UKH

Anyone striking in support of the school kids and students for the Global Climate Strike this Friday?

Never been on a strike in my life, no idea what good it'll do if any, but I've agreed with work that I'll strike on Friday (basically I lose a day's pay).

Nobody else?

That’s a little bit depressing!

You're not actually going on strike though are you. 
All you're really doing is taking a days unpaid holiday for personal reasons and the company you work for has decided to ignore what is probably an unlawful act on your behalf by striking without going through the proper measures via a ballot, etc.

So a days unpaid annual leave then. 

Well obviously.

The school kids aren’t literally on strike either, I mean they don’t even have a union or anything...

I was just interested to see if anyone else was supporting them on the day.

I won't be but I've written to my kids schools to allow them to leave school and join the climate change demonstration in Stratford. The youngest is 13 so needs written consent.

They also don't get paid and their 'employer' doesn't rely on them to be in work as expected.

Out of interest, would you still 'go on strike' if your company threatened you with a disciplinary hearing for doing so?

It’s nice your children’s school is supportive, some of them have come down pretty hard on the whole thing. Which is a shame, it’s a great opportunity for some education.

What's your point? 

A number of points really.
Why bother? To the Employer, it's no worse than someone pulling a sickie and therefore pointless.
The Employer isn't the one to blame for Climate Change, so why take strike action against them?
It's illegal and could possibly result in dismissal.
It's all a bit studenty and pathetic...  

 

I think we’ve established that it’s not really a strike, you’re not taking strike action against your employer. The terms on which you go to the ‘strike’ are up to you to agree with your employer (or not and face the consequences).

The idea is that you’re saying it’s more like important to try provoke action against climate change than it is to go to work for the day. 

Thanks. One or two thoughts - first, as far as I can see this protest isn't directly about causing economic damage but drawing attention to the issue and the need to address it. Does it work on those terms? It seems to be doing that. Second, yes, it's illegal for people in work (not the students) but is it worth the risk? I hope that as a climber you will understand this kind of judgement call. I also hope that people in work who join in are aware of the risks. As for 'studenty and pathetic' - well maybe for the grown-up cynic. But why p*ss on youthful idealism? 

Studenty, pointless, and pathetic, are subject points, I would suggest.

I teach Env Sci to freshman so we're still not sure how to handle it. We're sounding it out. We won't strike but certainly wouldn't discipline kids for not being at school and want them to be aware of the strike as our class theme is climate change.

What is the strike for? I get it that its "the climate", but what exactly will the strike achieve towards that?

That's my question.  If the net outcome is that commuter traffic moves more slowly and consequently pours more pollution into the air, how do those striking plan to offset this?

T.

Errm - raising the profile of the problem, threat of escalating action until "something is done", opening up debate (on social media like this), making politicos wring their hands, you know - that sort of thing?

What would you prefer? just to ignore it all until all the glaciers and a dozen (currently inhabited) islands have all gone? the world-wide economy is wreak as a result of changing weather patterns, drought, extreme weather, and we have even more global instability due to mass migration and starvation?

Still you'll not have to worry about what it's all for, but, by all means propose a more effective means of stopping things going bad.

My kids take the view that it's a protest not a strike. Any thing that raises attention levels towards the damage being done to the planet is surely a good thing. Business and Government need to know they are going to be held to account by the future generations so students raising awareness of their intentions as well as continuing to emphasise the need to do more to protect the rainforests and reduce plastic pollution is a priority for them. The world is an environmental mess and attitudes need to change very very quickly.

As far as I can tell, the UK Government is already aware of the situation and are doing things to combat Global Warming in the UK.  Therefore, a strike by children probably won't make them do anything differently or quicker. 
In common with Extinction Rebellion, there seems to be an awful lot of demands for immediate action e.g. Reduce greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2025, but little or no details of how that can be achieved. 
On a local level and aimed at the children going on strike, etc. what are they personally doing? Have they asked their parents to stop taking them on foreign holidays? Have they asked not to have a new phone every time that there is a new model? Are they wearing the same clothes that they wore last year?
My gut instinct, is that the strike action by children is more of 'Feel Good' thing and one that is encouraged by adults/parents so that they too can feel like that they're doing something, but actually in the main are doing nothing themselves because they can't/won't tolerate a lifestyle change.

