The world has experienced its hottest day on record, according to meteorologists.
The average global temperature reached 17.01C (62.62F) on Monday, according to the US National Centres for Environmental Prediction.
The figure surpasses the previous record of 16.92C (62.46F) - set back in August 2016.
I used to think the more apparent and devastating outcomes of climate change were bound to hit long after I passed away, but now I’m not so sure. Local storms are becoming more and more serious with every passing year, each summer is less bearable than the last and the nearby forests are burning down for the 2nd summer in a row. We are definitely speedrunning this shit.
I used to think the more apparent and devastating outcomes of climate change were bound to hit long after I passed away, but now I’m not so sure.
Too many people thinking like that is exactly why we are where we are today. And why it will continue to get worse.
Those of us who actually care about the world our children and grandchildren will have to live in have been trying to get some large scale action for decades, and we’re tired of beating our heads against a brick wall.
Most of the climate change predictions I’ve heard in my lifetime have talked about stuff that would happen by 2050 or 2100. It’s always been bullshit, just a way of pushing out the consequences beyond a timeframe we can actually conceive of effectively. In reality this shit is already hitting us and accelerating hard.
I’ve always thought those predictions were listed as “conservative” so the average is a lot closer but main media outlets pick the fastest out point in the bell curve so it’s not so doomed.
You constantly hear people say “oh, well we are in a warming cycle, so yeah, of course the Earth is going to get warmer”.
These are people on the Right who have moved past the point of denying the problem of Climate Change and shifted their argument to admitting it is happening, but not admitting that it is man-made.
In some ways, they are right - the Earth’s climate IS indeed shifting away from an Ice Age and moving toward a warming period, but what we humans have done is essentially thrown gasoline onto the already burning fire. We are accelerating the problem.Yah and we were actually headed to a 100,000 year cooling cycle. So even their supposed science is wrong lol.
We’re gonna blow right past it.
Billions will die.
It’s not even all about the climate though; it is human greed and cruelty that will kill the most: the haves butchering and purging the have-nots.
You are not a “have”.
For all intents and purposes, NONE of us who would actually be here, on Lemmy, in this comment thread, able to be reading this, are a “have”.
Unless your personal assistant’s butler’s niece’s boyfriend is sharing this with you, you’re probably just as fucked as he, she, and they are.
Honestly, I’m not sure if I’d want to bring a child into this kind of future. I’m not even sure how long I’ll last in this future.
You know how they talk about the Fermi Paradox, and the Great Filter? This might be it. We made it past nukes (for now), we may or may not make it past misaligned AI… but I’m not sure we can survive this.
It makes it difficult to get in the mindset of planning for one’s financial future. Retirement savings? Will I even live long enough to see those?
Heat index of 112F where I am at. FML.
I just try to enjoy each year as the coldest year I’ll get for the rest of my life.
What the heck? I thought this was supposed to be fixed by all of us using paper straws and driving hybrids?
No no no, you don’t understand. Now you have to stop eating meat and they need your permission to block out the sun
See below for proof
Unironically, yes we really should eat much less meat and use more renewables sources of energy (like blocking out the sun with solar panels)
I always find it strange that the most immediate and effective change any individual can make is giving up or greatly reducing their animal product intake. Will it fix the world? No. But would it actually at least somewhat of a difference? Yes. Is it something you can do right now, today, without any real effort whatsoever? Yep.
But what is pretty much no one willing to do? Give up/reduce animal products in their lives.
It was the easiest change I ever made. 31 years ago. No meat. No dairy. No eggs.
Oh, and no car.
Guess that’s too hard for people and they’d rather die in a war over water.
People don’t make any sense.
I don’t totally understand this either, though recently maybe more I understand it better. Seems like people cannot live without those things. I know someone who started crying when she realized she couldn’t spend as much money as before (only to use the crying to get more money to buy things). Or my sister, who asks my parents for money all the time so she can maintain her chosen lifestyle. If she can’t do that then life becomes difficult. It boggles my mind that ‘difficult’ is not being able to vacation twice a year but whatever.
The stress that less-vulnerable people experienced during covid when the main thing they had to do was not expand their social life for a year or two was a good example of how people are. The anger at not being able to go to the bar every weekend was nuts to me.
Few people can live a monastic life and feel like they are fulfilled, and fewer if any will feel good about that kind of life if they are forced into it. So who and how are they making those choices? We aren’t taught to be frugal, we’re taught to spend, it’s our education towards living a “good life”.
I think if you got people to stop eating meat and driving 2 blocks to the grocery store they’d grow depressed, frustrated, productivity would drop, birth rates would drop, life expectancy would drop. People need that stuff to feel good about their lives, and if you want to take it away you either need a near perfect competitor or take it away by force.
People do these things to fight negative emotions. If you want people to change their ways being arrogant and not showing any empathy won’t help.
Anybody who is dependent on consumerism got to that point because society sells these things like tasty food, vacation, alcohol, tech gadgets, etc., as an easy fix for pain and other internal struggles. It’s not about teaching them to be frugal. Almost everybody has something they rely on to deal with their negative emotions, but it’s easier to see in others than in ourselves.
What? Arrogant how? I feel like we’re saying the same thing here.
Sorry, I didn’t mean this on you specifically. Just that we can not tell people (as a society) to just live more frugal without addressing the overall problems that drive so many into consumerism. It’s a bit like how people treat drug addicts. I see the same in the recent climate debate. Instead of focusing on the root issue, it is reduced to judging other people’s morals or character.
