Environmentalism: A Slippery Slope of Ignorance and Hypocrisy – by Saurabh Malkar (Modern Diplomacy – August 13, 2017)

http://moderndiplomacy.eu/

Perusing through my morning news digest, I came across an article from The Daily Mail featuring a story on the employment of child labor in cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

While I can be chillingly apathetic to social plight, especially, when it doesn’t concern my loved ones: something I impute to my upbringing in a third world country; I was deeply moved by this story, which shed light on the horrors of artisanal cobalt mining, employing children, working in dangerous conditions, with no safety measures, and being paid a pittance. The kicker, though, of this story was that much of this cobalt would go into battery packs that would be installed in electric cars marketed to gullible, do-gooders around the world.

But, why would one want to buy cars that take hours to refuel and can only be refueled at specific points, thus, imposing a massive time cost on their usage? These contraptions don’t match in utility to gasoline-powered cars, let alone surpassing them. No wonder governments around the world are trying to get consumers to buy electric cars through purchase subsidies and tax exemptions of all sorts.

Ever heard of an iPhone or a Mac being subsidized or tax exempted by the government to boost sales? You won’t because products that offer value sell like hotcakes; it’s only products that don’t offer any that need government interventions to hard sell them.

Another way of hard selling electric vehicles is through ‘virtue signaling.’ The sales pitch involves promises of reducing users’ carbon footprint, stemming the tide of climate change, and protecting the environment. But most importantly, it involves washing your hands off of gasoline, a product bloodstained due to the endless wars fought over it, one of the major promulgators of environmental and social injustice and displacement of indigenous folks.

Buying electric cars is thus, a route to salvation, accumulating good Karma, penitence, and all other moral goods. More importantly, it is also a way of segregating oneself from the ranks of the ignorant, irredeemable, hopeless, uneducated folks who drive around in gasoline powered vehicles polluting the environment, melting the ice caps, perpetuating wars and injustice, and pushing the world one step closer to Armageddon. Electric cars make the do-gooders feel good about themselves.

For the rest of this article: http://moderndiplomacy.eu/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=2848:environmentalism-a-slippery-slope-of-ignorance-and-hypocrisy&Itemid=151