Being objective, rather than having a personal dig, you've no way of telling, nobody has other than the individuals.

Another way of looking at things, could be that since these kinds of things weren't happening ten years ago, they're a sign of a gathering realisation that things need to change, which is in itself a good thing, in being what needs to proceed change.

You make a fair point and one I make back to my children. My daughter has just turned vegan which is a major lifestyle change for her. The veganism is her way of protesting against the dairy and meat industry which as we know is causing untold damage to the planet . I have made the point to get that she needs to look at her wider lifestyle, not just her diet if she wants to be set an example to her peers. She wanted to replace her leather school shoes for black vans. I told her she needs to wear out her current shoes before replacing them because to replace stuff unneccessary make her part of the the problem, not the solution. She saw the sense in that argument and I'm proud of her awareness and understanding.

That's really impressive that she has gone vegan. There's something commonly quoted that the meat and dairy industry contributes a little bit more than transport, when it comes to climate change, but I recently heard a UK meat farmer on the radio complaining that not all farmed meat is equal in terms of it's contribution to climate change, with UK beef being greener than the ranches in other parts of the world, with (depending on where it's from in the UK) UK beef being among the greenest carbon wise.

What counts as an example may be rather subjective, but your daughter certainly serves as one to myself with my struggle to go veggie. If wild venison from the UK turns out to be as green as I'd like to think, I'll go for eating that. Otherwise going veggie seems inarguable.  

The rain forest is a mess. Huge amounts  of biodiversity being extinguished to make way for cattle ranching and palm oil. I don't doubt UK red meat is produced at a lesser environmental cost but even the UK is in urgent need of some rewilding and new forest plantations.

https://www.conservation.org/stories/11-deforestation-facts-you-need-to-kno...

You should try and time your strike with some good weather, then drive out and bag loads of routes, as the crags will be quiet mid week now the schools are back. 

You can satisfy the eco thing by free wheeling down the hills on the way home and only breaking when you feel your life is endangered. 

I’m a fully grown up person and I’m going (and probably to the next XR protest in London). For me the point is to express an opinion in public to local and national government and to raise awareness. I also think it’s really useful for people who are really worried about global heating and the numerous other environmental problems we face to know they aren’t on their own. 

The frustrating thing about the climate emergency is that we have most of the technology already available, it’s just about having the political will to make big changes and also getting enough people to change their behaviour, obviously difficult to achieve on an international scale.The Zero Carbon Britain project ( https://www.cat.org.uk/info-resources/zero-carbon-britain/ ) has some good models for a way forward at a national level. It’s also worth listening to Kevin Anderson for an analysis of the political nonsense surrounding these things.  youtube.com/watch?v=7BZFvc-ZOa8&   And he’s a climber!

As an individual, a one in 7 billion of a rapidly growing species, it is difficult sometimes to know what to do about climate change.

One option, is to carry on as before. The late 20th century growth model. Keep flying, keep consuming, get vaguely irritated at naive young people and daft hippies when they pull annoying stunts like daft strikes that achieve nothing.

Another option is try and get the supertanker to slow down and change course. I would argue that these irritating kids have done more to change government thinking on climate action in Western Europe than any other group. 

Things will have to change. Get out of the way if you can't lend a hand. 

I know whose side I am on. 

Do you honestly think that the UK Government is altering its thinking on Climate Change based on children going on strike and that they're not instead taking advice from all of the various experts at their disposal?

I'm doing my bit thank you very much and that was before Greta and Co got involved...

The children are changing the mood. They are moving things on. Channel 4 news is doing a nightly report on climate change and many MSM's are beginning to give it more prominence. 

Most of the various experts are grateful that school climate strikers are giving the issue such prominence and creating a media scrum. 

Respect on doing your bit beforehand. 

In reply to FactorXXX:

Yes of course. The UK government don’t listen to experts, they listen to the electorate, and if the electorate prioritise climate change then it will become important. Children putting climate change front and centre gives it a bit of a chance against the public desire for cheap petrol and the  building company lobbyists opposing all improvements in environmental standards. 

You’re asking what the kids are doing but you know they are just a bunch of kids right?

We should be looking out for their interests not the other way round...

Says the man who has got an active thread asking for advice about a climbing holiday in a Spanish speaking country for the benefit of his daughter.
Mainland Spain, Canary Islands or Central America are options apparently...
 

