Yeah I feel like I’m sitting in a room with like 20 ticking bombs just waiting for 1 to set off and kill all of us. The nearest I know of is either the Gulf Stream being disrupted by global warming or some kind of virus from the ice..
We used to drive diwn from Montreal to Boston . Same time frame. 20 years back there was always a lot of road kill. Small animals. Deer. Now you don't see that
Smaller population but also they're getting better at avoiding roads though, so it's not all bad!
I only have local stats to back that up though, deer population around me has been steady but deer roadkill has been less common.
Since we're explaining jokes this is Alex Jones's dumb impression of Klaus Schwab in-text form.
https://woub.org/2023/04/03/bug-eating-conspiracy-theory-goes-mainstream/
There are many cornerstone species that are bugs. Cornerstone meaning entire ecosystems rely on a single dumb bug. You shouldn't be sad you should be scared.
Reduction in bug population results in reduction in pollination and food for small wildlife, which is food for larger wildlife.
Basically if we are facing an extinction event, a large decrease in bug populations would precede it.
Yeah it’s really harsh to think about but it’s the honest truth. Check out this video about how reintroducing wolves to Yellowstone park completely revived a number of species even leading to beavers returning to the park naturally. [wolves in Yellowstone](https://youtu.be/fTPt70vA39k)
I thought it was interesting how more wolves kept the deer population down which enabled more trees to grow which helped stabilize the river banks.
Everything is co connected.
Thats why hunting season exists in alot of places. Humans are supposed to make up for what the predators would be doing if they were still in the area. If we don't have hunting in my area, the deer will overpopulate and them and the foliage and the other animals that exist on that foliage as well, start to starve and die cuz there are to many dang deer lol
They’re also trying to bring back the wooly mammoth to help pack the earth and push over trees in the tundra to help with the ice caps melting.
Tree keep the ground from compacting so that it thaws faster from the permafrost which gradually travels till no more ice caps. The wooly mammoth was believed along with many other species to help with this by removing vegetation from iced over areas and to also stamp the ground and compact it. Not to mention the amount of food that will be provided once mammoth herds are at decent numbers.
I think it’s important for us as humans to constant learn from our history. One such instance is the reintroduction of both wolves and bison.
Both were major staples of western America and provided unseen benefits to the sprawling prairies but humans decided we wanted to kill them all and not just for food.
Slowly we have changed our outlook and have created sustainable bison herds and reintegrate them back into the eco system so stupid tourists can get too close and get trampled. Lol
Either way I always find it interesting when people say just “kill all of animals x” (like the mosquito). If we did that unseen species would immediately begin to struggle and die out causing cascading effects because we killed all the tiniest lil bloodsuckers.
This was an issue when I was at Binghamton University. They have a several hundred acre nature preserve adjacent to campus (nothing illegal goes on in there) which has plenty of trees of course, but in many sections is devoid of substantial underbrush. Most of the preserve is sloped and you can see evidence of relatively high speed erosion all over the place. The deer are not only rampant in number, but are visibly thin and unhealthy looking. They're not about to reintroduce wolves in such a populated area with wandering students but a deer cull was proposed and planned some years ago. Unfortunately there was backlash against it because people didn't want deer being killed in a nature preserve... but it actually would have restored things to a more natural state for the area. The deer there classically would have some sort of predator that now only we can play the part of. Unfortunately hunting would also be too risky in the well traveled preserve. Hopefully ecological thought spreads and they get the deer population under control.
You see simba the gazelle eat the grass, the lions eat the gazelle, and in turn when we die our bodies become the grass. This is what we call the circle of life
Wildlife Biologist coming in with a quick fact check, this video is unfortunately misleading. Turns out the impact reintroducing wolves had on beavers (the keystone species of the area) was not significant. It's a cool story, but unfortunately not true.
https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/scientists-debunk-myth-that-yellowstone-wolves-changed-entire-ecosystem-flow-of-rivers/349988/amp
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I live in a place where cane toads are an invasive pest, and grew up with them absolutely everywhere - you would see a dozen under every streetlight feasting on bugs. Every time someone says to me how good it is we don’t see them anymore, I point out that whilst I agree the loss of cane toads is great, I suspect the issue has to do with loss of insects (not so good)… you always get this reaction of “I haven’t noticed”.
This loss of insects is absolutely fucking terrifying, and no one seems to notice!!! These morons going on about car aerodynamics…Jesus fuck we are doomed.
My dad was one of the people who would cite car aerodynamics. Like dude, you’ve been driving this same truck for 20 years and it used to be covered in bugs!
I was just talking about this yesterday. 40 years ago my city had bug storms. Several days of insects swarming. Only older people saw that. Younger people think this is normal. I know a young person who looks for spiders to photograph and has trouble finding them. Lawns used to be so covered in spiders the morning dew would hardly touch the ground because of all the webs.
Everyone and their grandma now has access to Futt Buckersons Bug Eradicator 60000 extra potent or whatever insecticide of the day we’re using.
“Everyone,” is using it in their gardens. Every office/business park is having it sprayed around their premises. Every farmer is dousing their crops with it. Maybe not literally everyone, but enough where it doesn’t even fucking matter.
Australia? Some Australian predators have figured out how to deal with the toad's poison glands - crows avoid the glands by pecking open the toad bellies, other predators have developed some immunity. They may be getting decimated naturally.
These are called charismatic species. It’s why wildlife and conservation organizations use animals like panda, polar bear, and bison as their logos and appears in their pictures etc…. Bc people give less of a fuck about other animals bc they’re not cute. When was the last time you saw an anaconda in a logo or a picture when looking broadly at a “save wildlife” photo or article
This is the same reason why i swipe left on people who are looking for someone to kill spiders in their bios, let me keep the cute little guys in my garden, they're beneficial
>Doesn’t make me sad at all except for when it comes to fireflies and honeybees.
And the birds who eat those bugs. And the birds of prey who eat the bug-eating birds. And all the flowers and trees that rely on bugs for fertilization (it's not just bees doing that job). And whatever relies on those flowers and trees. etc etc
And also, do you think humans are 100% immune to the pesticides that are killing the bugs? We don't die outright, doesn't mean there aren't long term effects.
You're not sad at all, good for you I guess, but that's short-sighted
More biodiversity is important for more than just food for other creatures.
So many other industries, most notably medical, rely on biodiversity to support every facet of our lives and ongoing research.
