Giving up Fossil Fuels? Enjoy Your Cave.

Fossil fuels are the enemy.

I know this because everyone’s telling me so. Remember this image from September 13, 2019? It’s the Fred Hartman Bridge in Houston, Texas, closed because twenty-two climate activists hung themselves off it to shut down “the largest oil export channel in the country to resist Trump.”

The quote is from their tweet, of course. They tweeted their protests using their cell phones, cameras, computers and internet servers. Oh, and they were transported to that site using some mode of transportation. And they wore clothes. And their protest flags and ropes were made in a factory somewhere. And I’m pretty sure they ate breakfast at a restaurant before they dangled themselves off that Houston bridge.

I wonder if they knew that every single step of their journey was enabled by petroleum products? Ironic? Heck yeah. Surprising? Nope.

Such is the state of the climate — ahem — debate these days. We demand action! This global warming thing is such an issue that we just have to do something radical, don’t we? It’s an emergency! Oil companies are baaaaaad! Hanging ourselves off bridges will show ‘em!

Seriously? I keep reading about how fossil fuel companies are the world’s enemy, how they are responsible for our world’s climate malaise. Last week I read stories that 20 fossil fuel companies are responsible for over 33% of the world’s carbon emissions since 1965. Never mind that these companies produce things the rest of us consume and use (and therefore emit CO2 from), these gosh-darn companies are ruining our planet. If we could just get rid of these evil oil companies then we could solve all our growing emissions problems.

So let’s spend a day in our life without fossil fuels, shall we?

It’s 7 a.m, and it’s time to get up. How do you know this? It can’t be because of your alarm clock, because alarm clocks are plastic, and plastics contain petroleum products. And since you don’t use fossil fuels, no clocks for you! Better dust off your sundial.

You reach for your cell phone, but of course there isn’t such a thing because cell phone cases and electronics use petroleum to make, and you don’t use those things anymore. Call your neighbors with a tin can and string!

You stand up to go to the bathroom but you realize that there’s no such thing as indoor plumbing anymore, because metal or plastic pipes are made with — you guessed it — petroleum products. So you look at that hole in the floor and hope you don’t trip.

Did I say hole in the floor? Sorry! There are no floors because tiles and linoleum and modern construction materials use petroleum to produce, so no floors for you either. If you’re lucky you were able to cut down a tree and make planks out of it to walk on, but chances are you used those planks to put overhead since we don’t have houses anymore. Aren’t you jealous of those dudes in caves?

You go to get dressed but of course your clothes are made from synthetic fabrics that used oil to produce or natural fabrics that used oil to harvest so…will it be the buffalo or elk hide for you today? Hope your employer is an animal lover!

You go to the kitchen but of course you don’t have one, nor do you have a refrigerator. Nothing to eat around here except for those roots in the garden and that pigeon on the fencepost. Bon appetit!

You look for the light switch but of course you don’t have lights. Or electricity. “But wait, I have a whole group of solar panels that can power my house!” you say. No can do, mi amigo, those solar panels were made in factories that use oil, so no solar panels for you. Or batteries. Or any modern form of energy. Stick a water wheel in that river or burn those logs if you want to power anything. Never mind your carbon footprint.

Let’s leave “personal grooming” out of this analogy, shall we?

You get the point. Literally everything we do every day is somehow touched by the petroleum industry. Everything. It is a simple fact of modern life. It is in our cell phones, computers, TVs, iPods, iPads, clothing, food, transportation, makeup, electricity…everything. If you’re protesting climate change and tweeting it, yep, you’re using your share of fossil fuels. If you’re reading this right now, you’re using fossil fuels. If you’re reading about evil climate-denying Republicans online, yep, you’re using fossil fuels. Sorry to burst your bubble. Try to live a day without the benefits of petroleum products and you will live in a cave eating bugs and grass.

Are oil companies evil? Who knows, and who really cares? Yes, they’ve spent billions to try and mislead us about the effects of their products. They also were some of the first companies to develop solar technologies and try to scale them. Does that make them bad or good? I have no idea. Every company that makes a product and uses resources tries to maximize their positives and minimize their negatives — does that make every company bad? Using that standard, isn’t every company who’s trying to stay in business and maximize their profits also bad?

The “bad company” argument makes no sense to me. Want to solve global warming? Help figure out how to make money at it, then watch all of our self-interests (including oil companies) run to solve it. Or do you still think that Big Benevolent Government will come and save the day? I sure don’t. Of course we need cleaner and better alternatives to power the 7 billion people in the world, so let’s use our creative capitalist interests to do that.

Next time the world’s teenagers take Friday off to protest climate change, let’s take away their cell phones and see what happens. Or when Bridge Hangers close transport passages, let’s turn off our cameras. Or when CNN broadcasts their climate-hysteria-du-jour, let’s just turn off our TVs. Does it really count as protest if we can’t Tweet it?

Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.