Are you really trying to say that you weren't aware of the Climate Change problems before Greta came along?
If so, I find that absolutely astonishing as it's been pretty much obvious and reported as such for years! 

Good on your daughter!
The 'What are Children doing' question wasn't aimed at you by the way, was just a general comment about how everyone, including myself, is totally hypocritical and selective when it comes to Climate Change issues. 

It's nice little day out for most. But sitting down and writing a letter to your local councillor, or mp will have more effect. 

Write additional letters and attend public meetings on issues that have some kind of climate impact, which can be just about anything. Make an appointment in person with your mp if there is a relevant local issue. 

There have been big marches in London for other issues, swampy in trees, celebs at anti fracking blockades.. . None of which really changed anything. 

Professional lobbying is the key, because that's what the big corporations will be doing. 

That's the problem you have, just there.  'Fraid the UK government's a bit busy doing grown-up stuff right now but if you leave a message, we'll be in touch as soon as we see a feelgood photo opportunity that doesn't commit us to doing a single thing longterm.

T. 

Interesting perspective - it is about striking against yourself

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/19/life-earth-wealth-meg...

It is about striking to change your own ways.  I appreciate the argument that it can be difficult to see what individuals can do to make a difference.  However, my view is that individuals can make a difference.  Lots of small things add up.  That is not to say that big organisations and governments don't need to do things as well.  Of course they do.

My overall perspective is that I would like to leave the planet in a state that younger generations can enjoy and live comfortably in.  I have had a good run of overseas travel but am now endeavoring to stop flying (we'll see how that goes).  I am happy(ish) to change my behaviours in the hope that younger people can get at least some of the same experiences that I have enjoyed.

No, I have a real job to do and a family to support.

Yeah, me too.

I don't know why you speak with such authority or how you know what others are doing or not doing, but we've done and continue to do all those things and more.

If anyone happens to be in Carlisle on Friday then from 12pm in the city 'square' there's a event with speakers from all the major political parties, children, the national association of head teachers, the national education union and various environmental groups and speakers. There's also a bunch of bands to keep the energy up. 

Yes, I’m hypocritical on climate change, I still fly, still have a car, still eat red meat and still heat my house in winter but I want the government to address climate change. Most people in the UK are either hypocrites or uncaring on this.

But that has nothing to do with the point I was addressing. You suggested that it was experts that were going to change government thinking, rather than public action. But there isn’t a problem with the science, we have all the scientific knowledge that we need to recognise this problem. What we need is political will, and to get political will in this democracy, we need public engagement. The children’s strike will engage the public. It may well alienate people from the cause too, but hopefully not too many. 

I heard something on the radio last night where they were talking to an indigenous tribesman in the Amazon, basically asking if he was worried about his way of life disappearing. The gist of what he said was that actually his way of life was pretty secure,  he could get his own food and shelter directly from the forest, his way of life was sustainable. He said that it was 'us' that should worry, our system was unsustainable and must inevitable at some point collapse. It was an interesting perspective.

I think it's about action at all levels, both personal and governmental. Individual action can be a bit piecemeal and even small changes at a governmental level can promote wide spread change. Think of the significant impact of charging 5p for a plastic bag.

Good luck with it, I think we all find change to consume less difficult!

I'd never thought of that perspective.  Really interesting.  Of course, his life is only sustainable if some company or farmer does not come along and cut down or burn the forest.  Let's just hope we don't destroy the sustainable lives and habitats of a large number of groups around the world.

Yep, there are various degrees of hypocrisies involved not matter what you do. 

However there are no hypocrisies bigger than doing sweet f*ck all because doing something/anything would be hypocritical (except for disparaging people as hypocrites for doing something).

Aimed at me?
What I'm getting from this thread, is that people are *demanding* that something is done, but apart from shouting about it aren't actually willing to do anything themselves about it.

It's a thread about a climate protest. Hence it's about protesting.

If you are genuinely interested in what people are doing then you could start a thread about that.

Fair enough...

Who isn't willing to do anything themselves?

If you mean Swampy protesting against the Newbury bypass, that certainly made a difference and shifted the thinking on building yet more roads at the time. Those of us who attended the rallies yesterday have been energised to get more involved with the issues. Numbers will continue to grow. Letters are a bit tedious for most people.