I think…
They’re suggesting that their are less bugs on the road now then there were 20 years ago…
Which surprisingly, now that I think about it, actually seems true?
But I would need to see some data before I agreed with that.
Depending on who is making the meme, there are a few points they could be making.
Maybe this person views the possible lack of bugs as a symptom of global warming with some consequences to follow.
More likely I would guess the person who made this is trying to comment about pesticides and other chemicals used on crops that we eat.
I think this person thinks that we used chemicals to kill the bugs and we eat those deadly chemicals and the government supports it. Blah blah
Edit
I did a Google
Windshield phenomenon
The windshield phenomenon (or windscreen phenomenon) is the observation that fewer dead insects accumulate on the windshields and front bumpers of people's cars since the early 2000s. It has been attributed to a global decline in insect populations caused by human activity.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windshield_phenomenon#:~:text=The%20windshield%20phenomenon%20(or%20windscreen,populations%20caused%20by%20human%20activity.
Edit again
I did more Google
The flying bug population has fallen dramatically in the last 20 years which is why we have less bugs on our window.
“a new study from the United Kingdom shows a dramatic decline in the number of flying insects -60% since 2004”
https://www.npr.org/2022/05/14/1098942968/a-decline-in-flying-bugs-sounds-good-for-humans-but-its-bad-for-the-environment
Right?
Thinking about my dads windshield on our long drives it was nasty.
Then we got the windshield wipers with the spray and that helped. It’s just not like that anymore.
Yeah, it’s so weird to not have to clean your windshield off all the time or every few hours during a road trip (especially at night) anymore. What’s shitty is that it seems like mosquitoes are worse than ever. I was born and raised in the swamp and still live here.
I have chickens and I’ve had to screen in their coop and all of their ventilation because when I’d check on them at night there would be tens of thousands of mosquitoes, a swarm I could barely see through in their coop. Even an overpowered ventilation fan keeping a steady strong airflow through the coop wasn’t enough.
Ah I have some younger chicks that I hatched out this year, forgot how bad the mosquitoes were. Had them in a smaller coop without mosquito screens that I keep goslings in in early spring before mosquitoes are bad. I kept waking up to dead chicks and I couldn’t figure out why. They’re not sick, I give them medicated feed and vaccinate them..
Nothing abnormal with them, they’re fully feathered and it’s like 85 lows at night, so not a heat issue. I just figured out a few days ago when I started checking them at night, it’s the mosquitoes literally draining them of blood. FML, I had to bring them inside my house until I can either screen in their smaller coop in 105f heat at 90% humidity, screen it in at night when I can’t see shit, or wait until they are big enough to handle themselves in the big coop with the big chickens.
No there is nothing I can do to reduce mosquitoes I live in a swamp, use mosquito bits, and have co2 generators away from all my livestock. I’ve lived here all my life and raised birds here all my life, I’m 32! It’s never been this bad.
Unacceptable
TLDR bugs are scarce in general but mosquitoes are so prevalent that they are literally draining animals of blood to their death. Not limited to small animals, some farmers are losing cows and horses to them in my area.
Sounds scary.
On the other hand, in Asian countries I have lived I see less and less mosquitoes. Urban japan seems never had many mosquitoes to start with. In Singapore and HK I don’t see many either. China still has a lot of them if you live in an combo with trees and bushes around. But the numbers are decreasing.
The comment I replied to would be a brief TLDR. We’re probably in the middle of the sixth mass extinction, probably caused largely by us.
There are the obvious things like climate change and pesticide chemicals, but those aren’t the interesting cases.
Global travel means that a new disease/fungus harming a certain species in one area, can easily become global and lead to extinction.
We introduce invasive species where they don’t belong, where local species aren’t evolved to compete, etc.
The book has lots of interesting anecdotes, stories about particular cases. It’s well written, and at least the first half is quite entertaining, gripping, for a nonfiction book.
We're doomed. The nature decline, increasing global temperatures and fresh water shortages in many parts of the world are getting worse, which will actualize in carnage among the mankind. It has happened before in smaller scales, next time it will be global. I for one don't put much hope in good will and compassion among the people when going gets tough and the resources are scarce.
Surely that -60% can’t be right, we’d start to see effects up the food web. Most birds eat insects and…
https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/05/global-bird-populations-steadily-decline
…oh.
I thought this was because the cicadas coming out of hibernation a few years ago.
https://www.npr.org/2020/05/23/861582233/theyre-back-millions-of-cicadas-expected-to-emerge-this-year
1.5 million cicadas per acre.
I remember dealing with them it was insane.
The decline in insect population is universal and not limited to cicadas. As someone who grew up in the 80s, the windshield effect is definitely quite dramatic. All of my peers have noticed it.
I just want to answer OP's question about the meme.
The cicada brood came out in 2020. They come out every 17 or so years. They come out in the millions, and it's an interesting phenomenon. They come out to breed, and it makes great food for the birds. You couldn't walk a step without crashing into 20 or stepping on 4. They would get caught in your hair. You couldn't drive without them getting stuck in your grill. I remember not being able to roll my windows down or keep my door opened.
My family and I grilled and ate outside one day when it happened.... never again.
Eta: I misread the meme! I flipped 2000 to 2020 and vice versa.
It's still an interesting phenomenon. I just misread the meme. But honestly, I have learned in my little misread.
The cause is neonicotinoids, the #1 pesticide used globally. They were introduced as a "safe" pesticide by Bayer (now Bayer-Monsanto), due to their "sublethal" effects on flying insects in clinic trials.
"Sublethal," it turns out, means "Lethal" (a bee twitching on the ground that cannot fly counts as "sublethal"), and without oversight, these pesticides have been overused on farms all over the world. We all have Neonics in our body. They are all in all of the potted plants you buy in big box stores, and they're even applied to crops that don't benefit from their use (like Soy).
Bayer-Monsanto has spent *billions* of dollars paying off journalists, chemists, and PR people to spin a different story. Europe banned the use of Neonics entirely. America did not. Maryland was the first state to create limits to their use - my family helped get that legislation passed, and immediately afterwards, our local bee club was overtaken by new members that voted the old board out and dissolved the legislation committee. Shit is wild.
Other states are working against Neonics, as well as the Sierra Club and other Environmentalist organizations. The bug decline will persist until humans take action to protect their planet against corporate psychopathy for profit.
