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I don't think she was being hypocritical, as she was open about it
I think she's a massive hypocrit. It's not just that there is actually a huge difference between flying first class and economy as @miro_o says, it's that her entire transatlantic life is unsustainable. Singling out individuals like her DOES help, because for some strange reason a lot of people aspire to a celebrity lifestyle, so therefore aspire to what celebrities do, such as flying first class. If we can get them to be more responsible they can influence others to do the same. She's got a massive cheek getting involved in XR.
The reality is that in the modern world at least some flying is necessary. Making distinctions between different reasons for flying and types of flying is entirely valid.
For example, I was in the Philippines back in January and took an internal flight from Manilla to Tuguegarao to go to a wedding. It was with a budget airline - pretty much their version of Ryanair with every seat filled and not much leg room. This is one of the most efficient ways to fly because the capacity utilisation is about as good as it gets.
Sat next to me were a big group of midwives from Ilagan going down to Manilla for essential training. The trip by road takes 12 hours, and believe me, Philippino roads are dangerous: someone dies every hour, which is 28 people a day, over 10,000 people a year. They were going to learn techniques to reduce infant mortality - literally life saving work.
Do you really think that making a distinction between their travel and Emma Thompson's unsustainable, extravagant lifestyle is a distraction? I sure don't.
Fox-
Who knows her reasons for flying first class, could have been the only ticket available for all we know. At least it wasn’t a private jet.
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unsustainable, extravagant lifestyle
Mine is too.
Given that the film/entertainment industry is fairly international (studios, locations etc), how feasible is it for individuals to have much control over their flight footprint? (Not a rhetorical question - you know about media industry so maybe you also know more about film stuff). Is there anyone who chooses economy over first class? Is there anyone who chooses jobs based on how much travel is involved? Do directors choose to use local locations?
It seems there's been more attention given to music tours than the film industry. -
I think she's a massive hypocrit.
She was asked about this and her response was kinda odd. Like ‘I’ve been moaning for ages about how polluting air travel is and because of how long I’ve been moaning I’m not a hypocrite’
Or something. It was weird.
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I think she's a massive hypocrite.
You don't know what hypocrisy means. The Wikipedia definition will do:
Hypocrisy is the contrivance of a false appearance of virtue or goodness, while concealing real character or inclinations, especially with respect to religious and moral beliefs; hence, in a general sense, hypocrisy may involve dissimulation, pretense, or a sham.
It continues:
Hypocrisy is the practice of engaging in the same behavior or activity for which one criticizes another. In moral psychology, it is the failure to follow one's own expressed moral rules and principles.
Note that this part must be read in conjunction with the primary definition above; merely being inconsistent doesn't amount to hypocrisy. It requires that element of secrecy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypocrisy
She doesn't hide that she flies and is therefore not a hypocrite about it. For the avoidance of doubt, I think she's wrong to fly while holding these beliefs, at best inconsistent, at worst self-contradictory, and she doesn't practise what she preaches, but she's not a hypocrite.
She's got a massive cheek getting involved in XR.
That may well be the case, but it's a different thing from hypocrisy.
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The reality is that in the modern world at least some flying is necessary. Making distinctions between different reasons for flying and types of flying is entirely valid.
Well. Read your second sentence here again. It's straightforwardly true because you can make distinctions between different types of flying. However, what you appear to mean, that one ought to evaluate different types of flying (based on whatever criteria, let's not worry about those for now) is something I consider completely irrelevant, as all types of flying are roughly equally damaging in their environmental impact. The seemingly essential, comparatively harmless kind, like in your example ...
For example, I was in the Philippines back in January and took an internal flight from Manilla to Tuguegarao to go to a wedding. It was with a budget airline - pretty much their version of Ryanair with every seat filled and not much leg room. This is one of the most efficient ways to fly because the capacity utilisation is about as good as it gets.
Sat next to me were a big group of midwives from Ilagan going down to Manilla for essential training. The trip by road takes 12 hours, and believe me, Philippino roads are dangerous: someone dies every hour, which is 28 people a day, over 10,000 people a year. They were going to learn techniques to reduce infant mortality - literally life saving work.
... together are easily as damaging as the comparatively low numbers of individually more damaging flights, e.g. private jets. There is a symbiosis, so you want to deal with it all together.
And, as ever with things that are merely the symptom, not the cause, flying fails to achieve basic utility and doesn't compensate for what is behind it, which is the basic problem with (particularly motorised) transportation: It is a symptom of a lack of sustainable arrangements for living, i.e. that XYZ isn't local, can't be got locally, etc., e.g. their 'essential' training thatm, despite being essential, isn't available in Ilagan, although it obviously should be.
In the example of the Philippines, their rail network is almost non-existent:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_the_Philippines
Rail is not massively sustainable, but vastly more so than flying or motorised road transport. The internal flights are merely a symptom of the lack of rail (so far, I note plans to expand rail). (I don't say 'a symptom of the lack of roads', as the last thing I want to see are more motorways.) Perpetuating flying there is only going to delay investment in better forms of transport. Needless to say, the Philippines are a mountainous island country and it won't be possible everywhere to build rail or RRORO ferries, but with modern engineering it's not at all impossible.
Do you really think that making a distinction between their travel and Emma Thompson's unsustainable, extravagant lifestyle is a distraction? I sure don't.
Yes. Concentrate on the underlying causes and not the symptoms.
jv
hoefla
Howard
Oliver Schick
Well, it's not hugely surprising that, having flown in, she's flying out again (and quite openly, too).
Obviously, I think she should have saved herself the trip and instead put out a supportive statement. but singling out individuals isn't going to help here, even if it's a celebrity. While the constant ability of celebrities to fly all over the shop and appear wherever product is to be promoted or concerts to be held at the drop of a hat is most definitely a main cause of why non-celebrities find how they perceive this kind of lifestyle very appealing and aspire to it, the real problem is seated still deeper and lies in the attitude that as we're modern people, we have to fly because we have all those great machines and these highly-trained people to fly them, yada yada.
Sure, Emma Thompson should practise what she preaches, but there are very few celebrities who've put their heads above the parapet on this, hardly any, in fact (someone's going to be along in a moment with a long list of supportive celebrities, I'm sure), and effectively accusing her of hypocrisy (I don't think she was being hypocritical, as she was open about it, just short-sighted and inconsistent) is merely the exception that affirms the rule, that most celebrities wouldn't support this cause (yet) and if they do, they'll be hypocrites, hence the status quo is resoundingly re-established.
I also don't think that flying economy class (difficult for someone famous, anyway) makes a huge great difference to flying first class. Flying is the problem, full stop, and making distinctions in that is a distraction.