The Cherry Picker

in German published 2019-01

The British and the Swiss are called cherry pickers.

       As I already said in my October 2017 post, I love Europe, but I have problems with the EU in its present form.

Many EU supporters insist on the inseparability of the four freedoms. Unlimited freedom of movement may not be broken. And anyone who tries is called a "Rosinenpicker" or cherrypicker.

You often find statements like this on Twitter: Europe doesn't need CherryPickers

However, from an economic point of view, nothing speaks for the inseparability of the four European freedoms. It would be different, for example, if a country wants freedom of movement of goods without committing itself to comply with the environmental protection agreements.

If a country were able to restrict the free movement of persons, the other member states would have no economic disadvantage.

The EU euphoricists want to enforce the four freedoms with a kind of compulsion. What a contradiction!

The idea of a united Europe is often promoted with ideological zeal. But shouldn't especially the Germans realize that political zeal can lead to catastrophes? Is zeal always good for the Good? No, “The opposite of Good is often well meant”

      Shouldn't more consideration be given to the needs of other countries? Dogmatic stubbornness and know-it-all-ism will destroy the EU!

Brexit would not have to happen if the EU showed more flexibility!

       The EU has a democratic deficit, and more and more citizens see Brussels as a bureaucratic Monster.

Green ideas and ideologies

in German published 2018-11

Green Aberrations

Plastic
Huge amounts of plastic pollute the seas. This must be stopped! But how?
Most of the stranded plastic from ships ends up on the beaches in Europe.
All ships had to pay a waste fee up in the ports of the EU states until now, regardless of the quantity.
They receive a quantity limit for that. If a ship wants to deliver more waste, it has to pay an additional fee. This of course leads to the temptation to dispose of the surplus waste illegally in the sea.
Under a new proposal for a directive, ships can dispose of waste without quantity limitations. The ports would have to charge higher fixed fees for this and offer resistance, because this would lead to a competitive disadvantage.
But these new directives need to enter into force as soon as possible if we seriously want to stop pollution of the seas.
I heard about this new directive only once in the media.
Instead, the media spread dozens of articles arguing for adding charges for the use of plastic bags and suggesting that this would do something to clean up the seas. But I suspect that in Europe hardly a thousandth of these plastic bags ends up in the sea.

This is pure grandstanding.
It isn't attractive for the media to report on port reception facilities for ship-generated waste. They prefer to report on laws that restrict the use of plastic items and thus serve the syndrome of “saving and renouncing” that is anchored in the emotions of every human being.
Apart from that, of course, I am also in favor of everyone's personal commitment to the sustainable use of our resources.


Firewood
Heating with wood is climate neutral. That is only half the story!
          Leaves, branches and tree trunks rot in the forest and form humus. The humus itself is slowly degraded by bacteria (mineralization).

In a natural forest, the humus layer always remains the same height. There is a balance. The amount of humus formed from new biomass is the same as the humus broken down by mineralization.
If wood is removed from the forest on a regular basis, a new balance is created, the humus layer becomes thinner, and humus as a CO2 store decreases.
There are several thousand billion tons of carbon bound in the top soil layer of the world, more than in the earth's atmosphere and the entire earth's vegetation combined.
The humus is a very important carbon sink, which is also significantly reduced today by intensive agriculture and slash-and-burn.

Solar Energy
Photovoltaics is a fascinating technology that can generate almost unlimited Energy.
But the use of solar energy still has a lot of Problems.
In Zurich the sun shines on average 6.8 hours in July, but only 1.4 hours in January (wetter.com).
However, energy consumption is highest in January and lowest in July.
The feed-in compensation is the same in winter and summer.
That's unrealistic! The feed-in compensation has to be higher in winter than in summer!
Short and long-term storage are needed.
Power-to-gas plants are promising, but the stored energy is still too expensive today.
When the recovered methane is converted back into electricity with a gas turbine, the overall efficiency is only 30%.

Global warming
CO2 emissions have to be reduced.

The CO2 emissions in tons per person per year varies widely across countries.                      

Qatar 40.4
USA 16.5
Germany 9.4
India 1.6 (rising rapidly)
Republic of the Congo 0.5

Reduction of consumption can reduce the CO2 emissions per person.                        

