Submitted 3 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/416e0b23-474d-4919-984e-88a173ae7cee.jpeg
This reeks of the “noble savage” stereotype. I would be willing to bet 80% of biodiversity being in native lands has more to do with how brutally they’ve been repressed than how “in tune” with the environment they are.
They’re people too, and I see little reason to believe they wouldn’t fall to the same human flaws as the rest of us if given the chance.
It’s called Indigenous TEK and it’s pretty well established.
Thank you for providing sources.
Except the fact we have lots of evidence that native population (which also includes pre-industrial European culture) built sustainable systems which includes altering the environment. Throughout North America there tons of evidence of the use of fire was used. The classic prairie environment of the Oak Savana is only possible through burns and supports a large buffalo population. There’s tons of evidence of strategic cultivation of trees and other plants within the Amazon rainforest that allow people to get food and medicine close by that to the untrained eye looks identical to the rest of the forest.
That being said some of those same people them destroy the same forest via slash and burn agriculture in order to earn a living for cash crops and more traditional agriculture. So profits is a main driver
So profits is a main driver
This is exactly what I’m getting at. If these groups of humans were placed in the same scenarios that Europeans or other westerners were placed in, would they not be susceptible to the same greed that motivated them?
I do not deny that many native societies appear to live in more harmony with the environment than your average westerner. There is certainly a lot to learn there, and I believe we would do better if we emulated some of those characteristics. However, I think that we’re all susceptible to the same flaws, as we are all human.
Ultimately what I’m saying is I don’t think that natives have some superpower where they have figured out how to escape the flaws that have plagued humanity for thousands of years.
95% of people can sing kumbaya in their little eco friendly circle jerk but if that 5% is over it and ready to fight over that belief the 95% better buck the fuck up and rise to the obvious existential threat in front of their fucking face or else they lose.
Oh look, that’s what happened.
What do you consider pre-industrial?
Agriculture directly led to the destruction of native biomes in any country that practiced it.
More people = more agriculture = more land cleared.
So long as most people who live die from avoidable famines, war and disease, then yes, it’s sustainable. But “in check” is probably the better term.
Many indigineous cultures uphold sustainability as a crucial part to their culture.
It is actually a common logical failing of Western culture to assume that everyone sees the world and interacts with it the way they do.
Many indigineous peoples uphold sustainability as crucial to their culture.
Many of every other nation, race, culture and creed do to.
It is actually a common logical failing of Western thinking to assume that everyone sees the world and interacts with it the same way (like them).
See how the second sentence describes the crime you committed in the first?
Sounds like shrinking the population would solve the problem, as long as it’s a very specific 10% that was shrunk.
Just a little off the top.
Humans10% are a virus to the planet
FTFY
Ecofascism isn’t a real ideology I don’t know why people keep insisting it is.
What do you mean? It certainly is. It has been, for example, an influence in several right extreme terror attacks (notably the Christchurch, NZ mass shooting in 2019 comes to mind, where the murderer explicitly described himself as such in his manifesto). Not to mention that crunchy, back-to-the land ideas are a really important part of contemporary far right propaganda.
I’d also argue that this doesn’t really sow division amongst environmentalists; just because it has ‘eco’ in the name doesn’t mean these people actually care about the environment, it’s all aesthetics.
Yes, surprised at these comments considering how much this stuff is some of the current hot topics in research.
It has been, for example, an influence in several right extreme terror attacks (notably the Christchurch, NZ mass shooting in 2019 comes to mind, where the murderer explicitly described himself as such in his manifesto).
“Michelle Chan, vice president of programs for Friends of the Earth, said, “The key thing to understand here is that ecofascism is more an expression of white supremacy than it is an expression of environmentalism.””
just because it has ‘eco’ in the name doesn’t mean these people actually care about the environment, it’s all aesthetics.
In other words, it isn’t an ideology.
Well first was this guy’s ideology really distinct or is he just a fascist who talks about environmental issues as a post-hoc justification to make his objectively deranged actions seem more reasonable?
But I didn’t mean there are no singular eco-fascists anywhere on earth. There are 8 billion people on the planet so I could make up a mad lib ideology and chances are it’s similar to what someone somewhere believes. But I’ve never met one to my knowledge, not even online. There’s no organized push for this or political power behind it. The vast majority of fascists don’t give a shit about the environment and the vast majority of environmentalists oppose fascism. So the only time I see it mentioned is when people get criticized for discussing the impacts of human population.