They work, but so does some social media.

Did swampy real change anything. Look at the damage already done in the name of hs2.

One good thing, at least global warming meant you had a nice day for it...

The ones on this thread that are still flying to go on climbing trips.
At the moment, you can't really blame most people for flying as there is no real disincentive for them not to do so.
However, if you're passionate enough about global warming to the extent of taking a day off to protest/strike about it, then surely an obvious thing to do is self regulate where you can and stopping flying must be one thing that can be relatively easily done?

Some say that 'in the scheme of things' people can afford to take one flying trip per year (at the current rate of climate change I slightly have my doubts, and rather think everybody should have been making a noise about it 20 years ago too), but I can't argue with the logic of that. 

Who knows the rate of tax we should be paying on plane fuel ie. increased cost/km flown ?? Would it really stop / restrict our travel ? 

In absence of government action who would be willing to donate this equivalent tax to tree-planting ? would that be an equitable act ??

there's a lot of talk about rising sea levels but I am not up to date on real threats - where do we see notable change ( other than freak weather events ) ? Is there any real level change in the seas around London ??

I think in the same way people don't voluntarily pay more tax despite being supportive of and voting for higher tax rates, that is a fairly mild form of hypocrisy. Government policy affects people's behaviour and it's reasonable to ask for the government to pursue different policies to affect you own behaviour as well as others'. 

Err... Not from round here, are you...

The people of the Maldives will be waiting with bated breath for the answer to that question.

Isnt there a place in north Wales that has a contingency plan to simply abandon it rather than waste money on sea defences?

Edit : Fairbourne

He got national coverage on the news repeatedly, and government at the time became wary of similar projects. I don't think Hs2 has anything to do with it! Perhaps we can rely on you to write some letters as Swampy retired soon after his stand. 

Yes.

Southern UK is sinking any way, Scotland rising. But annual water level increase has doubled since the Thames barrier was built. 3mm ish a year, doesn't sound much but it's pretty critical if you can't stop your capital city flooding in less than a 100 years. 

Reduction when possible is clearly a very good idea - but for the footprint we do generate it does not seem too expensive to take steps to limit the impact by offsetting. 

I’ve started to do this in an informal way via Trees for Life, they reckon that 4 mature trees will equate to about a tonne of CO2. Ive got a couple of work trips next year that will involve flying - The cost to offset in this way will be about £24 - so not a huge amount in the context of the flight costs.

If this cost was added to the ticket price would we even notice?

Good news for TominEdinburgh!

Thing is, don’t we reportedly have 12 years to save the planet before we go past the point of no return? Your trees will be still likely be mere saplings in that time.. offsetting is sadly far too little far too late. Your pollution is still there, still causing a problem. 

But will isostatic rebound out pace sea level rises... I don't know without checking. But I'd guess not. 

Been there done that. I spent several years as an unpaid parish/town councillor reading people's letter and writing new ones up the food chain. Mainly a job of sheer frustration, often at the incompetence and complete lack of care of people working paid full time jobs in district, county council and the national park. Banging my head in annoyance at the attitude of park planning committee many of whom don't reside in the national park, making decisions that impact how residents live. The general lack of environmental( and certainly qualifications)awareness in many of the staff in all agencies, only a desire to try and maintain the area in some vision of a Victorian heyday that never really existed. 

While thousands of acres go neglected or were a near monoculture, they wanted a big celebration and invited the mp if there were a couple of acres wood with a few dormouses. Living in a fluffy dream world at taxpayers expense. 

When you see some person living in Manchester voting against a women in the dales being allowed to have solar panels because it's not in keeping with the area. Despite the house roof not being visible from any road, footpath or their neighbours, who had all written letters in too supporting the panels. I just gave up in despair in the end. Their only concern was having it look pretty for southerners and their second or third homes. 

So whilst I didn't live like swampy I've done my bit and continue to do so in other ways. 

Yes, I think all the XR people have given up on letter writing as well.

I don't think it's the letter writing that's the problem. It's people. Managers in national parks whose back ground and qualification is in media and arts. People given posts on the planning board almost as a reward for being some ex boss within a county council etc. Well meaning, but totally unsuitably qualified for their post. Etc.

