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Roy Rolling

(6,853 posts)
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 03:24 PM Mar 2015

Lemme be Blunt

I marched against the Vietnam War so I don't need to tell you how old I am.

So it occurred to me, who opposes climate change the most? Sadly, it is the people who will not live long enough to see its devastating effects on the world.

What a bunch of selfish Americans, willing to trade away the future for a few coins today.

43 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
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Lemme be Blunt (Original Post) Roy Rolling Mar 2015 OP
Money trumps peace, stability, alliances, etc.. Rex Mar 2015 #1
Kickin' Faux pas Mar 2015 #2
K&R nt stage left Mar 2015 #3
I am about your age so I'll be blunt back. Skidmore Mar 2015 #4
Many years ago I read a book called "Affluenza: The All Consuming Epidemic." CrispyQ Mar 2015 #32
This message was self-deleted by its author antiquie Mar 2015 #5
um the republicans? Voice for Peace Mar 2015 #9
"Young wolves, show us your teeth." John Steinbeck K&R Tierra_y_Libertad Mar 2015 #6
Yeah, I think about that a lot Ratty Mar 2015 #7
the kids will carry the ball Voice for Peace Mar 2015 #8
one of the reasons that the oldsters might cry like canaries in the mine about climate roguevalley Mar 2015 #10
I'll be blunt. It's happening now, all around us. They just don't talk about it on TV. hunter Mar 2015 #11
Yep. We are in it, together, whether we like it or not HereSince1628 Mar 2015 #12
Yes it's happening now. But the OP is correct that as time goes by it will continue to get worse totodeinhere Mar 2015 #38
Problem is that the way our economy works now... hunter Mar 2015 #40
That may be true but ... ananda Mar 2015 #13
Well I Marched Too & I Say It's MY Daughter & Son AND ChiciB1 Mar 2015 #14
My kids too, what's with them!? Dont call me Shirley Mar 2015 #36
Let me be blunt too. zeemike Mar 2015 #15
Gen X over here abelenkpe Mar 2015 #16
The Viet Nam war is a most painful asiliveandbreathe Mar 2015 #17
thank you for that excellent article. niyad Mar 2015 #19
if oxygen could be turned into gold we would all die of asphyxiation. n/t. airplaneman Mar 2015 #18
Lemme be Blunt back at ya. sulphurdunn Mar 2015 #20
Pray harder. blkmusclmachine Mar 2015 #21
Wanna know what's REALLY annoying? Spitfire of ATJ Mar 2015 #22
K&R raven mad Mar 2015 #23
Let me be even blunter anotojefiremnesuka Mar 2015 #24
The problem is I don't think anyone has any real yeoman6987 Mar 2015 #27
You have made a very important point. Curmudgeoness Mar 2015 #41
I think these guys are onto the solution. airplaneman Mar 2015 #43
They don't give a shite about their decendents.. all the ones who are brainwashed by fox "news" & Cha Mar 2015 #25
I agree. Enthusiast Mar 2015 #26
I've come to the conclusion that humans as a species simply aren't smart enough to Oneironaut Mar 2015 #28
My father used to read the paper and say treestar Mar 2015 #29
What happened to the wisest man being the kairos12 Mar 2015 #30
It's worse than that. It's not just the money. DFW Mar 2015 #31
K&R Thespian2 Mar 2015 #33
Young people do care about this but they unfortunately don't see politicians as a solution world wide wally Mar 2015 #34
They may be very surprised.... paleotn Mar 2015 #35
War, never ending hot headed war, has been the biggest catalyst for climate change. Dont call me Shirley Mar 2015 #37
It is a class war. And the "new" Democratic Party discourages dissent and protest because it whereisjustice Mar 2015 #39
Yeah, "centrists" are great fans of democracy. BeanMusical Mar 2015 #42
 

Rex

(65,616 posts)
1. Money trumps peace, stability, alliances, etc..
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 03:26 PM
Mar 2015

The very last people on earth will be found fossilized, killing each other over money. Aliens will just shake their heads and wonder what could have been.