I understand why it’s a touchy subject. Past racist policies used overpopulation as a justification for crimes against humanity. But that the human impact on the earth is proportional to our population is just a fact, and it doesn’t make you a fascist to acknowledge that. You’re only a fascist if you think that fact gives you a right to brutalize people, and, as I’ve said, I just don’t hear this from any organized or popular thinkers.
I’m tired of people pretending they are smart and problem solving by by mass murdering most humans on the planet and stopping procreation.
You don’t solve a jigsaw puzzle by putting 10 pieces together and burning the rest so you dont have to deal with them.
Absoluetely no one is promoting this. I hear this bullshit argument every time degrowth comes up, but this has NOTHING to do with degrowth and is a bad faith argument full of too many fallacies to mention.
Then you should doublecheck who you have arguing on your side and who you stand with. You can pump your chest you do not personally stand for this but the practice attracts those that are more physically minded than you.
Degrowth sides with eugenics, racists, and psychopaths. Just cause you think it would save the world to make less lives does not leave it without those that will find horrible ways to make it reality as there is not other practical way to make it happen.
I watched a documentary in New Zeland about fish stocks. It was talking about how the fish around New Zeland are overfished and numbers are low. Had experts talking about issues with boats and how they need no fishing areas. They had Maori on there talking about how much abundance of fish there was before the white people came. They talked about how in tune the Maori were with the land and had ways to manage stock.
The documentary finished saying the issue is still ongoing and not enough has been done. Didn’t really go into why.
Well I looked it up after the majority of fishing companies are owned by the Maori and the reason the scientifically justified areas were not set as a sanctuary was because the Maori didnt agree with the science and wanted to do things there own way that would allow them to fish at levels higher than what the science was saying is possible. On this matter New Zealand cared more about what Maori incorrectly believed over what the scientific evidence was saying to them.
People need to get off their high horse. People suck all over the world. Yea shock the people that live in mountains which remain untouched because it is shit farmland is going to have the most nature. But go to other countries and you see it’s the same, well worse than white countries. Places like UK has had protected land for hundreds of years. They set up protected land in the new places they went. Areas they left like Malaysia and India are full of rubbish and monoculture. They didn’t get better. Go to Indonesia and look at their beautiful islands. The tour guide to us said “look no littering sign. Only on Indonesian. Westerners don’t litter but the locals do”.
no littering sign. Only in Indonesian
Not really related, but in Japan, I came across a monolingual sign that said: “In Japanese culture, it is considered impolite to piss in public”.
Westerners don’t litter but the locals do
Have you not seen how westerners behave on vacation? Maybe you got lucky, but there’s a reason the tourist part of nearly every city has the most litter
The Japanese are better than the westerners I’m not denying that.
Probably because thats where the most people are.
When you go to Asia most people are locals. Even driving through areas buses and trains don’t stop the amount of trash is monumental.
It’s not cultural, it’s moral and intelligence-related
As with all good vs bad discussions…
That documentary is embarrassingly wrong, the overwhelming majority of companies fishing in NZ waters are huge multinationals, not owned by Māori.
Well I can’t see how thats the case when you can easily look up catch right and special areas where only Maori can fish.
They must be selling off their rights or not using it then because the internet says otherwise. Or you are just making things up.
There’s another layer of complexity here that you’re glossing over, I think, and that’s class dynamics within the Maori population.
It can both be true that traditional Maori lifeways were more sustainable, and that modern, Maori owned fishing companies are over fishing.
The coming of the white man didn’t ruin the sustainability of fishing, because of something ontologically bad with white people, but because they enforced an extractive, capitalist, economic system onto the region.
Colonialism pulled the Maori into a broader world system which generated a group of Maori with enough capital to, say, found fishing companies, and a wide swathe of Maori who can’t.
And paradoxically, that capital generation from unsustainable, capitalist, fishing practices is probably one of the things that allows Maori communities to have a degree of sovereignty, all the while said fishing practices are undermining their ability to continue to sustain themselves.
I distinctly remember being taught in 2002 in upstate New York that humans were outside of the ecosystem and not bound by the same rules and things as animals were. The teacher said that’s what made us so special.
What a fucking crime.
Your meme has too many words and the four block structure makes no sense.
Tldr White people bad
It’s actually “TL;DR rich people bad” but sure, pop off I guess.
White people do be bad tho.
Anne Hathaway, Emma Watson, Cate Blanchette…
Absolute baddies 🥵
Dude, there is a memes that are mutliple paragraphs that some people can recite by heart.
Just mention eliter snipers or vaporeon and watch the people go.
Come on, copy pasta is an entirely different form and they work due to being identical, or near, every time.
