This page was created for participants in one of our Climate Conversations. It contains our thoughts and feelings on the topic that day and should not be read as advice. There may be factual inaccuracies. You may find the related conversation guide helpful if you want to know more about the topic we discussed.
Why don’t people’s actions fit their beliefs?
Our first thoughts and feelings:
- I’m pessimistic about the effects of my actions.
- It’s hard to have confidence in something different or new.
- It takes knowledge. Do I need to do a carbon analysis for everything I do?
- Expense or legality might deter people.
- Feeling pessimism and despair.
- It’s exhausting going against society.
- Cognitive dissonance.
- Social pressure from people you know. It takes time and energy to go against it.
- Hypocrisy and laziness.
- It’s hard.
- It can mean giving up something you like.
- Some people believe it’s the government’s responsibility.
- Some people believe that little things are all they can do.
- I thought about the pandemic, and how it was easier because everyone was doing the things.
- Climate change is less tangible than the pandemic. We’re not seeing numbers of deaths changing every day in real-time.
- Some people might be giving the impression of caring to fit in with their group.
- Habits.
- Life rolls you along.
- We do things from a sense of what’s normal, necessary or just the obvious thing to do in a given situation.
As the conversation developed:
- Beliefs can be hidden and intangible.
- Resources, class and income limit our decisions. There’s a relationship between carbon footprint and income.
- It’s possible to have a belief but not know how to put it into action.
- People don’t know how bad their actions are for the environment.
- Emotions affect what you want to do. For example, watching a Roger Hallam video might make me feel like joining a direct action, but then something else might make me feel like conversations and talking to people is the way to go.
- People and the media can affect your emotions.
- You can’t go off emotions all the time.
- The climate crisis is absolutely terrifying.
- It’s a long way from believing the science to doing something about it.
- What would it look like to live by your beliefs all the time? It’s hard to be consistent.
- It would be interesting to ask people directly. Imagine asking someone “Please don’t fly”.
- If I tell people I don’t fly people take it as a judgement. Sometimes as a direct attack on them. Or they ignore it.
- I have to listen to their justifications and I don’t want to hear them.
- I find it hard to have empathy sometimes when people do one thing and say another, despite knowing all this.
- There are lots of bad guys in the world. It’s not fair to blame individuals, friends and family.
- I think we overstate how rational we are. I think we decide what we want to do first and then justify it.
- We use emotions, not facts and figures when voting.
- The climate crisis generates negative feelings that people don’t want to experience, like being scared or worried, or defensiveness. When we’re scared we look for easy answers or turn to a group identity (I think I’ve read this in about the far-right).
- Maybe we should sell it differently. The climate crisis, or climate action has an image problem. We could talk about biodiversity instead.
- When I think about the kind of world we’d need to live in if we were to deal with the crisis I think it seems quite nice.
- Beliefs around cars don’t seem to match the reality of traffic and parking problems that drivers complain about:
- freedom
- individual
- status
- convenience
- These beliefs are culturally and socially organised.
- We seem able to hold contradictory beliefs.
Thoughts and feelings after the conversation:
- It was an interesting conversation.
- It made me think about how we’re all quite complicated. It’s not black and white. We all have different situations.
- I haven’t been for a while. It’s nice to have these broad open conversations I don’t have anywhere else.
- I thought our response to the question was quite sophisticated. There’s a lot of understanding regarding how complex it is.
- It’s interesting how people can have completely contradictory beliefs.
- Not one or the other. I’m interested in investigating the nuances.
Topic for next time: cognitive dissonance