“I stopped traveling for like 15 years. But my colleagues were constantly flying, and I got tired of being the only one abstaining.”
(I have slightly abridged this comment for privacy and space.) My response to this comment:
Kudos to you for stopping traveling for 15 years. Hopefully you were later able to find ways to travel in moderation — such as train, bus, etc. I don’t think we have to stop travel entirely.
in the Riot for Austerity group/movement, where we aim to achieve a footprint 10% of the average USA resident’s (inspired by figures in George Monbiot’s pioneering book HEAT), we give ourselves a gasoline allowance of 50 gallons a year. And trains and buses are assumed to offer 100 gallons per mile because we are sharing them with so many other passengers.
The metrics aren’t perfect but a lot of very smart people put them together and they are pretty darn good.
Re flying — unfortunately, from what I’ve read from multiple sources, carbon offsets are not a fix.
I did retroactively carbon offset every flight I could remember taking in my adult life, and actually padded my estimate considerably, but I have additionally chosen to continue to refrain from flying.
I just can’t use other people’s robber-baron lifestyle habits as my standard. There would be no end to it. There are so many so-called “climate-concerned” people who incessantly jump on airplanes.
I think that if more of us share about our choice to abstain from flying, and minimize long-distance travel to an occasional treat or emergency, we can inspire and comfort each other. Watching the social media posts of irresponsible consumption is an endless rabbit-hole of wistful envy and resentment.
One area where the lure is particularly pernicious is academia, I think. And of course government. At the very least, we need to not be flying to climate conferences or peace conferences etc.
Veterans for Peace is one example of an organization that sets the bar high. There are F2F meetups in local areas, but everything else pretty much is by teleconferencing. They are a wonderful organization that is raising awareness of the deep-seated connection between fuel consumption, climate crisis, and endless wars; fascism.
Also regarding flying – Here is a great FAQ-type article that I found very helpful. It answers all those little emotional tugs that tend to want to lure us into thinking it’s OK to fly. Because we can always find a way to justify why our flight is OK or even necessary.
Q&A from an organization called We Stay On the Ground: https://westayontheground.org/questions-and-answers/
Also: The “Flight-Free” movement websites, both USA and UK, have some really good sections of people’s real-life stories of how they are savoring the joys of life without flying.