Hundreds of thousands of protesters took to German streets on Friday to demand a massive global reduction in carbon emissions.
But their march is the apex of irony. While these protesters like to blame America for carbon emissions, they neglect to note their own failings.
First, Germany’s carbon record is quite pathetic. German emissions have only started falling in the last year or so, and the government continues to rely on coal to supply the national power grid. Idiotic scaremongering over nuclear power has led Berlin to phase out that far cleaner power source, and this is the main reason German rhetoric and action are so incongruous.
Second, the solutions that these protesters present are just thinly veiled authoritarianism. When you start instructing people to stop eating meat and flying for vacations, the majority rightly view that as a nonstarter. Such suggestions close off all serious policy debate before the discussion even begins. They show that climate change advocacy is just a cover for an unrelated far-left ideology.
To be fair, this hypocrisy isn’t unique to Germany. Those international organizations supposedly responsible for climate coordination are equally bad. The international Climate Change Performance Index, for example, insanely suggested this year that China’s policy position on carbon emissions is better than America’s. This is a lie, proven by the almost unbelievable gall with which China spews out carbon and then claims to take climate change seriously.
Human-driven climate change is a real problem. But anyone with sense understands that it’s a problem to be dealt with through technological improvements that reduce carbon emissions and also protect living standards. It isn’t about meaningless international treaties such as the Paris accord, which allow major polluters such as China and India to do nothing on carbon emissions, leave the European Union to do little, and mostly just burden America (which has in most recent years led the world in carbon reductions). That approach only guarantees more economic hardship for our citizens, especially the poorest.
International climate protesters need to look in the mirror. They might find their own nations aren’t so visionary after all.
