Item — HN Reader

I would argue this is different in the sense you’ll hardly find alternative for most of the plastic you use, while some can surely drastically reduce their footprint by eating beans instead of steaks, using smaller cars (when car is absolutely required), buying smaller house to heat…

Does europeans drivers are more sad than the American ones ?

Does vegan enjoy less their meal ?

Does Japanese feels poor to live in a 30m2 appartement ?

Hiding behind culture, habits and society is not enough to dumb their responsibility, especially for rich and smart people.

Don’t forget 30 days is often what it gets to form a new habit like dropping beef off your meal.

2 comments

I own no car, never have. In exchange for becoming a vegetarian, am I allowed to continue to eat meat in your world? Or do I have to change my lifestyle because a group of bigots is pointing fingers?

You are allowed to do whatever you want. It does nothing for this conversation to frame it like your a haughty teenager. That's your own baggage!

I'm European, have been to the US, and yeah, it's more fun to drive there.

I've been vegan for years and yeah, it was less enjoyable and empirically less healthy for me than the more normal diet I have now.

I have lived in a small flat, and now I own a house, and yeah, the house is better. I can't imagine ever moving back into a flat unless I become impoverished.

The entire movement you propose is simply "be poorer".

You share your experience as an (probably rich minority) individual. What about the society you lived in ? How about the society your kids will live in 40 years ?

The movement I describe is “sobriety”. It’s similar to being poor of something (big car) but you’re not lacking it, instead you choose to do without. This difference is a big deal in a psychology point of view and that’s probably why you feel “less fun”.

Totally agree with your point of healthiness of vegan diet, the case was more on quantity than beef/no beef.

If you call being Western "rich minority", which is technically true, sure.

I grew up poor in the UK. Poor people in the UK generally have houses and cars unless they're in big cities.

The majority of the people in the society I live in drive cars, live in houses and eat meat.

I could choose to do without these things. I don't because like, I don't need to.

Climate change will not be solved by me moving into a tiny flat. It will be solved by the UK figuring out how not to use natural gas to heat my house.

In 40 years my kids will likely own houses and drive cars too. Unless they choose not to. I'd love them regardless, but would be a bit upset if they were to turn out to be far-left extremists.

I sincerely wish the best for your kids, and that includes nice cars and houses.

Figuring out how to heat a country without gaz will be easier when there’s less volume to heat, and energy crisis in EU drive more non-far-left-extremist to see sobriety as an asset within the solution.

From my own country president (and he his quite right/liberal):

> We are living the end of abundance. […] Our system based on freedom in which we have become used to living, sometimes when we need to defend it, it can entail making sacrifices. [0]

[0] https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/article/2022/08/24/macron...

Thank you. I'll just continue to outcompete others, but yeah, probably a lot of people will be poor I guess?

Macron is famously not doing any of this.