here are some hyper-polluting individuals:

  • the Rolling Stones’ Boeing 767 (5,046 tonnes of CO2)
  • Lawrence Stroll (1,512 flights)
  • Thirty-nine jets linked to 30 Russian oligarchs – (30,701 tonnes of CO2)

relevant quote:

But I will say this, a movement can’t get along without a devil, and across the whole political spectrum there is a misogynistic tendency to choose a female devil, whether it’s Anita Bryant, Hillary Clinton, Marie Antoinette, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, or J.K. Rowling [or Taylor Swift]. And there’s always gonna be people who seize on any opportunity to be misogynistic. So I would advise trans people and our allies [or environmentalists] to keep in mind, that J.K. Rowling [Taylor Swift] is not the final boss of transphobia [anti-environmentalism]. She’s not our devil. The devil is the Republican Party, the Conservative Party.

—Natalie Wynn (emphasis and bracket text mine)

edit: if you can’t respond to this without using the c*nt expletive it is not helping your case lmao. mods are we okay with this? in any case, please don’t feed the trolls.

edit 2/FAQ: “but why did she threaten legal action against that college kid though?” still shitty, but refer to this comment for a good explanation of the context behind that decision.

She only threatened legal action since those memes started before when her flight movements got the attention of the right in an attempt to make her less credible of a voice speaking out against trump. And knowing how batshit insane trump cultists can be and how she’s basically the single most hated person of his base I’m not surprised that she feared for her security. Those records were public for years but the legal action only happened after someone created that meme and even fox news suddenly cared about plane emissions…

and another good comment

[…] For Swift, this is legitimate fear. I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced actual fear for your life, but it’s crippling, and it effects your psyche. To experience that on a daily basis because of an app? You bet your goddamn ass I’m going to talk to my lawyers about what my options are.

sources/timeline for the above:

  • gmtom@lemmy.world
    11·
    9 months ago

    Stop trying to make this about Swift being a woman.

    She’s getting all this attention about it because her legal team sent a cease and desist letter to the guy tracking her jet threatening him with legal action over priding publically available tracking information.

    • deaf_fish@lemm.ee
      1·
      9 months ago

      Na, she is getting this attention because some very powerful people, who benefit from producing a lot of greenhouse gases, would prefer that everyone be mad at T Swift instead of them.

      • gmtom@lemmy.world
        1·
        9 months ago

        Or, the much more likely thing that private jet usage has become a big talking point on the inter etc recently and swift having by far the biggest jet emission footprint of any celebrity.

    • prole@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      1·
      9 months ago

      How does this make her “actions wrong”? Because you disagree?

      Yes, it’s legal for him to do what he’s doing, but it is also legal (and completely reasonable) for Swift to challenge that right because she fears for her safety. This is literally what our legal system is for.

      There are a lot of insane people out there (and most of them tracking Swift’s plane at this moment are right wing psychopaths that wish her harm). I really can’t fucking blame her for wanting to do something about it.

      • gmtom@lemmy.world
        3·
        9 months ago

        So you think it’s perfectly moral for the ultra wealthy to abuse the legal system to threaten and bully random people into submission because they are ruining the billionaires image?

        And again to reiterate, this is all publically available information, anyone who wants to track her jet can do so without the tracker that guy set up. She has no legal standing in her actions.

        • prole@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          0·
          9 months ago

          So you think it’s perfectly moral for the ultra wealthy to abuse the legal system to threaten and bully random people into submission because they are ruining the billionaires image?

          Lol yeah bud, that’s what I said.

          Dude, I understand it’s public information. I understand that current law (probably rightfully) allows air traffic to be tracked, including private jets.

          I was simply doing something that you’re clearly incapable of, and empathizing (you remember empathy right?) with her position. A position that is markedly different than Musk’s, given that she receives a constant stream of legitimate death threats from people known to be violent; she has valid reason to fear for her life right now. I think I would probably do similar in such a situation.

