cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/24043909
Under this methodology of all 193 UN Member States – an expansive model of 17 categories, or “goals,” many of them focused on the environment and equity – the U.S. ranks below Thailand, Cuba, Romania and more that are widely regarded as developing countries.
In 2022, America was 41st. Interesting to see where it will be after this term of office, which looks set to be working against many of these aims.
The United States of America is a consumerist nation, and always has been. Consumerism is counter to conservation.
Consumerism is counter to conservation.
So much of what we produce is pure garbage from conception. Junk mail, disposables nobody asked for, excess packaging, physical advertisements, planned obsolescent hardware, military industry waste…
What people want in a consumer economy is a readily available supply of surplus goods/accessible services that can be obtained/delivered as people realize they need it. What people get in a consumer economy is a manufacturing machine constantly trying to force-feed us shit we never asked for. Consumer items that are highly sought after become rare and expensive (housing, transport, education, healthy food). Consumer items that nobody wants get shoveled on us over our protest. We are not an economy of excess supply but of induced demand.
The US and being worse at things than third world countries, name a more iconic duo
You know what, MTG was right. National divorce now. Red states be dragging us down.
If all republicans vanished. Two new parties would emerge. The “New Democrats” and “Progressive Party of America”.
There would actually be a chance to move the country (now without republicans) forward.
Red states be dragging us down.
Show me a red state and I’ll show you a bunch of big blue cities. Show me a blue state and I’ll show you enormous red rural territories. Even within the same city center, you can find enclaves of rival political ideologues - arch-conservative suburbs and LGBTQ friendly business corners - abutting one another.
Nobody is getting Nationally Divorced without the kind of ugly fascist purges common to post-invasion Iraq or Israeli-occupied Lebanon and Syria.
That would be fine if this weren’t an international problem. If we split up then the new confederacy would be completely run by a few oil execs who would strip the regulatory state and start fracking and burning trash until their emissions rivaled the totality of the global south.
This isn’t even considering the minorities, women and LGBT people that we’d be abandoning to the fascists. Liberal America’s job is to drag the country kicking and screaming towards progress. We can’t abandon that duty because they’re kicking and screaming more now
Liberal America’s job is to drag the country kicking and screaming towards progress
Can’t drag the country kicking and screaming towards progress when liberal america keeps shifting to the right.
Better to get rid of Democrats, they are still the largest obstacle to progress
The US has been a third world country for a few decades now.
