I’m not completely sure of what point you’re making. Would you buy the cheaper product even if you could afford the more expensive green one?
Because if the answer is “no”, then you are still agreeing with OP; and if the answer is “yes” then you are saying you want to knowingly buy something that is harmful for the environment and encourage a company to make more of it, while deflecting responsibly and saying that corpos and govs are the ones who have to do something.
This is really just a very specific type of socialism, as indicated by Lenin being here; an authoritarian who killed other socialists. This is about ML.
The first and last panels are right, but, for example, according to this post Anarcho-Communists don’t exist. They don’t believe in “evolving to a point” as the third panel says, they believe in jumping straight to that point. Also, Libertarian Socialists wouldn’t really be fond of “elected committees” controlling things, as the second panel talks about; maybe electing people into leadership positions inside of a company/cooperative, or maybe even having unions make those decisions, but nothing above that.
One problem no one has mentioned, is that it also makes life a lot harder for homeless people. I guess they need to open a bank account and start writing their account number on a cardboard.
This actually reminds me of when I went to a restaurant a while ago. I had some physical money to spend, so I figured I’d take it with me and pay with that. At the end of the meal, while my friends paid with a card, I asked if I could pay with cash. Immediately, the waiter’s demeanor changed and he looked almost… disgusted? I don’t even know. Then he asked me in a tone that matched his expression if I didn’t have a card, and I answered something like “Well, I do, but it would be more convenient for me to pay with cash, if that’s okay”. Then he, for some reason, repeated the question, and I answered similarly. He didn’t say anything and just avoided looking at me. While a friend next to me was paying I asked again, “so, can I pay with cash?”, and without looking at me, he just barely shook his head yes. So I paid with cash, and then I awaited my 3€ change back (in my country it’s not usually custom to tip because waiters actually get paid full salaries). Eventually he came back with our receipt, but no change. I just left without saying anything - at this point I wasn’t going to argue about 3€ - but I’m most definitely not coming back to that place.
Still don’t know what the dude’s problem was, but it did leave me wondering how are homeless people expected to pay for anything, if even a person who isn’t homeless can receive such cold treatment just for choosing to pay with cash.
I don’t know much about her, but directly from the wiki:
The rate at which Harris’s office prosecuted marijuana crimes was higher than the rate under Hallinan, but the number of defendants sentenced to state prison for such offenses was substantially lower.[76] Prosecutions for low-level marijuana offenses were rare under Harris, and her office had a policy of not pursuing jail time for marijuana possession offenses.[76]
It sounds like her position on weed is not exactly what people are painting it as. At least these comments make it seem much worse than it is according to the wiki.
EDIT:
According to this, she even supported a bill in 2019 to legalize marijuana at a federal level, tax it, and use that money to (according to this):
Create a community reinvestment fund to reinvest in communities most impacted by the failed War on Drugs and allow those funds to be invested in the following programs:
Job training;
Reentry services;
Expenses related to the expungement of convictions;
Public libraries;
Community centers;
Programs and opportunities dedicated to youth; and
Health education
I don’t know if it’s on purpose, but you are definitely spreading misinformation.
The grass is always greener on the other side. Americans who think companies don’t pay enough, housing price is too high, fuel is too expensive, etc., would be shocked to see how bad it is in Portugal. You can have a degree in CS and go work as a Software Engineer, and you still won’t have enough money to rent a home in the city. After a few years, if you manage to get some raises (good luck), you’ll maybe have enough for a small flat.
Health care is much cheaper than the US, but that doesn’t mean much when there are no doctors or nurses, and maternity wards start closing down.
We have people who are unqualified to teach having to teach school classes because there is no one else available; also some teachers have to live in their cars because they can’t afford a home in the area they teach.
I could keep naming things. And progressive in what way? Drugs are decriminalized, but that’s not the same as legal, and it’s still illegal to sell weed unlike in the US. Both the US and Portugal have had same sex marriage and adoption for years now. And I also don’t think trans rights are much better in Portugal than in the US; so I’m not entirely sure in what way it’s more progressive, to be honest.
