Elder Abuse

You may be aware that there was a global climate change conference last month. Sponsored by the UN, COP29 didn't accomplish much, other than gathering 83,000 stuffed shirts in Baku, Azerbaijan and coming up with some more non-binding folderol for nations to play along with or reject, depending on their national interests.

You are probably less likely to be aware that there was another global conference last month. The fifth (and supposedly final) meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee took place in Busan, South Korea, and ended at an impasse.

That impasse was between those would seek to cap and ultimately end plastics use and those who would focus on managing plastics pollution rather than plastics existence.

Plastics pollution isn't much of a problem in the US, no matter what the greens tell us. The vast majority of the problem originates in China and Southeast Asia, with other poor/developing countries around the world causing more than wealthy countries.

These conferences have something in common. They are usually rich people from poor countries arguing that rich people from rich countries should send money their way. The rich people from rich countries usually pay lip service to this begging (COP29 saw an increase in pledged transfer from $100B to $300B) while making demands that the poor countries keep themselves poor - all in the name of saving the planet.

Sometimes, the rich people from the poor countries play along. Witness Sri Lanka, where its arrogant President Gotabaya Rajapaksa imposed an organic farming "revolution" that ended in disaster and ended his Presidency.

Human living standards in the poorest countries have been advancing steadily across recent decades. India has vastly improved its citizens' access to electricity, from 40% in 2011 to over 97% today, as just one example.

This angers many Greens, who despite endless historical refutation and contrary evidence insist the Earth is overpopulated, abused, and in need of their "Degrowth" agenda. These Greens typically live in the wealthiest parts of the First World, where electricity, air conditioning, and countless other products of technology are givens. So it goes with plastics. Plastics are ubiquitous for a reason - they are the cheapest means to countless ends, and that cheapness frees up money/capital/wealth for other life-improving things.

Put me on the side of the "manage" over "eliminate." Management - or stewardship, as I discussed here - is how we do right by both present and future generations. Ocean plastic pollution, though somewhat exaggerated (aren’t all environmental issues these days?) is a “tragedy of the commons” problem that warrants attention. That attention should make sense and be within the bounds of reality, rather than be an absurd and not-gonna-happen demand that people stop using plastics.

Demanding people stay in poverty, which is what many "Elders" that attend such global conferences do, is inhuman and anti-human. It's an attempted abuse of the world's poorest, and it's a futile and wealth-destroying one at that. The developing nations aren't going to play along with carbon caps or plastics bans, so any resources devoted to such endeavors are doomed to failure and will do nothing more than take money from productive economies to line the pockets of the rent-seeking and self-enriching.

Those Elders, in both word and deed, reject the premise of equality that is fundamental to free societies. In its stead, they see their fellow humans as ignorant masses in need of proper management. Or, more aptly, we the benighted need their boots on our necks, supposedly for our own good, but in practice for their own self-congratulation.

A year ago almost to the day, libertarian Javier Milei got elected President of Argentina. He promptly yelled at the Elders at last January's World Economic Forum. Since then, he's done wonders for Latin America's third largest economy, and I'm sure many of those Elders have been chewing wasps non-stop.

A month ago, Trump shocked the Left and much of the world by winning the US Presidency. His policy promises have rattled many Elders, to the point where they are kissing his ass as he travels around the world. Glimmers of ending decades of Elder Abuse of the masses.

Oh, the times they are a-changin'.