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We Only Have Months, Not Years, to Save Civilization from Climate Change
International agreements take too long, we need a swift mobilisation not seen since the second world war
For those concerned about global warming, all eyes are on December's UN climate change conference in Copenhagen. The stakes could not be higher. Almost every new report shows that the climate is changing even faster than the most dire projections of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in their 2007 report.
Yet from my vantage point, internationally negotiated climate agreements are fast becoming obsolete for two reasons. First, since no government wants to concede too much compared with other governments, the negotiated goals for cutting carbon emissions will almost certainly be minimalist, not remotely approaching the bold cuts that are needed.
And second, since it takes years to negotiate and ratify these agreements, we may simply run out of time. This is not to say that we should not participate in the negotiations and work hard to get the best possible result. But we should not rely on these agreements to save civilisation.
Saving civilisation is going to require an enormous effort to cut carbon emissions. The good news is that we can do this with current technologies, which I detail in my book, Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization.
Plan B aims to stabilise climate, stabilise population, eradicate poverty, and restore the economy's natural support systems. It prescribes a worldwide cut in net carbon emissions of 80% by 2020, thus keeping atmospheric CO2 concentrations from exceeding 400 parts per million (ppm) in an attempt to hold temperature rise to a minimum. The eventual plan would be to return concentrations to 350 ppm, as agreed by the top US climate scientist at Nasa, James Hansen, and Rajendra Pachauri, head of the IPCC.
In setting this goal we did not ask what would be politically popular, but rather what it would take to have a decent shot at saving the Greenland ice sheet and at least the larger glaciers in the mountains of Asia. By default, this is a question of food security for us all.
Fortunately for us, renewable energy is expanding at a rate and on a scale that we could not have imagined even a year ago. In the United States, a powerful grassroots movement opposing new coal-fired power plants has led to a de facto moratorium on their construction. This movement was not directly concerned with international negotiations. At no point did the leaders of this movement say that they wanted to ban new coal-fired power plants only if Europe does, if China does, or if the rest of the world does. They moved ahead unilaterally knowing that if the United States does not quickly cut carbon emissions, the world will be in trouble.
For clean and abundant wind power, the US state of Texas (long the country's leading oil producer) now has 8,000MW of wind generating capacity in operation, 1,000MW under construction, and a huge amount in development that together will give it more than 50,000MWof wind generating capacity (think 50 coal-fired power plants). This will more than satisfy the residential needs of the state's 24 million people.
And though many are quick to point a finger at China for building a new coal-fired power plant every week or so, it is working on six wind farm mega-complexes with a total generating capacity of 105,000 megawatts. This is in addition to the many average-sized wind farms already in operation and under construction.
Solar is now the fastest growing source of energy. A consortium of European corporations and investment banks has announced a proposal to develop a massive amount of solar thermal generating capacity in north Africa, much of it for export to Europe. In total, it could economically supply half of Europe's electricity.
We could cite many more examples. The main point is that the energy transition from fossil fuels to renewables is moving much faster than most people realise, and it can be accelerated.
The challenge is how to do it quickly. The answer is a wartime mobilisation, not unlike the US effort on the country's entry into the second world war, when it restructured its industrial economy not in a matter of decades or years, but in a matter of months. We don't know exactly how much time remains for such an effort, but we do know that time is running out. Nature is the timekeeper but we cannot see the clock.
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151 Comments so far
Show AllThe problem is government itself. The US government continues to subsidize coal when they have no business meddling with business affairs. Government must stop subsidizing coal so that solar energy can fairly compete or government should be abolished.
Little coverage on massive hydroelectric dams and the climate impact not to mention human rights and ecological devastation.
The OAS in DC will hold a hearing on the impact on Human Rights
at 5:30 on Monday Nov. 11
International Rivers documents worldwide and has a press release posted with webcast link:
http://www.internationalrivers.org/en/node/4793
RE: The problem is government itself...
Close. But who does our government serve? Corporate power.