And this is not to mention all the government scandals we’ve had in the last 15 years; probably the same or more as the US, you just don’t hear about it because it’s not the US.
But to get back to the point:
That means they are forced to cater their policies at least a little bit toward all those people, and it ends up having a real meaningful impact on their platform.
No they’re not, trust me. Source: the reason for our last elections. Or how we’ve (the people, through taxes) had to sink a ridiculous amount of money into a national airliner that made no money, and recently when it seemed to be turning a profit after decades, they began to talk about privatizing it, which is something the right had been demanding for a long time now.
If you always vote for someone, they have no incentive to do anything for you; they know they get your vote anyway. If you don’t vote for them, then they have an incentive to try and appeal to you in order to get your vote.
Right, but the point still stands that voting tactically just reinforces the status quo.
Two examples from the last election:
Lisbon, which gets to decide 48 of the seats (the most):
PS (currently leading party) won 21 of the 48 seats in Lisbon. If half their voters actually spread their votes amongst the left, the second-largest party (PSD) would still have only got 13, the IL party 4, and the far right party 4. The power of the right would not have changed, but PS would only have 10 while the left would be a lot more powerful, and we would not have been subjected to a majority victory from PS.
Portalegre, which gets to decide 2 of the seats (the least):
PS won both, with 47% of the votes. PSD won 0 with 23%. In this scenario, if half of the PS votes went to the left, then PS would still have 1, and PSD would also have got 1 - hardly a change on the surface, but the result is that people could look at it and see the other left parties also have some decent representation, maybe it’s not crazy to vote for them and they are a viable alternative. Instead, because the votes went all to PS, everyone is now engaged in a self-fulfilling prophecy: “I should vote for PS! Why? Because they’re the closest party to the left with a change of winning. Why? Because everyone always votes for PS.”.
And that’s how you end up with the same two parties in power for 49 years, while everyone is always complaining about how much they suck the whole time and that nothing changes: “We have to vote for X, because not X doesn’t have a change of winning, because we’re always voting for X; also, not X would probably be just as corrupt and incompetent as X because I’m just guessing they are”. I’ve been hearing that logic since I was a child - the words and rhetoric are ingrained in my brain, and every time I hear the word “elections” the voices pop up in my head.
I was gonna make this a reply, but I guess it fits as a general comment.
There will always be some excuse to maintain the status quo.
In the USA people say it’s because of “first past the post”(*). But in Portugal there is no such thing. We have a parliamentary system (technically semi-presidential, but for practical purposes parliamentary) but somehow people still find an excuse to always maintain the status quo. Since we’ve been a democracy (49 years), only two parties have ever been in power. Before the last elections, we had 9 parties in parliament. After several decades of incompetence, and everyone complaining about how corrupt the system and politicians are, the same party won the last elections with a majority vote, and now we have 8 parties in parliament. Basically, we’re not too far from a two-party system.
This happens because there’s always some excuse to compromise; in my country, the excuse/logic to rally behind the centrists and put them in power is something like “look how much the extreme right is growing, we have to keep them at bay! Plus, the other parties are probably as bad and corrupt anyway!”, with the expression “useful vote” thrown around a lot. Never mind the fact the far right are growing due to the incompetence of the people currently in power, and that, being a parliamentary system, a vote for any non-right wing party already works to keep the right at bay. And the cherry on top is how everyone gas lits themselves with “the other parties that never had any power are probably as bad and corrupt as the parties that have been in power for decades and which we know for a fact are bad and corrupt”.
This isn’t very eloquently written, but hopefully the point comes across: some people always expect you to “compromise” with them by doing exactly what they want, while they don’t compromise at all; and some people create a self full fulling prophecy by convincing themselves from the start that there are no other options. I can’t speak 100% for the USA because I don’t understand the system as well, but at least in my country the reality is that if everyone actually voted for the people they most align with, we could still keep the right at bay and not put all the power in the hands of the “moderates”.
