So far my best bets have been talking about the Demographic Transition Model - i.e, as wealth goes up, birth rates decline, so uplift the poor and we'll be fine.
I also say that we have enough resources to go around if we stop allowing 1 man to use the resources of 100.
Theres also people with mad conspiracies that the government is trying to decrease birth rates by promoting LGBT stuff. To that I've said I also say that the current system of capitalism is all about growth and making money, and more people = more money. They don't want to thin us down.
What else can I say? It seems to be a very common belief.
I don't really think that 70% pollution stat is that meaningful. I mean, we live in capitalism, so corporations are producing the things that we all need -- in addition to the stuff we don't. Does that means that 30% of emissions are caused by subsistence farmers? By the US military? It's unclear what the remainder would be.
How do we reduce the emissions in that 70% while not eliminating necessary production - it's not elucidated by that number.
Ban private property silly! No one has a right to own a car or eat meat. Problem is Americans are too willing to kill for this if they couldn't own it anymore. So we gotta kill the reactionaries before they can you know, react.
Well, of course, but a certain point of that 70% of emissions is from things like manufacture of medicine, growing and harvesting food, running restaurants, manufacture of building materials and construction of houses and buildings.
Like, demonizing corporations for existing under capitalism is not particularly meaningful, when there is a difference between necessary production that would happen without private property anyway and making plastic decorative doo-dads and shipping them around the world for pure consumption.
Necessary is subjective, this is why we need a communist party to decide things for us. Have faith in communism friend.
It's not that subjective everyone for example knows on some level that food is important in a way that random pieces of plastic aren't
Certainly everyone can survive without meat, but no people are willing to kill to be carnivores.
Yes, necessary is subjective. I am fully for a planned, efficient economy with necessary production. All I'm saying is it is meaningless to say 70% of emissions come from corporations, without differentiating what is being produced by corporations that are doing that emitting. Like of course corporations do the majority of emissions, we live under capitalism. It is a statistic that does not provide any insight.
It's not terrible as a propaganda line though
It's fine if whoever you're talking to doesnt ask any follow up questions or think too hard about it.
I guess I don't see what the statistic is saying. What is it supposed to suggest? What is included in the non-corporation emission? For me it's a number that doesn't give insight if I continue to think about it.