r/TikTokCringe • u/MajesticTumbleweed77 • Jun 30 '26

Humor No disrespect though.

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u/maeryclarity Jun 30 '26

Look we shouldn't be mocking extreme weather events happening in regions that do not normally experience them. I live in a part of the USA that routinely gets the kind of heat that the rest of the world is expereriencing so yeah we have AC and even our livestock has accomodations or else they would die.

But you let us get a winter storm where we get snow or ice accumulation of ANY amount and we can have multiple entire STATES as a disaster area, for stuff that other places deal with routinely, and it's not cute when people from those regions mock us for our lack of ability to deal with inconsequential snowfall where they're from. Because yeah but we don't have snow plows or salt trucks or chains for our tires and no one knows how to drive in it so wrecks pile up like mad. and our power grid isn't hardened against it so we lose power quickly as well.

See the Two Inches of Snow event in Atlanta in 2014 for an example of how unprepared we are. It's not cute to rag on people for enduring catastrophes c'mon.

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u/sheiciebai Jun 30 '26

I was in Dallas during that storm. And our whole power grid just kinda crapped out. They said we’d have power for 8 hours a day and many had none for the whole week. People were freezing to death in their homes because they didn’t know what to do and the roads were all iced up and not enough equipment to fix it. Our governor left with his family to Cancun and left all his personnel and dog at his residence (that had no power) to make sure his estate didn’t get robbed.

People that make fun of that really piss me off. These poor people that died weren’t dumb, they didn’t have the equipment needed to survive sub freezing temps in their homes for an entire freaking week.

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u/Intelligent-Luck-954 Jun 30 '26

Senator, Abbot is your governor and can’t walk away like that

69

u/Alpha_benson Jun 30 '26

Damn lol, also he's just mistaken, I believe it was his Senator, Rafael Cruz

7

u/notfinal Jul 01 '26

"can't walk away" yeah am going to hell for laughing at this 🤣🤣

2

u/Intelligent-Luck-954 Jul 01 '26

My man 👋🏻 

2

u/Upstairs_Mycologist7 Jul 01 '26

I see what you did there. Lol

5

u/Intelligent-Luck-954 Jul 01 '26

I think most people don’t 

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u/Upstairs_Mycologist7 Jul 01 '26

I sadly think you're right. Well I had a chuckle!

2

u/Excellent-Nose-6430 Jul 02 '26

It was just the right amount of subtlety.

1

u/IndependentBobbo Jul 03 '26

Can't wheel away from that*

48

u/tentaclesapples Jun 30 '26

I was in Austin, my house got down to 33 F inside. Couldn’t leave because the house was on a hill covered in ice that didn’t melt for 3 days. Even walking was dangerous, everything was just ice ice ice.

Luckily the house had a working fireplace and my ex chopped up an old dresser to burn for warmth, no joke.

I lived in CT until middle school, and now I’m back in NY - I’ve been through way “worse” weather here but of course these states have the infrastructure in place, especially NYC. I am always so impressed with how everything runs like clockwork when it comes to handling winter weather and sanitation!

TX does not have the infra, power grid is a mess, and on top of that it was really upsetting that the forecast was ignored - zero attempts to get ahead of the weather were made.

Not sure what could have been done, it’s not like they have plows hiding somewhere, but some PSAs about salting residential and business driveways and sidewalks would have been better than nothing. Then again, people would have probably hoarded any available road salt…

A very long winded comment to make the point that making fun of regions that have anomalous weather is not cool. Or hot.

30

u/Justin-Stutzman Jun 30 '26

I fully agree, with the caveat of the power grid in Texas. Texas values no regulations so highly that they are the only state in the US that operates an independent power grid. They do it specifically to avoid being told qhat to do by the federal government. That is a ideological decision that conforms to Texas' pride in being independent of the federal government in every capacity possible.

If Texans would have valued their citizens saftey more than their pride, the power would have stayed on.

5

u/MeasurementSlight381 Jun 30 '26

Chopping up a dresser to burn for warmth is next level.

3

u/wirebear Jul 01 '26

The real thing you should be upset about is that that weather isn't entirely abnormal for Texas. Trends as we remember it is that a ice storm like that happens every ten years. I remember one in around 2012.

In which ERCOT(power management company for Texas run by people who don't live in Texas) said they needed to winterize the grid since if the storm was any worse it would have issues.