(*)but, unless I am massively mistaken, if a third party gets enough votes they will still get seats in parliament which should still give them power, or at least still take power away from another.
I know what you mean, I felt the same way when I first saw it, and even when I started playing. But the concept intrigued me, so I kept going, and after a while I got used to the art style. If the concept of the game appeals to you, I’d still recommend you give it a try.
Looks at the entirety of modern history and lmmfao… 🤣
I mean, yeah, exactly, look at modern history… People keep complaining about politicians doing nothing, and everywhere you go people complain about how politicians do nothing, and yet those same politicians keep winning elections.
It’s literally a meme in my country that every one complains about how corrupt, nepotist, mismanaged, and just bad the leading party is, but how they keep winning anyway. The excuse is usually “the other parties are all too extremist”, even when one of those parties are basically the same as the leading party except: so far they have no instances of corruption; they have a very big focus on environmentalism, which is their main platform. And also, guess what? They’re the smallest party in parliament, with just 1 member. The second smallest, but with also 1 member, is a more centrist but also mostly environmentally driven party.
For reference, there are 8 parties in parliament right now (before the last elections there were 9), and since we’ve been a democracy only 2 of those have ever won elections. We’ve had 16 elections, and 2 parties are 10 to 6. The one with 10 is currently in power after winning with over 50% of votes. And everywhere people keep complaining about them, and you hear scandals and see ministers resigning every other week, and our forests burn every summer, and living costs keep rising, cities are getting too expensive for our citizens, and so on. And so the meme lives on.
This isn’t some invisible force casting those votes, it’s the people. It’s the people who cast all those votes, and it’s also the people who, by the way, made the far right party the third-biggest party in parliament in the last elections.
So yes, please do look at modern history, and understand that for the most part people are getting what they voted for. If you want politicians to act different, vote for different politicians, which is what the other user is saying.
Voting is snake oil, but it’s snake oil because the majority of people stop it from actually working.
Liberals believe in the invisible hand that will redistribute wealth and regulate the economy; people like you believe in an invisible hand that is responsible for all of the world’s problems, when the reality is that people hold most of the power, but the majority are either complacent, or actively working to keep things the way they are.
Final Fantasy 6. There are technically several protagonists, but the one with the better claim to “main protagonist” is a woman.
Also, Heaven’s Vault isn’t an old game, but it’s not very well known or talked about, so I’ll throw it in anyway.
Full disclosure, I only read the first 3 paragraphs because it seems you missed a key part of my point:
It’s directed at people who could do more, but actively chose not to, and then blame the system and say policy needs to change.
If you have transports close to home that can take you to your work place, but you choose to drive a car anyway, then the problem isn’t the state giving it a priority over other options, the problem is you. Clearly, the state improving transports and making them more accessible wouldn’t make a difference to you.
And are you arguing that most people east most of their meals at fast food places? Because I’m sure we both know that’s not true. Firstly, at least where I live that’s not affordable, fast food or not. Most people do their shopping around once a week and cook at home, because that’s what is actually affordable to most people. Secondly, most fast food places offer vegan and vegetarian options nowadays, and even before that plenty of them offered chicken or fish, both of which are much better than beef, and even pork. So I really don’t understand how this is a reasonable excuse for the incredibly large consumption of beef, as well as dairy products. You can also go on any big forum that doesn’t skew left so much and doesn’t care so much about the environment, and you’ll quickly find out most people’s views on vegans and vegetarians, and see that for most people it is not an access issue.
And why do you need disposable plastic goods? I’m sure you can come up with some rare scenario like a 1 in 10000 occurrence that would justify it, but that’s very obviously beside the point because of what I said at the start. Do you need to buy sodas, which come in plastic bottles? Do you need to buy water in plastic bottles? Do you need disposable plastic utensils, like forks, knifes, plates, cups? Because all those sell quite well around the world. I’ll also add this comment someone wrote in another thread a while ago:
what would happen if everyone turned around and said ‘you know what, fuck companies that sell drinks in bottles i’m never going to be without my refillable bottle’ how long would coca-cola keep producing 100 billion plastic bottles a year? what would they do with them?