          I don’t think it’s “wrong” for her to seek to do what she can to protect herself, and that includes this.

          The argument that “what they’re doing is legal” is pretty stupid too… I’m not even saying that I disagree that it should be legal, but how do you think laws change? The boundaries of them get tested in courts. This is not an abuse of the legal system, this is using it as intended.

          • gmtom@lemmy.world
            3·
            9 months ago

            Lol yeah bud, that’s what I said.

            That is in fact, literarily, what you are saying and what you are continuing to say in the rest of your comment.

            I was simply doing something that you’re clearly incapable of, and empathizing (you remember empathy right?) with her position.

            Oh wont somebody please empathise with the poor billionaires that are using the insane wealth to bully people for criticising their insane over-use of private jets.

            You guys are doing actual mental backflips to try and make Taylor Swift the victim here and its honestly just kind of sad.

            given that she receives a constant stream of legitimate death threats from people known to be violent

            And those people could find that same PUBLICALLY AVAILABLE information even without the guy’s tracker. So even if he did take it down, she is in literally no better position when it comes to stalkers.

            Literally all getting him to take down the website does is stop people from criticising how much she uses her jet, which hurts her image. Thats it.

            Like if she ACTUALLY cared that much about being tracked and her safety she could just charter private jets instead of owning her own. That way no one could track her. But she doesnt, because its not about her safety, its about her image.

            This is not an abuse of the legal system, this is using it as intended.

            Lmao swift stans are actually neurotic.

            • prole@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              1·
              9 months ago

              Lmao swift stans are actually neurotic.

              FYI (because apparently this needs to be said), I’ve never once purposefully listened to a Taylor Swift song, and besides maybe two, I couldn’t even tell you if a pop song currently playing is her or not. That’s how little I care about this person’s art/music. My feelings toward her can be described as, at most, ambivalent. I’m definitely neurotic though, but that’s unrelated to this subject.

              All I’m doing is empathizing with another human being. Billionaires might be (for the most part, though I’m not sure I can imagine a more ethical way to become one than how she has) awful people, but they’re still people and they deserve basic human rights such as: not being in 24/7 fear for the lives of you and your loved ones because fascists are mad that she told young people to vote.

              I’m not even advocating for taking down the site or making the info no longer publicly available. I’m literally just putting myself in her shoes and rationalizing why she did what she did and understanding that I might have done the same.

              We seem to be having two completely different conversations here, which I guess I shouldn’t be surprised about given that you clearly can’t comprehend nuance. Your clear hatred for this woman is clouding your ability to be a decent human. Do better.

      • Red Army Dog Cooper@lemmy.ml
        2·
        9 months ago

        How is knowing at what airport an airplane is, public information that anyone can just pull up and find without that much know how, a massive risk to safety.

        And if it is, hpw is she going to stop them from dping the neglegable research themselves

    • sverit@feddit.de
      1·
      9 months ago

      This right here. Posts like that are guilty of what they accuse themselfes: Making it about sexism.

  • iAmTheTot@kbin.social
    4·
    9 months ago

    Levying valid criticism on someone is not scapegoating. You can criticize more than one person for the same thing.

    • blindsight@beehaw.org
      0·
      9 months ago

      The point is that the scapegoat is usually female. Why is Taylor Swift being singled out for her private jet use? Is it because her use is assumed to be less legitimate because she’s a woman?

      A quick Internet search brought up this:

      Among the most polluting jets covered by the list was a Boeing 767 wide-body aircraft used by the Rolling Stones. It emitted an estimated 5,046 tonnes of CO2, the equivalent of someone taking 1,763 return flights from London to New York City in economy class.

      Aircraft owned by Lawrence Stroll, the billionaire owner of the Aston Martin Formula One team, recorded a combined 1,512 flights since the start of 2022. His private aircraft, including two helicopters, also made the most journeys of 15 minutes or less.

