Memes

Oh, that's not my solution.

I'm just saying that there is a solution that would be satisfactory to those who think this way. I have an 11 year old ICE car that's remarkably fuel efficient. The average cost of gas has driven my usual fill up about $20. I used to be able to fill up for a bit over $40, now I'm paying a bit shy of $60 for the same thing. I'm largely unaffected. I suspect the loudest people complaining about gas prices drive F150 and larger engined vehicles.... Where a 50% uptick in cost, is more like $70. They don't go any farther on a tank than my little 1.5L 4cyl can, they just pay more because TRUCK.

See, I get down voted frequently because I approach issues from a neutral perspective, and I can see the arguments on both sides and make very neutrally biased comments... Then people brigade in thinking I'm making a statement, which I didn't and never meant to imply, and my vote count goes straight to hell for it.

I'm literally only pointing out that there is a solution that satisfies all parties. Which isn't to say, nor imply that either I think that should happen, or will happen, or even if I think it's a good idea to pursue. Yet, everyone likes to draw conclusions on what I think for simply pointing out that there are facts to the matter.

For the record, I'm very much in favor of EVs. I'm not convinced that Tesla's way of doing things is the right way, but I have to give them credit for basically proving the naysayers wrong, and making EVs viable above all questioning. Both for consumer transportation and now they're going after trucks and they inspired Ford to put out the F-150 lighting. That's progress. There's bigger fish to fry than consumer vehicles, even just talking about the transportation sector, but I'll refrain from commenting further on it since it is not material to the point. What is material to the point is that EVs are a good step in the right direction.

The oil industry has tried to kill EVs for a long time, and they were successful for a long time until Tesla shook things up. The oil companies had no real way to fight against Tesla making EVs.... Now that electric vehicles have proven themselves, there's no looking back. EVs will be the way forward. Battery tech might change, and the way we charge them may change, hell, even how we store energy for use may be completely different (like with fuel cell EVs).... Who knows? But cars driven by electric motors will not be going away. Anyone in opposition needs to either get on board or get out of the way, because they're on the wrong side of history.

There were people that opposed "horseless carriages" back in the day too.... We all know how that worked out.

Oh, I'm not endorsing that mindset. I'm just explaining it.

I'm all for everything renewable, but in the process of making things more renewable, we have to keep an eye on things being repairable too. Increasingly, we have sealed devices (phones, TVs, microwave ovens, etc) that are difficult to repair at best and impossible to repair at worst. I understand that for some things, the majority of the cost is in the circuit board, so when something goes wrong with that (or it's hopelessly outdated, or inefficient or whatever), then it's time to replace, but often the circuit board shares fate with most of the rest of the device, so if the battery fails, or the screen or input system isn't working, etc, then a perfectly good/working device (besides the main malfunction) is thrown away because it doesn't work and nobody wants to fix it.

There's always a market for newer stuff, like the latest iPhone/Android/tablet/car/TV/whatever.... But older stuff shouldn't be forced into the landfill just because the power connector is damaged beyond usefulness.... It's stupid and wasteful.

I think Tesla is deranged, half for the walled garden they've been fostering against other car manufacturers, and even EVs, but also because they replace whole modules on the slightest issue. Got a leaky fitting, whelp, gonna have to replace half the mass of the car just to fix it. Stupid. Just stupid.

IMO, it's not enough that the things we have are reusable/renewable, is it any better if we pay for reusable bags (as an example) that are only good for 3-4 trips to the shop, when they cost 5x as much and create 5x as much waste in the process? How does that make any sense? It's like trying to put out a fire with hotter fire.

Therein lies my dilemma, a lot of these things sound great on the surface, but the data isn't there to support the claims. Not as far as I can see. We all agree that reusable bags are better than one-time-use plastic, sure, but is it actually doing any good? On top of that, I used to re-use plastic shopping bags for cleaning up after my pets, and for waste bins in the kitchen and bathroom, which now I have to pay extra to buy bags for those reasons specifically, which saves me nothing, and probably costs more in the long run, even if I paid 5-10 cents a bag at the registry for that plastic.... IDK, I haven't run the numbers on it. Add to that, how the hell am I supposed to pick up dog shit or scoop cat litter without a disposable bag? Apart from the financial cost, is there a practical way to do this without having to clean shit off of things, or myself?

For me, there's a lot more to consider than what marketing is going to lead you to believe. But I could literally rent about it for the better portion of the day, which is why my earlier response was so concise, because I didn't want to launch into a lecture.