But if James Quincey said ‘fuck it, I’m not producing plastic bottles anymore they’re bad for the planet’ but 8 billion people said ‘oh ok, well we’re still going to regularly buy drinks in plastic bottles’ the numbers of plastic bottles being made would dip slightly but only while Ramon Laguarta rushed to spend the flood of money now coming in to scale up production at pepsi co.
It’s a two way problem. As long as most people keep wanting those things, then they will keep being produced. And policy will not change it unless you install a dictatorship.
Anyway, like I said, I didn’t read the rest of the comment because it seems you missed an important cornerstone of my point, and I’m too tired to keep arguing, so I’m sorry but I’ll leave it there. Have a good night or day wherever you are.
I don’t see how consuming less resources is waste of resources.
At the end of the day, they are both morally wrong and reprehensible. Neither should be done if it can be avoided.
I don’t feel like writing too much, so I’ll just leave this here to perhaps add some context. It’s another (longer) comment I wrote earlier about the topic.
Well, the answer, and you imply towards the end, is that it’s morally wrong.
If I said…
There are wars currently going on. Slavery, torture, some mass shootings, and every now and then even a genocide happens in the world. So until we stop all that, why shouldn’t I go and punch some random person in the face, if it will make me feel better? After all, it’s just a drop of water in an ocean of violance.
…you would probably call me an ass, maybe even a lunatic. You’d say I was just looking for excuses to keep being an ass. But that’s the thought process you (not just you, more of a general you) are defending and making an excuse for.
The more “utilitarian” answer is that if we can’t expect people to make changes in their lives by themselves when they have the choice to, why would we expect them to be okay being forced to make those changes by a government? And why wouldn’t they just then go vote for someone who undoes it all?
Everyone would like a Tesla model geewiz with zero emissions
But that’s exactly the problem! That right there is illustrative of the whole problem! Cars are not the solution, electrical or otherwise (electrical cars are still bad for the environment for a myriad of reasons)! And yet, instead of wanting more walkable and bikable cities, with more public transports, most people just want electrical vehicles; a “solution” that doesn’t require them to change anything about their lives, or requires any actual systematic change.
And as for “supergreen organic carbon neutral groceries”:
Anywhere I know of, most greens are cheaper than meat, and yet 2 things are true in a lot of the developed world:
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that most people could eat less meat than they do - especially red meat, which is worse - but they don’t. They actively chose to keep consuming, and overconsuming, even when they don’t have to. If they can walk, they’ll make excuses to take the car. If they can take public transport, they’ll still make excuses to take the car. The philosophy of “I don’t have to do anything, it’s the corporations and government who have to act” just enables that behaviour, and also raises two questions:
What will those people do when policy comes in to place that requires actual change from them? Will they be OK with it, or will they end up taking the system down and electing someone who undoes everything?
If people truly care so much, why aren’t all countries around the world electing more environmentally aware parties that enact more effective change?
I think convincing people pollution is morally wrong and to avoid it as much as possible in their own lives, will not only make the systematic change easier, it will also cause those people to actively fight for better and more effective changes when they realize they are being limited by the system itself. As opposed to now, where they just keep doing their thing, electing the same people, and just hope someone sorts it out without bothering them.
It’s also not something I nor anyone else here has said. It’s a total strawman.
It’s not just about this place, it’s about the average person. Every time this topic comes up, people always get very defensive and take it personally, often times even going on about “I already do all this, and that, and some other things, what else can I do?”. Well, chances are the criticism is not directed at you, then.
The criticism is directed at the people who base a big part of their diet on red meat; it’s directed at people who make excuses to drive when they could have easily walked or taken a bike but thought driving was more convenient and comfortable; it’s about people who have access to public transports but don’t want to take them because they’d have to walk five minutes to or from the station, or don’t want to “smell other people”, or just want “the privacy of my own car”. It’s directed at people who could do more, but actively chose not to, and then blame the system and say policy needs to change.
