this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2023
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If top of the society is immoral psychopaths with power, and most of the society is composed of people with good intentions, then there is not much hope for "beta uprising" until things go way beyond point of recovery, because powerful psychopaths will not let their power get taken away.

Not sure if this is just evolutionary biology, but this cycle of psychopaths at the top has been going on since when, at least ancient Egypt. And in all these thousands of years, the system that enables this cycle got way more reinforced than it got dismantled.

So is it maybe better idea to put benevolent people's energy towards designing and preparing a new societal system that will have built-in mechanisms for preventing corruption and malevolence? "prepare" as in get ready to implement for when the current messed up system is about to grind to a halt and collapse? Well, it would be best to figure out how to go full Benevolent Theseusβ„’ by replacing parts of currently failing system with the corruption-proof ones.

What are some resources related to this topic? Recearch on societal dynamics, designing political systems, examples of similar revolutions that already happened, etc. Post any links that you consider relevant

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[–] kaj 2 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Companies and their leaders are paid by individuals, lol. Going vegan definitely does help.

Even still, why did you only mention carbon emissions? The question was about making a better society. Did you forget that veganism is about animal rights?

[–] redempt 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

going vegan doesn't help animals much either. we live in an overproductive society that wastes most of what it produces anyways - even if your personal choice marginally reduces demand, the abuse is ongoing. we need systemic solutions. we need to destroy the meat industry. veganism will never be popular enough to create systemic change on its own.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How do you plan to destroy the meat industry without anyone going vegan? You realize the meat industry is funded by non-vegans, right? And tax payers, of course, who also eat meat and won't support policy that challenges their freedom.

[–] Wogi 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Destroying the meat industry isn't going to have the beneficial impact you think it will.

Most of the food we grow we can't eat, most of the farmland we use exclusively to support livestock isn't suitable for anything else. These animals are eating food that is otherwise biological waste that will simply decay and contribute to carbon emissions.

I'm not saying there isn't room for improvement, I am saying elimination isn't improvement, it only creates more problems.

This sets aside the problems created by eliminating animal fat and protein from our collective diet, which causes a health and nutrition problem on top of a pretty significant caloric deficit that again, we don't necessarily have the agricultural land to replace.

If being vegan is your jam then more power to you, but it isn't the answer for society's problems.

[–] kaj 0 points 1 year ago (2 children)

While animals can eat waste from crops grown for humans, that's a minority of their feed. Almost all new corn and soy cropland is cut to meet growing animal agriculture demand.

How does eliminating animal fat and protein cause health and nutrition problems? Humans are perfectly capable of living on vegan diets at all stages of life.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

animals can eat waste from crops grown for humans, that’s a minority of their feed.

about 85% of the of the global soy crop is pressed for oil, and the industrial waste from that process is the vast majority if what is fed to animals. only 7% of the global soy crop goes directly to animals. ruminants live almost entirely on grass, even if they are grain finished.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

How does eliminating animal fat and protein cause health and nutrition problems? Humans are perfectly capable of living on vegan diets at all stages of life

every paper i've ever read about it spends the bulk of the paper explaining the risks and giving ways to mitigate them.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Going vegan definitely does help.

no. it doesn't.

please point to the year you went vegan on this chart

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

What a stretch! The last time I saw this line of reasoning was from actual holocaust deniers. Did you know that the population of humans has rapidly increased over time?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

pigeonholing me with holocaust deniers is a hamfisted ad hominem.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nothing about you. Just the argument! It's quite plainly stupid, you see.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

this is an appeal to ridicule, not a refutation.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I already refuted it, but you never addressed that aside from the non-sequitur "What's your excuse?"

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

I didn't ask you for an excuse. I refuted your claim with facts.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

you have not refuted it at all, and I don't have an excuse: I have facts.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Did you know that the population of humans has rapidly increased over time?

whatever your excuse, being vegan hasn't helped.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

you said it helps. i pointed out the proof that it hasn't decreased meat production at all. you made an excuse for why your tactic isn't working.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I see! Maybe you've never before encountered the concept of opportunity cost before. It's something like this: if I don't murder someone on a given day, I'm not actually decreasing the total number of real murders on that day. But contrasted against the hypothetical day where I made the inverse decision, it does. Does that help?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

so being vegan doesn't actually help. which is what I said.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Which part remains unclear? Is it the use of a hypothetical? Specifically, this hypothetical asks you to imagine a world with no vegans. Do you think that, in such a world, there would be more animals killed for consumption or fewer animals killed for consumption, compared with reality?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have no reason to believe the industry could produce any more than it does, and so no reason to believe it would.

[–] kaj 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Exactly! In a world with more vegans, fewer animals are killed. Hence, vegans help.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

what do you mean "exactly?" I said your hypothesis doesn't seem intuitive to me. but even more dire: it can't be proven.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Put people above animals, always and forever.

[–] kaj 2 points 1 year ago

I do! But I also value animals, and consuming their dead corpses is completely unnecessary and on top of that is wasteful, hurting humans in the process.