Check if your area has a Weed Warriors group/organization. They go around removing invasive plants that are smothering native plants. I find it fun and get a satisfaction of having done something nice while exercising.
If your area doesn’t have that, there’s most likely opportunities to volunteer with hiking trail maintenance at nearby state parks. Or just go hiking, start small and bring water!
I look at independent randomized controlled trials, not anecdotal evidence. Here’s a recent trial from Finland that didn’t have industry funding. They compared low-nicotine vaping vs varenicline alone vs placebo. Both varenicline and vaping resulted in about 40% of people quitting at 12 weeks, and 20% of placebo group. So add nicotine replacement therapy and behavioral therapy on top of varenicline and the rates should go higher. Pfizer and other pharmaceutical companies sell most of the FDA-approved cessation therapies, and in comparison the big tobacco companies sell vapes.
Check out SmokeFree.gov! It has great free resources that are science based. Quitting smoking is the number thing someone who smokes can do for their health.
The most effective methods to quit smoking include varenicline (aka Chantix), FDA-approved nicotine replacement therapies (gum, patch, lozenge, inhaler, etc), and behavioral therapy. Combining all of these therapies in a clinical trials results in the most people quitting.
No vape is FDA-approved as a cessation therapy, because no company has applied. There have been some small academic run trials, which tend to show a decrease in smoking, but continued nicotine addiction. Probably because vapes have much higher nicotine content than FDA-approved therapies. While vapes expose people to a lot less carcinogens than smoke, there are some carcinogens and nicotine itself is harmful to vascular and mental health. So if the evidence-based methods don’t work, completely switching to vaping would be less harmful.
Agreed! I get this with my Unitarian Universalist church community. UUs don’t require anyone to believe a certain scripture, but we have a shared set of principles, like valuing democracy, science, and nature. The community aspect and music program are great by themselves, and our minister’s sermons have been a great source of motivation to keep fighting for what we believe in.
Depends on your demographics a bit. Dictatorships like to scapegoat ethnic minorities or other out groups (see Pinochet’s, Mao’s, Pol Pot’s, etc extermination of scientists and educators) for society’s problems. These groups of people tend to experience much greater intensity of oppression under dictatorships than already present in the US. This tends to change culture on a fundamental level because most people actively try to fit in with the in group to avoid becoming a target themselves.
While present to some degree in our current system, another core characteristic of dictatorships is that self enrichment for those in power is the primary driving factor for decision making. Dictators don’t need to pay lip service to making decisions for the greater good. You see this especially prominently in dictatorships in developing countries with valuable resources… The dictators and their close friends take all of the wealth from resource extraction for themselves and everyone else lives in extreme poverty. Yes we have wealth inequality already, but it would be accelerated even more. You could see even highly skilled professionals having a hard time making ends meet (or in jail for being too smart and having “ideas”), and even more homelessness, potentially even wide scale famine.
In terms of geopolitics… Our relationship with allies would become about how the relationship personally benefits those in power.
Agreed! I feel like public discourse often forgets these efficiencies when talking about UBI. Include social security and education financial assistance and the numbers really add up.
The COVID-era stimulus checks and PPP “loans” proved its possible to provide a package this large, would just need to offset the spending with increased taxes on the wealthy to make it sustainable long term.
I have monthly recurring donations to several charities, I guess you could count those as subscriptions of a sort:
Subscription to rainforests: Coalition for Rainforest Nations (the operate globally with indigenous and local communities to do everything possible to protect rainforests and reforest areas)
Independent journalism subscription: ProPublica (no paywall investigative news organization that has really hard hitting reporting that holds corporations accountable)
Subscription to science-based political advocacy: Union of Concerned Scientists
Subscription to open information: Wikipedia
Subscriptions to a healthy community: Local food bank, urban green space advocates, and housing support orgs
Totally agree it’s important to engage all levels of government. But only the US Senate has the authority over nominations
Trump doesn’t have that power, he’s pressuring the Senate to do so. Thus calling Senators to stand up to these shenanigans is important.
Have you tried calling their phones? Sure some don’t pick up, but enough do.
I’m in favor of larger structural changes, but I’m not about to roll over and allow fascists to get everything they want in the current system. How many people do you expect to join a revolution if they won’t even be bothered to pick up a phone?
The book does acknowledge and analyze the violent and nonviolent aspects of the resistance movements in the case studies, and how they impacted each other. Thanks for the suggestion on Setting Sites
It’s highly variable, and yes I absolutely agree money in politics is a big problem. I do have a direct experience where reaching out to my Senators led to them aggressively and successfully opposing a provision in a law that would have had a big impact on me. Don’t want to dox myself, but this real change to a bill made a huge difference to me and many others. So it is possible to make an impact.
I’m for larger structural changes, but I disagree that rolling over and allowing fascists to get their way in the current system is acceptable. Let’s do both
Why not use multiple tactics? It’s not all or nothing and yes I’m certain Senate offices care about hearing from constituents, far more effective than simply doom scrolling.
These tactics are not always a guarantee to have things go your way, but they increase the chances. For phone calling, numbers of people calling in matter the most, particularly at strategic times, including: right after big announcements, right before a committee vote, right before a floor vote. It’s also more effective before dominant narratives have arisen around a topic and there is uncertainty on how things could shake out.
Resistance to authoritarian regimes takes many forms, I found the book Why Civil Resistance Works to be a very helpful analysis of different resistance movements and their tactics
Agreed, a lot of the time I’m in need of a super charger, there’s a line to use it. The demand is there and it’s not like EV owners can easily switch back to gas