Global CO2 emissions are the product of individual CO2 emissions times the number of people in the world.

CO2 emissions of single individual  x  Number of individuals in the world = Worldwide CO2 emissions

The world population is therefore as important as the emission per person.
But this fact is taboo for most Greens.
Every 12 years the world population grows by 1 billion people.
There is no point in reducing our greenhouse gas emissions by one-third if, at the same time, the world's population increases by a third.
The increase of the world population should be slowed down by voluntary family planning.
Greenpeace, the WWF and most conservation organizations are silent about these relationships, and you could be considered a racist if you talk about it. Those responsible are too cowardly and would prefer to let the world go to ruin.
Ideologues and religious adherents have difficulty dealing with the topic of population growth.

Species extinction

Experts estimate that between 50 and 150 species per day disappear irretrievably from the earth.

A large part of the animal and plant species will disappear in the coming decades.
The only way you can fail to see that the main cause of species extinction is population growth is by wearing ideological blinders.

Battle of the World Views

in German published 2018-08

Are the do-gooders winning the fight?

There was a struggle between the Catholic world view and the Protestant world view in the 16th and 17th centuries.

        And in the 19th century, the ideologies of socialism and communism emerged. Marx launched the class struggle.

The left and right world views are still in a fight today. The question is what world view is better for the country, the economy and all sections of the population.

In the second half of the 20th century the gap between the workers and the factory owners become increasingly smaller. There are more and more small businesses, and the workers are decreasingly unskilled and have more demanding jobs. Are there still clashes between the left and the right?

There are more and more intellectuals in the social-democratic parties. The classical left-right conflicts are losing their importance.

The new arguments are taking place between do-gooders, realists and populists.

                    Catholics ----- Protestants

                              Left ----- Right

              Do-gooders --- Realists --- Populists

Populists exist on the left and right.

The term “Realists” is also difficult to grasp. It could be equated with the concept of a “rational person”. For the left, the term “do-gooder” is a sarcastic, hateful or contemptuous denigration of individuals or groups.
In social media, the do-gooders resist the use of this term, but I have not been able to find a less negative synonym. Maybe “predominantly emotionally driven people”?

I described the negative influences of do-gooders on the development aid, foreign policy (e.g. the bloody attempt to remove Assad) and on family planning in my post “The Problem with Do-gooders” from March 12, 2018. But the influence of do-gooders is also precarious when it comes to the refugee problem. No one has a miraculous solution here, but Chancellor Merkel's “Welcome Culture” is certainly a prime example of the negative influence of do-gooders in politics. 

The introduction of the euro was also shaped by do-gooder thinking. No sincere person can claim that the introduction of the euro happened at the right time and to the right extent. The realists would certainly not have agreed to the introduction of the euro, nor would the populists. But the European economy would probably not thrive any better with the far-right populists.

Do the do-gooders have a do-gooder ideology? I think so, and like all ideologues it is hard for do-gooders to admit mistakes. The do-gooders still won’t admit that the introduction of the euro was a mistake. And they won't admit that they recently held the view that peace with Assad wasn't possible.

The more influence do-gooders have, the stronger the populists become! The repeated moralizing admonitions of the do-gooders drive people into the arms of the populists. You good people should just imagine constantly listening to the pious sayings of missionary Christians.

We need good people, but not do-gooders!

What world view do you have? Comments are very welcome.

Direct Democracy

in German published 2018-06


Can citizens have enough say on important questions indirectly in a representative democracy? For example, if someone wants to strengthen the EU, they can elect the appropriate politicians.

But whom should voters elect if, for example, they are for the abolition of Hartz IV, against abortion and for more restrictions on immigration?

So the claim that in a representative democracy the voter can sufficiently express their will is utterly absurd.
Only a few countries are ripe for direct democracy. Direct democracy is the highest and most demanding form of Government.

                       Combination of direct and representative Democracy
                                            Representative Democracy
                                       Democracy with limited elections
                                        Democracy with bogus elections
                                          Dictatorship without elections


 It is argued that many citizens are overwhelmed when voting on substantive issues. That may be true, but experience has shown that many citizens just follow party slogans. This requires the parties and the media to explain to people exactly how they want to solve the problems with regard to a substantive issue. That makes the citizens better informed, and then they cannot say that politicians do what they want anyway. Elections on substantive issues are the best remedy for political disenchantment.

