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Comment by imgabe | Hacker News Reader

This is just childish. Written by a probably 20-something journalist who has never in their life been responsible for fulfilling a real human need.

Without fossil fuels, civilization would grind to a halt. Billions would die. Yes, we need to move to renewables, but it's not going to happen overnight. In the meantime, somebody has to extract, refine and distribute fossil fuels. Telling them that they're evil for keeping the lights on and your house warm is not helping anyone.

Tobacco, sure. Don't smoke. But people do smoke. I guess we could make it illegal. Look how well that worked for other drugs.

Nuclear weapons. Our enemies have them, so we need to have them as well, which means people need to work on them. It is suicidally pollyannaish to think we can just stop working on them and everyone will get along and sing kumbaya.

This is pure clickbait and nothing else.

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If I had to rank an oil worker, a nuclear sub designer, a tobacco salesman, and a Vice journalist in terms of their benefit to society, I don't think the journalist would like the outcome. They would have a slight edge over the tobacco salesman, but oil and gas and military engineering are both essential for society to function, regardless of their poor optics.

Really now. I'll take a bit of non-essential labor over one that actively damages the planet and will kill us if continued.

An oil worker sources and find the oil necessary to create plastics.

A nuclear sub designer puts together a tool to ensure peace. If you want to see a world where big sticks are not around, look at any non polite society.

Tobacco is on par with weed For effects. It provides an effect. There is a reason salespeople smoke, because it calms the nerves.

Journalist of old was valuable, journalist of today is from a school of training that you need to be an activist to force change, which means they are no longer providing a good, but an active manipulation toward a belief that the journalist believes in. If you think a journalist has an iq above 80, take a look at an article in your field, then realize they are mentally deficient and are trying to promote a message. Then look at other articles and realize this same person is doing it.

We can't bootstrap a transition to renewables without fossil fuels and petroleum byproducts. In the short term, we might even have to accept missing emissions targets in order to build infrastructure and production facilities that will support green energy. So until we reach the point where we can rely on green energy to produce more green energy, and have viable substitutes for the thousands of ways petroleum products are used on industry, oil and gas workers will still be needed to keep our economy running.

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