Skidmore

(37,364 posts)
4. I am about your age so I'll be blunt back.
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 03:46 PM
Mar 2015

I am concerned about climate change because as I leave the world, I leave behind my children and grandchildren. I am concerned about the stewardship of the land and the planet. I do agree that Americans are largely responsible for the demands being placed on the resources of the world. Over the years, I have written any number of posts on the impact of our destructive consumerism and penchant for collecting doodads and stuff. Yesterday, I read something in passing that kind of illustrates this. America has something like 3% of the world's children and consumes 40% of the world's toys. That's a lot of junk, plastic or otherwise. Just junk. And that is just represents a portion of the consumerism related to children alone. We consume too much junk, nonessential junk.

CrispyQ

(36,231 posts)
32. Many years ago I read a book called "Affluenza: The All Consuming Epidemic."
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 10:05 AM
Mar 2015

If you can find it you should read it. It simplifies the problem a bit, but I still thought it was a good read. It's was worth it for the Horsey cartoons alone!

Response to Roy Rolling (Original post)

 

Tierra_y_Libertad

(50,414 posts)
6. "Young wolves, show us your teeth." John Steinbeck K&R
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 03:57 PM
Mar 2015

I'm 71 and I marched against that wretched slaughter after I got out of the Marines.

To me, now, climate change is the most important issue facing humanity. I don't march any more but I'll sure as hell vote against any politician who denies or enables climate change.

Ratty

(2,100 posts)
7. Yeah, I think about that a lot
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 03:59 PM
Mar 2015

Inhofe won't live long enough to see what his greed has done to his grandchildren. He'll go to his grave smugly thinking he was always right.

 

Voice for Peace

(13,141 posts)
8. the kids will carry the ball
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 04:17 PM
Mar 2015

we made a good start.. there is a powerful wave of young
folks who are awake and active.

roguevalley

(40,656 posts)
10. one of the reasons that the oldsters might cry like canaries in the mine about climate
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 04:26 PM
Mar 2015

could be the environmental movement started in our generation and we have children and grandchildren who will be scrabbling for the soylent green when we're long gone. I can hardly breathe sometimes thinking about it. I hear you, Roy Rolling. I am actually glad this time to be older but worry about my babies too.

hunter

(38,264 posts)
11. I'll be blunt. It's happening now, all around us. They just don't talk about it on TV.
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 04:39 PM
Mar 2015

Sure maybe it's not your problem today, but there are millions of people around the world, and even here in the U.S.A., who are already getting slammed hard.

Too many people won't notice until it hits them personally and they start tearing down the "welcome" signs at the state borders.






HereSince1628

(36,063 posts)
12. Yep. We are in it, together, whether we like it or not
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 04:52 PM
Mar 2015

I really have met as many people younger than me who don't accept climate change as I have met people older than me that don't accept it.

The motivations don't seem generalizable.

totodeinhere

(13,037 posts)
38. Yes it's happening now. But the OP is correct that as time goes by it will continue to get worse
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 12:17 PM
Mar 2015

unless something radical is done about it now. Our grandchildren will suffer a lot more than we are right now. And even if we did make some radical changes some damage has already been done. All we can do now is mitigate it somewhat.

hunter

(38,264 posts)
40. Problem is that the way our economy works now...
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 12:47 PM
Mar 2015

...the grandchildren of people most responsible for the suffering wont be hurt. When their beach house is flooded, or there's no more water to fill the swimming pool of their desert house, that's okay, they'll still have other nice houses, and the income to buy real food.

Selling a full spectrum of Soylent brand nutrition products to the starving masses, and showing disaster porn from faraway places on the television news (See! Your life could be much worse! Keep voting for The Party!) will still be profitable.

ananda

(28,783 posts)
13. That may be true but ...
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 05:00 PM
Mar 2015

... it also shows a certain careless shortsightedness
on non-activist young people.

I blame all the distractions.

ChiciB1

(15,435 posts)
14. Well I Marched Too & I Say It's MY Daughter & Son AND
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 05:11 PM
Mar 2015

their kids who TUNE me out. Only then co I say, tongue in cheek.... "Well, it's YOU who will have to live through it!" Of course they then say I have at least 25 more years to live.