If you want to solve a problem, first you need to understand the problem. Then, in order to find the right answer you need to ask the right question. The "right" question is not "how do we slow global warming", the right question is how do we stop Capitalism, for Capitalism is not only the driving force behind resource exploitation, use and pollution; hence global warming, but of resource wars (Iraq, Af-Pak, the Congo etc.) class conflict (wealth concentration) - you name it.
Correctamundo!
hmmm...saving civilization, with a z or an s, is all about electricity? I understand electricity makes many things possible that may not be otherwise...my question is whether those things are conducive to a sustainable world?
The problem may not be how we generate electricity, but that we use it at all...
Lester is right, however the U.S. has a poor track record on crisis intervention until after the fact. I'm afraid some very overt symptoms of the crisis must materialize before such a "moon shot" approach would be politically plausible. By then, the writing will likely be on the proverbial wall.
I think you are right on. There will be lots of denial and teabag shouting about communism, socialism and taking people's country away until the proverbial s**t hits the fan and then the same loudmouths will be demanding that the government do something to protect them. The more things change here the more they stay the same.
aliensoup,
If we were to frame it as "Corporate Communism" which is polluting your food, air and water, it might help pull the right wingers on board. The right and the left, can agree that this government is an incompetent custodian of public safety, and unfit to disperse the moneys of the US Treasury.
Start there.
TJ
"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent." - Thomas Jefferson
a more PRECISE description of the USA is not that it has a "poor record of crisis intervention until after the fact"
rather :
if there is ANY nation on earth that is the CENTRAL or ROOT cause of CRISES of such proportions as the Climate threat to civilization and life - it is none other THAN the USA.
it is not so much about the USA "having a poor record ....until after the fact" ...it is that the USA LEADS in creating crises and conditions accelerating towards crisis..and THEN
STILL is the most recalcitrant. how so?
it's very method and habit of creating crises INCLUDES blaming others that are dragged into the crises that were created or enlarged BY the USA..whether it is through its so-called "competition" world of economics, its disaster economics, its ecnomics that is tied to WAR making, or economics tied to "artificial scarcity" , or economics of profligacy forcing other countries to function WITHIN that economic system......
people, especially americans will not like it : but it IS TRUE that the USA is the CENTER of ALL the great crises in the world..whether it is in politics, economics, environment, climate disaster change and threats to everyone.
in short - it is the USA MODEL of civilization that is THE THREAT to ALL life on earth and all civilizations.
all one has to do is review :
since the USA "appeared"
has CHINA or RUSSIA or IRAN , or afghanistan or venezuela, or palau, or new zealand, or even the imperial powers of europe REALLY been the main generators of these CRISES EVERYWHERE that we see today for decades now?
what was the TRHEAT to "civilziation and the climate and environment"
by countries and cultures such as Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Philippines, China, Russia, Korea, Japan,
EVEN germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, Portugal
Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Egypt,
Congo, Nigeria, Kenya, Mozambique,
Brazil, Nicaragua, Honduras, Mexico, Peru, Argentina...etc?
what is it that CONNECTS all these?
they - as part of the globe - are all and have been FORCED to FUNCTION WITHIN an economic and financial and industrial and unnecessary militaristic system promoted and ENFORCED or PROVOKED by the USA.
if it can be said that "ALL CIVILIZATION is responsible" -- and we ARE all responsible....
it is also LARGELY due to the dominance of A CERTAIN SYSTEM that like a Gangster has coerced the entire world towards that kind of "lifestyle" -- and THAT is the United States of America.
if it can be said that "all civilization is responsible"
the LEADER towards driving the world to the brink of such disasters - economic, political, military and environmental -
IS the one and only UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
and IF americans do not like to assume that responsibility APPROPRIATE to the USA's CENTRAL and FUNDAMENTAL GUILT...and wish to point to other countries "not doing enough"
they should FIRST look at the USA and what IT has done to ENSURE that other countries - rich or poor - have for generations been literally PREVENTED from finding ALTERNATIVE forms of economics and just and thoughtful policies to enhance the improvement of the lot of humanity WITHOUT having to rely on RAPACIOUS forms of "lifestyle" that
RESULT in the CRISES of all forms -- ALL of them rooted , designed, birthed, nurtured and spread FROM the USA.