I see no solution. Because even an avid ER campaigner problems thinks purple heather moorlands are wonderful and wild.

Of course - but given it’s impossible for most folk to go zero carbon overnight, things like offsetting are still going to be helpful.

the last figures I can see says there are about 18 million passengers a year for internal flights in the UK. If we planted c5 million trees a year as part of climate mitigation as a consequence then we would be doing something of value. 

Scale that up for international flights and we would be planting something like 40 million trees a year in the U.K. alone.

That’s creating two Forests of Dean every year. Do that for the next 30 years and we move the U.K. to a very different environment, with an additional 12000 square miles of forest or woodland.

Alternatively, we might do well to get into the mindset that flying is as unacceptable as smoking in a restaurant, if not much more so.

While that might be a good think to do in the abstract, it is politically impossible because it would require a vastly lower standard of living.  Even if you don't fly personally, you will rely on flights for many, many things.

We could do, we could stop all non-essential activity - I assume you will stop climbing at crags you can not walk or cycle to and have invested in a hemp rope? At least then you would have something to smoke.

What if we incorporated carbon capture and storage in the cost of flying (say about an extra £20 on a flight to Dublin) so the flight becomes carbon neutral today?

Would that be acceptable or is it just that flying is bad full stop?

Sure, I get that. Equally, if we carry on like we are, more flights, more runways, it's going to become equally impossible, probably far worse than the scenario you sketch. But as it's merely an abstract notion at the moment how impossible the future will be for most of us in the developed world, not even considering the total disaster we are imposing on the rest of the world, we only consider the disadvantages of not flying. Of course, like you, I'm painting with broad strokes.

I don't know. As I've mentioned before, and as Timmd has said, it's impossible not to be a hypocrite. But to me there does seem something repellently self-indulgent, vicious and destructive about most flying, like some Caligula-era orgy or blowing smoke into a toddler's face. I'm sure if I knew more about it, I'd find worse things (sea cargo?). I'm not stopping anyone flying, just myself.

vicious and self indulgent? cripes! For most U.K. citizens flying is a tiny part of their carbon footprint - about 2% of mine this year (all for work) - in fact my carbon footprint from rail travel (all for pleasure) is greater. Now some of that rail travel is substituted for flights I would have taken in the past, so has a lower negative impact, but that’s just the same as offsetting really - maintaining my lifestyle whilst reducing its impact rather than changing it more radically.

A devil's advocate view is that the  technology exists to make almost everything else we do other than flying carbon neutral, so we would be better off focussing on achieving very low or zero emissions from everything else and just accept the current few percent of global emissions from flying.

Really? A very short flight or is the rest of your footprint enormous?

Bristol Dublin. 

I understand you're playing devil's advocate but I think this is where the language of 'emergency' and 'crisis' is really important. It should be frightening everyone into making radical changes and asking governments to do the same. We had literally decades of people being told to turn the lights off and not leave phone chargers on unnecessarily with almost no change in most people's 'big impact' behaviour - transport, diet, construction etc., such that targets aren't even vaguely tight enough and the big economies rarely get close to them. That's mainly because most people weren't aware (or rather, weren't frightened), and so governments didn't feel compelled to push voters to radical change. It's true that, in that time, more and more renewable technologies have come on stream and had a major pick-up but the urgency needs to come from larger groups of voters, and from individuals who feel a sense of crisis which translates in to 'big impact' behavioural change.

Saying "flying isn't really an issue because we can get everything else to net zero", is another way of excusing a disastrous behaviour , because at the moment everything else isn't even close to net zero. And, god knows, we're all looking for getouts, all the time.  

In terms of the actual climate change we're seeing it seems pretty clear that we're well past several tipping points with many positive feedback cycles already kicking off all over the place, but it must be true that the right amount of reforestation combined with low carbon economies can mitigate some of the effects over the longest terms.

That's not the argument. Flying is an issue, but just the one least easily targeted.

It’s easily targeted at an individual level - the tricky bit is the aggregate. 

Putting the price up with hypothecated taxation seems a great way to start.

Yes, to be honest, I think I (and, I suspect, most others) would more readily be priced out of the market than shamed out of it. The bottom line is that a realistic system of carbon taxes is the only way of bring about the changes needed.