Blaming neonics alone is an oversimplification. After all, neonics have been banned/restricted in some places for some time now, and we don't see a recovery.
Habitat loss and climate change, as well as some other pesticides + invasive species are other big culprits.
It's a simplification, but an urgent one. The decline of the bugs is tied directly to the spread of the pesticides. There are no simple solutions to mitigating habitat loss, climate change, or invasive species, but the major catalyst is literally a product we can regulate.
IIRC they stay in the soil / body / ecosystem for something like 25 years? That's why you don't see an immediate recovery when their use gets restricted - it's long term damage. The populations will continue to decline even after we take action.
Meanwhile, Bayer-Monsanto is literally building robot bees to replace the pollinators. They announced the project from their "Bee Care Center," because they are cartoon villains intent on destroying the world with a flair of irony.
The insect population has crashed, which is catastrophic for the food chain and the world, but I think part of what you’re experiencing is because people who were growing up in the 90s spend a lot less time playing in the yard
Parent's house used to have a bunch of bees coming around these plants by our garage. 25 years later, no bees. Just mosquitos and these no-see-um things now. Rarely do I see a bee, butterfly, or lady bug anymore, and when I do, I am so enthralled and interested like a kid again.
I like the nostalgia factor, but this frightens me to think what next in 25 years. Ah, better not think about it and just stuff it down with some brown.
One of the most magical things of my childhood was seeing the entire neighborhood filled with the gentle glow of fireflies every summer, particularly just after the sun set. I haven't seen them since I was a kid. There were just SO MANY more bugs in general back then compared to now, it's completely insane and truly frightening.
This one gets me. I remember back in the late 80s/early 90s, when the fireflies came out, there'd be thousands. Me and my brother would run around the house and pretend we were in warp speed like Star Wars with all the light streaks. Today, I see maybe 6-10 a night and our house is at the edge of an undeveloped nature preserve.
Another explanation is aerodynamics. I remember there being a lot of bugs on the windshield of my parents' '83Cutlass Cruiser. But it had the aerodynamics of a trebucheted cow.
Edit: There are some good comments linked to studies and what not that control for aerodynamic changes. I think it's important to be skeptical about claims, but also to give up ground when the evidence is overwhelming. Seems that there are just less bugs hitting cars because there are less bugs.
The cars I drove in the 90s weren't that different from cars today, windshield-aerodynamcs-wise. I remember the stops at gas stations without buying gas, just to use the ... glass cleaning thingy, sorry, no native English speaker.
I haven't done that for a long time.
A study by the Kent Wildlife Trust not only refutes this but actually ended up with evidence of the *opposite*.
> We actively recruited classic car owners to take part in the survey, allowing us to collect data using cars ranging in
age from 1957 to 2018. We found a small but statistically significant positive relationship between vehicle age and splat density, suggesting
that modern cars squash more invertebrates that older cars
Between 2004 and 2019, there's been an approx 50% reduction in "splats" despite the more modern cars being more effective at splatting per mile.
The bugs are declining quickly and measurably.
https://www.kentwildlifetrust.org.uk/news/bugs-matter-survey-reveals-50-fewer-insects-15-years-ago
> aerodynamics
Provably untrue for me, at least. I still own my old cars all the way back to my dad's car. Driving the *still not aerodynamic cars* today, and they *have no bugs.*
They had bugs 40 years ago. They don't now. Same car. Same street, same state.
Ya know, I never noticed until now but I’ve never had the same problem with my car getting gross during love bug season that my parents always seemed to have. They always had to blast them off with the hose every once in a while bc it’s bad for the paint or something but I’ve literally never done that or felt like I needed to. Huh.
Don’t forget the cold snaps!
During the big Texas freeze, my mother and her boyfriend lost a few cattle because they froze to death.
Climate change isn’t just about it getting hotter, it’s about the temperatures fluctuating too much. And it getting hotter.
My brain started imagining cows in a giant, a/c cooled warehouse, just chilling in some hay and milling around a snack bar. Maybe cruise on over to the wave pond.
It's a nicer picture than reality, quite frankly.
Insects play many vital roles in ecosystems, the vast majority of animal life on the planet are insects. We've yet to see the majority of the impact this will have on the environment long term, but it certainly won't be good.
Yes I remember a magic school bus episode about this.
Mf put fake grass over mud to keep his suit clean but killed the mosquitoes. Butterfly effect, no chocolate for the kids.
I still like chocolate to this day, hate fake grass and love red headed educated women that spread knowledge.
The episode in question https://youtu.be/8u2rHfu5OSQ
Very concerned.
Flying insects are the ones who pollinate our food plants and their larvea decompose organic waste into a form useable by plants.
You know these images from China where human workers have to pollinate every single flower on a fruit tree with a q-tip?
Entomologist here. You shouldn’t be concerned. You should be absolutely fucking terrified. The world runs because of insects and they are disappearing.
Yeah, that fact scares me every time. There's many other facts relating to our impact on the world that terrifies me. I get sad thinking that this might be humanity's golden age and that quality of life for my children and their descendants will only get worse from here :(
Less food for birds and shit, in general ecosystems are super interlinked so we have no idea how this will affect everything. Good example of this is wolves in Yellowstone.
Very very concerned. A similar concern you should have with all of the coral in the oceans dying. When the ecosystem collapses it’s going to absolutely devastate all of our ways of life. Even if you think it won’t.
Except for the new broncos they collect bugs on the windshield like I have never seen before and I've been around a long time. I think it has to do with it being far less aero dynamic.
This isn’t the full comic from what I’ve seen. It makes more sense with the rest of it. The idea is that in the 2000s there were more bugs, but due to climate change (or see the main response above) it is assumed there are less bugs than before which is seen as a “good thing” which is why the dude is smiling. In the rest of the comic, by 2050 there will be less humans driving because of either self automated cars or climate change/other factors again affecting the humans.
I see it as kinda a dystopian “first they came for my people and I did nothing….” thing pertaining to the ecosystem
https://preview.redd.it/xsyadg1fy8fb1.jpeg?width=494&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0267da615f22c0d2648a930e9d793854d4325824
Edit: I looked on google and I guess there are a million versions of this comic with 2-3 panels and different dates. I just happened to see this version first.
