"Danni" and the costs: No understanding for this protest

Climate protection is important, every felled tree is a shame, and yes, the recent flood disaster shows that one really has to be careful when interfering with nature. But this realization was never up for debate in the Dannenröder Forest. The question was whether a constitutional state, in which all instances of the legal process have been exhausted, all reports have been written and all reforestation measures have long been carried out, can then also enforce the law and finally finish building a section of a motorway. Many people believed no, the state and its representatives should not do just that in view of the effects of climate change. They are also convinced that they can argue from the higher moral point of view, to this day. The goal justifies the means, no matter what the cost.

Now the bill has arrived: The protests, some of which were violent, cost 36 million euros, from the occupation of the forest to the life-threatening and irresponsible abseiling actions on various highways towards uninvolved third parties. And we also know that the attempt to take recourse against the perpetrators or to prosecute them as criminals has largely failed. The personal details cannot be determined, there are many tricks that obviously work. The answer to the question of why normal citizens should understand this is something that the supporters of the protests do not answer.

And they are also intellectually dishonest. If one follows the perfectly understandable thought that a lot has to change in town and country so that society gives the right answer to climate change, it will again depend on the state and its representatives to enforce this change and the necessary laws. The more one undermines the authority of the relevant institutions, the less one can hope, in this scenario of a committed climate protection policy, that the authority will suddenly be there again when it comes against those who have something against this new legal situation.

In challenging times, a country and its society only have a future if one is prepared to implement and accept constitutional decisions that have passed the last instance of an independent judiciary as the final hurdle. That such a knowledge is no longer common knowledge is the most sad discovery from the Dannenröder forest.