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Wednesday, September 7, 2022

Mike Hosking: Climate warriors still not living in reality


We have the headline "A beauty buffs guide to Sydney. Where to stay, shop and spoil yourself."

There are a lot of those headlines about these days. That's despite the fact Auckland Airport refuses to look like it's open and despite the fact international travel is only at 50 percent of pre pandemic levels.

The travel industry is working hard to get us on a plane and off somewhere.

But I can only imagine what Ralph Sims made of the headline. He is a sustainable energy professor, and he hates this stuff. By the way, when do you think sustainable energy professors became a thing? When did sustainable energy get taken seriously enough to have a job at a university named after it? And what was it you did before that? Was it just plain energy?

Anyway, Sims is part of an equally busy group these days trying to convince us not to use things like fuel frivolously and travelling to Sydney to pamper oneself is about as frivolous as you get.

He said the other day in the way only sustainable energy professors and their ilk can, "I know people that have been to Melbourne for the weekend just to go shopping."

Eeeewwww, can you imagine?

Lord only knows if he talks to these people he knows or just looks down his nose at them from a distance.

But I think we all know people like that. In fact, I suspect a lot of us are people like that, and we are perfectly happy being that sort of people.

In that is the rub. Is flying to Melbourne a waste of fuel? Or is it living life and enjoying ourselves? Or post Covid, aren't we allowed to enjoy ourselves? Or is enjoying ourselves limited to non-fuel activity?

It is true if we never travelled again, we'd save fuel and possibly help the atmosphere, like Ralph Sims would like us to.

But the Prime Minister is off to the United Nations shortly. That's a lot of fuel and I can tell you for nothing that little, if anything will come out of it.

So, do we stop flying? Do we stop connecting? Does Air New Zealand not open that direct to New York route? What if the Prime Minister went to the UN and went shopping? Is that a double crime? Two lots of frivolously activity?

The problem with the climate activists is they have no sense of humour and certainly no sense of fun. And because of that they lose us, and in losing us, they lose their argument.

Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings.

1 comment:

DeeM said...

The climate activists would be shocked if they saw how little actual data backs up their end-of-the-world apocalyptic claims of catastrophe.
Virtually none!

Climate change is happening and, as it has been for eons and eons, it is almost certainly natural. We can't do anything about it except mitigate its effects.

Like all Greenies, these waste-of-space woke academics preach and scold everyone on saving the planet but I bet Professor Sustainable loves attending those conferences...in person.
They all have a degree in hypocrisy and being fatuous.