I am sick of green - Page 3

I guess you have to take this line of thinking, because if people started conserving, who would buy your fancy drinks?

Most of the "Global Warming Denial" literature out there is financed by industries who have a serious interest in keeping us in the dark about the true impact of our unsustainable lifestyle. Sorry but I will trust Al Gore over ExxonMobil any day of the week.

I agree with the basic premise of this thread.

Is global climate change a problem? Most Likely

Should we try to live more sustainably and better manage our resources? Definitely

Should something being "green" a reason for the government to add new taxes and start to seriously inconvenience people? Definitely Not

Like at my Dad's store every flooring company is talking about how "green" their products are now, but you always have to look at the fine print, ie one of the carpets is able to be recycled, so hence it's "green". As if whomever removes it 10-15 years down the road is going to know that and not just throw it out.

This website uses some of the worst logic I have ever seen.

Also, it cites no sources, which is incredibly suspicious.

why would you trust a man who is the absolute definition of hypocritical? he puts out an inconvenient truth, then conveniently starts a company where people can purchase "carbon credits resulting in HUGE profits. he then denies involvement for a very long time and tries to throw people off the trail by buying credits himself. now its well-known that he started the 'carbon credit' phenomenon and people who worship him are still too blind to see what is going on??

also, the man himself does not recycle and uses more energy in one of his homes than an average family uses in a year. get real and realize that al gore is just a guy trying to make money on a phenomenon and using his status to do so. he is a politician for fuck sake, not a goddamn saint. you are fucking blind if you think he cares about anything other than how much money he can make off the "crisis" he created in the media. he's a very smart man and he clearly has you fooled.

what do you mean?

I think he meant he would say the same about you

Oh, and yes, Al Gore's home uses more energy, but it's also 4 times as big as the average NEW home (new homes are, on average larger than the average home) and uses more energy for other reasons.

Also, some of the energy he uses is from renewable sources.

snopes.com: Al Gore's Energy Use

reading my previous post, i wanted to clarify something i said. when i say that humans have little to no impact on the environment i want to point out that what i am saying is that anything we do differently has virtually no impact. obviously there is impact, but that stems from simply being here. what i mean is that driving hybrid cars, not using plastic, recycling, going organic, etc, etc has little to no impact as compared to just going about life normally.

yeah I know just wanted him to have enough balls to say so instead hiding behind his usual one liners

Politicians don't fool me; I understand politics better than most people for reasons I'd rather not divulge here.

This is a longer discussion, but the "carbon credit" thing is one way we'll be able to keep the balance of global power in our favor as rapidly-industrializing nations like China and India threaten our economic hegemony. So don't be so quick to dismiss it.

Secondly, IMO Al Gore has the right to enrich himself...since he very well may have been the victim of the greatest election theft in America's history. I think it's a bit of poetic justice, considering that the evidence at this point is hard to ignore.

don't you think if he was as concerned as he claims to be and cares as deeply as he seems to that he would change his lifestyle? maybe build a smaller house that is green and live a more humble life? give me a break. if i met al gore i would punch him in the testicles.

individually we may not make a significant difference but as a mass we could prevent it from escalating any further.

and they say hf is dead. this is quality discussion people.

the #1 web community for authentic environmental debate perhaps???

you guys are waisting a ton of electricity arguing on line

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say IBL

I am not prepared to pass judgment on it, because I am really not in a position to confirm exactly how much energy Al Gore wastes in a year. Most of the stuff about his house has been circulated by right-wing attack outfits and bloggers sending out chain emails, and I don't know where the truth starts and the defamation ends.

And if I ever met Al Gore I would address him as "Mr. President."

Feel free to log off then. We'll try to make do without your substantial intellectual contributions to this thread.

I walked past him in DC a few years ago. It's a small town. Honestly I think that if it is true he's a hypocrite but more money more problems you can't judge someone unless you've walked a day in their shoes.

this is true, but for it to really have meaningful impact we would need to do away with all cars/trucks/etc and rely on foot and horses for transportation, shut down all business and manufacturing, live by candlelight, and basically go back to living as the settlers did by making all of our own stuff and raising our own food. and that simply isn't going to happen.

living in today's world, the things that we could do would be minimal even if everyone on the planet tried to live as "green" as they possibly could. even the green stuff you buy is made in mass factories burning energy, shipped via fuel-guzzling trucks, stored in incandescent-lit warehouses, and sold in huge stores burning incomprehensible amounts of energy allday everyday.

al must have seen this and turned off the internet for a bit...

it's a bit off pipe dream I know but lack of hope doesn't justify letting it all go completely to hell. I hear what your saying it's frustrating and seemingly futile at times but I guess I am holding out hope that we as human beings can undo or at least for long the inevitable destruction of our planet at least long enough for our kids and grand kids to enjoy it while it lasts.

Living green doesn't mean NOT using electricity or energy. That is a very poor argument.

I aint sick of green
My bank account so green its like a forest.

This is a classic strawman - mis-representing the 'other side' of an argument so you can knock it down easily.

Small things can make a difference if enough people do them.

For example, if everyone used detergents made from vegetable oil, rather then petroleum oil, we'd cut down substantially on the demand for oil. If we start using glass bottles, rather than plastic ones, that demand will go down again.

I've been making 'green choices' for the last ten years, but it's been a gradual process. If you came to me in 1999 and told me to live like I'm living now, my reaction would have been "you're kidding me, right?"

Just cutting demand 5-10% for something can have a huge impact. That is the purpose of things like green lightbulbs, using your own grocery bags, recycling, etc. The less your lifestyle demands that new shit gets made, the more green it is. Some economists have said that we could drive down the price of gas by close to a dollar if we all just cut our driving by 10%. And this happened, earlier this summer! Gas prices went sky-high, so people started cutting down. And what happened? Prices at the pump have been sliding ever since.

I won't buy a hybrid, because I don't think the added cost and the environmental hazards posed by the battery are worth it. So I buy only used cars - they've already been manufactured, and I'm chipping away a bit at the demand for new cars. A lot of people are doing the same thing.

If you're going to live this way, you have to really and truly realize that you're only doing it for yourself. If you're worried about what the rest of the world or your neighbors are doing, it won't work. But if you do your own thing and march to your own pace and are happy with it - as with any other thing we do - people will take notice and start to consider their own actions and choices.

The way I live would be considered uncomfortable to many of you, but over time it has influenced a lot of my friends to make similar choices. I don't ever lecture them and tell them that they have to do it my way; that would only make them want to ridicule me and reject my approach twice as angrily.

It isn't just about "global warming" - that's just a trendy term that makes people scared into walking the walk (which is what we need to be, IMO). It's about much more than that - finding alternative sources of energy, encouraging sustainable development, cutting waste, reducing animal slaughter/deforestation/overfishing/etc...

But industries depend on environmental destruction, which is why we can't just stop it. So the policymakers at the very top of society's pyramid know that we need to have a gradual transition - where are all the people that work in these heavy industries going to go? That's why we're starting to see the push towards government subsidization of green enterprise and projects - because the Old Economy is going to cling to its cash cow as long as there's a dime left in it.

Get a grip. It's just an internet pants forum.