this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2023
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Thanks for dropping the facts comrade. It's hard for some people to understand that having 1.4 billion people means you can't compare apples to apples with USA or Europe. China is by far working the hardest on lowering their carbon footprint.
And yes, I'm considering the SocDems in Europe, those people don't use a lot of energy because they produce nothing. If their overseas manufacturing plants produce carbon, it's not part of their footprint, on paper. China produces many things, their footprint matters to many countries.
Having 1.4 billion people isn't exactly responsible either, though. Call it what you want, China is still responsible for the lion's share of pollution (not just CO2).
China: we are worried about overpopulation, we will tax over 1 child
Westerners: authoritarian!
China: Birth rate slowed, stopped the tax, has 1.4 billion people
Westerners: ugh you have too many people! Irresponsible!!!
๐
USA is still accountable for more c02 pollution in the atmosphere than any other country. And keys be honest, USA and Europe are responsible for most of the pollution of all kinds in the world. Please break out of your bubble...
There might be other ways to control population like, oh, say, sexual education or free contraceptives. It is totally the Chinese, authoritarian way of thinking that lead you to where you're at now.
And it's single minded liberal thinking that makes you believe that these things are mutually exclusive, and putting words into my mouth to say things I never said.
How difficult is it to flip a switch in educate one and a half billion people? How long does that take for it to take effect? How can you get high quality education into rural societies that may not even have access to the internet?
This is the problem with liberals, there's only one solution isn't there? Everybody believes the same thing, right? The solution that works for me will work for everyone...
Of course access to sex ed and condoms will help, I believe that. And China is now doing that too. But that's so easy to Google, I know you didn't even try. They didn't need to tax multiple kids forever, they needed to slow it down quickly. And they've removed that tax.
Westerners use taxation to incentivize or decentivize action all the time, is that authoritarian? Please, for one fucking second, turn your excellent deduction skills (lol) inward onto yourself for a moment.
Ah yes, as you can see from the cranium of this skull, the Chinese brain is simply predisposed to authoritarian thought... ๐
Europe having ~500 million and the US another ~300 million isn't exactly responsible when each person consumes multiples of the what the average person in the global south consumes. Call it what you want, the global north is not only responsible for the lions share of emissions and other types of environmental degradation, it also doesn't give a fuck and has no plans whatsoever to make meaningful changes to save the world from climate catastrophe. Luckily the global north is steadily and surely consigning itself into irrelevancy.
Maybe, just maybe, both places suck.
Except for two things.
First, the way to express this is not to make eugenicist arguments alluding to Malthusian concepts of overpopulation.
Second, the links provided above offer a mere taste of what China has been doing to try to stop climate change. It doesn't matter whether these sources are persuasive, though. The proof of the pudding will be eating it in 10, 20, 30 years time and revaluating what each country has achieved. I'd bet the habitability of my planet on China achieving a lot more than the G7, possibly combined, unless the G7 suddenly became radical and changed their capitalist ways.
I said China is overpopulated (it is). I didn't allude to anything; you did that in your own head because you like to play the victim.
Time will tell what happens, I guess. I wouldn't bet on an authoritarian country achieving much, however. History has shown that they tend to not do so well in the long run.
The notion of overpopulation relies on a logic of Malthusianism, which is eugenecist. Allusion only requires an indirect reference. So by referring to overpopulation but not to eugenics, the effect is an allusion (indirect reference) to eugenics. I accept that you may not have intended this.
This allusion would be strengthened were you to suggest, though, in the context of saying there are too many Chinese people, that China should depopulate itself for the good of the planet, without addressing the unsustainability of capitalism or of the lifestyles (not lives) of those who live in the imperial core.
Even though there are roughly the same number of people living in the global north as in China, the habits of the inhabitants of the global north, due to their capitalist political economy, are overwhelmingly driving climate change and destroying biodiversity.
It's hardly playing the victim to point out that eugenicist arguments are bad, nor that westerners should have to change their models of consumption and production to ones that are far more sustainable long before we get to the question of who should not have children. And when we do get to that question, the answer should be anything but based on race or ethnicity because that would be abhorrent.
How else would a state curb the excesses of capitalist logic except by consciously being authoritarian? This very power, exercised by the working class, is why China will achieve so much.