Theres a very subtle line where youve adapted them to the specific situation that they no longer work.
And the bottom 2 panels should maybe be reversed?
There is a point burried in there that is drowned out by all the fallacious added baggage. Its disingenuous bullshit.
Indigenous Chinese or Indians or Nigerians are not protectors of the earth, just like every other industrial nation. The picture meant to frame “Indigenous” as what Canada calls the indigenous First Nations peoples. It’s relying on the racist trope of the noble savage, forgetting that First Nations aren’t against industrializing their lands, as long as they are included as partner beneficiaries and they don’t maximize returns via egregious environmental destruction on their lands. They also generally want industrialization and trade including water treatment, sanitation and all the other goodies like internet, tv, playstations and the like.
It also targets “capitalist” without looking at the eco-horrors of every other 'ism on earth.
This is a shitpost carefully designed to be a lopsided attack.
Thank you for this thoughtful and nuanced take on the subject. It’s sad that constructive discussion around population is often shut down due to the link between eugenics and population control. It’s often assumed that anyone advocating for lowered population is in support of similarly dystopian/authoritarian policies, when increasing access to birth control and education has the same effect while increasing personal agency.
I would also note that the theory of evolution has been used to justify all kinds of absurd ideologies, yet we don’t have a problem accepting its basic tenets.
If we accept the fact that humanity is in a state of ecological overshoot, and that overshoot is a function of population x consumption, then it’s entirely reasonable to want to address both sides of the equation.
Also “living in traditional ways” is at best misleading. There is already more than enough to go around when we consider actual physical resources. Using market mechanisms to determine how things are distributed works very poorly in terms of meeting everyones needs, and blinds us to actual solutions.
The idea of overshooting earths capacity is firmly rooted in extractive ideology (which is a cornerstone of capitalist economies) and doesn’t even begin to consider how an adjustment in economic output to meet real demand and not whatever is the most profitable, would result in massive changes in the way we do things.
Food production could become more regenerative because we need to feed people not make money.
Clothing industries would cut gigantic amounts of waste simply by ceasing the destruction of clothing to maintain high prices.
And these 2 ideas alone could revolutionize nearly every aspect of our existence.
Indigenous ways of doing is not extractive. It is better described as a collaboration with nature. Managing natural resources to meet our needs, and the needs of (often specifically) the next 7 generations. It means managing forests to make more forests, with all the flora and fauna that entails. Among other things
The fascist part is:
Ohh humans are the problem Okay, which humans? Who decides who gets what? Who lives and who dies? Is there any consideration for the power dynamics in our society (spoiler, no there is not)
In short the quote who ever said it:
Environmentalism without class struggle is just gardening.
The fascist part is: Ohh humans are the problem Okay, which humans? Who decides who gets what? Who lives and who dies? Is there any consideration for the power dynamics in our society (spoiler, no there is not)
That’s the part that always gets me. When I hear that argument it usually goes like this:
“There’s too many humans, we’re killing our planet :(”
“Yeah good thing you’re not one of those! Oh wait you are so…Okay, are you gonna be first in line to sacrifice yourself for the alleged Greater Good or. . .?”
“. . .”
“. . .well?”
The issue isn’t population, it’s consumption.
We don’t need a dozen different plastic tchotchkes delivered to our doorstep the day after we order them. We don’t need 64 GB of RAM for 10,000 steam games we’ll never play in 4k at 60fps. We don’t need to be able to order greasy piles of fast food whenever we want.
To me, blaming overpopulation for the world’s problems always comes across as saying “I don’t want to change my lifestyle, and if there’s 6 billion fewer people, I won’t have to”
I’m not sure this person is aware what indigenous means. Unless, of course this meme is a 100% America-centric meme and largely ignores the entire rest of the world.
Also pretty funny that “eco fascism” is placed underneath what I assume are native Americans.
Switch the bottom panels in your head. They’re not meant to be associated with the up row. Oop poor design choice.
I get the intent, but I still think it’s funny that you placed eco fascist underneath the group the native Americans.
Btw, I still don’t think you know what indigenous means.
This is echoed across the globe, aboriginal people on Australia and others in the pacific islands. No, it’s not America only indigenous.
Although I dont disagree, the argument doesn’t make sense. Do you think our worlds population would be the same if we all lived like indigenous people?
Indigenous people protecting the environment from what?
Capitalism
That’s the real answer
How ignorant are you? Are Indigenous populations deforesting the Amazon? Are they forcing oil pipeline projects that cause massive oil spills that pollute rivers and lakes for thousands of years? Do they force mining projects that pollute earth for thousands of years? Did they invent forever chemicals that have now pollute every single square inch of earth? No, they live sustainably.
