We would be riding cows instead.

Americans seem very “fighty” compared to people from many other countries. You just have to say something that could be construed as liberal (the American kind) or conservative, too politically correct or incorrect, or mention you ride a bicycle or have an outdoor cat, to set some people off. With some Americans having a conversation is like navigating a minefield, especially those who have very little understanding of the rest of the world and reads everything you say into an American context, language barriers and all.

I love talking politics, and have had pleasant conversations with all kinds of people but I have learned from experience to just not bother with Americans, unless they’re the very curious and open kind.

The right to work from home. Many people have jobs they could do from home if their employers would let them, and I think people will be granted the right to choose in at least some countries/sectors.

On a more personal level, I think (or hope) access to education and work for people with disabilities, is something that will improve a lot in my country. There are currently a lot of barriers and counterproductive laws, that I think will be viewed as inhumane in the future.

No car, plane rides or children. I also eat less meat than average, rarely buy new (or used) stuff and vote for one of the greener parties.

I grew up (first world) poor, so this was just the way things were, when I was a child. My income is still quite low but I could absolutely live more lavishly than I do now, if I wanted to.

I think you could argue that this is an example of cognitive dissonance. It is uncomfortable to come face to face with new information that contradicts your beliefs or actions, and it requires energy if you want to integrate that new information into your worldview and adjust your actions. It is much easier to deny that information, even when it is clearly true.

For example, when it came out that aspartame might cause cancer, if you (like me) have eaten/drunk a lot of products containing it or have had a strong belief that it was completely safe, then it may be more comfortable for you to criticize WHO or think “well, it’s not really relevant for me because my family isn’t predisposed for cancer.” If you didn’t care about aspartame or artificial sweeteners before, you will probably readily accept that there may or may not be a cancer link.

Having your groceries delivered or buying a moped or motorcycle might be an option for you. I don’t think anyone on here would begrudge you using a car in that situation, though.

I think the anti-rural sentiment you sometimes see, mostly stems from how unsustainable and car dependent the lifestyles a lot of people who live outside cities are. People who find a job in a city to get a high pay, move out of said city to get a garden and then commute back and forth between their home office and their work office, with very little concern for how they effect the world around them. They take no personal responsibility and don’t want to take collective responsibility either, because that could threaten their lifestyle.

People who live in suburbs, villages or rurally because that is where it makes sense for them to live, isn’t an issue. It makes sense to move to the countryside when you retire and no longer have to be anywhere. It also makes sense to live in the countryside if that is where you work or if you work from home. Some of these people would benefit greatly from owning a car, while others can get by just fine with a bicycle or their own legs.

You can also do a lot to lessen the dependence on cars outside city centers. You can easily run metros and trams into the suburbs and encourage a higher density (more row houses and smaller apartment complexes). Rurally you can encourage people to build villages (clusters of houses) instead of every house being spaced evenly apart, and you can run bus lines through those villages.

I get that, but those were the kind of nuances and perspectives that I was talking about. You can think that drunk driving is a bad thing that should be prevented, without resorting to black/white thinking like: drunk drivers are bad and they should be thrown in jail.

Maybe they should be, but what is the downsides of that policy? What is the reduction in drunk driving and drunk driving accidents expected to be? Who are the drunk drivers and when do they drive drunk? What do they do in other places/countries? Anything about our country/area in particular that causes people to drive drunk? Is there anything else we could do that is more effective and/or less expensive? Could an alternative solution be to run busses through the night? Involve parents? Require alcolocks to be installed in cars?

It’s not about whether you are a good or a bad person, or about what your beliefs or values are. In my experience, poorly educated people are just more likely to think in absolutes, which makes sense, because analytical thinking and the ability to view things through different “lenses” and from different perspectives, is something they try to teach you in school.

Understanding that things are nuanced is not the same thing as not having opinions.

You can acknowledge that drinking alcohol can cause addiction, act as a social lubricant, and decide if you want to drink. You can even have an opinion on what you think alcohol’s role in society should be and what should be done to prevent drunk driving.

If only artists could hold copyrights to their works, this wouldn’t be an issue.

Corporations are usually not the ones who create art, they just hire people who do. If Disney spends an astronomical amount on money on hiring artists and producing a work, there should be a separate set of laws that protects them from someone sweeping in and stealing the franchise or the product. It shouldn’t be down to copyright-laws, because Disney isn’t an artist.

Copyright also grants the right to opt out of the commercialization of your work. Even if you really like a painting I have done, you should not have the right to demand that I or someone else sell prints of it. If I instead want to just keep it on my Instagram profile, in my attic or hanging on the walls of a gallery, I should be free to do so.

If you make something public people have the right to look at it and to get inspired by it, but I don’t think it’s unfair to ask that the artist retains the commercial rights to it.

Black/white thinking. Everything is either bad or good, the problem or the solution.

As a hobby artist, I think copyright should exist to protect individual artists commercial rights. Whether I sell my work or not, should be up to me. On the other hand, we should not punish people for finding inspiration in other people’s works or using them as wallpapers, and usually we don’t.

It should not be legal for H&M to scrape Artstation or Deviantart for images to print on their T-shirts, not even if 20 years have passed since it was posted. If they want to use an image, they should have to contact the artist and get permission first.

I think works owned by corporations is a different beast. Corporations should also be allowed to profit of their works, but I don’t think they should be able to hold copyrights as a default. Copyright should protect those who make art, not those who commission art.