The initiative to ban minarets in Switzerland is often cited among the opponents of direct democracy. A majority overruled the rights of a minority here. But Muslims can continue to meet everywhere and continue to build mosques.

You will only be able to judge whether the ban on minarets is good in 20 to 50 years. The headscarf ban, which applies in some European countries in some circumstances, is also a restriction on the rights of religious minorities.

And even the ban on smoking in the restaurants, which was introduced in Bavaria in 2010 by a referendum, restricts the rights of a minority.

For more than 10 years, the anti-nuclear movement in Germany has led to major demonstrations, violent riots, blockades and confrontations with the police.

If the opponents of nuclear power could have launched an initiative to phase out nuclear energy, this conflict would probably have been resolved peacefully.

Conflicts are fought on the streets when it is not possible for politically active groups to make their voice heard through a direct democratic path.
The EU has a democratic deficit. Many mistaken developments in the EU would have been avoided with more democratic participation of citizens. The southern European countries would certainly not have been included in the eurozone. The introduction of the euro was forced by euphoric and ambitious politicians. The people make more pragmatic decisions.

 No meaningful international treaties should be concluded without the consent of citizens in all European countries.

The Members of the European Parliament do not really represent the citizens they were elected to represent because most of the time, only politicians who are convinced by the EU in its current form stand for election. EU skeptics are unlikely to pursue such a post in Brussels. 

 

A critical view of human rights

in German published 2018-05

The first written document dealing with human rights originated very early on in history. In 539 BC Cyrus conquered Babylon. He freed the slaves, declared that all people have the right to choose their own religion and created racial equality. These and other decrees were inscribed on a baked-clay cylinder in Akkadian cuneiform.

In 1215 the Magna Carta was written in England and in 1628 the Petition of Rights. These documents aimed to protect the individual from the arbitrary power of the rulers.

In 1787 came the US Constitution, in 1789 the French Declaration of Human and Civil Rights and in 1791 the US Bill of Rights.

In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the United Nations. These 30 articles of human rights are certainly an important step towards a better and more humane world.

        However, are the human rights as stated in the documents above valid for all time and universally? Or can they be viewed critically?

Are they carved in stone and as sacrosanct as the tablets of law that Moses received on Mount Sinai?

I believe that human rights can be changed and adapted. The same applies to international law and the Geneva Refugee Convention.

        We shake our heads when we hear that many US citizens believe that owning and carrying weapons is a human right.

But there are also rights that are missing in the 30 articles. There is no article that guarantees bodily integrity. There is no article from which one can deduce that the circumcision of girls is prohibited. If the circumcision of girls were to be officially outlawed, then the question of whether the circumcision of boys can be tolerated would have to be dealt with and physical integrity would have to be declared as a universally applicable human right.

The drafters of human rights are kowtowing to religions and ideologies. As a realist, however, one must come to the conclusion that the religious representatives are still too strong and that they would obtain the support of leftist ideologues in a dispute.

        Is there a right to family planning?

In the proclamation of Teheran, in 1968 a passage was incorporated by the International Conference on Human Rights stating that each couple should be granted the fundamental right to freely decide on the number of children they have.

One would assume that all reasonable people support this human right. But once again, ideologically minded people (Catholics and left-wing greens) have problems with this human right that, if enforced, would benefit everyone in the world.

Every year, about 8.8 million people, mainly children, die of hunger, which is equivalent to one death every 3 seconds. But the do-gooders want to take their time and count on the fact that with more schooling, the number of children will decrease.

Lack of access to family planning is estimated to result in 63 million unwanted pregnancies annually and 40 million abortions, which can often be a life-threatening risk for affected women in developing countries, as they are not carried out by medical professionals.

         Are human rights universally valid? Can we criticize violations of human rights in other cultures? Are we strangling the peculiarity of foreign cultures and is it a case of Western cultural imperialism, asks Otfried Höffe. The colonial expansion of Europe has deeply offended much of the world politically, economically and, above all, culturally.

