Rampant consumerism and tech saviourism are not solely the domain of “nerds”, nor are they true of all “nerds”. The group you are looking for is “people”.

Plenty of people you would never consider nerds will throw away their old phone just to get the newer model. They will assume they have no responsibilities to the world or to the community because government/science/jesus will sort the big problems out. They will live in their own tiny worlds never even considering the bigger problems at play.

Why do you think this is a problem that only affects nerds?

Butter also works

You have opened my eyes, thank you

Just because something makes individuals happy doesn’t eliminate the consequences. Most people would probably agree that cars are more convenient for sure, but they are highly inefficient compared to public transport.

You might not trust your government to manage public transportation effectively and that’s completely reasonable, but is that the same as saying public transportation has no value and we should all just get cars and to hell with the consequences?

Yeah we should just never do anything if it doesn’t instantly fix the problem.