greenstorm (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
greenstorm) wrote2025-07-06 10:12 am
greenstorm) wrote2025-07-06 10:12 am
(no subject)
I keep trying to figure out how to write about this. My writing so far has been really dark and I haven't kept it. But very basically I'll jump in from this meme I saw this morning.
"Don't be so happy about people in Texas dying in the flooding because some of the people in Texas who died in the flood didn't vote for Trump" with my emphasis.
What I want to say is this: if we believe that every life is important and should be protected to the best of our ability, then it doesn't matter who someone voted for (or where they live, or their ethnicity, or the political status of their location) because people dying is bad for whatever reason -- I'm kind of on team John Donne for my reasoning, but also have kind of a moral sense and also an ecological sense about it, with a good measure of slippery slopeness and needing hard lines thrown in.
If we don't think that every life is important, and instead rejoice when someone who voted the wrong way, or did a bad political thing or whatever dies and think it's a moral good, then we're being morally derelict by doing so little killing. By not going to rallies and passing out poisoned coffee, buy not going door to door and shooting people with the wrong flag, our duty is being forsaken.
Note I fully and completely do not believe the latter but a lot of people seem to build the foundation for it and then just kind of ignore the ramifications. But this is of course not the time to talk to people about it. This is the time for everyone to rejoice in early and preventable death as long as it's the right people.
"Don't be so happy about people in Texas dying in the flooding because some of the people in Texas who died in the flood didn't vote for Trump" with my emphasis.
What I want to say is this: if we believe that every life is important and should be protected to the best of our ability, then it doesn't matter who someone voted for (or where they live, or their ethnicity, or the political status of their location) because people dying is bad for whatever reason -- I'm kind of on team John Donne for my reasoning, but also have kind of a moral sense and also an ecological sense about it, with a good measure of slippery slopeness and needing hard lines thrown in.
If we don't think that every life is important, and instead rejoice when someone who voted the wrong way, or did a bad political thing or whatever dies and think it's a moral good, then we're being morally derelict by doing so little killing. By not going to rallies and passing out poisoned coffee, buy not going door to door and shooting people with the wrong flag, our duty is being forsaken.
Note I fully and completely do not believe the latter but a lot of people seem to build the foundation for it and then just kind of ignore the ramifications. But this is of course not the time to talk to people about it. This is the time for everyone to rejoice in early and preventable death as long as it's the right people.
Thoughts
Humans have free will. This includes the right to make mistakes and experience consequences.
Voting for a leader whose actions increase climate change and decrease government's ability to respond to disasters was a choice. It was the free will of Americans en masse, but particularly in southern states, to make that choice. Twice.
And it is my free will how to spend my time, energy, and attention. If I were to exert my efforts to protect people from experiencing the results of their choices, it would rob them of the opportunity to learn. So when disaster hits the southern states, I am inclined to focus on mitigating climate change, or on supporting environmental recovery efforts, rather than on rescuing humans. Each activist has to decide which causes to work on, because nobody can do all of them.
Of course some people are harmed or killed by the poor life choices of their neighbors. That's climate change all around. Generally rich people reap the benefits and poor people suffer the costs. It doesn't matter how much work someone does on the environment, they are still stuck on the planet with lunatics and will suffer the problems even though it's not their choice or their fault.
Also, contrast voting which is a choice with other things which are not choices. Being black, female, queer -- those aren't choices. Letting people suffer because of innate traits is wrong.
Each activist, or group of activists, needs to define their sphere of influence and target audience. If that's "help everyone," fine, there are groups who do that. But it's not popular in America, and in fact is increasingly illegal as the government tries to attack "immigrants" -- or more realistically, everyone who isn't white enough. Look at a state like Texas, which has a significant number of people the government dislikes mixed with its own supporters. So how long before the authorities raid the aid stations to disappear the people they dislike? That endangers everyone. But! It's also not currently legal to make your charity Whites Only. A dilemma. People will work out their own responses to that based on their stances.
Re: Thoughts
The meme greenstorm saw was cautioning people against moving from mindset 2 to 3, but failing to acknowledge that hey, mindset 2 is also pretty shitty.
I think I'm at about 1 (and I believe you are as well?) on my good days although if I were personally in a position to help I would *of course* pull the climate change denier out of the floodwaters. (It's different when it's personal or in-person, and not national and global scale stuff.)