it is the USA's drive towards the "purity" of its "market economics" dogma that has KILLED any alternatives that might have averted the global crises that we all see today.
and if americans need more proof of that:
all they have to do is look and ask themselves:
"A country of a MERE 1 percent of the globe's population has controlled much of its wealth"
HOW CAN THIS BE SO - UNLESS it has been achieved through manipulation?
and if americans STILL can not understand that simple question that points to the truth of the USA"s GUILT in driving such an injustice that has CREATED the CRISES we all see - they also just have to look WITHIN the USA itself:
HOW CAN a FEW hundred or thousand families ACTUALLY CONTROL the MAJORITY of wealth in the USA ? SOMETHING IS WRONG.
it is the same as in a FAMILY.
if a child is so "healthY" and "prospering" at the expense of his siblings -- SOMETHING IS WRONG in that family.
that is the same as the global relationships of nations, and Even in the relationships WITHIN nations, in which the USA is the MAIN and most dangerous culprit that is guilty for enhancing such unjust relationships whose PATH results in CRISES of all kinds.
Most all of what you write may be true, and I'm probably in agreement with the majority, but like it or not, technologically superior cultures (and I use the term culture loosely) will ultimately dominate the less technologically sophisticated. The ability to dominate and dictate economically doesn't make it right, but to return to Lester's appeal, I was simply stating the obvious. Fighting for a dominant world order that eschews humanism with no scores to settle will take a while, probably too long for us hominids. In the end we are all at the mercy of Mother Nature and this is as it should be.
We are going to go extinct imho. We can't seem to throw off the illogical shackles of religion and tribal warfare. Those things served certain tribes well in the past, allowing them to wage war and dominate, but now those mindless things are a huge liability instead. The big "Skygod" is not going to save us if we but pray. Starting another war and stealing resources will not prevent the coming temperature rise.
Only immediate population control combined with outlawing all internal combustion engines has any chance of working. (Tax babies, build solar panels with the proceeds. Outlaw the private automobile and sink the container ship fleet for fish habitats.)
But, alas, a species as dumb as Homo sapiens probably doesn't deserve to survive...
TJ
"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent." - Thomas Jefferson
Prohibition didn't work with alcohol or marijuana so what makes you think that it will work on internal combustion engines or automobiles? How do you plan on implementing immediate population control? If you sink a ship fleet, what is the guarantee it won't harm the fish? Why not take apart the fleet and put those materials to something of better use? We won't go extinct because history has always shown that everytime a crisis worsens, more people wake up and step in to help and this time will be no different.
"We won't go extinct because history has always shown that everytime a crisis worsens, more people wake up and step in to help and this time will be no different."
You're mistaken, Marco. Many civilizations (not to mention species) have perished due to environmental changes. That being the case, we have to draw the conclusion that you think the elements of "western civilization" and particularly "good old American know-how" have brought us to a state of godlike perfection where it is impossible to fail.
It's a delusion and a particularly puerile (although not uncommon) one at that.
IMO, we have to decide what we mean by "civilization". What can we "save" and what we want to save? Also, IMO, we are far beyond the point of saving civilization as most people speak of it. The 350ppm and "months" are attempts to wake up people to actually do something (which is good), but we passed the point of "saving civilization" long ago. We are well into the ecological disaster/species extinction/climate change predicted by scientists decades ago. They predicted it based on evidence and here it is...duh. I think the record shows human stupidity, not cleverness.
So, if we can expand our minds to encompass what we are facing (which entails a major realization), we'll not only be able to better deal with it, including its unavoidable elements of tragedy, but we'll be better people, more whole, stronger.
nativetongueredux quotes from "The Hollow Men". I think, whatever happens in the coming decades, it would be much better *not* to go out with a smiley face and a cardboard cutout of Redi Kilowatt. (But I'm afraid a whimper and a silly smile is likelier.)
