Can a person claim to believe in Global Warming without walking

[heidler1]

the talk?

[ThomCat]

1. Absolutely.

Many people being in sexism without making the least effort to combat it. There are many problems that people acknowledge without ever trying to resolve.

[larrysh]

2. What amazes me is all the Kerry bumper stickers

still on SUV's here in Kingwood, Texas. Kinda hard to convince an independent voter to go Democrat (due to environmental concerns), while driving an SUV. Kinda like Barbara Streisand telling people to
give up their clothes dryers and hang wet laundry on a clothes line.
Right,her maid really uses a clothes line.....like her neighborhood association in Malibu would permit one in the first place....

[Javaman]

11. Just a little factoid I picked up. of the 25,000 neighborhood

associations in the U.S., not one allows the hanging of laundry on a closeline in their neighborhoods.

If you ask me for a link, I won't have it, I read it here on DU. :)

[Sequoia]

14. That just can't be true!

I hang out my laundry and I can tell you it saves so much money on my electric bill. In the winter I hang them inside when I'm using my not so pot belly stove.

[Javaman]

15. I know it seems insane, but just having moved from one of those

nazi suburbs myself, I know from my experience it's true.

Several people tried to hang them (myself included) and we were threatened with "fines" aka taking away our poooool privileges. Such children. I tried reasoning with them regarding the saving of energy etc. No dice. I left the meeting by saying screw this. I moved. Now I freely hang my laundry in a not home association area. :)

I could go into a whole bunch of things but the bottom line is, when energy prices sky rocket, I will be amused at how quickly they change their tunes.

[Sequoia]

18. Where is that so I will never move there.

And in Kansas there are neighborhoods that don't allow....boy, get this....sitting on your front porch!!!!!!!!!! Why? Duh, because that's what them there illigal aliens do. Yep, that's the sole reason. Hot? Stay inside and bake but don't dare come out on your cooler porch and maybe be neighborly. Off topic but talk about insane people. And in Georgia? Get rid of those $1 taco stands. Creepers, you'd think these were the border states.

[Javaman]

19. I'm in Austin, yes a blue city, however...

over the last 10 years (dot com boom, bust) an "element" has moved in. The uptight homeowners. Not all areas are like that here, most are very normal and, gasp, liberal. However, some of these new exoburbs and out of the way, suburbs are like little fiefdoms. We moved because of that insanity, but also because there were no bus routes to the area and none were planned. I didn't like that concept at all. I don't like being a slave to my car. So out we moved. :)

[Sequoia]

20. No buses either?! Insane.

I hope all this crap comes back to bite them.

[Javaman]

21. Oh it will, I can guarantee it.

that community was set up to be completely car dependant. It's in the middle of the Austin "hill country". Which means: in the middle of no where with lots of steep hills. Terrible for buses and hellish on gas usage. In order to go anywhere, one has to drive. Nothing at all is within walking distance.

Giant houses, very high property taxes. I know for a fact, that many of the people living in that area are living way beyond their means. It won't be pretty.

When we left, so many houses were for sale. Next summer as the price of natural gas goes up it will be a very interesting time around here. Like the northeast uses oil to heat their homes in the winter, Texas uses natural gas in the summer for A/C. And those huge, and I mean HUGE, houses cost a kings ransom to cool. 3-4000 square feet is the norm.

We are now in a little pishky 1300 square foot house and it's wonderful. :)

You are probably wondering why I was living there in the first place. LOL GF got divorced and was saddled with the home until I came along. LOL

[Sequoia]

22. I live in a postage stamp so 1300 is big to me.

Good thing you got out when you did too. Good luck.

[xmas74]

17. Which is why, even if I had the money,

I would never live in an area that had a neighborhood association.

I don't cater to people telling me what I can and cannot do.

[noamnety]

3. yep

lots of people know smoking is bad for them, but continue to smoke
lots of out of shape people don't exercise
lots of diabetic people eat stuff they shouldn't

Short term gratification causes us to be self-destructive in all kinds of crazy ways.

[phantom power]

4. The mathematician in me proposes we define "talk" and "walk"

[heidler1]

6. The way I use "Walk the Talk" is just like "Practice what you Preach"

I'm almost 81 years old and usually think people are no better or worse than they were when I was a kid, however on this issue I do believe people want to "Get on some band wagon" so bad now days that there is no expectation that they are suppose to do anything about what they say they believe in, including religion. It used to be a pretty major put down to accuse some one of being hypocritical. IMO that was better.