Policy would mean not subsiding red meat, therefore making it more expensive; it would mean raising prices of gas and forcing those people to walk more or ride more public transports; it would mean anything made of plastic would be a lot more expensive, and anything that needs to be shipped somewhere would be too.
How many people do you think would actually be okay with those policies, when they won’t even do it out of their own free will when given the option? How long until they regret it and vote for someone who undoes all the policies?
Even if we ignore all that and say that voting is the most important thing, how many green and ecological parties do you see winning elections around the world?
No matter how you measure it, it’s clear most people are not pushing that hard for change. The average person is choosing convenience and comfort over everything else, and just hopes someone else will sort out the problems - in a way that doesn’t really affect them or their choices. It’s also the reason there’s such a large push from the average “environmentally aware” person for electrical vehicles (even though they’re still bad for the environment) instead of more transports; it would mean not having to change anything in their lives.
Haha, well, to each their own, but the way I see it:
The second has a skill system that I like more than the first one, and it starts to have more of a semblance of a story. The NPCs in the first one basically just exist to tell you to go to place A, then B, and so on. To be honest, I couldn’t even finish the first one.
Like others have said, there’s no reason to play in order, but to be more specific:
If you ask someone what their favourite FF is, 90% of people will answer something between 6 and 10, so you should probably start with one in that range.
1 is probably not worth playing at all, it hardly even has a story and is very simple.
2 is better, but I would say 3 is where it really starts to get good.
4 and 5 are also very liked and popular.
12 doesn’t have the best story, but it’s good and it has a lot of people’s favourite combat system.
13 isn’t bad, but a lot of people didn’t enjoy it. I hardly hear people talk about it nowadays, but maybe that’s just me.
15 is probably more liked than 13 but it also gets a lot of criticism. It’s quite modern, though, so it’s probably one of the easiest to get into for most people.
11 and 14 are MMOs. If you like MMOs, you should probably choose 14 because 11 is quite old and doesn’t have a lot of players.
EDIT: Forgot to mention 16 because it just came out, but from what I hear a lot of people like it, so it may be a good entry point, although it’s console exclusive.
I just wanted to say, this is a very good comment.
When people say it’s not “we” and it’s just a few people, or just companies, it always seems to me that they are - consciously or subconsciously - just making excuses for not having to actually do anything and hoping someone else will solve the problem for them. They want the problem to be solved, while not having to do anything or change their lifestyle.
There are some very obvious and clear examples of this; here’s two of them:
Studies have shown most people are in favour of carbon taxes. But with carbon taxes, companies would just shift the extra cost onto the consumers by increasing prices. One thing affected by carbon tax, would be the price of gas itself. And when prices (especially gas prices) increase, that usually results in a lot of anger and protests. So why would any democratically elected politician ever implement a carbon tax? If they did, they would be voted out, and the next one to come in would just undo it.
Another obvious example, is meat. We know one of the major protagonists in CO2 emissions is animal farming. Red meat especially is responsible for a huge source of those emissions. And yet most people don’t even wanna think about eating less meat, and they will still crack jokes about vegans and look at them sideways. And as for regulations regarding meat, the example from before still applies.
As you seem to be implying, what really needs to happen is a whole cultural shift. Trying to shift blame onto to a few people and hope they get the guillotine, won’t change anything as long as people keep demanding all the same things because then someone else will come in to fulfil that demand. Whether we like it or not, we have to accept that it’s the sum of all our actions that will determine the future, and our actions can influence other people’s actions; therefore, one way or another, we are all responsible.
Sorry for typing some much at you since you’re basically making the same point already, but I just felt like adding on.
Ah, I see, I definitely agree with everything you’re saying; I just got a bit confused. When you talked about “green option”, I was thinking something like fast fashion vs clothes that will last, for example.