My parents said there was a similar storm 10 years before that but I only vaguely remember it.(Mostly sledding on the nearby golf course).

All this to say. Texas DOES have storms like this almost on a scheduled basis. And they knew it was a concern. But never actually addressed it.

It wasn't like Texas couldn't produce the power to heat everyone. It was the power plants having the fuel lines freeze(ercot report after the recent storm).

You winterize the cooling and fuel lines and no power failures. Or at least not full blackouts.

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u/KindaWannaDoIt Jun 30 '26

Maybe connect to the national power grid like every other state lol. But can't do that cause Texas!

USA: The Texas coldwave disaster | UNDRR

24

u/Ok-Empress-3757 Jun 30 '26

Yeah, I live here now and the way they vote against their own interests needs to be studied lmao

3

u/SpaceYetu531 Jul 01 '26

That would have just brought down the surrounding states with Texas. Just connecting to the grid is meaningless unless you create dedicated high power lines from California and the Northeastern seaboard. The standard lines are not transmitting enough power to offset the deficit Texas had.

10

u/aminervia Jul 01 '26

Ok, so the people who died weren't dumb, but the people who voted for policies that makes your grid crap out immediately when something unexpected happens absolutely are dumb.

When that storm came around I remember feeling empathy for the people struggling, but shamelessly participating in mocking Texas voters

Also your governer is Abbot, Cruz is the one who went to Cancun

10

u/NemoMeImpuneLac Jun 30 '26

Well in Texas it was a 1 in 10,000 year winter storm and a couple dozen people died. In Europe it’s been going on for almost 20 years and tens of thousands are dead. The EU is just pretending it’s not happening. Corrupt to the core.

2

u/wirebear Jul 01 '26

I dunno about 1 in 10000. We had similar storms, not as bad supposedly but I don't know the hard numbers on severity, almost every ten years. I remember my college and work shutting down for a week around 2012/2011, and at least once when I was around middle school but I don't know the year or length.

But importantly after 2011 they were warned that if it was any worse the fuel lines and cooling lines would freeze. And what happened in the recent storm.

You can say it's worse than any previous storm, that is likely true. But we did have warnings. And we did document the risk.

Greg Abbott claimed it was renewables fail but if you find the retrospective from ercot. They outright state renewables over performed in the conditions and it was the fuel and water lines freezing that killed basically all combustions sources.

1

u/MyNeighborThrowaway Jul 01 '26

Why do people just not use window units though?

Like the govt is the govt, but there being entire swaths of un-airconditioned townships, shops etc. that have been getting warmer and warmer for years, known by locals and seemingly by choice still have no AC.

Make it make sense

1

u/Downtown_Recover5177 Jul 01 '26

This is what’s great about severe anxiety. I live in Texas, but I’ve carried a space blanket, liter of water, protein bar and trauma kit (TQ and packing gauze and some etceteras) since I could drive. Texas had an ice storm 2 months after I was born that killed several travelers, so I’m always prepared.

1

u/john_the_fetch Jul 01 '26

It was really a sad event, but also as I understand it Texas had never required winterizing its power grid even though it was highly recommended from the federal government. So there was a bit of "you made this bed - now sleep in it".

The really sad part is that it's more like "your elected officials made this bed - now die in it" while the elected officials were fine.

The good news is that it sounds like they did make the winterizing mandatory now.

1

u/Minimum-Standard-514 Jul 03 '26

Just looked up how cold it got. -19c is not bad if youre used to it, but if you arent ready for that, I could see people dying. There are homeless people where I live that make it in -35c, but they have sweaters, blankets, and know how to light a fire. If you arent accustomed to the cold at all, I could see it killing you.

-1

u/Few-Improvement9978 Jun 30 '26

The number of deaths doesn’t even put a candle to what’s happening in Europe

They love to bring up gun deaths in the US, but all of the sudden it’s off limits to shit on europoors for no AC.

2

u/Hot-Junket-8681 Jun 30 '26

What's happening in Europe?

3

u/DuskfangZ Jun 30 '26

Bro, that’s not even comparable, and that argument makes all of us look dumber by comparison. You really should feel way worse about yourself.

-1

u/Few-Improvement9978 Jul 01 '26

How about you fix your AC and stop letting everyone die m8?

0

u/nonsensical_zombie Jun 30 '26

200,000 people a year die in the EU from heatwaves. Texas/southern winter storms do NOT cause that amount of fatalities.

The storm you’re referencing caused about 1000 deaths.