      Thirty-nine jets linked to 30 Russian oligarchs – including Roman Abramovich, Leonid Mikhelson and the recently deceased leader of the Wagner group, Yevgeny Prigozhin – were responsible for 30,701 tonnes of CO2 (equivalent to the total average carbon footprint of around 1,000 Russians).

      Source

      So, attacking billionaires who are abusing private jets is totally fair, in general, but always singing out the woman who does so is misogynistic.

      Where are the Rolling Stones or Laurence Stroll memes?

      • iAmTheTot@kbin.social
        2·
        9 months ago

        There have been memes about lots of shit head billionaires. The Taylor Swift ones are popular right now because she Streisand’ed it by trying to get that tracker taken down.

      • Sneezycat@sopuli.xyz
        2·
        9 months ago

        I mean there was a Twitter account that followed Elon’s jet and was banned. That was the first time I saw a big meme around billionaires using jets. And I’m pretty sure I’ve seen other people criticized for it too. I feel like the focus is on Taylor this time around, but it’s just one of many. Although I’m not saying there’s no mysoginy involved, but I don’t think she’s singled out if you think of a couple years timeframe.

      • BluesF@lemmy.world
        2·
        9 months ago

        The only reason this has blown up is because she threatened that tracker with legal action. It’s the Streisand effect 100%. The same shit happend when Elon Musk shut down the account that was tracking him.

        • Geobloke@lemmy.world
          0·
          9 months ago

          Gee, it’s almost like she’s worried about stalkers or something. And I was on the net when elon tried it ands it wasn’t like this

          • beardown@lemm.ee
            2·
            9 months ago

            You’re treating her better than Elon purely because she’s a woman. That’s sexism

              • beardown@lemm.ee
                2·
                9 months ago

                You’re saying it’s valid and good for her to worry about stalkers. You are not saying the same about Elon. This is purely because she is a woman and he is a man. This is sexism.

                Women are not delicate flowers who need to be protected. Men are not tough monsters who do not need protecting.

                Billionaires are destructive enemies of humanity - gender doesn’t affect that analysis

        • gmtom@lemmy.world
          1·
          9 months ago

          No one memed on Elon when he shut down his tracker?

          Yes they did? When he announced he was buying twitter/everyone/ was miming on him because they knew he was buying it to shut down that account.

        • Spiralvortexisalie@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          9 months ago

          Taylor has long had criticism for her jet use, the meme explosion is just about the media wanting to use her as hype prop while at the same time her team sued to shutdown the flight tracker kid. Posts that seem obsessed with possible damage to Taylor’s reputation sound like it is coming from a PR firm. Does Op genuinely believe that someone sees a Jet Meme and think differently of Taylor? Is Op against Taylor being the poster child for Aviation reform? I do not understand why an uninterested third party feels the need to prevent Taylor from suffering consequences of her actions merely because other heads should roll first.

          ETA: I had to check if OP was a PR FIRM, check OP’s own response to Taylor Jet Memes: https://lemmy.cafe/comment/4651417

          • spujb@lemmy.cafeOPEnglish
            0·
            9 months ago

            thanks for your commentary.

            1. taylor swift absolutely should face the consequences for her actions. there is no good billionaire.
            2. these memes kicked off in 2022, and Swift reduced jet use (significantly, but not perfectly) in response, something i have never seen from any other individual. she is still worthy of criticism but i question if what she is getting is proportionate.
            3. it is now 2024. i am concerned to see that Fox News is using this debacle to discredit her (good and positive) call to increase voter participation.
            • Droggelbecher@lemmy.world
              1·
              9 months ago

              She isn’t getting the most hate because she is the worst offender, she is getting the most hate because she is the most famous and most beloved offender right now. People already hate the likes of Musk. Not saying this is the only reason and there’s no sexism etc involved, but it certainly is part of it. And I’d argue if calling attention to rich people’s environment sins, it’s going to get more attention the more famous and well liked the offender is. It’s ‘yes ALL billionaires are bad, even the one who’s likeable and pretty and makes good music and never says unhinged right wing stuff’.

