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Climate change department closed by new UK PM Theresa May

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suedester

Banned
This is all about creating new cabinet departments due to Brexit and only having a limited number of seats (22 I think). Hopefully there will be a climate change minister and this won#t be as bad as it seems right now.
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
Whatever, let's just drive blind and at full speed against the wall. I do not have any hope left that politics and industry will even remotely be able to tackle this issue. Let's hope the history books will not forget a single one of these morons.

Not sure where most of these 'please read' comments are coming from.

My reply to that is 'please get some reading comprehension and perspective'

Nothing about this sounds good. Being folded into a more powerful department who are probably not going to make it a priority for obvious reasons is one of the worst possible things that could happen IMO. Instead of a quick death with a slim possibility of coming back when/if people come to their senses it is probably just going to be slowly strangled to death by corporate interests and lobbyists.

Exactly. I have no idea where these "please read" posts are coming from.
 

Zips

Member
My opinion of the UK continues to drop at a very alarming rate.

The whole country seems to be increasingly an example for the rest of the world as to the ever-present danger of going full retard.
 

Famassu

Member
Let's see who only reads the title. It's now part of the much more powerful Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy.
It's been shown time and time again that when you mix business/money with nature preservation & such on a government level, business always wins.
 

Timedog

good credit (by proxy)
I didn't realize that this kind of resistance extended outside of the United States. The UK being an island makes this all that much worse.
The united states is on an island too. It's just a really huge island. A massive island is what we live on.

In 2012 (the movie, not the year) they made huge boats called Arks that important people were put on when the climate change caused a big flood like in the Bible.
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
It's been shown time and time again that when you mix business/money with nature preservation & such on a government level, business always wins.

Yeah. I am a believer in free markets. But one would have to be very naive to think that any businesses will sacrifice short- and middle-term interested for the sake of vague long-term interests, despite all the strong evidence for climate change and all the obvious consequences the current global development will have. They would only do it if they could market climate change initiatives and climate-friendly products to consumers and make a profit out of it. But that's not something the coal and oil industry can do...
 

D4Danger

Unconfirmed Member
It's been shown time and time again that when you mix business/money with nature preservation & such on a government level, business always wins.

well somebody forgot to tell that to the 195 countries that signed the legally binding Paris Agreement then.
 

TyrantII

Member
"Both parties are he same"

Looks like the UK left is as shitty as the US Left. Fracture over literally nothing, and look what you get.
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
well somebody forgot to tell that to the 195 countries that signed the legally binding Paris Agreement then.

It's not even ratified yet and consists mostly of vague and non-binding statements. And what has been specifically promised is not enough.
 

D4Danger

Unconfirmed Member
It's not even ratified yet and consists mostly of vague and non-binding statements. And what has been specifically promised is not enough.

if the only argument left is "yeah man it ain't enough because BIG business and like they're gonna rape mother earth don't you seeeeee" hippy bs then I'm not playing. That is beyond weak.
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
if the only argument left is "yeah man it ain't enough because BIG business and like they're gonna rape mother earth don't you seeeeee" then I'm not playing. That is beyond weak.

You mentioned the Paris agreement. I said that it does not contain binding and specific to-dos. And you answer to that is this? What are you even talking about.
 

D4Danger

Unconfirmed Member
You mentioned the Paris agreement. I said that it does not contain binding and specific goals. And you answer to that is this? What are you even talking about.

I pointed to a specific example where the UK has a clear commitment to tackle climate change in a thread that was posted to infer the opposite. I can post others if you want? being 2edgy and just saying stuff like "business always wins" and whatever isn't an argument.
 

Yoda

Member
This is the side-effect of right-wingers capitalizing on the "collateral damage" of neoliberalism. The longer the "haves" pretend there is nothing wrong with the current level of economic opportunity, the more right-wing nationalism is going to stick. Free-trade needs to be treated as an economic policy, not a religion.
 

Arnie7

Banned
Yeah >_<

"Bu-Bu-But their logo is a tree!"

In memory of a real tree.

tumblr_l6hs99yxjN1qc073co1_400.gif
 

Boney

Banned
I'm flipping out right now. Merging it with the business ministery is a slap to the face.

I didn't quite get who was the woman that asked that "is climate change real" in the article.
 

Siegcram

Member
I pointed to a specific example where the UK has a clear commitment to tackle climate change in a thread that was posted to infer the opposite. I can post others if you want? being 2edgy and just saying stuff like "business always wins" and whatever isn't an argument.
You should post others, since the Paris agreement is as of now neither legally binding nor nearly far reaching enough to even make a dent.

If that's all we got, we are fucked.
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
I pointed to a specific example where the UK has a clear commitment to tackle climate change in a thread that was posted to infer the opposite. I can post others if you want? being 2edgy and just saying stuff like "business always wins" and whatever isn't an argument.

You keep saying that despite the fact that this was the very thing I challenged. A challenge that you chose to ignore. You could, for instance, name one binding and specific policy that the Paris agreement demands. Not just "we agree that X is important and that we need to do something about it". Something specific that is more than just vacuous political rhetoric, too unspecific to be of any legal value. Instead you are going after the straw man that "business always win" is the only thing that has been said.
 

AHA-Lambda

Member
I pointed to a specific example where the UK has a clear commitment to tackle climate change in a thread that was posted to infer the opposite. I can post others if you want? being 2edgy and just saying stuff like "business always wins" and whatever isn't an argument.

