this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2026
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Climate
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Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.
As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades:
How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world:
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Even this type of data is overly decontextualized without considering cumulative (not annual) emissions since the industrial revolution (globally), proportion of corporate contribution and off shoring. Per capita is important too.
With regard to developing nations, emissions will go up as people get pulled out of poverty and have lifestyles more like people in developed nations. It's hard to ask them not to pursue that or to delay it without coming across as hypocritical. Especially since developed nations are responsible for 50% of cumulative emissions, historically, despite being 20% of the global population (and have a higher quality of life so show for it).
Now with the US/Israel's war in Iran more nations in Asia will be burning coal due to oil supply constraints. It's easy to show a graph blaming those nations for resorting to that but several are already rationing gasoline (Americans would lose their minds lol) and the people are absolutely struggling for it.
This is the type of decontextualization that Western nations employ to pressure nations in Africa, Latin America, and Asia and its often is not received well, understandably.
there were no solar panels during the industrial revolution, i care about what’s being emitted today, what is the point of us reducing our emissions for china and india ro simply slurp up all the savings and then some?
people in the west worried about climate change while somehow ignoring the elephant in the room
Sure that's one way to look at it but it's short sighted in my view. From the other perspective it comes across as the West saying they could pollute as much as they wanted to in order give their people a better life and now everyone else has to operate under strict constraints or get a finger wagging from the largest contributers to CO2 emissions in human history. That's a lot of hypocrisy.
You're right that solar panels do exist now. It should be noted that China has done more with renewables and getting ICE vehicles off the road than any Western country, many of which seem to be stuck in old habits. Nations like India and China are developing on a massive scale, actively integrating renewables into their expanding grids as they pull hundreds of millions out of poverty.
The average person in India and China contributes substantially less to global emissions than the average Westerner. So as their emissions increase, rather than seeing it as them cancelling out your efforts, you should be flattered that they want to live with the luxuries and privileges youve had for some time now. They are in no way less worthy of that.
Perhaps Western nations should be contributing less per capita than developing nations, as a way to offset their historically disproportionate contribution.