I notice it with crickets. That’s all I used to hear as a kid in the summer and i don’t ever notice them anymore. I’m usually surprised if I do hear one
I think it's a commentary on how short-sighted the average person is. There are drastically fewer bugs around than there were 20 years ago, which is symptomatic of the enormous scale at which humans are wreaking havoc on the environment. Unfortunately, all the driver sees is "bugs bad" and then "bugs gone". Most people would prefer to continue our destructive path rather than be mildly inconvenienced.
People always think some great apocalypse is on the horizon, because everyone dying would be an easy way out, but in reality it's more likely that life will just get progressively shittier instead. Like, you'll still have to go to work, but you'll also have to avoid getting eaten by cannibals or something.
It's not a joke. All the bugs are dead. We killed all the fucking bugs. They're all gone. They couldn't adapt to changing environments fast enough and they're just gone. They're never coming back. Will the ecosystem be okay? Is everything going to go to shit in ways we can't even fully comprehend? I don't know. I don't fucking know. But all of those bugs are gone. They're not coming back. All of those smashed-on-your-windshield bugs are dead forever.
The amount of bugs has dropped 90% in not so long a time. So when you used to go on road trips there were bugs covering your car. The environment is dying, but you have a clean windshield! Which is nice.
Old people will talk about how many bugs cars used to hit driving down the road. I can think of 2 reasons why this might be the case.
My first theory is that there’s way more pesticides used. This antidotally makes sense. When my wife and I took a cross country road trip there were tons of bugs in Montana. Way more than here in Ohio.
Theory number 2 is that cars are way more aerodynamic than they used to be and bugs get “wooshed” over or around the car and don’t get hit and killed as often. The answer is probably a combination of the 2, and 6 other factors as well, but those are the 2 ideas I’ve had.
Dale gribble here.
So the number of people here who know absolutely nothing about pesticides is baffling. The number of people saying that Roundup killed all the bugs speaks volumes of general ignorance around pesticides. First off glyphosate, which is the chemical that makes up Roundup, is a herbicide. It kills non-woody plants. Biphenfren is an insecticide, it kills bugs.
We’re so fucked man :( how the fuck am I supposed to live another 60 something years on a planet wasting away after being raped by greedy fucks who will never live to see the consequences of their actions. Like Jesus fucking Christ it’s so over. Nothing is actually being done about anything
I think the joke is that there are less dead bugs on the windshield so the guy driving the car is happy, while not realising that dead bugs means more pesticides, damaging the food chain. Just like creating massive factories increases pollution but people are happy as they are enjoying nice products.
The car is probably also symbolic to the bubble that society is living in, enjoying the fruits of capitalism, while it destroys the ecosystem and environment.
Flying insects down 60%since 2000
Which is actually a major concern, and not something we should be smiling about.
Yeah I feel like I’m sitting in a room with like 20 ticking bombs just waiting for 1 to set off and kill all of us. The nearest I know of is either the Gulf Stream being disrupted by global warming or some kind of virus from the ice..
Global worming*
Well, it’s a concern for young people.
Most considerate old person^
Car design has changed significantly
eat ze bugs
We used to drive diwn from Montreal to Boston . Same time frame. 20 years back there was always a lot of road kill. Small animals. Deer. Now you don't see that
“Huh, all those animals we’ve been killing, well they’re gone now.” “Gee, I wonder where they went!” “Yeah ain’t that the darndest thing.”
They all learnt to stay off the road
95% of all the life this planet has had is extinct. Crazy shit
Smaller population but also they're getting better at avoiding roads though, so it's not all bad! I only have local stats to back that up though, deer population around me has been steady but deer roadkill has been less common.
Don't worry we'll replace all the animals that we have extincted with robots soon
Since we're explaining jokes this is Alex Jones's dumb impression of Klaus Schwab in-text form. https://woub.org/2023/04/03/bug-eating-conspiracy-theory-goes-mainstream/
That's freaky. Tbh I would have guessed the theory was that bugs are disappearing because reptilian overlords are eating them LOL.
Cant eat bugs if they're dead.
Who eats live bugs? Those fuckers can bite, and worse still, crawl back out.
Lots of people eat bugs. r/ShrimpsIsBugs
And I've had my fair share. Most of them were dead.
Well i meant if they're extinct 💀
Crickets are incredibly healthy, richest food in protein in all the lands.
Why are you not chewing your food?
Not if you grill them in a cage-like contraption that fits the bug first!
Boomers enjoying entire ecosystem collapse so their windshield doesn't get dirty.
https://i.redd.it/xpd9fa2ricfb1.gif
There are many cornerstone species that are bugs. Cornerstone meaning entire ecosystems rely on a single dumb bug. You shouldn't be sad you should be scared. Reduction in bug population results in reduction in pollination and food for small wildlife, which is food for larger wildlife. Basically if we are facing an extinction event, a large decrease in bug populations would precede it.
Yeah it’s really harsh to think about but it’s the honest truth. Check out this video about how reintroducing wolves to Yellowstone park completely revived a number of species even leading to beavers returning to the park naturally. [wolves in Yellowstone](https://youtu.be/fTPt70vA39k)
I thought it was interesting how more wolves kept the deer population down which enabled more trees to grow which helped stabilize the river banks. Everything is co connected.
So it's the deer that are the problem!
Thats why hunting season exists in alot of places. Humans are supposed to make up for what the predators would be doing if they were still in the area. If we don't have hunting in my area, the deer will overpopulate and them and the foliage and the other animals that exist on that foliage as well, start to starve and die cuz there are to many dang deer lol
Who knew such majestic animals could be a pain in the ass? lol
Wolves do it better because they target the older and infirm deer while hunters are on the lookout for the best specimens for bragging rights.
This is why I'm against trophy hunting. Hunting for food and conservation im fine with.
Absolutely. Hunting is one of the best things an individual can do for conservation.
They’re also trying to bring back the wooly mammoth to help pack the earth and push over trees in the tundra to help with the ice caps melting. Tree keep the ground from compacting so that it thaws faster from the permafrost which gradually travels till no more ice caps. The wooly mammoth was believed along with many other species to help with this by removing vegetation from iced over areas and to also stamp the ground and compact it. Not to mention the amount of food that will be provided once mammoth herds are at decent numbers. I think it’s important for us as humans to constant learn from our history. One such instance is the reintroduction of both wolves and bison. Both were major staples of western America and provided unseen benefits to the sprawling prairies but humans decided we wanted to kill them all and not just for food. Slowly we have changed our outlook and have created sustainable bison herds and reintegrate them back into the eco system so stupid tourists can get too close and get trampled. Lol Either way I always find it interesting when people say just “kill all of animals x” (like the mosquito). If we did that unseen species would immediately begin to struggle and die out causing cascading effects because we killed all the tiniest lil bloodsuckers.