    • Poppa_Mo@lemmy.world
      0·
      9 months ago

      This isn’t wrong, but the uptick in these memes coincides ridiculously with Trumps recent desire to latch on to her name.

      The narrative is constantly being spun by these fucking goons.

      • 474D@lemmy.world
        1·
        9 months ago

        The uptick is due to her threatening legal action against the flight tracker dude and being all over TV for football this season. I find it hard to believe the trumpers give a shit about the environment. But I suppose they could hop on the bandwagon if it fits their “enemy”

  • ninpnin@sopuli.xyz
    3·
    9 months ago

    in response to public pressure, Swift recently cut back on private flights and downsized to one jet

    So the memes worked?

    • Agent641@lemmy.world
      3·
      9 months ago

      She donated one of her private jets to an underprivileged kid who didn’t have any private jets.

  • TimewornTraveler@lemm.ee
    2·
    9 months ago

    Yeah, criticizing the Rolling Stones in 2024 is totally equivalent to criticizing Taylor Swift, yeah let’s pivot right to that. Ignore the fact that she’s arguably the most popular musician on earth right now, just played a major cultural event, and all recent events… no, let’s go back to a washed up classic rock band and meme on them instead. Yeah, that’ll work.

    Fucking Swifties dude…

    • spujb@lemmy.cafeOPEnglish
      1·
      9 months ago

      honestly, for me personally? the fact a “washed up classic rock band,” as you put it, is outputting more CO2 than an actually-relevant Swift? that’s a huge difference and reason to be all the more critical of The Rolling Stones. like what are they even doing all that for lol.

      i criticize both and defend neither.

    • emptiestplace@lemmy.ml
      1·
      9 months ago

      • I’m quite confident that, more often than not, women face greater challenges than men.

      • This post is fucking weird.

  • casual_turtle_stew_enjoyer@sh.itjust.works
    2·
    9 months ago

    Wtf does this have to do with her gender? Are you claiming she does not top the charts in celebrity carbon emissions, but is being used as the scapegoat instead of a man?

    The Conservatives aren’t attacking her because of her gender, it’s because of their her influence. Misogyny has nothing to do with it, they’d do the exact same with any celebrity of any identity/orientation because they’re influence conflicts with their agenda, not because of their gender.

    This smells a lot like ground-laying for radical feminist arguments, I can’t find any other reason you would be here making a mountain out of an imaginary anthill. Moreover, I can’t understand why anyone upvoting this would care to see a non-humorous PSA in a “hello fellow teens” vaporware frame on a surrealist/(whatever it’s called) shitposting community unless it is meant to be satire.

    edit: gendered a pronoun to make it concise who the subject was

  • arymandias@feddit.de
    1·
    9 months ago

    The Taylor airplane meme has basically been played out and is no longer funny.

    But for me the reason I found those memes funny is the same why I find it more interesting to take the piss out of Bill Gates rather than Musk. Everyone already knows Musk is a complete nut job. But there seem to be an alarming amount of people that think Gates is genuinely a good person because of his stupid charity.

    From what I see Taylor Swift is just a business woman doing business, and she is very good at that. So most decisions she makes are because she assesses that they are good for her brand, and this includes political decisions/ standpoints. The airplane angle is one of the few things she can not control in this regard, and that is why I find/found it funny to stress that point.

  • Clbull@lemmy.world
    1·
    9 months ago

    I mean it’s hilarious that we pilloried Elon Musk for trying to sue someone for tracking his private jet with publicly available records and posting this online, but the same people are defending Taylor Swift for doing the same.

    I don’t think it’s a gender bias so much as it’s a bias towards people we don’t like.

    • prole@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      0·
      9 months ago

      Do you have a list of people that you’re cross-checking to make sure they’re the same? Because you know how the internet works right? Those were likely not the same people.