When I try, and I guarantee you I try extremely hard to get them involved and they keep telling me I'm just too SERIOUS and I need to let it go. They tell me I stress myself out far too much and need to find a "hobby!" Well, I do have a hobby, but it's more of an addiction, it's being politically active!

AND, I love my tennis and watching some truly fantastic tennis on TV.

Dont call me Shirley

(10,998 posts)
36. My kids too, what's with them!?
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 12:00 PM
Mar 2015

I have shown them time after time, reduce reuse recycle and they just don't get it. They'll understand why I was always "harping" about it when their world heats up. Sad.

zeemike

(18,998 posts)
15. Let me be blunt too.
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 05:16 PM
Mar 2015

We will fall sooner than climate change does us in...because the lack of concern for the environment is just one of the symptoms of a greater sickness in our society.
We went from the virtues of community and family to the virtues of greed in just the time I have been around...and I am around your age.

Things changed in the 80s...well it started before that but it was more pronounced then...we (not all of us of course) adopted the principles of greed and taught it to the next generation through TV and media and created a genre of media I like to call "My future's so bright I gotta wear shades" that inflected a generation of young people into the mystic rights of Ayn Rand's virtues of selfishness whether they ever read her books or not...and it has been a down hill slide ever sense.

And then there is the war thing where we now see war as a great adventure full of heroes killing the evil ones...and this is how we will fall before the climate has a chance to do us in..

abelenkpe

(9,933 posts)
16. Gen X over here
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 05:31 PM
Mar 2015

Kinda hoping we move forward fast to repair the environment and work to counter climate change. Seriously disappointed that our society hasn't already.

asiliveandbreathe

(8,203 posts)
17. The Viet Nam war is a most painful
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 05:34 PM
Mar 2015

time in our history - so many young men of my generation coming home wounded or didn't come home at all -

- we were fed so much propaganda - the draft caused so many to flee to Canada - or be jailed....Mohammad Ali comes to mind...all the while people the likes of cheney differed....over and over...

In my mind - my lost generation suffered much - the people in Wash. who do not recognize climate change - global warming - call it what you want - are not our representatives..they are in it for greed - bought and paid for by big corp donors...

Climate change will be and is the cause of the wars today and for generations to come if we don't stop polluting our great home we call Mother Earth.....

I don't need to tell Du this - check it out - http://guardianlv.com/2015/03/violence-in-syria-linked-to-drought/ NUFF SAID!

 

sulphurdunn

(6,891 posts)
20. Lemme be Blunt back at ya.
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 06:05 PM
Mar 2015

I fought in the Vietnam War, so I don't need to tell you how old I am. And it occurred to me that I agree with you.

 

Spitfire of ATJ

(32,723 posts)
22. Wanna know what's REALLY annoying?
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 06:36 PM
Mar 2015

Hearing someone say it's all a conspiracy by commie, liberal, anti-capitalist types who want to destroy the American Way Of Life ®.

raven mad

(4,940 posts)
23. K&R
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 06:50 PM
Mar 2015

Although my daughter does work hard and does her best to rectify global warming. She's doing it for her daughter. We should all have the same amount of concern.

 

anotojefiremnesuka

(198 posts)
24. Let me be even blunter
Fri Mar 20, 2015, 06:55 PM
Mar 2015

If Democrats, ALL Democrats don't start fighting back the survival skills many of us have acquired while working for the US Government Spreading Democracy all over the work will come in quite handy when the shit hits the fan, and it will unless things change very soon.

Only a few us have first hand experience of what chaos and war is like and saw it is other places, now imagine what it will be like here. That is where we are rapidly heading towards.

To put it in perspective for those who do not have the experience of spreading democracy, would you kill some one for a meal or water in order to survive? Because that is the reality that most will have to confront.








 

yeoman6987

(14,449 posts)
27. The problem is I don't think anyone has any real
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 08:59 AM
Mar 2015

Solution to stop Climate Change. We hear that it may be too late of that we have to reduce carbons which we have done. If we had a real tangible way to stop the climate change then maybe we would see more exceptance. Honestly I think some may find it too overwhelming to deal with.