Which is my point. People. They’re protecting it from other people.
This is absolutely worshipping indigenous people more so that you should be. They’re human same as the rest of us, and don’t have magical pro environment powers.
I think its more of a stewardship concept
This better be ragebait
We aren’t saying that brown people are above tech and modernities and that’s why they don’t have them… are we? Surely not.
Nope, check out the TEK links and the First Nations link.
Carbon emissions are not the only problem. I really doubt the world’s reaches 10% also produce half of the sewage and plastic or that most of the land is turned into farms to feed them. It’s nice that indigenous people living in forest don’t destroy it but you can’t have 8 billion people living in forests. Cities and highways are not part of the ecosystem.
No, sorry, I stand by the “humans are a virus” side. A small minority aren’t, but most are, myself included.
It is good you admit what you are.
Nihilists should lead by example and remove themselves first.
Thanks for the good vibes, they’d also love this over on LeftyMemes@lemmy.dbzer0.com
Feel free to crosspost!
Sure, if you all want to live like it’s 1750 again humans are not a problem. We both know you don’t want to do that so stop acting like the modern lifestyle is sustainable if the rich just polluted less. It’s not that simple, they pollute that much because they own the facilities that support our lifestyle
they pollute that much because they own the facilities that support our lifestyle
I didn’t know their private jets, yachts, and companies that lobby for lax environment rules support my lifestyle.
Cars, as in personal vehicles, are one of the largest portions of environmental damage. The majority of cars are owned by people who aren’t rich
What are the population densities and technology levels among these magical indigenous peoples? This is the Magical Negro trope all over again.
Who is reading this without being part of the 10%?
According to this study, an income of $38,000/year puts you in the top 10% of carbon emitters. This study puts it at €42,980, or about $50K USD. That’s a little higher than the median income in N. America, Europe, and Australia.
That said, carbon emissions are just one way humans impact the environment; other facets are far less variable (we all produce about the same amount of human waste per day, for example).
what’s the cutoff to be in the 90%?
Wealth distribution pyramid has $100,000 as limit to top 7.7%.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_of_wealth
So $90,000 could be the cutoff.
Of course students don’t have that. However I would include anybody into the top 10% who will own $100,000 at one point in their life which should be anybody with real estate or a private pension plan in the West.
Why does this matter?
We have to know if we have to change our lives or those of the 1,000 billionaires.
It would be easy to change our lives but it becomes difficult if we wait for the billionaires to change instead.
amazon, many rainforests(both amazon and mega-biodiversity of indonesia, south eas asia) is being decimated and untold species both undiscovered and rares are fast disappearing.
Saying stuff like humans are the virus isn’t fascism it’s just simply stupid/edgy. Sure you could say someone like that is a useful idiot to fascists but that’s like saying everyone who drinks gasoline from the cars parked on the street is furthering the agenda of some solar panel manufacturing company. Both are inconsequential enough for me not to give a shit.
It’s not wrong to say that population is the driving problem. Do you think indigenous people ever coexisted with their ecosystem at the population density we’re at now?
Are we counting the world’s industry into “the world’s richest 10%”?
When you buy a house you’re “one of the world’s richest”. The “world’s richest” aren’t just millionaires and billionaires. They include the middle classes.
The planetary zero-impact carrying capacity for humanity is somewhere between 500 million and 2 billion, depending if we want (respectively) a first-world meat-inclusive diet or a fully vegan diet.
Carbon emissions aside, we are indeed a plague upon the planet. Thanks to high tech, we have massively blown past our carrying capacity, and risk lowering the non-high-tech-enabled carrying capacity down into the mere tens of millions or even less. Which bodes very badly if we experience a severe civilizational collapse in the next 10-30 years (as is becoming increasingly likely) that makes building and maintaining high tech impossible.
Ima need yall to not crush a good imeperionstion that I do. I can do a great Hugo Weaving (as mr smith), and the main line that i start off with, or use in my head while saying other things, is the humans are cancer speech.
Also just… Missssster Anderson
magazine.hms.harvard.edu/…/good-viruses-do
Not all viruses are evil, so it might hold up?
tyler@programming.dev 6 days ago
Completely ignoring the fact that humans just existing on islands killed thousands of bird populations. creaf.cat/…/humans-may-have-caused-extinction-143…
This is pretty well documented for Hawaii, where yes the fish population did fine, but the bird population did not.