We as a global community need to work on cleaning up our acts and lowering our carbon footprints. However, this needs to be actively supported and encouraged by our governments. I would like to pose a couple of questions: how big a role do you think that governments should play in enforcing more environment-friendly policies on individual citizens, and should this be accomplished through mainly negative reinforcement (ie fines and bans on environmentally unsafe practices) or positive reinforcement (ie lowering prices on eco-friendly food and fuel costs and a reward system for those with lower carbon footprints)?

dang thats deep

I feel like that is one of the trade-offs when you live in a democracy like the United States. The government overall cannot play any part and tell you how much carbon waste you can or cannot exert. Doing so would void the constitution and would get rid of the best part and main attraction of our country.

I agree with you and I feel like governments need to play a larger part in Climate Change prevention due to the fact that it is an issue that we will see most likely impacting us in our lifetime. The government should play a large role unless people are able to begin being more eco friendly on a mass scale all over the world. I believe that people respond better to positive reinforcement so I feel as though that would be the best way to go about as well as creating new infrastructure that helps to push eco friendly ideas.

While every day citizens definitely need to be held accountable for their contributions to climate change, it is not the most efficient way to stop the climate crisis. The government should not weigh in on its citizens contributions to climate change before they take action on the large corporations that are currently playing the biggest role in the destruction of our planet. The government must address industrial emissions before the blame is put on the people. When our leaders finally learn to care about our planet over the economy, we can begin to secure our future. Until then, I would encourage every day people to do the best that they can when it comes to reducing their carbon footprint by reducing their intake of meat, recycling, reducing air travel and much more! Every person must do their own research and hold our leaders accountable for their immense role in the current climate crisis.

I agree with you the government should do more for citizens , for exemple :
- government requires to buy more electric cars !

I agree with you the government should do more for citizens , for exemple :
- government requires to buy more electric cars !

Although i do think a spotlight needs to be put on better informing everyday citizens on how to reduce their carbon footprint, i do agree strongly that large corporate companies are the ones who need to be dealt with by the government first. Yes there are things we can do as individuals, such as reducing our use of single use plastic, however its large companies producing them in the first place, and consumers who are put at fault for it. These large corporations need to be addressed by the government on their contributions to climate change and polluting our environment, because as consumers, we dont have other more ethical sources to support a lot of the time. The government systems need to realize that if we continue in a society where the economy is valued over the ecosystem, we wont have much of an ecosystem for very much longer.