Curmudgeoness

(18,219 posts)
41. You have made a very important point.
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 01:48 PM
Mar 2015

I, for one, do think that it is already too late, but that doesn't stop me from trying to turn things around. But I have realized that whenever there is something to outrage me, when there is no solution that I can work toward, I want to give up.

I remember that there used to be a weekly segment on the nightly news about some problem that really pissed me off. It was always something monumental and it was something that needed changed, but there was never a solution or an action that the pissed off people watching could do to stop it. That was the flaw....people need to feel that they have something that they can do to fix a problem, and with climate change, it just overwhelms all of us.....this is global.

On an aside, because of my anger at not having options to pursue presented to me, every time that I speak at meetings or regulatory hearings, I make a point of listing several things that ordinary people can do to help.

Cha

(295,925 posts)
25. They don't give a shite about their decendents.. all the ones who are brainwashed by fox "news" &
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 04:28 AM
Mar 2015

limbaugh types.. egged on by Big Oil and Koch bros

They couldn't care less about babies, kids, or their mothers and fathers or anything unless its a fetus.

Oneironaut

(5,462 posts)
28. I've come to the conclusion that humans as a species simply aren't smart enough to
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 09:02 AM
Mar 2015

avoid destroying the planet. We're made to consume resources, but like any other animal, we'll keep consuming resources until it eventually kills us. Nobody is willing to give up even a penny to save the future now. Nobody will care until the worst happens, and then everyone will scratch their head and wonder why it's happening.

treestar

(82,383 posts)
29. My father used to read the paper and say
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 09:45 AM
Mar 2015

he was glad he was old and wouldn't have to worry about these problems. He actually quit doing it after I wondered did he care about his grandchildren?

kairos12

(12,817 posts)
30. What happened to the wisest man being the
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 09:48 AM
Mar 2015

person who plants trees under whose shade he will never sit?

DFW

(54,055 posts)
31. It's worse than that. It's not just the money.
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 09:59 AM
Mar 2015

It's the fact that the ones who are yelling loudest about there being no climate change are more than a little bit successful at convincing too many young people that there is no climate change. When the water is lapping at the knees in Miami, they will insist their feet are dry because Sean Hannity says they are.

*I marched against the Vietnam War, too. Was there at the Pentagon in 1967 watching the National Guard wondering how to react when girls were putting flowers in the ends of their rifles.

Thespian2

(2,741 posts)
33. K&R
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 10:38 AM
Mar 2015

Blunt it is. Have we considered the water shortage that is only a few years away, if we are lucky? All us old folks here who have done our best to work for politicians who would lead the country in the right direction awoke one morning to hear Raygun pronounced president. The Republican greedy bastards took the cue and immediately began planning to take control of the country. Democrats twiddled their thumbs and whined. Carter's destruction by criminals such as the Bush family should have been enough to energize the Democrats into action. Didn't happen. Democrats began to work hard to be just like the Republicans so they could hold on to their jobs. Now, we are left with Republicans controlling 22 states and the federal government. Major decisions are in the hands of the oligarchs who don't give one shit about ordinary American citizens. Water is running out. Corporations are bottling water every where they can steal it. California has a year's worth left. The Oglala aquifer is running dry. The Biscayne aquifer is being filled with salt water. And on and on. Do the oligarchs care? No.

world wide wally

(21,719 posts)
34. Young people do care about this but they unfortunately don't see politicians as a solution
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 11:57 AM
Mar 2015

I can certainly understand why, but they are the only hope right now.

Dont call me Shirley

(10,998 posts)
37. War, never ending hot headed war, has been the biggest catalyst for climate change.
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 12:02 PM
Mar 2015

Stop war, then the climate will begin to cool.

whereisjustice

(2,941 posts)
39. It is a class war. And the "new" Democratic Party discourages dissent and protest because it
Sat Mar 21, 2015, 12:23 PM
Mar 2015

Last edited Sat Mar 21, 2015, 03:32 PM - Edit history (1)

might offend their benefactors. In fact the Democratic Party doesn't just discourage protest, they are arming police and creating a massive police state infrastructure to make sure your voice is never heard again.

I'm told by the centrists that if I don't like it, I can buy my own investment bank and buy my own candidates.

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