A couple of things really bug me about this event.
What is the point? Raising awareness about GW? Do you think anyone with the capacity to view the concert on television is unaware about climate change?
Why should I care a whit about what James Blunt, Akon, Ludacris, or Fallout Boy support? Just because you can rhyme “walk away”, “die today” and “AK” doesn’t make you the standard bearer for facing down the greatest crisis in the history of mankind.
The hypocrisy of jet-set rockers willing to produce more CO2 on one tour than I will in a lifetime makes me doscount the GW message. And if this is so damn important, cut your CO2 emmissions AND buy your carbon offsets…your trying to save the planet, remember?
So, what is the point? I can’t imagine people are going to make lifestyle changes based on the pleas of semi-talented pop sensations.
I can only think this is a cynical (brilliant?) ploy by Al Gore to pave the way to take the democratic nomination. He has created a pop-culture juggernaut that may have harnessed the ever elusive “youth” vote.
So the debate…will this concert have any long term positive impact on the global warming crisis?
Bonus question: Is this really a thinly veiled launching platform for Al Gore’s candidacy.
Extra credit: How much CO2 will be needlessly created through efforts associated with this event?
Extra credit. The only answer is suicide. Living in an industrialized country ,you will create a extra amount of pollutants. Whining about concerts and gatherings in ridiculous. Do the crashers live a pollution free life.
Perhaps senate and congress should operate by email from home. Think of how they would represent a smaller footprint if they did. Bush should bicycle around Washington to cut gas usage.
1.) To allow Cartman to be the hero, and for Chef to be able to sacrifice himself for a noble cause.
2.) I dunno. Why should people care about what kind of underwear Paris Hilton buys? (Assuming she actually does buy any.)
3.) According Al, they’re doing that for the concert. Most of the performers are playing close to where they live and they’ve bought carbon offsets, etc.
Bonus: Al will only take the nom if the Dems come begging. Right now Clinton and Obama are nearly unstoppable juggernaughts, and Al’s got that sticky business of his son just getting busted for drugs. If Clinton makes the mistake of referring to Obama by the n-word (You know, “nostril”. ;)) and Obama get’s caught hitting on white women like Mr. T did to Adrian in Rocky III, and it looks like Biden’s going to get the nom, then you can expect Al to join the race.
Al Gore believes that we need to take a serious look at our environment. This isn’t a new crusade for him. I think it is safe to say that Al Gore has done far more good for the world than George W. Bush has.
Al Gore is a hypocrite. Carbon offsets are the most ridiculous thing ever. It’s rich people buying the right to pollute from the poor. Fucking hypocrisy at it’s finest.
The Live Earth concerts are ridiculous bloated capitalist consumer whoredom at its finest. They are part of the problem, NOT part of the solution.
If the hypocrisy of rock stars makes you skeptical of Global Warming, then you might want to hone your critical thinking skills. There are reasons to be skeptical, the hypocrisy of a few musicians is not one of them.
This is as ridiculous as those Gap ‘red’ T-shirts, where you got to feel like you were being socially responsible by helping Gap turn a profit.
This IS the problem, that we use any excuse to have a drunken orgy of consumption.
I also kind of thought the concerts were pointless. I mean, sure, the gesture is nice, but really, the future of the world is in the hands of how India and China steer their industrial and commercial revolutions, IMHO.
Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner! What we do here in the West is irrellevant unless the Chinese and Indians do something similar. China’s building something like one new coal power plant a week. At that rate, even if they’re low polluting (which I imagine they’re not), it’s only a matter of time before they outstrip us as the greenhouse gas champions of the world.
I’m sorry but this is the biggest load of horsecrap. China just barely surpassed us, and India has yet to surpass us in emissions. Even still, being the third largest polluter by volume and by far the single largest polluter per capita will remain significant.
Why is it so important to justify it away like this? ‘Oh, it’s ok to shit in the middle of the street because the Chinese and Indians are going to do it more soon.’ Nevermind the fact that they are largely doing it producing products that we buy. That part of course is irrelevant.
:rolleyes: There just aren’t enough of these.
What we do is far from irrelevant, we can have a huge impact. Why should I not steal from K-Mart, my little bit isn’t going to significantly impact their bottom line, I mean lots of other people do it too. Why do people think that the pollution problem has to be absolutely solved for it to be worthwhile to take a dent out of it?
Yea, right now. How about in 5 years? 10 years? 25? We are talking about 2.5 Billion people getting economically and industrially reorganized on a scale unprecedented in human history.
Never said it wouldn’t.
What on earth are you talking about? I never said the concerts were wrong or a bad idea, I just said that, IMHO, they were kind of pointless. I’d rather they happened than not, but I just think it’s not enough. I mean, come on. Musicians extolling the virtues of buying songs online so that less trucks transport CDs. Meanwhile, massive reorganization of 45% of the world’s population is occurring and will continue to occur for decades. That, to me, will be the deciding factor.
Shamozzle Concerts are totally pointless as I said above, they are bloated and wasteful, a source of the problem, not a source of the solution.
My problem is with this idea that incremental solutions are not good enough. In my opinion any reduction of pollutants is a good thing, regardless of how much China and India add to it. If they power up as we power down, then it is a significant difference.
I’m thinking that there will come a time when we aren’t really in a position as a clear leader.
And I don’t know that the nations mentioned will be in a position to follow, regardless.
I don’t mean to be such a “Debbie Downer”, but it’s just the way I see it.
I mean, let’s think about the scale of what is happening. Hell, we struggle to direct and control smaller issues. I see the new “Asian-centred” world order as being too large to steer meaningfully in terms of environmental issues, etc.
I hope I’m wrong. I hope someone comes on here and says, “No, no no, it will all work out, like this: XYZ. See?” And then I can say, wow, you’re right! Cool!..
The best way for America to lead is to innovate, to come up with the solution. Perhaps its a way to make battery storage much more efficient, perhaps a way to make alcohol an effective fuel. Somewhere there is, very likely, a genius with a crackpot idea that needs only funding. I am convinced, based on nothing more than a WAG, that if we’d put some serious effort and money into this twenty years ago, we’d likely have the solution already. America saves the world. Just speaking as a flag waving and patriotic dirty fucking hippy, I love the idea.
Shamozzle How about we just think about pollution in terms of its local effect. We reduce emissions so that less kids in our cities will be asthmatics? What do China and India have to do with this? I don’t think leadership really matters. To me civilization is one large waste management project. How do we get food to the mouths of our people, and how do we get the waste product away from their mouths. It’s all about organizing the resources we use. Being less wasteful is overall a good thing. How about doing it because you want to see less paper plates and beer cans on the beach or at your favorite campground?
Moral behavior isn’t about justifying your behavior by the behavior of the lowest common denominator, if it was, then it would be a swift march to the bottom throughout all of history. Moral behavior is about doing what is right because it is right. Just because other people are raping and murdering doesn’t mean I go out and do it, simply because whether I choose to do it or not is statistically insignificant to the overall incidence of rape and murder. I don’t rape and murder because I recognize that the instant gratification of indulging my rage and my libido has a greater negative social impact which in turn affects me, than abstaining from doing so. It is only because this individual control of oneself became the accepted norm amongst the larger part of the populace, that we can even have a society at all. Pollution is just another step toward moral progress within our species, and yes the overall rate will probably go up despite how much we reduce, but it would go up even faster if we didn’t reduce.
That being said, the Live Earth concerts are still retarded.