Every person living in a democracy can make a difference with their VOTE. Only vote for people who have plans and intentions of bringing change. Vote at all levels, and vote whenever you get an opportunity. Ask what candidates in municipal elections think about the climate emergency. Organize. Talk to doubters. We can do this.
If voting worked, we would have solved this issue decades ago. You can vote for whomever you want, but at the end, no matter what they promise, they always end up doing nothing at all, because they are elected by using big oil donations.
Only a self-organized revolution can stop this madness, people in some nations are already blocking oil tankers and oil rigs. We can’t win by only voting, you can vote for a day every few years, but we need to fight this everyday. Take turns blocking streets so no oil driven trucks and cars pass, only this will make an effect.
The idea that nonviolent protest works has been the most harmful idea in history
I mean nonviolent protests DO work.
Non-disruptive DOES NOT work though.
MLK Jr didn’t peacefully sit in a park. They ran boycotts, sit ins, shut down streets, trespassed into white only areas, and drove businesses insane.
If MLK Jr was your enemy you were going to have a miserable time when he rolled into town.
Ghandi had people illegally burn documents and basically smuggled salt against all regulations.
MLK had the Black Panthers and Nation of Islam as looming threats. Gandhi is also the one who said “pacifism without violence is not pacifism, it is helplessness.” A violent counterpart to a non-violent movement helps by being the stick to the non-violent carrot.
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I can assure you the US Government is not quaking in their boots at the thought of Billy Bob’s basement arsenal.
Especially since those guys are pretty much all lard-asses. There’s a reason why every competent military on the planet emphasizes physical fitness before anything else; it’s because real combat --as opposed to playing paintball with your fatbody friends-- is one of the most physically and psychologically punishing activities known to man.
Yup, the only real revolution is a violent revolution.
And how the heck do we know that it have any reasonable chance of working out well and that it won’t be brutally suppressed or co-opted by reactionaries? And how would anyone even organize such a thing? ~Strawberry
We don’t have any idea if it will work out or if it’ll be snuffed out.
However, the lack of purposeful revolution will result in an aimless one, carried on not with thought and intent, but instead as a reaction to the immseration of the world’s people as we bake in and are flooded from our homes and cities.
The only option is to try as the current hegemony will not solve the problems we face for the problems are a direct result of their desired politics in action.
As for organizing one, that’s way too long of a conversation to occur here.
So we have no idea if it’s even remotely a good idea or if it’s likely to leave us in a similar position to before or worse, or how to do it? Great plan. ~Strawberry
in other news my ultra conservative parents installed solar panels on their house, and for over a month now, they’ve been generating more electricity than they can use, feeding back into the system their surplus. when real world results are such, we can start using these incidents as examples of why it’s not only the morally correct thing to do (combat climate change and save our species), but also the economically savvy thing to do.
who knows what will be the final straw that breaks their stubbornness.
You mean they had a financial incentive to partake?
Your example just shows how economics incentives are designed to work, but that money does come from somewhere.
I’d love to get solar but it’s not economically viable to encur 20k expenses that will need over twenty years to pay off when that money can be used elsewhere
If someone gave me a Tesla I’d love it but I really don’t have the cash to get a car right now and even if I did the price of teslas and most electrics are so high it’s just not an option.
People think he solution here is to remove cheaper options but that won’t work it will just keep people holding on to beaters far longer.
If the economics make sense to change people will change but trying to shake people or force people to make economically disadvantage choices will never work long term
My wife got a used Prius for 13K or 17k a couple years ago, it’ll be more expensive now I believe, but the thing is most people don’t have 13k or 17k to spend on a car. If people can’t scrape together 500 dollars from their savings in an emergency, they aren’t going to be able to get a hybrid or electric car for a very long time, and all legislation that tries to push people in that direction benefits the rich, and penalizes the poor when they remove options the poor can afford.
Liberals talk shit while “ultra conservatives” quietly solve the problem using their own resources? What world is this?
We thank people who disregarded nuclear energy. We could’ve sliced global emissions by a lot if were not for you, but burning coal is far safer.
Thank the good old Green Party of Germany! Restarting all those coal plants and shutting down nuclear reactors!
God, that’s so depressing. I genuinely don’t understand how we - any of us, in any country - are supposed to be okay with these political mechanisms filled with incompetent, out-of-touch, self-interested codgers. I’m not willing to take action, but when our entire world is being picked apart by the public sector and sold for parts by the private sector, what are we to do?
Lobbies. The German “green” party if fully funded by Russia, which has a vested interest in keeping coal, but especially nat gas (which despite the CO2 emission is still labelled as “green”) being the primary source of energy.
While lobbies are extremely powerful, I don’t understand how I, personally, am supposed to support the lobbies that represent my interests. Donating to PACs? I’m just not wealthy enough to make it make sense.
I think its a bit too late for that. 40% of wealth is owned by the top 1%, and even if the remaining 99% own 60, most of that wealth is not available, but used for everyday necessities. So no, you cant outbid our out PAC billionaires anymore. Too much trickle up economy has been going on for too many years
was fucking hot in western WA yesterday, my first year gardening and have had some plants bolt :(
edit: I shouldn’t have used the term bolt cause even I didn’t know what that meant before this season, it just means that a lot of my plants flowered due to stress from the heat, which often makes things like kale bitter, or spinach tough. In my case it was bok choy, and just now cilantro, but that was probably more from me planting late.
The smoke from 4th of July fireworks and from the usual summer wildfires has not been helping whatsoever over in WA
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How the heck is it the hottest day if its nice out today