It depends on the severity of the environmental changes. The worse the changes, the tougher it is to recover. We've lost much of our grasslands out here in the heartland just like the amazon rainforests losing their trees. There's no recovering those things. Rainforests become jungles if destroyed and grasslands become parched dry lands. Corn is the biggest culprit I've witnessed as a farmer. Most farmers don't want to change their practices to using less corn which I have done. All may not be lost but most of it could be so you could be right. Positive thinking only goes so far until reality hits hard.
I didn't think of that one. I grew up in NYC with no knowledge of farming. I'll need some help and research on this when I have some time this weekend.
I am not denying the possibility of worst case scenarios but I apologize for incorrectly saying that we will never go extinct. I meant to say for the next 300 years, I see no chances of going extinct. I'll have to expand my mind to get a picture as you have suggested to avoid thinking of the wrong antidote. Thanks.
Teddy gets off on the culpability of the US with regard to all social and environmental problems. Trouble is, that culpability lies with the plutocracy of the world, not just with a single nation state. Do you really think the wealthy of Europe looked to America in leveraging up their consumption and lavish lifestyles? No, from Louis XIV and before, the nobility--later the merchants--flaunted their wealth at the expense of ordinary people and the environment.
And if you think the West should take all the blame, think again. China exploited its people and the environment from time immemorial. Same with India. As the good old USA fades away into the sunset, other countries will hurry to the forefront ever ready to pollute, destroy, and take possession of the world's resources. In fact, the brief period of dominance of the USA might even seem like halcyon days in comparison to the ugliness to come.
Social and environmental problems do not lie with a single race or ethnicity or nation, but with humanity in general. Humans wish to be wealthy, to be powerful, to leave many descendants, all carrying a particular set of genes. That is the way we are. Blaming a single nation is foolish because it lets everyone else off the hook. It's not a perspective that encourages everyone to look inside their own hearts to discover what lies there.
You are correct, and there are probably reasons for this universal behavior that have evolved over the millenia but are undecipherable to us. No reason to give up hope since the alternative becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. The best reasons for hope are the unknowns about human behavior that may surface to help humanity. If they don't materialize, then our species will likely become just become another member of the fossil record.
Powerful post drosera,
And so true it is. Teddy is well-educated unlike 99 percent of his countrymen from the former only Colony the USA ever had. Unlike the general population, teddy's elite group is cognizant of their own brutal colonial history, and will never get over it. Never mind that the Spanish and the Japanese brutally murdered and oppressed them earlier, everything with teddy, is the USA's fault.
I agree with you however, that our current world calamity is not a single country's fault, it is not even the fault of capitalism, it is the consequence of NEPOTISM and TRADE giving unfair advantage to crime families who disregard the law and morals because they feel they are entitled to write them or ignore them at will.
The problem is not the USA, which for it's citizens was the free-est civilization on the planet in it's early years; the problem is creeping nobility and secret royalty. Secret Kings and Robber Barons and Skull and Bones and Bilderberg clubs. The problem is Harvard and Yale. A brand new crop of oppressors and despots is graduating this year. If the trend is any indicator, they will be worse than their greedy forebears. They will cause us slavery and world war. We have to dethrone them and restore Democracy so that environmental issues of the people will no longer be ignored or glossed over.
TJ
"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent." - Thomas Jefferson
Don't forget the folly of ethanol.
Or to word that more succinctly: Don't forget there are those that will twist opportunities to make progress into opportunities to destroy progress for a few silver coins.
Hardly more succinct.
If it is indeed the case that we only have months, then we might conclude, game over!
Obama and the Dems are pissing in the wind, treading water, kicking the can down the road, and in bed with coal and nuclear.
We have been at the end game a long time, problem is most people are still in denial about it.