[phantom power]

7. Yes, but everybody preaches different things WRT global warming.

(or anything else).

For instance, I might preach "buy some energy efficient light bulbs, and try to not drive quite so much." I've seen other people who preach things like "We must give up cars altogether and eat nuts and berries." Some people even preach "Humans must submit to voluntary extinction" (no, really, they even have their own website).

Some here in this forum advocate the use of nuclear power to mitigate global warming. I'm one of them. Others consider that anathema, and advocate a pure renewable solution.

Over and above all of that, I'm pretty sure that events are overtaking us. The "prevent global warming" ship has sailed, and we're not on it. Even the "prevent major disaster" ship has left the docks. I like to think that we can still catch the "prevent human extinction" ship. That ship may only have room for so many people.

So, I no longer know what talk to talk, and I'm not sure that individuals walking the walk is where it's at. Major worldwide adjustment is where it's at. In whatever form that will take. My favorite bet these days is that there will be no plan, only desperate fire-fighting.

[NNadir]

8. I am old enough to recall that time when being a hypocrite was an anathema.

You've got almost 30 years on me, but I do remember that time well.

However the situation is very complex. It is ironic that many of the people who talk about climate change insist on magic to address it.

I think the big difference, other than the complexity of the problem, is that you come from a generation that was aware that life involves serious risk and that life cannot be perfect. My generation, the baby boomers, came to believe that perfection exists, and therefore we have made the perfect the enemy of the good. In fact, since the baby boomers have become "the powers that be," it has been one case of "paving the road to hell with good intentions" after another.

Given that this insistence persists, we are doomed.

[heidler1]

10. Don't give up. Humans do differ from lemmings in that when they see the

brink of disaster they will fight to keep from going over the brink. This problem is pretty tough and very dire. We will have to give up on the pretense of doing something constructive and get real. The first thing to do is get some credible think tank to make up a school course of study starting in the first grade. Kids know that they stand to live a long time and they will demand truth without phoniness.

[bananas]

5. Eat In, Act Out

"the national event Eat In, Act Out from July 31 to Aug. 6"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x61478

[Boomer]

9. What an odd question

Global warming is a fact. Period.

Knowing that climate change is happening doesn't guarantee I'm going to change my life in any way. After all, just because I'm overweight doesn't mean I'm going to go on a diet.

As it happens, though, I'm going to Weight Watchers :P As for "walking the talk", can't say that I've changed anything I'm doing specifically to combat global warming. Being naturally frugal, I've been doing as much as I can to reduce energy usage long before warming became a "now" issue, rather than a "later" threat.

[Javaman]

12. You were frugal before frugal was cool. :)

I know what you mean, if I was to conserve or cut electricity any more, I would be living in the dark. And this is by pure economic necessity, nothing to do with global warming, it just so happens it works out that way.

[Boomer]

13. My mother washed used aluminum foil

She didn't throw it away until a sheet basically fell apart. In every way possible, she lived below her means and accumulated only a modest amount of belongings. Unless you count her books... not sure you COULD count her books, actually, since that's the one arena in which she ran wild!

I can't claim to have reached her level of frugality myself, but her influence definitely does pervail. For instance, when I went to buy a house I looked for one significantly below what the bank said I could afford.

My idea of the perfect home would be an earthbag construction, with off the grid energy. Someday...

[Javaman]

16. LOL my girlfriend says I'm...frugal...

You have to repeat that phrase by elongating the "U" sound. LOL I have become noticeably "tight-wadish" as I have grown older.

I don't know how old your parents are but mine being of the depression era also saved tin foil (even though it was aluminum foil), wrapping paper, paper bags, etc. My moms new jag is plastic bags. LOL She could be a supplier now.

And I am right there on the same page with you on the house. We just bought one. To put it politely, "a real fixer upper" LOL. Our friends come over and give us patient smiles. LOL Way below what we could afford, but I had to convince my GF to go for it. I saw great potential in it. Slowly but surely, a butterfly is emerging. However, it just may take about 2 years to get out of the cocoon. LOL