      In my opinion, they both have the right to challenge this, so there’s nothing wrong with her doing that. Second, conservatives are currently foaming at the mouth to do harm to this woman, so I really cannot blame her for feeling unsafe. Musk is just a crybaby.

      • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
        1·
        9 months ago

        Thinking rich people have the right to threaten people for knowing and stating public information is such a bonkers take. Thats like calling organ donors unethical.

  • TeenieBopper@lemmy.world
    1·
    9 months ago

    I just… I can’t bring myself to give a shit about Taylor Swift’s airplanes when BP and Shell still exist and capitalism is still the dominant economic system.

    • Deceptichum@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      3·
      9 months ago

      I can give a shit about both and more.

      Imagine if we could only give a shit about one threat to our existence at a time. We’d be ignoring a billion others.

      • TeenieBopper@lemmy.world
        0·
        9 months ago

        I mean, kudos to you for having the energy to get so far down the list of things that actually matter about climate change that you reach the one person and a few private jets section of the list, but I’d rather use that brain space to play a board game or something.

    • DarthFrodo@lemmy.world
      2·
      9 months ago

      BP and Shell only have that much power exacly because people buy fossil fuels from them. If demand would drop, their profits and political power would drop accordingly. As long as we don’t even hold the biggest financiers of these companies responsible, how can anything change? Demand drives supply.

      It’s like saying “As long as hitmans exist, I won’t give a shit about the people who pay hitmans, all consumption under capitalism is unethical anyways so anything goes.” As long as we ignore those who actually fund the problem, we won’t be able to fix anything.

      • pup_atlas@pawb.social
        0·
        9 months ago

        No they have so much power because decades of lobbying have made it impossible to get anywhere without traveling on a road in a car— Which uses gas. This is not a problem citizens can feasibly solve, this sort if problem can only be fixed with government intervention.

        • dumpsterlid@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          9 months ago

          Maybe this time we can solve our problems by simply just hating a powerful, successful woman though.

          • SphereofWreckening@ttrpg.network
            1·
            9 months ago

            *By simply hating a billionaire.

            Some of the criticism levied against Taylor Swift is definitely rooted in sexism, misogyny, and political bias: but not all of it.

            To lump everyone criticizing Taylor Swift into the same group as the misogynists and sexists is disingenuous. She deserves criticism and is not free of it just because she’s a woman.

            She’s also one of the most famous people in the world. So of course she’s going to get more flack from her visibility alone.

            Thus the following can be true: Taylor Swift isn’t the only one that deserves criticism from her private jet usage. And there are those that would criticize her in bad faith because of her political alignments/because she’s a woman. But even then the criticism she has received is still completely valid.

            No billionaire deserves or needs special treatment.

  • schnokobaer@lemmy.ml
    0·
    9 months ago

    It’s a valid criticism, I’m just wondering where 90% of those folks criticizing were the last 10 years, when it would have also been a valid criticism against her, but only a select group of people called it out and I recall precisely zero memes on this specific topic. Curious, that this has only become a mainstream meme now that there is a defamation campaign actively being conducted against her by right wing media.

  • Pohl@lemmy.world
    0·
    9 months ago

    I’m not sure I fully understand the criticism to be perfectly honest. Is it actually possible to have a mega pop star of that type without them having a more intensive carbon footprint? Like she can’t really fly commercially for a lot of reasons. Tour schedules are one thing but can you imagine the scene it would make?

    Fame is really just letting one person, who we consider special for some reason, use the resources of many. They get to live an extravagant lifestyle and we get the cultural benefit their work.

    Bottom line: private jet travel seems to me like a requirement of her job. I’m not about to sit here and shame everyone for the carbon output that their job requires of them. She is not some capital class, passive income, leech. The lady works.

    FWIW, I don’t really think I could name or identify one of her songs. Everything I know about her is what bleeds through into my media sphere. She could be a real shitheal for all I know.