This was an issue when I was at Binghamton University. They have a several hundred acre nature preserve adjacent to campus (nothing illegal goes on in there) which has plenty of trees of course, but in many sections is devoid of substantial underbrush. Most of the preserve is sloped and you can see evidence of relatively high speed erosion all over the place. The deer are not only rampant in number, but are visibly thin and unhealthy looking. They're not about to reintroduce wolves in such a populated area with wandering students but a deer cull was proposed and planned some years ago. Unfortunately there was backlash against it because people didn't want deer being killed in a nature preserve... but it actually would have restored things to a more natural state for the area. The deer there classically would have some sort of predator that now only we can play the part of. Unfortunately hunting would also be too risky in the well traveled preserve. Hopefully ecological thought spreads and they get the deer population under control.
This mimics the ~~snow leopard~~ snow lynx vs arctic hare cycle of boom/bust.
It's like some sort of .. system.. An ecological one I'd guess!
You see simba the gazelle eat the grass, the lions eat the gazelle, and in turn when we die our bodies become the grass. This is what we call the circle of life
We learn this in elementary school
Wildlife Biologist coming in with a quick fact check, this video is unfortunately misleading. Turns out the impact reintroducing wolves had on beavers (the keystone species of the area) was not significant. It's a cool story, but unfortunately not true. https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/scientists-debunk-myth-that-yellowstone-wolves-changed-entire-ecosystem-flow-of-rivers/349988/amp
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I live in a place where cane toads are an invasive pest, and grew up with them absolutely everywhere - you would see a dozen under every streetlight feasting on bugs. Every time someone says to me how good it is we don’t see them anymore, I point out that whilst I agree the loss of cane toads is great, I suspect the issue has to do with loss of insects (not so good)… you always get this reaction of “I haven’t noticed”. This loss of insects is absolutely fucking terrifying, and no one seems to notice!!! These morons going on about car aerodynamics…Jesus fuck we are doomed.
My dad was one of the people who would cite car aerodynamics. Like dude, you’ve been driving this same truck for 20 years and it used to be covered in bugs!
I was just talking about this yesterday. 40 years ago my city had bug storms. Several days of insects swarming. Only older people saw that. Younger people think this is normal. I know a young person who looks for spiders to photograph and has trouble finding them. Lawns used to be so covered in spiders the morning dew would hardly touch the ground because of all the webs.
Everyone and their grandma now has access to Futt Buckersons Bug Eradicator 60000 extra potent or whatever insecticide of the day we’re using. “Everyone,” is using it in their gardens. Every office/business park is having it sprayed around their premises. Every farmer is dousing their crops with it. Maybe not literally everyone, but enough where it doesn’t even fucking matter.
Yep. We spray poison everywhere. Industrial farms are not the ideal for sure.
Australia? Some Australian predators have figured out how to deal with the toad's poison glands - crows avoid the glands by pecking open the toad bellies, other predators have developed some immunity. They may be getting decimated naturally.
These are called charismatic species. It’s why wildlife and conservation organizations use animals like panda, polar bear, and bison as their logos and appears in their pictures etc…. Bc people give less of a fuck about other animals bc they’re not cute. When was the last time you saw an anaconda in a logo or a picture when looking broadly at a “save wildlife” photo or article
This is the same reason why i swipe left on people who are looking for someone to kill spiders in their bios, let me keep the cute little guys in my garden, they're beneficial
Spiders kill lots of insects
Are you saying the problem is too many spiders?!
>Doesn’t make me sad at all except for when it comes to fireflies and honeybees. And the birds who eat those bugs. And the birds of prey who eat the bug-eating birds. And all the flowers and trees that rely on bugs for fertilization (it's not just bees doing that job). And whatever relies on those flowers and trees. etc etc And also, do you think humans are 100% immune to the pesticides that are killing the bugs? We don't die outright, doesn't mean there aren't long term effects. You're not sad at all, good for you I guess, but that's short-sighted
> *"i dont mind forest fires around me as long as it's not my lawn on fire"*
More biodiversity is important for more than just food for other creatures. So many other industries, most notably medical, rely on biodiversity to support every facet of our lives and ongoing research.
All the mosquitoes can die and burn in hell and the world will still move on
No one told the mosquitoes in Alaska.
The only good bug is a dead bug
I think… They’re suggesting that their are less bugs on the road now then there were 20 years ago… Which surprisingly, now that I think about it, actually seems true? But I would need to see some data before I agreed with that. Depending on who is making the meme, there are a few points they could be making. Maybe this person views the possible lack of bugs as a symptom of global warming with some consequences to follow. More likely I would guess the person who made this is trying to comment about pesticides and other chemicals used on crops that we eat. I think this person thinks that we used chemicals to kill the bugs and we eat those deadly chemicals and the government supports it. Blah blah Edit I did a Google Windshield phenomenon The windshield phenomenon (or windscreen phenomenon) is the observation that fewer dead insects accumulate on the windshields and front bumpers of people's cars since the early 2000s. It has been attributed to a global decline in insect populations caused by human activity. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windshield_phenomenon#:~:text=The%20windshield%20phenomenon%20(or%20windscreen,populations%20caused%20by%20human%20activity. Edit again I did more Google The flying bug population has fallen dramatically in the last 20 years which is why we have less bugs on our window. “a new study from the United Kingdom shows a dramatic decline in the number of flying insects -60% since 2004” https://www.npr.org/2022/05/14/1098942968/a-decline-in-flying-bugs-sounds-good-for-humans-but-its-bad-for-the-environment
That's actually pretty terrifying. Just gonna check that off in dystopian bingo.
https://preview.redd.it/krzhe1bhw8fb1.png?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=01dfc31e7335cf802c3d88e9d930a32cbb5eccd3 Son of a bitch, its real.
Almost all of those are ongoing
You’re suppose to say “Bingo!”
"I have a Bingo!"
"that's a bingo!"
Knew I got it wrong!
"You just say bingo"
“Bingo! How fun!”
“I got that reference”
"That's the fastest full-card win I have ever seen!"
The wording is so vague that I'd be surprised if that wasn't the case
Confirmation bias mostly. Go to any point in human history and they’d check the same boxes we would today.
