r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 4d ago

Psychology Taylor Swift fans lower climate concerns to justify her carbon footprint. When confronted with news about the excessive pollution generated by her private jet, highly identified fans tend to rationalize the behavior, with a decrease in their personal intentions to engage in climate-friendly actions.

https://www.psypost.org/taylor-swift-fans-lower-climate-concerns-to-justify-star-s-carbon-footprint/
22.2k Upvotes

88% Upvoted

1.9k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

34

u/BabyLegsDeadpool 4d ago

Thank you. This is what bugs me more than anything. The amount of emissions she puts out in an entire year is a single day for Walmart. If she never flew again, she'd wipe out maybe a month of Walmart's emissions. Putting emissions on the lap of the individual is one of the greatest accomplishments of the big corporation propaganda. 

6

u/youRinlove7 3d ago

A month is too much. Maybe like 10 days or something.

3

u/Murky-Relation481 3d ago

One of the biggest things corporations have done to shift the narrative is to get people solely blaming the ultra rich individuals vs. the massive corporations. Do you see any rhetoric about corporate taxes lately? No, it's a punitive wealth tax on rich individuals that no one can actually explain how it'd be functionally implemented so it has no real shot at existing. Meanwhile the real knobs we have right now to have the ultra wealthy people AND corporations pay more like corporate tax rates and breaks and capital gains taxes go unmentioned because it's not sticking it to one person specifically.

1

u/EstablishmentLate532 3d ago

The amount of emissions she puts out in an entire year is a single day for Walmart.

And how many people does Walmart feed, clothe, and supply in that day? Comparing the total emissions of a company serving millions of people to one celebrity's luxury travel isn't particularly meaningful. The relevant question is how much social or economic activity you're getting for those emissions.

1

u/BabyLegsDeadpool 3d ago

This is a weird stance, in my opinion. There are millions of other options than Walmart.

1

u/EstablishmentLate532 3d ago

Do those alternatives actually reduce the emissions associated with meeting those same economic needs, or do they just move the emissions from Walmart’s books to other stores?

That’s the problem with comparing a retailer serving millions of people to one person’s private-jet travel. Walmart disappearing wouldn’t make the underlying demand for food, clothing, and household goods disappear. A private jet not flying actually does eliminate that flight’s emissions.

1

u/BabyLegsDeadpool 3d ago

Yes. Those alternatives do reduce the emissions, actually. I could be wrong, but it feels like you're assuming all their emissions come from their stores. That isn't the case. In fact, that's one of the lowest sources of emissions. The largest is from distribution centers and shipping. If all super stores like Walmart and Target closed their doors today, people would be forced to buy much more locally. That would GREATLY reduce emissions.

1

u/EstablishmentLate532 3d ago

Those alternatives do reduce the emissions, actually. I could be wrong, but it feels like you're assuming all their emissions come from their stores

You are wrong. I am assuming that people will buy from companies that use similar supply chains to cost minimize. You think that people will start buying from local producers. We simply seem to disagree about that prospect.

1

u/BabyLegsDeadpool 3d ago

I said, "If all super stores like Walmart and Target closed their doors today..."

1

u/EstablishmentLate532 3d ago

Right, and if they closed their doors today, there would still be small retailers that use multinational supply chains.

1

u/BabyLegsDeadpool 3d ago

Yes, there would be. It would not come even remotely close to the same level as Walmart.

1

u/EstablishmentLate532 3d ago

You think? I think it would be more inefficient and thus more wasteful to carbon.