That sounds pretty drastic, I am not a sceptic. The problem is that no-one is feeling it. We see the glaciers melting back and we are told that the sea is rising at 3mm per year but we neither feel it in our pockets nor by burning on our skin nor by the choking as our heads go under. Though science has been to great efforts to predict our future, the outcome is just that - a prediction - which might not come in our own lifetime.

It would be interesting to analyse the group who do react to the impending danger. Are they driven by science or ideology ? Who are the people who have stopped (or reduced ) flying, who have turned vegan, who turn off the light switches when they leave each room ? Are they those who never used to do such things but in recent decades changed abruptly ? 

I don't think science has let us down in this instance but unfortunately neither the populace nor the decision makers are scientists. And those driven by ideology are in the minority . When will we start to feel it, and will it be too late by then ? 

With a 3 degree rise having just been predicted, and carbon emission rising at their fastest rate, and being at their highest since post industrial times, it's 'shit or bust' about doing anything and everything possible. 

Anybody who is flying around the world on climbing trips essentially needs to be asked 'Really, What The Fuck Are You Fucking Doing?' given the above I've just heard on the radio.

It's too urgent to be pondering whether what one does is negligible in the scheme of things.

When it comes to looking children in the eye when they ask why people didn't do anything about climate change, what kind of answer is 'I wanted to go flying off to go climbing' ?  

Edit: I'd dearly love to fly on holiday, but I sat and pondered after reading about coastal communities in poorer countries being negatively affected by changes in ocean temperatures and acidity when it comes to food available, and the more urgent things become haven't found a way to justify it to myself. 

I'd have thought there's little doubt that we are already feeling it. Predicting the weather has been a difficult challenge since ancient times but scientists have said that global warming will happen and it is. And they've said that more extreme weather events will occur as a result, and the have. 

One of the biggest problems is that global warming and the associated climate effects are both diffuse, gradual and varied. There won't be a time when a bomb lands on London and we suddenly say, 'Man, global warming really has just arrived, like they said it would'. We're the frogs in the saucepan, or whatever it is. That's why the emergency talk is important - it gives a sense of urgency which isn't actually real, in some senses. Things won't actually get 100x worse next year, or even the year after. And many of the richest countries around the planet will be able to mitigate the effects they feel directly. What they will struggle with much more is managing the fallout of poorer countries stuggling to mitigate or cope with the effects they feel. Which is to say nothing of the impacts on the planet not directly linked to human coping.

I'm reacting and I'm driven by ideology; I've known the science since 1990. I routinely showed 'An Inconvenient Truth' to schoolkids and explained the problems and what we needed to do, like turning off lights. But now I feel a sense of moral urgency and that has, in part, been engendered by the climate strikes. My point about light switches is that governments were happy to tell us to do that stuff for decades because it was easy for everyone. Telling everyone not to fly or drive and to eat plant-based and to have fewer kids and not have pets and not build their homes using concrete is way harder and governments haven't wanted to do it, especially because they are supposed to stop NOW. Now people know they should do / not do those things more clearly than ever. That puts pressure on all of us and therefore governments. 

I disagree, up to a point. I can easily choose not fly. It's harder for me to choose to build houses in new developments in more sustainable ways or to plant new forests. It's also harder for me, personally, to not drive. But I'm working on the problem with some urgency. I should think a huge number of flights could be avoided really. Transforming our energy infrastructure, particularly in relation to construction and the overhaul of existing buildings must be harder. Transforming other areas of transport infrastructure is probably harder too.

The problem is that any getout will always be taken. If people think they're doing their bit by turning off lights they can go to bed content.

And I agree that just taxing it to death is a good idea, for those of us still not feeling any moral urgency.

Wonder how many of the children that took part in Fridays protest had recently been on lovely foreign holidays?

It's about their parents, isn't it, what their parents are doing. Hopefully they're doing something more than keeping their children off school.

I'm fairly sure that these obviously earnest, environmentally aware and concerned children could raise objections to such holidays.  Wonder how many would actually forego a holiday in Spain as opposed to one in Rhyl?
I'm also fairly sure that the parents of such children have similar views on global warming and had a certain amount of smugness that their child was taking part in the protest.
I'm also equally sure that both parents and children don't consider that their individual actions should be taken into account when it comes to mitigating the effects of global warming and that it should all be magically sorted out somehow by someone else without any detrimental lifestyle changes to themselves.
 