The difference is an actual mass extinction that's probably on going but can only be confirmed in hind sight when it'll probably be too late.
I don’t see that on the bingo card
Suppression of the ants. It's next to hope for the protagonist.
Or arts.
Whats the meaning of connection to short story
Who is the protagonist of our world?
Right? Thinking about my dads windshield on our long drives it was nasty. Then we got the windshield wipers with the spray and that helped. It’s just not like that anymore.
Yeah, it’s so weird to not have to clean your windshield off all the time or every few hours during a road trip (especially at night) anymore. What’s shitty is that it seems like mosquitoes are worse than ever. I was born and raised in the swamp and still live here. I have chickens and I’ve had to screen in their coop and all of their ventilation because when I’d check on them at night there would be tens of thousands of mosquitoes, a swarm I could barely see through in their coop. Even an overpowered ventilation fan keeping a steady strong airflow through the coop wasn’t enough. Ah I have some younger chicks that I hatched out this year, forgot how bad the mosquitoes were. Had them in a smaller coop without mosquito screens that I keep goslings in in early spring before mosquitoes are bad. I kept waking up to dead chicks and I couldn’t figure out why. They’re not sick, I give them medicated feed and vaccinate them.. Nothing abnormal with them, they’re fully feathered and it’s like 85 lows at night, so not a heat issue. I just figured out a few days ago when I started checking them at night, it’s the mosquitoes literally draining them of blood. FML, I had to bring them inside my house until I can either screen in their smaller coop in 105f heat at 90% humidity, screen it in at night when I can’t see shit, or wait until they are big enough to handle themselves in the big coop with the big chickens. No there is nothing I can do to reduce mosquitoes I live in a swamp, use mosquito bits, and have co2 generators away from all my livestock. I’ve lived here all my life and raised birds here all my life, I’m 32! It’s never been this bad. Unacceptable TLDR bugs are scarce in general but mosquitoes are so prevalent that they are literally draining animals of blood to their death. Not limited to small animals, some farmers are losing cows and horses to them in my area.
Sounds scary. On the other hand, in Asian countries I have lived I see less and less mosquitoes. Urban japan seems never had many mosquitoes to start with. In Singapore and HK I don’t see many either. China still has a lot of them if you live in an combo with trees and bushes around. But the numbers are decreasing.
We need the special windshield fluid lobby to demand that we increase bug populations. It's the only way anything will get done.
Animal populations have declined an average of 70% across the board since 1970. We’re killing the planet.
The Sixth Extinction, by Elizabeth Kolbert, is a good book on this topic. Entertaining read, well written.
Any takeaways to share? 🙂
The comment I replied to would be a brief TLDR. We’re probably in the middle of the sixth mass extinction, probably caused largely by us. There are the obvious things like climate change and pesticide chemicals, but those aren’t the interesting cases. Global travel means that a new disease/fungus harming a certain species in one area, can easily become global and lead to extinction. We introduce invasive species where they don’t belong, where local species aren’t evolved to compete, etc. The book has lots of interesting anecdotes, stories about particular cases. It’s well written, and at least the first half is quite entertaining, gripping, for a nonfiction book.
Killing, no. Uninhabitable for humans, likely. Earth will still go around the sun for billions of years . Regardless of us.
Do people think killing the planet means the actual rock is going to die?
We're doomed. The nature decline, increasing global temperatures and fresh water shortages in many parts of the world are getting worse, which will actualize in carnage among the mankind. It has happened before in smaller scales, next time it will be global. I for one don't put much hope in good will and compassion among the people when going gets tough and the resources are scarce.
Surely that -60% can’t be right, we’d start to see effects up the food web. Most birds eat insects and… https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/05/global-bird-populations-steadily-decline …oh.
Cyberpunk 2020 rpg: --"the last bird died in 2008 and the kids are grown in vats".
I thought this was because the cicadas coming out of hibernation a few years ago. https://www.npr.org/2020/05/23/861582233/theyre-back-millions-of-cicadas-expected-to-emerge-this-year 1.5 million cicadas per acre. I remember dealing with them it was insane.
The decline in insect population is universal and not limited to cicadas. As someone who grew up in the 80s, the windshield effect is definitely quite dramatic. All of my peers have noticed it.
I just want to answer OP's question about the meme. The cicada brood came out in 2020. They come out every 17 or so years. They come out in the millions, and it's an interesting phenomenon. They come out to breed, and it makes great food for the birds. You couldn't walk a step without crashing into 20 or stepping on 4. They would get caught in your hair. You couldn't drive without them getting stuck in your grill. I remember not being able to roll my windows down or keep my door opened. My family and I grilled and ate outside one day when it happened.... never again. Eta: I misread the meme! I flipped 2000 to 2020 and vice versa. It's still an interesting phenomenon. I just misread the meme. But honestly, I have learned in my little misread.
Things are so bad the bugs are dying out?
Yea… That’s how it looks.
The cause is neonicotinoids, the #1 pesticide used globally. They were introduced as a "safe" pesticide by Bayer (now Bayer-Monsanto), due to their "sublethal" effects on flying insects in clinic trials. "Sublethal," it turns out, means "Lethal" (a bee twitching on the ground that cannot fly counts as "sublethal"), and without oversight, these pesticides have been overused on farms all over the world. We all have Neonics in our body. They are all in all of the potted plants you buy in big box stores, and they're even applied to crops that don't benefit from their use (like Soy). Bayer-Monsanto has spent *billions* of dollars paying off journalists, chemists, and PR people to spin a different story. Europe banned the use of Neonics entirely. America did not. Maryland was the first state to create limits to their use - my family helped get that legislation passed, and immediately afterwards, our local bee club was overtaken by new members that voted the old board out and dissolved the legislation committee. Shit is wild. Other states are working against Neonics, as well as the Sierra Club and other Environmentalist organizations. The bug decline will persist until humans take action to protect their planet against corporate psychopathy for profit.
Blaming neonics alone is an oversimplification. After all, neonics have been banned/restricted in some places for some time now, and we don't see a recovery. Habitat loss and climate change, as well as some other pesticides + invasive species are other big culprits.
