2024 Resolutions. #1 Do a pull-up. #2 Improve local composting options

January 2, 2024 7:06 AM

New Years Resolutions for the climate. Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe famously adopts two new climate-friendly habits each year—“not because I think they’re going to change the course of climate change as I know it... but because it enables me to be consistent with my values and it gives me joy.” A NPR reporter suggests getting into energy policy as a stretch resolution. Yale Climate Connections recommends finding your lever (do you have a school-age kid? perhaps push the school district to switch to renewable energy?). The Climate Council asks us to move our money out of fossil fuel investments. And the Guardian reminds us to eat our leftovers and to eat less beef.
posted by spamandkimchi (12 comments total)

That "find your lever" link is a pretty short article, but I really like that phrase.. That's the key I feel like any article like this should focus on: not taking personal actions (as mentioned in first link - personal change does give me personal fulfillment - but it does not change the climate), but finding your lever to impact other people's behaviors and policy at broader scales. I can't impact federal policy (until we build the power to do so) but I can try to impact my own employer and then use that to try to impact other hospital systems, state policy, etc...
posted by latkes at 7:31 AM on January 2 [9 favorites]

Thank you for this post, spamandkimchi. I had not settled on any sort of new climate-friendly habits this year, though I'd been considering a couple possibilities, and the interview with Hayhoe spurred me to think harder.
posted by cupcakeninja at 7:38 AM on January 2 [1 favorite]

Great post! I always find Katharine Hayhoe so refreshing in her constant reminders that it's not too late to do something about climate change.
posted by hydropsyche at 8:33 AM on January 2 [3 favorites]

I just reposted your Naomi Klein (Between the Covers) interview to the most recent Gaza thread

quality stuff, thanks for this also, spamandkimchi
posted by elkevelvet at 8:54 AM on January 2

Thanks so much for sharing. I really love the “find your lever” concept and will be taking it on board for 2024.
posted by rpfields at 9:33 AM on January 2 [2 favorites]

Thanks for this post. I've recently been thinking more about the usefulness for me of actions that don't "make a difference". So far in life I've been fairly on the side of "do easy things like recycle, sure, but don't get too wrapped up in individual actions because the system has to change". But it does feel like there's something to the idea that acting in line with one's values is good for you in some important way. I'll check out the rest of these links!
posted by rivenwanderer at 9:58 AM on January 2 [3 favorites]

Along the same lines the article highlights the potential for reducing food waste and eating leftovers as a good way to reduce impact and make you better off. Another one suitable for this time of year might be whether you have car journeys you can replace with walking or cycling trips to get the most from your new year resolution/Christmas bike/Garmin watch.
posted by biffa at 10:06 AM on January 2 [2 favorites]

Adding this resource that I just stumbled across on Twitter: Not Too Late (A print anthology, but there's a free PDF of "What can I do" available from them here).
posted by rivenwanderer at 12:24 PM on January 2 [4 favorites]

I feel sad when I see articles of this sort which go 'you really can make a difference!' which are an overall dishrag of uselessness given the lack of efficacy from the actions proposed. The cumulative effect would be good were everyone to adopt this approach. A simple look in people's carts in the average supermarket will show what little regard is taken with packaging. A simple look at the trash cans on garbage day is another. The majority of people continue to not give a damn. Most municipalities also... It is sad.

All I do is look at my neighborhood and the sales of truly stupid plastic lawn ornaments by the billions which are sprouting up everywhere. Typically trashed due to poor quality and newer 'novelties' arriving each 'celebration'. Americans truly need to get away from over-consumption, excessive packaging, wasteful eating, and SERIOUSLY take to looking at what corporations globally are doing to the environment.
posted by IndelibleUnderpants at 7:27 PM on January 2

Katharine Hayhoe mentions how it is important we talk about climate change. Basically, yes personal decisions matter, but talkinga about it could influence 5 or 10 other people to make those same choices. I talk about nerdy and boring things like insulation, solar panels and heat pumps. Not only has it definitely raised awareness about how beneficial they can be, it also serves as its own reinforcement because repeated information is perceived as truthful.

I work at a car manufacturer, we produced a wide variety of vehicles that consumed anywhere from 4L/100km to 11L/100km of petrol. I often picked the most efficient one for personal use, posted about it on social media, even convinced some people to buy them. But the public overwhelmingly preferred buying the least efficient 11L/100km vehicles, so that's what we sell today.

> But it does feel like there's something to the idea that acting in line with one's values is good for you in some important way

This may be referring to Self-Verification Theory (1981) where we have self-views, and many of our interactions in our day to day lives involves self-verification, that is, confirmation of who are, not just on an individual basis but also in how others perceive us. This act of verification acts in a positive feedback loop that further strengthens our self-view and creates feelings of well-being. If we instead receive evidence that conflicts with our self-view, this causes dissonance and ill feelings.

This explains why nostalgia is such a powerful feeling: reliving positive events of the past which have shaped our current self-view is a very strong form of self-verification, especially when done socially with others.

So if your self-view is that you care about the environment, then it will improve your mental wellbeing to act in a way that verifies that both individually and socially.
posted by xdvesper at 7:45 PM on January 2 [7 favorites]

I'm afraid none of these admirable and sensible actions will have much of an impact besides making people feel better about themselves for doing them.

The scale of the damage and danger is so, so many orders of magnitude greater. The forces involved in driving us over the cliff are powerful, rapacious, and insatiable, and they are unpersuadable.

What's left to be done by ordinary people that will make the most difference is to decide to survive Collapse. You need to form harmonious, self-sufficient communities with a robust defense, and prepare, stockpile, research, gain needed survival skills, and make fortifications. You need to be of a sufficient size to not get wiped out by attackers.

The Authorities won't save you. They will abandon you and head to their bunkers when it's time.

The fact that the trash you threw in the bin marked "recycling" is in a different part of the landfill than the trash you threw in the bin marked "trash" doesn't matter at all.
posted by cats are weird at 1:37 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]

I doubt fortifications help much, but yeah non-bullshit skills sounds useful anyways.

If I read it correctly, there are three planetary boundaries more dangerous than climate: (1) novel entities like plastics & pesticides, (2) biosphere integrity like insect loss, and (3) biochemical flows like phsophorous disapearing into the oceans. It's pluasible fossil energy shortage impact most people even earlier though, so..

We should accelerate fossil fuel shortages by harming fossil fuel investemts in any way possible, with the naieve methods being divest, protest banks, support lawsuits, dox investors, protest fossil fuel infrasture, support protestors, dox fossel fuel personnel, protest cars & planes, encurage trade wars, protest repairing cannals, and outreach for these. There exist less intuitive methods too, primarily cultivating & supporting foreign governments' interests in reducing your own governments' emissions.

We've statistics like if America or China stopped burning fossil fuels tomorrow then all the other nations consume the rest by 2050 anyways. I think North America has a special position though since it produces so much shale oil: If enough harm befel North America's shale industry then North American oil stays in the ground. Also other countries have more trouble copying.

tl;dr Don't waste your time building a fortress. If you can take such personal risks, then instead cultivate friendships with people who work for an embasy of some tropical countries that do not produce oil.
posted by jeffburdges at 8:03 AM on January 9