"commitment" means jackshit unless they actually deliver on it, so we should be looking at their history on these matters, which is less than stellar...

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...-green-policies-killed-off-by-tory-government

http://www.green-alliance.org.uk/resources/Green Standard 2013 report.pdf

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...olicies-conservative-tory-attacks-environment

and cop21 agreements were made at a time when we were part of the EU, so I doubt those commitments remain so "ironclad"

And again, cop21 was plenty criticised too as not going far enough

https://www.newscientist.com/articl...-deal-is-agreed-but-is-it-really-good-enough/

http://www.businessgreen.com/bg/new...ough-say-third-of-ethical-corporation-members

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/14/paris-climate-change-deal-cop21-oxfam-actionaid
 

AHA-Lambda

Member
Jesus Christ this is depressing.

Thanks yet again, Leave voters.

yep.

These actions resulting after brexit should NOT be a surprise to people. The conservatives do not care about the environment and now they have great excuse to renege on much regulation and commitments that were EU based.
 

D4Danger

Unconfirmed Member
"commitment" means jackshit unless they actually deliver on it, so we should be looking at their history on these matters, which is less than stellar...

I'll come back in 20 years and update this thread then. christ, what else do you want? I can't time travel and tell you how it works out all I can do is reply saying that this isn't some setback for climate change like the op is inferring because there's agreements and policies in place that are a commitment to reduce emissions and the causes of change. If people just want to be cynical about it then there's nothing I can say.
 
I'm going to wait for more information before making any judgements. Apparently it's being merged with Business and Industry (departments which they had to work alongside anyway), and some sort of restructure was already underway during Cameron's time in office.
 

AHA-Lambda

Member
I'll come back in 20 years and update this thread then. christ, what else do you want? I can't time travel and tell you how it works out all I can do is reply saying that this isn't some setback for climate change like the op is inferring because there's agreements and policies in place that are a commitment to reduce emissions and the causes of change. If people just want to be cynical about it then there's nothing I can say.

those same commitments, many of which are bound in EU based legislation?

very well, let's wait and see...
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
I'll come back in 20 years and update this thread then. christ, what else do you want? I can't time travel and tell you how it works out all I can do is reply saying that this isn't some setback for climate change like the op is inferring because there's agreements and policies in place that are a commitment to reduce emissions. If people just want to be cynical about it then there's nothing I can say.

I don't know how much experience you have with legal texts like the text of the Paris agreement, but unless it defines specific policies and penalties, it is legally worthless. For instance, you can just go through the text and, without reading, remove any paragraph that stats with "recommends", "notes", "realizes", "requests", "urges" and so on. This is not cynicism, this is how such texts work. The only "binding commitment" about this text is that it "recognizes" something without committing to do anything specific about it.
 

system11

Member
You should post others, since the Paris agreement is as of now neither legally binding nor nearly far reaching enough to even make a dent.

If that's all we got, we are fucked.

It's going to make a lot more difference than flipping out over a department name.

It's still hopeless though, carbon targets are a waste of time. There's value in cutting pollution but all this 'energy neutral' focus is IMO actually fairly damaging in terms of people discussing the problem as a whole.

People focus on climate change as a function of industry, business and power generation, because it makes them feel like they can achieve something. It's an acceptable target of blame, a palateable problem. In reality they can't bear to actually look at the real problem, and that's people. Even if you find the magical wand which suddenly makes every product and every watt of power 'carbon neutral' in the superficial way the term is mostly used, the planet is still fucked. The animals still die. The ecosystem still collapses. The planet is still slowly, inevitably, swallowed whole.

But hey, if kicking off over someone changing the name of a government department works for helping you sleep at night, good for you.
 

Condom

Member
It's amazing how little they care. We have people on this forum that refuse to believe climate change exists. Or if they do, it's not our fault "because it's happened before". Yeah, with disastrous consequences. Fucking hell.
I know people, intelligent people who deny climate change is impacted by human behavior. They just use that as a cop out so they don't have to do anything or worry about it.
 

Onemic

Member
I know people, intelligent people who deny climate change is impacted by human behavior. They just use that as a cop out so they don't have to do anything or worry about it.

Honestly, they should just say they dont care. At the end of the day that's 100% the reason why they'd refute all the scientific evidence that says otherwise.
 
It's going to make a lot more difference than flipping out over a department name.

It's still hopeless though, carbon targets are a waste of time. There's value in cutting pollution but all this 'energy neutral' focus is IMO actually fairly damaging in terms of people discussing the problem as a whole.

People focus on climate change as a function of industry, business and power generation, because it makes them feel like they can achieve something. It's an acceptable target of blame, a palateable problem. In reality they can't bear to actually look at the real problem, and that's people. Even if you find the magical wand which suddenly makes every product and every watt of power 'carbon neutral' in the superficial way the term is mostly used, the planet is still fucked. The animals still die. The ecosystem still collapses. The planet is still slowly, inevitably, swallowed whole.

But hey, if kicking off over someone changing the name of a government department works for helping you sleep at night, good for you.

There's more to this issue than simply limiting carbon emissions. A whole lot of this is about preparing for the inevitable. Your do nothing and watch the planet die stance might be fine for you, but most are not ready to stick with the status quo until the planet is swallowed whole. Though, this is an interesting stance that the fossil fuels industry could take if they find there isn't enough people willing to deny the issue.
 
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