I disagree that gaining support for and enacting a carbon tax would take decades. It won’t be easy, and maybe isn’t probable, but a mass movement could make it happen.
To your other point about private solutions being good because they move the needle a little:
In my personal life I shop sustainably (but I’m not perfect or obsessive about it). I do think it’s a little better as a consumer to make ethical choices than not to.
But: the rhetoric around climate change as something individual choices will fix is extremely dangerous. If you ask your average person about what we can do to fix climate change, I’d guess most would go straight to market solutions. Why is that? Could it be because that’s what the entire marketing and media establishment wants us to focus on, because a collective solution will cost them a shit-ton of money?
Yes in a different world it’s not either or and we’d have individual and collective solutions working together to save the planet. In this world, however, the powerful have a vested interest in market-based solutions being the only options on the table.
Basically, yes I agree that ethical companies are better than unethical companies. But on a macro level, propaganda around ethical consumption is so dangerous imo that I’m not interested in contributing to it just to move the needle an imperceptible amount.
To your other point about private solutions being good because they move the needle a little:
In my personal life I shop sustainably (but I’m not perfect or obsessive about it). I do think it’s a little better as a consumer to make ethical choices than not to.
But: the rhetoric around climate change as something individual choices will fix is extremely dangerous. If you ask your average person about what we can do to fix climate change, I’d guess most would go straight to market solutions. Why is that? Could it be because that’s what the entire marketing and media establishment wants us to focus on, because a collective solution will cost them a shit-ton of money?
Yes in a different world it’s not either or and we’d have individual and collective solutions working together to save the planet. In this world, however, the powerful have a vested interest in market-based solutions being the only options on the table.
Basically, yes I agree that ethical companies are better than unethical companies. But on a macro level, propaganda around ethical consumption is so dangerous imo that I’m not interested in contributing to it just to move the needle an imperceptible amount.