Last summer, alert travelers "caught" probably the most prominent climate scientist, Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber - now head of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Laxenburg near Vienna - on a domestic flight from Berlin to Münster.
The malice was particularly great among Springer and right-wing conservative media, after all, the scientist has been warning about the consequences of the climate crisis for more than 40 years and is campaigning for a ban on domestic flights.
Ha!
Finally he was exposed as a hypocrite who preaches water and yet drinks wine.
What a relief.
You could finally fly in peace again, and the so-called “climate pope” is doing it too.
This is of course nonsense.
You can certainly call for a ban on domestic flights and still fly.
Just like you can demand an animal welfare label or a sugar tax and still be able to eat a steak or enjoy snacking.
The myth that climate researchers and activists have to live like monks just because they demand an ambitious climate policy has been a populist narrative from right-wing conservative circles since the climate movement existed.
The members of the German Ethics Council also see it that way.
The 24-member committee, which advises the federal government and the Bundestag and is intended to promote social discussions, has thought about such moral questions of climate justice.
A statement of just over a hundred pages came out this week.
It explores who is suffering from the consequences of the climate crisis, who is financially burdened but also who bears what responsibility.
When it comes to morality in individual everyday decisions à la Schellnhuber, point 5 in the summary is quite interesting.
There the authors explain that “the fair distribution of responsibility for these and other climate protection measures (...) is primarily a state task.”
Companies and private collective actors were also included.
The “previously widespread focus on the individual responsibility of individuals does not do justice to the problem,” it continues.
Because the individual is shaped by the general conditions that prevail in a society (or with Marx: people are the product of their circumstances).
Example of domestic flights: If there were cheap, fast and punctual (!) train connections throughout the country (and ideally all of Europe) and flights were expensive or even forbidden, then individuals would not have to constantly live in a moral dilemma.
But they don't exist!
Shifting responsibility: choose for yourself!
Therefore, the statement states, “low-emission action” still requires “moral heroism.”
The expensive organic meat or the cheap schnitzel, the cheap industrial insulation for your house or sustainable raw materials, diesel or Tesla: choose for yourself!
The ethics experts therefore rightly write: “Moral criticism of decisions in the area of private life and consumption is no substitute for necessary political measures,” they say.
In short: Please free the citizens from this “moral heroism”!
The idea of pitting citizens against each other when it comes to climate protection comes from the oil company BP.
He had the brilliant idea of the CO2 footprint, which is now familiar to everyone.
In 2004, the company first released a CO2 calculator that allows people to calculate how much CO2 emissions they are responsible for.
That's clever, of course.
It would be much more interesting to create a CO2 calculator for BP.
But the idea caught on.
To this day, citizen XY feels more guilty than the CEO of BP.
The Ethics Council's power is therefore essential.
The phrase “moral heroism” also appears three times in the report.
Unfortunately, these clever comments are lost in a lot of banter throughout the hundred pages.
In many places the paper reads like an intellectually disguised meandering, much remains extremely vague and convoluted.
This at least indicates heated debates in the run-up to publication.
From page 110 there is the so-called “special vote” written by three members of the Council who did not want to sign the statement.
They complain that too little thought has been given to innovations (nuclear power is also briefly mentioned).
However, what this is supposed to change morally remains vague.
One reason could also be the Council's criticism of underground CO2 storage (CCS).
The technology that will soon be permitted in Germany must be “critically examined,” also with a view to future generations, according to the actual statement.
Not everyone seems to have liked that.
The special vote also highlights the “excessive and tendentiously illiberal moralism” that supposedly imposes “a moral obligation to cooperate” on individual citizens.
However, this is incomprehensible in view of the clear criticism of the state mentioned above.
The dissenters are correct in their criticism of the lack of a comprehensible explanation that goes beyond “academic jargon.”
Alleged “Activist Council”
The knee-jerk reaction of some media representatives is also interesting.
The “Welt” actually had the headline “How the Ethics Council became an Activist Council”.
However, it is not resolved which of the members of the council should now be an activist.
Instead, the world author quotes long, sometimes extremely boring passages from the statement instead of translating the messages into understandable language.
Incidentally, it was also the newspaper that invited the great “climate expert” Henrik M. Broder to discuss Schellnhuber last summer.
He managed - as was expected of him - to spice the whole thing up with a dose of chauvinism: the climate researcher's behavior was like "if you caught a rabbi or a priest in the brothel in the evening."
Of course, no discussion about climate protection can take place at this level.
A balanced statement from the Ethics Council is of little help.
Anyone who wants to raise awareness against climate protection in this country will continue to do so.
It only becomes problematic when too many citizens follow this polemic and false promises of freedom - perhaps because they feel disadvantaged or not heard.
For this reason alone, future governments should at least listen to the authors' advice.
Incidentally, Mr. Schellnhuber said in SPIEGEL after his “flight scandal”: “Sometimes you just have to endure your guilty conscience.
You can't always do the right thing 100% of the time in everyday life, buy the right food, use the right electronic devices, and so on.
You have to live with a certain amount of conflict and let it motivate you to continue looking for good solutions.«
Therefore: Keep arguing with yourself - but don't despair.
Without political decisions, neither Germany nor Europe can become climate-friendly.
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