Mr. Obomba has done nothing that he was elected to do..We did not really expect that he would
but hope is an easy sell.. We need someone to throw the money changers out of the temple so to
speak. Ya I know good luck on that one.. We saw this coming years ago and did not have children
because of it. Hope I live long enough to see all the gnashing of teeth that is going to go on
when it hits the fan!
obama can't even end mountain top removal....i can't even remodel my garage but these guys can bulldoze a mountain top and dump it in the valleys burying streams -while creating toxic lakes just waiting to collapse dronwing the entire area in a toxic brew you couldn't cleanup in 10,000 years......
ah the golden rule - those with the gold make the rules......
Has 0 made any move towards trying?
Did anyone twist more than his wallet when he signed all those permissions?
Our bus will leave without 0, whichever direction it goes.
who will save climate change from civilization?
While waiting for the government, rulers, etc. (don't hold your breath) here are some things that can be done:
Improve the energy efficiency of your home__proper insulation, reduce use of heating in the winter and air conditioning in the summer or even try to go without. Reduce number of appliances and make sure the ones you use are energy efficient.
Drive less and walk or bicycle when possible. Consider getting a scooter.
Stop eating meat or stop eating so much of it.
Stop buying "new" things__go to yard sales, flee market and thrift stores etc.
I'm sure there's more. When he mentioned the war mobilization it made me think about the fact that there were 43,000 Victory gardens during WWII. We are a much larger population now but we can organize and do community gardening.
Indeed, Lost. While I have admired Lester Brown since first reading his annual state of the planet in the mid-1980s, he is really going in the wrong direction here. Planning and hoping for alternative "clean" energies to save us (and our current lifestyle) is the last of the three big actions we should be focused on. By far the most effective, least expensive, fastest and simplest solution is to immediately and dramatically reduce our energy usage. Lost My Tribe, you have a great start to how this can be done (for more support on this check out the Transition Initiative movement).
The next thing we should all do is make sure the very few ways we still need to use energy (after serious curtailment) are as efficient as possible. Finally, way after both of those strategies are being implemented, any "leftover" energy could be used to research "clean" energy alternatives. We must realize that even the best case scenario- alternatives may replace 20% of the energy we currently use.
The latest Scientific American features an article detailing how within 20 years we could get 100% of our energy from non-polluting sources: wind, water, and solar.
Your point is well taken that we all need to reduce consumption. However, given human nature, most people will not give up anything except when forced. More countries and peoples are, in fact, moving in the opposite direction.
"yet say this to the Possum: a bang, not a whimper, with a bang not with a whimper."
Eliot's buddy Ezra Pound, from Canto 74.
Let's not count it out just yet.
I don't claim to know the science, but I can tell you one thing.
If there are only months left to 'save civilization,' you can kiss civilization good-bye.
"Nature is the timekeeper but we cannot see the clock." Exactly. I had a button, dented appropriately by my Rottie pup, that said "Remember, Mother Nature bats last". This is a lesson that we seem incapable of learning until it is too late.
I have been reading reports about global warming for 20 years now, mostly in The Guardian, and over and over, scientists have been having "Oh Shit!" moments, unreported by the US MSM.
So how many times do scientists have to discover unexpected positive feedback loops accelerating global warming beyond their predictions before they realize they cannot predict the future of climate change? They keep adding new data to their climate change models, and then create new predictions. When will their egos allow them to admit that they are clueless about what will happen with global warming? And that based on past experience, things will only get worse than expected?
Although what most interests me is why last March NASA suddenly decided to stop sharing what it was seeing in outer space with astronomers. We wouldn't be having a perfect storm converging on us, would we?
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Sioux Rose
BE FOR KIDS: Lately that terminology, "Perfect Storm" has been coming up a lot. I see parallels between the economic base collapsing and a similar collapse in progress with respect to the ancient glaciers.
By the way, I thought of you today as a friend of mine emailed me something about the state of the US dollar and I wanted to email you a copy of this. The info works quite well with my prediction for November being the time of scarcity showing up, and major issues around the flow of money. I lost your email address, so if you want me to forward this eerily interesting article your way, please apprise me accordingly.
Even in times of scarcity, there are survivors besides the rich. Plan accordingly.