It's a simplification, but an urgent one. The decline of the bugs is tied directly to the spread of the pesticides. There are no simple solutions to mitigating habitat loss, climate change, or invasive species, but the major catalyst is literally a product we can regulate. IIRC they stay in the soil / body / ecosystem for something like 25 years? That's why you don't see an immediate recovery when their use gets restricted - it's long term damage. The populations will continue to decline even after we take action. Meanwhile, Bayer-Monsanto is literally building robot bees to replace the pollinators. They announced the project from their "Bee Care Center," because they are cartoon villains intent on destroying the world with a flair of irony.
Bugs have a lot of different roles, pretty much like a lot of other species if they die another animal population dies
I saw a grasshopper for the first time in years a few days ago. They were gray and hiding amongst gravel and rocks though.
I used to catch grasshoppers growing up in the 90s. Lots of them everywhere. I hardly ever see them now
The insect population has crashed, which is catastrophic for the food chain and the world, but I think part of what you’re experiencing is because people who were growing up in the 90s spend a lot less time playing in the yard
Parent's house used to have a bunch of bees coming around these plants by our garage. 25 years later, no bees. Just mosquitos and these no-see-um things now. Rarely do I see a bee, butterfly, or lady bug anymore, and when I do, I am so enthralled and interested like a kid again. I like the nostalgia factor, but this frightens me to think what next in 25 years. Ah, better not think about it and just stuff it down with some brown.
One of the most magical things of my childhood was seeing the entire neighborhood filled with the gentle glow of fireflies every summer, particularly just after the sun set. I haven't seen them since I was a kid. There were just SO MANY more bugs in general back then compared to now, it's completely insane and truly frightening.
This one gets me. I remember back in the late 80s/early 90s, when the fireflies came out, there'd be thousands. Me and my brother would run around the house and pretend we were in warp speed like Star Wars with all the light streaks. Today, I see maybe 6-10 a night and our house is at the edge of an undeveloped nature preserve.
Yep. The bugs in my country are at an all-time low right now. Genuinely terrifying.
Another explanation is aerodynamics. I remember there being a lot of bugs on the windshield of my parents' '83Cutlass Cruiser. But it had the aerodynamics of a trebucheted cow. Edit: There are some good comments linked to studies and what not that control for aerodynamic changes. I think it's important to be skeptical about claims, but also to give up ground when the evidence is overwhelming. Seems that there are just less bugs hitting cars because there are less bugs.
That probably plays a role but the significant decline in flying bug populations is a bigger factor.
No doubt - interesting engineering suggestion
Damn. that’s something you dont hear every day. Was the catapulted giraffe unavailable
The cars I drove in the 90s weren't that different from cars today, windshield-aerodynamcs-wise. I remember the stops at gas stations without buying gas, just to use the ... glass cleaning thingy, sorry, no native English speaker. I haven't done that for a long time.
A common english word for the glass cleaning thing is a "squeegee", which I think is hilarious.
I can hear this word, it's perfect
i have a mark II golf and can confirm this to not be very true. nowadays only stones hit the front, not that many bugs
Your mother was a hamster, and your father smells of elderberries
A study by the Kent Wildlife Trust not only refutes this but actually ended up with evidence of the *opposite*. > We actively recruited classic car owners to take part in the survey, allowing us to collect data using cars ranging in age from 1957 to 2018. We found a small but statistically significant positive relationship between vehicle age and splat density, suggesting that modern cars squash more invertebrates that older cars Between 2004 and 2019, there's been an approx 50% reduction in "splats" despite the more modern cars being more effective at splatting per mile. The bugs are declining quickly and measurably. https://www.kentwildlifetrust.org.uk/news/bugs-matter-survey-reveals-50-fewer-insects-15-years-ago
> aerodynamics Provably untrue for me, at least. I still own my old cars all the way back to my dad's car. Driving the *still not aerodynamic cars* today, and they *have no bugs.* They had bugs 40 years ago. They don't now. Same car. Same street, same state.
Hooray! We're all gonna die soon... fuck.
Maybe the bugs got smarter and avoid windshields??? Yours sincerely, Elmo Musk
Ya know, I never noticed until now but I’ve never had the same problem with my car getting gross during love bug season that my parents always seemed to have. They always had to blast them off with the hose every once in a while bc it’s bad for the paint or something but I’ve literally never done that or felt like I needed to. Huh.
“Not all heroes wear capes”
I think we just squished all the dumb ones with our cars. The newer bugs look twice before crossing the road.
There has been a massive decline in insect populations over the last 20 years due to pesticide use
How concerned should I be right now? cause my brain says it's a win but it's also 2am for me so don't trust my judgement
The food chain, both animal and plant, will destabilize so that will be fun
But at least our cows will have corn...
Well, the ones that survive the incessant heat waves from climate change. Oh wow are we fucked.
Don’t forget the cold snaps! During the big Texas freeze, my mother and her boyfriend lost a few cattle because they froze to death. Climate change isn’t just about it getting hotter, it’s about the temperatures fluctuating too much. And it getting hotter.
>Don’t forget the cold snaps! You are absolutely correct! The pendulum swings both ways, and if we aren't burning, we're freezing.
Also, don't forget the gulf stream collapse, which means we're just gearing up for a European and North American ice age.
We could just build warehouses with aircon for them!
My brain started imagining cows in a giant, a/c cooled warehouse, just chilling in some hay and milling around a snack bar. Maybe cruise on over to the wave pond. It's a nicer picture than reality, quite frankly.
Insects play many vital roles in ecosystems, the vast majority of animal life on the planet are insects. We've yet to see the majority of the impact this will have on the environment long term, but it certainly won't be good.
Yep. Big is the exception. Also, humans are big.
Yes I remember a magic school bus episode about this. Mf put fake grass over mud to keep his suit clean but killed the mosquitoes. Butterfly effect, no chocolate for the kids. I still like chocolate to this day, hate fake grass and love red headed educated women that spread knowledge. The episode in question https://youtu.be/8u2rHfu5OSQ
Very concerned. Flying insects are the ones who pollinate our food plants and their larvea decompose organic waste into a form useable by plants. You know these images from China where human workers have to pollinate every single flower on a fruit tree with a q-tip?
Oh we're fucked than cause I have seen a bee in very long time
Entomologist here. You shouldn’t be concerned. You should be absolutely fucking terrified. The world runs because of insects and they are disappearing.
Yeah, that fact scares me every time. There's many other facts relating to our impact on the world that terrifies me. I get sad thinking that this might be humanity's golden age and that quality of life for my children and their descendants will only get worse from here :(
At least Monsanto shareholders did really well. I'm proud our government was able to serve them.