I feel like nothing I do will make a difference so why bother? I have Mossmorran out one window and Ineos out the other. Both using vast amounts of energy and producing vast amounts of carbon. Ineos burning £250,000 of gas in 24 hour's through one flare coz it's more profitable than building a storage tank. Their f*cking thousands of lights on 24 hour's a day. Why should I not go on holiday? What difference will it make? I see shops, offices and council buildings with lights on 24 hour's a day. What difference will anything I do make when that's going on? I've only been on a plane 12 times in 55 years, and I get lectures from people who've flown 100's of times, people who fly every week on business but they think that's OK coz it's business. I've taken people to Edinburgh airport in my taxi in the morning then picked them up in the evening! A flight for a 20 minute meeting! Sorry, but I think I'm going to Lanzarote in November for a sunshine boost to get me through the winter and the ridiculous hours I work through the Christmas period. 

Because of the moral imperative to? 

(without seeming to be a high horse)

Absolutely, and how many of them do a 5 minute school run the rest of the time in a f*cking 4x4?

You've spoken to a lot of children and parents about it, then?

When a cynical person meets a pessimistic one, and they talk about climate change, one confirms the other's belief that it's hopeless to try. This thread is an apt example. 

It doesn't matter what one thinks, one has to try, to be able to look children in the eyes when they ask, as they surely will.

I should feel a moral imperative to do something that will make no difference? 

That sounded very, as you put it, high horse.

Where as if one doesn't act, one makes it hopeless for others who do. 

Edit: This is the crux of the issue, singularly we all feel hopeless, but collectively it may make a difference. Either way, future generations will still ask...so what are we going to do?

Edited to make it less personal.

I look out the window and see the proof that me not going to Lanzarote won't make a jot of difference. But I still reduce, reuse and recycle. I was recycling back when it meant going to the dump, before the council started picking up the various bins. I buy local as much as I can in these local crappy towns where there's not much local produce available. There's some farms around that sell stuff but I'd have to drive further to get to them than I do to the supermarkets. 

What are you going to do about Mossmoran and Ineos?

Yes, I understand the need for some sunshine to stave off gloominess during November. I probably should have put it as 'Where as if one doesn't act', rather than 'you'. 

No you're talking about me, personal responsibility for the climate. So I ask you, what are you, Timmd, going to do about Ineos burning £250,000 of natural gas in 24 hour's in a flare in their Grangemouth plant?

Isn't e.g. not flying (or flying less), using efficient cars, heating your house less doing something about Ineos?  If we all reduce our fossil fuel energy use, Ineos etc will produce less. 

I agree and disagree with you.

I disagree that nothing you do will make a difference. Everything positive you do makes a difference, it may be a tiny difference but it's still a difference. It may seem paltry compared to the other factors out with your control that affect climate change, but that's just life, it's difficult for an individual to make a difference in the world in any respect, but collectively the changes can be significant.

I think one of the overlooked differences people can make is not the absolute amount of harm that is done to the world but changing the conversation and behaviour around it. It shouldn't be that the person who chooses not to fly on holiday or cycles to work, or takes their own re-usable cup is thought of as some kind of eco-hippy, it should be that the person who has no regard for the environmental consequences of their decisions is looked on with low regard. Cultural change is really important and much as these threads on UKC can cause me some despair at times I also think these conversations help.

Where I agree with you is that individual change is not enough and it's also not fair. Environmental damage is not factored into the costs of people's behaviour, the only restriction is people's morals and being environmentally responsible often costs you in time and money. This needs to change, it shouldn't cost you more to make the right choice.

I don't blame you, enjoy your hols.

We only think of Brits chasing the sun, but a huge number tourists fly into the UK as well. No flying would massively change tourism. The amount of foreign revenue flowing into some areas from overseas visitors could decline rapidly. As we progress towards 2050 plans or thoughts should be given to those areas. It won't of course. 

Yup. We can't have change without changing things but (or at least it seems to me) the costs of not changing things seem so significant they completely overwhelm the case for not changing things. 

Personally I prefer a comfortable easy life where I can do what the hell I like but it's become apparent that that's not the choice, the choice is to take some pain of change now or face a world of pain later.

Why do I get the sense you felt I was having a go at you, and that you're having one in return?