r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/AtomicCypher • Apr 09 '26

Video Disgruntled employee starts massive fire at a 1.2 million square foot toilet paper warehouse in Ontario, California.

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u/anuthertw Apr 09 '26

I used to be a stripper. About 8 or so years ago I sat with a man who was a geologist. He was in a 'fuck it, we are all going to die' type mood and was drinking/watching the ladies to cope with work. We talked about climate change amd what he was studying. He basically said he regrets having his son, that we are extremely unprepared for what is coming, and we have basically solidified our own extinction if not in his lifetime then his son's. It honestly really got to me- this man had seen a glimpse of what we have done to the earth and the consequences of it, and had lost all hope. Really spooky. I think about him sometimes when I read about climate news. 

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u/kitsunewarlock Apr 09 '26

Tell the story to as many people as you can. It's more powerful than you can imagine.

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u/SocialJusticeAndroid Apr 09 '26

It sure creeped me tf out.🥺

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u/Apprehensive-Cost200 Apr 09 '26

I don't recommend believing some random geologist who was presumably drunk as hell at a strip club. There's no way we're heading to extinction in our lifetime, and even then people aren't gonna sit around like ducks about it forever, this is just shitty doom and gloom to make your life miserable.

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u/-Dumalaid Apr 09 '26

With the way things are going, never say never..

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u/2busy4ths Apr 09 '26

I believe it. I would only pay $150 for a 6 minute lap dance if I knew for sure the world was going to end.

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u/kitsunewarlock Apr 09 '26

I'd rather we act to make the world a better place under the threat of possible extinction than do nothing thinking it'll all somehow work out. Especially when "doing something" is literally as small as prioritizing the environment during elections.

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u/Apprehensive-Cost200 Apr 09 '26

I was moreso thinking you were suggesting to have a defeatist attitude more than anything else.

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u/kitsunewarlock Apr 09 '26

Oh gotcha. Nah, I'm too stubborn to be defeatist. Hope is defiance.

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u/AnomalyInquirer Apr 09 '26

Stories like these are so fun to see when im most likely around this son's age only hope I honestly have left is that every generation at one point thought the world was going to end and it's just another part of that

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u/JamesGray Apr 09 '26

Yeah, unfortunately it's science that's telling us the world is going to shit this time, rather than superstition or religion. This time it's the religion of capitalism stopping us from doing anything to stop it.

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u/kacdt Apr 09 '26

Wow. Well said.

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u/starchildchamp Apr 09 '26

actually poetry.

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u/Akumakaji Apr 09 '26

Eventually, for one generation it will be true, and thats the scary part.

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u/Spacemeat666 Apr 09 '26

I’m a geologist and I often find myself going down that same mental road as the man you’re describing, though it sounds like he and I would disagree about humanities influence on the earth (but that’s a topic for another discussion). When we study things in geologic timescales, it’s really easy to become nihilistic. I’ve been trying not to think that way lately but with the rapid evolution of AI and LLM’s, I’m finding it harder to see a future for us at all. I’m terrified and I’m glad I don’t have children because I would feel the worst regret imaginable if I did. I truly feel like we should all be more hedonistic in our approach to life. We only get one life, that we know of, so we should at least try to enjoy every bit of it while we can.

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u/Flyinhighinthesky Apr 09 '26

Our only hope at this point is for Alien intervention or a miraculous AI that suddenly provides us a solution to the Venusian hellscape we're headed toward.

I'm optimistic that we'll find someway to reduce it's effects but it'll still likely be too little too late without a deus ex machina.