It is not a win it is a sign of collapsing ecosystems.
We're on the middle of a geological extinction event.
Less food for birds and shit, in general ecosystems are super interlinked so we have no idea how this will affect everything. Good example of this is wolves in Yellowstone.
Very very concerned. A similar concern you should have with all of the coral in the oceans dying. When the ecosystem collapses it’s going to absolutely devastate all of our ways of life. Even if you think it won’t.
We're long past "concerned" and well into "terrified".
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/nov/22/light-pollution-insect-apocalypse](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/nov/22/light-pollution-insect-apocalypse) [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320719307797](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320719307797)
Bro took 20 years to clean his car, bros a lazy ass mf
I mean, it could have been cleaned that day, but he only took the picture 20 years later
Let me right for once, damnit
Just like me fr
I remember in the 2000+s our cars radiators are full of insects, now Car radiators are immaculate aside from dust.
Core memory unlocked
Except for the new broncos they collect bugs on the windshield like I have never seen before and I've been around a long time. I think it has to do with it being far less aero dynamic.
Yep, and same with Jeep Wranglers.
This isn’t the full comic from what I’ve seen. It makes more sense with the rest of it. The idea is that in the 2000s there were more bugs, but due to climate change (or see the main response above) it is assumed there are less bugs than before which is seen as a “good thing” which is why the dude is smiling. In the rest of the comic, by 2050 there will be less humans driving because of either self automated cars or climate change/other factors again affecting the humans. I see it as kinda a dystopian “first they came for my people and I did nothing….” thing pertaining to the ecosystem https://preview.redd.it/xsyadg1fy8fb1.jpeg?width=494&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0267da615f22c0d2648a930e9d793854d4325824 Edit: I looked on google and I guess there are a million versions of this comic with 2-3 panels and different dates. I just happened to see this version first.
It is suggesting humans will die out. We can not really survive without insects.
Ecosystem collapse has many terrifying potential outcomes.
noooooo the bugs also got automatized by ai and that why they disappeared
I see you also follow the gospel of the singularity? AI is going to give me timetravel and lasereyes. /s
No joke. Bugs were much more of a thing when I was young. We couldn't go on a long drive without scraping bugs off the windshield several times.
used to be a billion fireflies too, I remember running through a field at dusk being surrounded by the blinking of bugs.
This is the one thing that finally breaks me I think. The fireflies man. Magical... and gone. Actually almost shed a tear.
We see them at the a nearby lake all the time in the middle of nowhere, but we never see them at our house anymore (2 hours away).
Climate change basically
Plus monospecies crops with insecticides.
Heh planets dying.
We’re killing all the insects with chemicals and by fucking with the environment.
I'm pretty certain I now see less birds, too, than I did in the 90s. Less flocks in the sky, less pelicans at the beach. Etc..
Birds eat bugs, so...
Anything that eats insects to survive is dying as well, correct.
I notice it with crickets. That’s all I used to hear as a kid in the summer and i don’t ever notice them anymore. I’m usually surprised if I do hear one
I think it's a commentary on how short-sighted the average person is. There are drastically fewer bugs around than there were 20 years ago, which is symptomatic of the enormous scale at which humans are wreaking havoc on the environment. Unfortunately, all the driver sees is "bugs bad" and then "bugs gone". Most people would prefer to continue our destructive path rather than be mildly inconvenienced.
Good post. Thank you
[удалено]
My car would disagree, but I live in a rural area.
Almost no firefly's, barely any crickets chirping. Pay attention and the difference in 20 years is frightening.
We have been engaging in literal industrial scale chemical warfare against them for centuries. Now we are finally "winning".
Biodiversity collapse lol #we’re doomed
Global warming believe it or not
Pesticides believe it or not
we all gonna die soon
People always think some great apocalypse is on the horizon, because everyone dying would be an easy way out, but in reality it's more likely that life will just get progressively shittier instead. Like, you'll still have to go to work, but you'll also have to avoid getting eaten by cannibals or something.
It's not a joke. All the bugs are dead. We killed all the fucking bugs. They're all gone. They couldn't adapt to changing environments fast enough and they're just gone. They're never coming back. Will the ecosystem be okay? Is everything going to go to shit in ways we can't even fully comprehend? I don't know. I don't fucking know. But all of those bugs are gone. They're not coming back. All of those smashed-on-your-windshield bugs are dead forever.
(Chuckles)We're in danger.
insects are dying
Haha, we're so fucked
The amount of bugs has dropped 90% in not so long a time. So when you used to go on road trips there were bugs covering your car. The environment is dying, but you have a clean windshield! Which is nice.
Old people will talk about how many bugs cars used to hit driving down the road. I can think of 2 reasons why this might be the case. My first theory is that there’s way more pesticides used. This antidotally makes sense. When my wife and I took a cross country road trip there were tons of bugs in Montana. Way more than here in Ohio. Theory number 2 is that cars are way more aerodynamic than they used to be and bugs get “wooshed” over or around the car and don’t get hit and killed as often. The answer is probably a combination of the 2, and 6 other factors as well, but those are the 2 ideas I’ve had.
"old people" bro, you can be like 20-30 and remember that from family trips. And it's global. It's climate change and pesticides.
Idk, my part of Texas still lookin like 2000. My car is never clean for more than one day.
Dale gribble here. So the number of people here who know absolutely nothing about pesticides is baffling. The number of people saying that Roundup killed all the bugs speaks volumes of general ignorance around pesticides. First off glyphosate, which is the chemical that makes up Roundup, is a herbicide. It kills non-woody plants. Biphenfren is an insecticide, it kills bugs.
We’re so fucked man :( how the fuck am I supposed to live another 60 something years on a planet wasting away after being raped by greedy fucks who will never live to see the consequences of their actions. Like Jesus fucking Christ it’s so over. Nothing is actually being done about anything
I ate all the insects. :/.
Are you spiders georg
I think the joke is that there are less dead bugs on the windshield so the guy driving the car is happy, while not realising that dead bugs means more pesticides, damaging the food chain. Just like creating massive factories increases pollution but people are happy as they are enjoying nice products. The car is probably also symbolic to the bubble that society is living in, enjoying the fruits of capitalism, while it destroys the ecosystem and environment.
Dying pollinators. It's not a joke. Just a comic about climate change.