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Let's Get Real About Climate Change [1]

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Date: 2023-03-27

A lot of people claim to be really concerned about climate change, but I don’t buy it. If the situation is really as dire as the scientists lead us to believe, we need to stop wasting fuel on recreation. I am not referring to driving somewhere to have fun, but activities where the fun is the burning of fuel. For example, it’s fine to drive to the lake to go swimming on a hot day, but we should frown on hopping on a jet-ski and zooming around in circles just for the exhilaration of doing it. It’s fun, I know—but can we really afford that?

Even worse are those activities where people drive a car as fast as they can, going precisely nowhere, just to see how fast they can go. You know, NASCAR, Indy 500, drag racing—where the activity IS the burning of fuel. Those cars are not known for being fuel-efficient. We simply can’t afford recreation like that anymore—at least until we get our CO 2 level under control, if we ever do.

Why has no one called for banning car races? Well, no Republican has, because they do not accept that the situation is as dire as it is. And no Democrat has, because it would be political suicide. Remember the shit John Kerry took by pretending to like NASCAR—can you imagine what would happen to someone who suggested banning it?? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t blame them, I would rather have Democrats elected than Republicans. But on the other hand, SOMEONE should start raising the subject. We have to stop wasting fuel on frivolous activities.

So, as long as I am going to be the bad guy who brings up unpleasant subjects, let’s talk about college sports. UCLA and USC recently joined the Big Ten, which means that every weekend, a huge jet will carry a football team from southern California to somewhere in the midwest (or vice versa) so that they can play a game that has little to do with a college education. There has been a lot of conversation about whether big-time sports are appropriate activities for universities, I will leave that conversation for others. But regardless of where you stand on that issue, can’t we at least agree that there is no need to travel long distances to play those games? There are plenty of other universities nearby: really, no college team should ever get on an airplane for any reason. If you can’t get there on a bus, you shouldn’t be going there. Remember, sports are “extracurricular activities.”

And while we are on the subject of sports, what about professional sports? Every week the sky is crisscrossed by airplanes that are delivering pro sports teams from one city to another, in order to play a game for the entertainment of fans. Some even fly to Europe to play their games, then turn around and come home the next day. Again, it would be political suicide to suggest that we ban pro sports. But if we don’t, we cannot pretend that we are serious about facing down an existential crisis.

The bottom line here is that we will not change people’s behavior by simply appealing to their better nature. Historically, the only thing that consistently works to make people change is economics. If gas cost $15-20 a gallon instead of $3-4, and jet fuel increased by a similar factor, none of these things would be happening. Pro sports tickets would be prohibitively expensive to all but the very rich, and people might think twice about spending $100 to tool around on their jet-ski.

Considering the PR disaster that accompanied $5 gas last year, I do not expect anyone to propose $20 gas prices. But I believe that if we fail to even raise the subject, we are admitting that we are not as concerned about climate change as we claim to be. People are dying, folks, and many more will do so if we don’t get serious about this.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/27/2160374/-Let-s-Get-Real-About-Climate-Change

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