun at all.
Reliability of Expert Consensus

As it happens, there is no consensus among experts about climate change, although it is plain that there is an orthodoxy that runs heavily against denial. But how reliable would such a consensus be, even if there were one?
Not very. Our history is littered with examples of experts getting things wrong. Ask an International Panel on Catholicism if the Pope is infallible, and they will probably tell you that he is. Ask an International Panel on Chiropractic if you can fix 101 ailments by ?spinal manipulation? and it will say, ?Oh yes? (they are not negative people at all).
The Light in Their Eyes

No, what really makes me so suspicious about the climate change lobby is that light in their eyes, so similar to what one sees in evangelicals when they start talking about their religious obsessions. There is no point talking to them about the evidence that the world was not actually created in just one week a few thousand years ago ? there are not interested. In the same way, the climate change people are just not interested in contrary evidence. You show them the evidence that global warming may well have stopped about 10 years ago, that the Antarctic is getting colder, that none of their models have proved able to predict anything reliably, that carbon levels seem to follow climate change rather than lead it, that 100 years ago you could kayak 100 miles closer to the North Pole than you can today, that it is not just Earth, but other planets, including Mars Jupiter and Pluto, that have been warming. All of this suggests a complex and imperfectly understood picture, but for the guys with the light in their eyes, there is no doubting. They are just not interested in considering these issues."
 
Last edited:
Top