this post was submitted on 24 Oct 2023
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Why? To ease your conscience by claiming that it is not as bad because you paid something extra? It’s the modern version of the selling of indulgences.
It’s worse than doing nothing because it gives the people the illusion that it’s not so bad - while in fact it is exactly as bad.
I am not against easing one's conscience, so long as that's not the only thing people do. It's a perverse turn in our culture that we've started to shame people for trying to act morally. We have a conscience for a reason: to motivate good behaviour. This reminds me of the right's claim that everything is "virtue signalling", as if moral action itself is undesirable. It coheres with a hyper individualistic and self-interested worldview.
My question is precisely whether "in fact it is exactly as bad". That is an empirical claim, not one that you can declare with a serene wave of the hand. That John Oliver reporting is useful in that regards, whereas your comment, devoid of argument or evidence, is not.
Seeking to ease one's conscience by means of spending excess money is hyper-individualistic and conforms with a self-interested worldview.
The perverse thing is how neoliberalism has left people with the idea that they can meaningfully impact the world through deciding where they spend the pittance left them after their bosses and government warmongers have taken their cut.
If you give a shit about the environment stop believing the propaganda that market forces will be swayed by your hobby of guilt spending. It will be the hard work of organizing people and uprooting the financial interest who direct national and global policy.