That's a great idea and that's exactly what our ancestors did during the Great Depression. I know that there are tough and tougher times ahead but getting together and planning on how to make it through is an act of team courage. Win or lose, you have nothing to lose.
"Months, not Years"
How many months? Who ever wrote the above is off the hook given that years can be expessed in months.
A study in contrasts:
jakenewton:
Far-right-wing Internet troll / loser.
Lester R. Brown:
The Washington Post called Lester Brown "one of the world's most influential thinkers." The Telegraph of Calcutta refers to him as "the guru of the environmental movement." In 1986, the Library of Congress requested his personal papers noting that his writings "have already strongly affected thinking about problems of world population and resources."
Brown started his career as a farmer, growing tomatoes in southern New Jersey with his younger brother during high school and college. Shortly after earning a degree in agricultural science from Rutgers University in 1955, he spent six months living in rural India where he became intimately familiar with the food/population issue. In 1959 Brown joined the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service as an international agricultural analyst.
Brown earned masters degrees in agricultural economics from the University of Maryland and in public administration from Harvard. In 1964, he became an adviser to Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman on foreign agricultural policy. In 1966, the Secretary appointed him Administrator of the department's International Agricultural Development Service. In early 1969, he left government to help establish the Overseas Development Council.
In 1974, with support of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Lester Brown founded the Worldwatch Institute, the first research institute devoted to the analysis of global environmental issues. While there he launched the Worldwatch Papers, the annual State of the World reports, World Watch magazine, a second annual entitled Vital Signs: The Trends That are Shaping Our Future, and the Environmental Alert book series.
Brown has authored or coauthored 50 books. One of the world's most widely published authors, his books have appeared in some 40 languages. Among his earlier books are Man, Land and Food, World Without Borders, and Building a Sustainable Society. His 1995 book Who Will Feed China? challenged the official view of China’s food prospect, spawning hundreds of conferences and seminars.
In May 2001, he founded the Earth Policy Institute to provide a vision and a road map for achieving an environmentally sustainable economy. In November 2001, he published Eco-Economy: Building an Economy for the Earth, which was hailed by E.O. Wilson as "an instant classic." His most recent book is Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization.
He is the recipient of many prizes and awards, including 24 honorary degrees, a MacArthur Fellowship, the 1987 United Nations' Environment Prize, the 1989 World Wide Fund for Nature Gold Medal, and the 1994 Blue Planet Prize for his "exceptional contributions to solving global environmental problems." More recently, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Italy, the Borgström Prize by the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry, and appointed an honorary professor of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
I didn't see anything so right-wing about what jakenewton wrote. All he said was that years can be made to look like it is months. Let go back to the article and examine this quote:
"since it takes years to negotiate and ratify these agreements, we may simply run out of time. This is not to say that we should not participate in the negotiations and work hard to get the best possible result. But we should not rely on these agreements to save civilisation."
Well that leaves me wondering what then we should rely on and why should we simply believe that prediction? The author may have a great background but for this article, he's trying to make a whimsical prediction sounding as if it is the end of the world. In this article he whimsically predicts that global warming will have done its share of the damage by the predicted time the agreements are ratified without giving consideration to other ideas such as marketable ones that could slow down whatever the damaging effects of global warming. I am not afraid of Peak Oil or Global Warming. They have come and gone and the harder it hits, the more people will cooperate to stave it off.
I think that this is what jake is referring to but he will have to confirm or correct this.
"I didn't see anything so right-wing about what jakenewton wrote."
That means you haven't seen threads that he has littered with his chronic right-wing trolling.
The point he made is trivial pedantry. The author meant that we have less than a year to begin to turn things around. A five-year-old could figure that out.
jakenewton is just playing a childish game of pedantic "gotcha."
He has nothing serious or substantive to say. He knows nothing about this subject.
His purpose out here is to derail and disrupt serious discussion.
Do you really know him? Have you actually met him? Let's cut out the personal attacks and stick to the topic, ok? Why do I feel like I'm talking to kids on this forum?
