Two options for environmentalists: fascism or capitalism
If you want to help this planet’s environment, you have two options: fascism or capitalism. Sort of puts the hippies in a pickle, as they hate both. But it’s simple: you can proscribe earth-saving technologies and practices (fascism), or you can allow people to adopt them voluntarily (capitalism). There is no in-between. There is no way to compromise between voluntary action and violent coercion. The Kyoto protocol (if you actually want to guarantee results that would satisfy it) squarely falls into the fascism side. If that makes you uncomfortable, take heart. There is another way.
I like to call it “free and sustainable environmentalism.” The best way to make new technology sustainable is to make it economically beneficial so that people will voluntarily adopt it. If a hybrid car would save me money, I’d buy one in a second. But it’s a losing deal. I get about a 30% mpg boost for a huge price and maintenance boost (and a resale value that plummets as the warranty on the batteries nears its end). The real environmentalists are the capitalists who are investing their money into new technologies that’ll be better for the environment and will save people money once they mature. The real environmentalists are the inventors who discover better technology and the entrepreneurs that bring it to the masses.
The prime example that is available today is Compact Fluorescent Lights. These low-energy light bulbs pay for themselves in energy savings within the first year, and for the next six years (or so), they generate a profit. That’s money in my pocket. That’s a no-brainer. Those are the only kind of bulbs we buy in my house now. Want to save the environment? Create a similar energy saving breakthrough for air conditioning. That’s half of my electric bill in the summer, here in Florida.
The best part is that, as a consumer, you don’t have to strain yourself. Just keep an eye out for better, greener technologies, and when it becomes economically beneficial to switch, switch — and then tell your friends.
Sure, the world is black and white?
… there are always only two choices. Some examples:
- Coke or Pepsi
- democracy or dictatorship
- fascism or capitalism
So you say it has to be “profitable” to switch to a greener technology. OK. But there is a flaw in your system, if you look at modern societies. No one puts reasonable prices on resources like “clean air”. Hence they are free, a notion, as you will likely agree, that doesn’t otherwise exist in capitalism.
So if the prices would be balanced according to the rules in capitalism and there was a price tag on, e.g. every single liter of air you (or your power supplier) pollute, it will most certainly pay off for more than “Compact Fluorescent Lights”, e.g. switching off the air-conditioning
The supply of air is limited and renewable only by “filters” like trees. So cutting down trees and at the same time polluting air is a NO NO and should be priced accordingly. Same for crude oil, coal and consequently gasoline, plastic and whatever secondary products are created from those primary resources.
You write:
A no-brainer? Maybe for you! But most certainly not for enough people world-wise. Apart from that consider only the light bulbs for ads … ridiculous.
Also, have you ever considered that other societies should have the same right to pollute the environment. Oh my goodness … I already imagine China allowing a per-capita pollution similar to the US, which accounts (currently) for one quarter of the worldwide CO2 emissions. Goodbye Earth.
Oh, and please read up on “fascism” and its original meaning. At least what you claim defines fascism will be found in many more societies, including capitalist ones.