We have a strongly individualistic image of man. In other cultures, the collective is more important than the individual. In such societies, the group as a whole is in the foreground, and is more important than the self-realization of the group members. In such societies, human rights are logically less important and it is more difficult to introduce democracies. Collectivist societies are mostly dictatorships and for dictators, human rights are an obstacle to their exercise of power.

Many countries are not yet ripe for democracy. Human rights can only be enforced in democracies. If we impose the human rights idea on such countries, we destabilize these countries. It is starry-eyed to want to assert all human rights in dictatorships.

Do not all societies have a right to non-interference? Has the West's interference in Iraq, Libya and Syria paid off for the people living there?

Otfried Höffe finds that in intercultural discourse, an ethical universal must be found that can be justified by argumentation.

Religious freedom is a human right. Are all religions protected by human rights?

Is Scientology a religion? This question is not answered in the same way in all countries. If so, is Scientology a religion worthy of protection?

Is Islam a religion worthy of protection and promotion? Certainly, most Muslims practice a religion that is respected by most people. However, there are more than a hundred passages in the Qur'an that can be interpreted as requiring, in some circumstances, violence against Jews, Christians, or those of other faiths. The Islamists rely on these passages.

Is the content of the Koran compatible with the purposes and principles of the United Nations? Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopts the above italicized wording as a condition for the actions of asylum seekers.

Articles 18 and 19 guarantee the right to freedom of expression without declaring that certain principles must be respected. Can left-wing and right-wing extremist groups that propagate ideologies that endanger peace or call for violence also invoke Articles 18 and 19?

The problem with the do-gooders

in German published 2018-03

The Duden German dictionary adopted the term Gutmensch (do-gooder) in the year 2000.

Is a do-gooder a good person? Or: Is well-meant the opposite of good and is well-meant not the same as well done?

It could be argued that the term do-gooder is often used polemically. In 2015, Gutmensch became "non-word of the year" in Germany.

Every human being who aspires to higher goals (myself included) repeatedly slips back into the role of the do-gooder.

           However, the influence of the do-gooders can have disastrous consequences, as the war in Syria has shown.

In the past there were true believers, who also felt they were better people than their fellow men. The true believer feels superior to the paper Christians.

The term Pharisee is even more pejorative.

The do-gooder, the orthodox and the Pharisee all feel morally superior.

Do the do-gooders have an ideology? Is there a do-gooder ideology?

Most do-gooders are positioned to the left of the center.

They have a rosy worldview.

The Swiss politician Blocher coined the term "the left and the nice".

The nice are for the most part religious.

The do-gooders want to remove all dictatorships in developing and emerging countries, whatever the cost. In Syria, an attempt has been made to overthrow the bad man Assad. As a result, half a million people have died for nothing and several million Syrians have had to flee.

Sure, Assad is a brutal dictator, but can a country in the Middle East be governed in accordance with human rights?

What would happen if a do-gooder was instated with full powers as head of the government in Syria?

Do-gooders can also have a negative influence on development aid. The distribution of second-hand clothes in Africa decimates the local textiles manufacturing. Due to food distribution, local farmers can no longer live on the sale of their products. Clothes and food consignments only make sense in disaster areas. However, this does not shine a light on do-gooders, because they have often been taken over by the helper syndrome.

Only help for self-help gives people in developing countries a boost.

Do-gooders oppose the fact that we support voluntary family planning in developing countries, because we may be subject to racist motives. There is certainly a danger of this, but that does not have to be a reason to make family planning a taboo subject. This promotes famine and the neglect of children who are sent out on the street by their parents, because they can no longer feed their large hoard of children.

         I would like to transplant do-gooders to Africa and see how they use the opportunities there to feed 6-8 children without having access to any contraceptives.

          More than 3 million children die each year as a result of malnutrition and hunger. This number would be much smaller if we were to allow all women to volunteer for family planning.

Now a look at the USA: Why was Trump elected? US voters were fed up with Obama, who was accused by Trump of placing more importance on political correctness than the welfare of the American people.

           Trump is the anti-do-gooder.

Whereby it is unclear how anti-do-gooders are to be classified.