This one is hard to reach too, I decided he's not worth the time, I haven't seen anything in his posts that interest me anyway.
He'll criticize the above sentence contruction though, as well as point out any spelling errors.
Sock puppet of the psycho right-wing conflict addict jakenewton.
Just when he needs an ally, a "new" poster shows up. Hmmmmm. . . . Sounds like multiple-personality disorder to me.
I do not know jakenewton personally but I have read some of his posts when I would get some time to at least read if not post. Recently, a few days ago he mentioned that he doesn't give positions but tries to explore the facts and logic in greater detail. I don't recall ever seeing him being a right-wing troll. I read his post and he was just questioning the timing of a possible disaster. I don't believe that the disaster to come in less than a year will be complete. Some of it may come but the rest of it might take place at a far later time. As a matter of fact, the author contradicts himself when he acknowledges that some actions are being taken to hold off the disaster thereby telling us that maybe we have longer than a year to straighten things out.
I did come across an exchange jakenewton had with Goldenmean and jake was nice and all he did was ask for proof of what Goldenmean claimed but Goldenmean was rude and refused and then called jake a troll. I have seen some others do this to him. He may have disagreed with the evidence presented but I don't recall him ever being a right-wing troll in any way possible. If you had any personal fights with him before, now is not the time to bring them back. He is questioning something about what the author wrote, not the author himself.
Thanks a lot for your support. I predict that since you have shown a bit of support for me, for which I thank you, that "vanmungo" will now attack you too. Just to warn you.
He has done it before I think but I think he toned down some. Sometimes it's possible to tame them. If not, well can't do much I suppose. I have seen a lot of progressive infighting here lately myself. I'm glad I could lend a helping hand. If he attacks me, it won't bother me. Those who attack me often end up attacking themselves. They won't know it until they proofread what they wrote.
By the way, here's an interesting article one should read on negativity in the online community. I think everyone should read it and try to strive for some positive thinking for a change or at least cut down the negativity as much as possible.
http://74.125.93.132
/search?q=cache:Wy7dO-HKqCEJ:www.marco.org
/81566726+negativity+site:marco.org&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Site was down. Funny my first name matches.
"He has done it before I think but I think he toned down some."
If you say so.
"an interesting article one should read on negativity in the online community."
I just caught the last couple years of USENET before the AOL phenom started up and eventually killed it. It was *tough* in there. A FAQ for a group might remind you that there was no particular value placed on politeness, that you should really_maybe_just_lurk for a while before posting, that you had better be able to back up any statements of "fact" that you make, etc. alt.martial-arts.karate.shotokan was my baptism, and I got my butt chewed up good. I owe several of the participants there to my "awakening". One has gone on to create one of the best discussion sites on the web, regardless off subject, and he now seems like a completely different person than his USENET persona, perhaps in the spirit of the article you posted.
I think that if individuals would venture to be charitable towards those that they debate, that over time you'd discover that we all value similar things and that the differences are philosophical. See you.
Online bullying can be just like bullying in the real world. Confronting it is no different. The advantage of online forums is that in most cases, people's posts are archived so that any newcomer can read them and know who best to talk to and who to avoid. They can also think of ways to talk to that person he or she finds unsuitable should that he contact that user. USENET used to be awesome back in the 1990s but I would never get enough time to read and post. I can't even get enough time on this site on most days. Most folks here are pleasant and easy to talk to when I came here. The key to overcoming online bullying is a blind veil and tolerance as much as possible.
"Online bullying can be just like bullying in the real world."
I'm not so sure. I think of an officer in Arizona piloting a drone remotely over a suspected terrorist safe house half the globe away and dropping hellfire. Isn't that much easier than getting up close, sticking and twisting a knife?
"The key to overcoming online bullying is a blind veil and tolerance as much as possible."
And a thick skin, and a sense of what is really important to you.
True about the drone but wouldn't he have to pay a lot to use it?
Good idea on thick skin. Thanks. I don't get too self-centered on what's important but try to see what I can learn and share. You might be right though on the need for getting a sense of what's important.