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Australian wildfires
4 Jan 2020 08:42Of course, yes, I'll be making a donation. It was on the list for 2019, but we only managed to squeeze in about 1/3 of the ones we wanted to make because of time. Because we are, um, idiots.
But I'm seeing two things that I find disturbing:
The appeals are coming from/for the Australian Red Cross, the Australian branch of the WWF, and a rural volunteer firefighting organizations.
This is just fucking NOT OK. The Red Cross? Sure. The WWF? OK. But government should fund, fully, and at this point considering circumstances, without delay organizations that are needed to provide civic good.
It looks like Morrison has, just today, weeks into the crisis, agreed to fund and support the firefighting efforts. This is good, but comes too late.
FTR:
How to help victims of Australia's apocalyptic wildfires.
Because up 'til now, it seems like there was a tendency to YET-FUCKING-AGAIN rely on individual solutions to fix systemic problems.
This is getting to be the norm, and it's truly not ok. It happens all the freaking time, when we demand that people give up plastic straws, but there are no alternatives to, say, ridiculous plastic packaging, and no recycling etc. All of which need to be taken up at a larger scale than me giving up plastic straws for metal. When it's implied that going vegan would be The Best Thing! people could do to combat global warming (*) but the reality is that all of Germany and Austria going vegan would have a lesser impact on climate change effectors than the closure of a single coal fired power plant. When we blame poverty on the bad decisions of individuals without acknowledging how the larger structure of society, our education system, bias, and access to health care, just to name those, plays into it.
It truly angers me. It's everywhere, big scale, small scale. The screaming of "individual responsibility" is a cop-out, and allows the larger organizations (business, government at all levels) to shake their heads and ooops, we're trying but... No. We need solutions that don't rely on individual people.
For example. My local Park and Rides have started charging for parking. $90/month, reduced to $20 for people with reduced income who already have a reduced fare transit card. Why? Because there is not enough parking at the park and rides. This just makes no fucking sense. They're asking people to come up with an additional $90/month because too many people want to take the bus to work, in an area with huge traffic problems. Leaving aside the drip drip drip of fees that hurt the middle class, they're trying, what? To encourage carpooling TO the transit center? Or people driving? Or WHAT? But this is targetting individual behaviour and people who don't have the luxury of changing how they get to work have to cough up money. A systemic solution might be, for example, small buses that run frequently during rush hour around the Park and Rides to catch people who are too far to walk (**) but who could take a second bus if it ran frequently and reliably enough. But no. Punish the individual for not having the flexibility to be able to change their behaviour.
There are multiple examples of this, in all fields, and the Australian wildfires are just one more.
(*) Nothing wrong with being vegan, for whatever reasons you chose to do so, but it's not the Single! Solution! to Global! Warming!
(**) Many of them. One of the park and rides implementing this is not in a residential area.
But I'm seeing two things that I find disturbing:
- A lack of full response by the Australian goverment.
- Appeals from many organizations who need help at all levels.
The appeals are coming from/for the Australian Red Cross, the Australian branch of the WWF, and a rural volunteer firefighting organizations.
This is just fucking NOT OK. The Red Cross? Sure. The WWF? OK. But government should fund, fully, and at this point considering circumstances, without delay organizations that are needed to provide civic good.
It looks like Morrison has, just today, weeks into the crisis, agreed to fund and support the firefighting efforts. This is good, but comes too late.
FTR:
How to help victims of Australia's apocalyptic wildfires.
Because up 'til now, it seems like there was a tendency to YET-FUCKING-AGAIN rely on individual solutions to fix systemic problems.
This is getting to be the norm, and it's truly not ok. It happens all the freaking time, when we demand that people give up plastic straws, but there are no alternatives to, say, ridiculous plastic packaging, and no recycling etc. All of which need to be taken up at a larger scale than me giving up plastic straws for metal. When it's implied that going vegan would be The Best Thing! people could do to combat global warming (*) but the reality is that all of Germany and Austria going vegan would have a lesser impact on climate change effectors than the closure of a single coal fired power plant. When we blame poverty on the bad decisions of individuals without acknowledging how the larger structure of society, our education system, bias, and access to health care, just to name those, plays into it.
It truly angers me. It's everywhere, big scale, small scale. The screaming of "individual responsibility" is a cop-out, and allows the larger organizations (business, government at all levels) to shake their heads and ooops, we're trying but... No. We need solutions that don't rely on individual people.
For example. My local Park and Rides have started charging for parking. $90/month, reduced to $20 for people with reduced income who already have a reduced fare transit card. Why? Because there is not enough parking at the park and rides. This just makes no fucking sense. They're asking people to come up with an additional $90/month because too many people want to take the bus to work, in an area with huge traffic problems. Leaving aside the drip drip drip of fees that hurt the middle class, they're trying, what? To encourage carpooling TO the transit center? Or people driving? Or WHAT? But this is targetting individual behaviour and people who don't have the luxury of changing how they get to work have to cough up money. A systemic solution might be, for example, small buses that run frequently during rush hour around the Park and Rides to catch people who are too far to walk (**) but who could take a second bus if it ran frequently and reliably enough. But no. Punish the individual for not having the flexibility to be able to change their behaviour.
There are multiple examples of this, in all fields, and the Australian wildfires are just one more.
(*) Nothing wrong with being vegan, for whatever reasons you chose to do so, but it's not the Single! Solution! to Global! Warming!
(**) Many of them. One of the park and rides implementing this is not in a residential area.
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