And the band kept on playing (until it didn’t)

Sweden disastrously had the biggest year-over-year CO₂E emissions increase since 1990 as a direct and immediate consequence of our elected government’s policies—it’s proven that their diesel pricing was the culprit. When people tell me “We’re such a tiny country, we don’t need to do anything” that’s so wrong because:

• We’re disproportionately bad, among the worst countries in the world
• At the very least we shouldn’t be actively and deliberately increasing our emissions the way our gov’t has done
• Fundamentally the idea that, when faced with a collective problem, any given subset claiming they don’t have to do anything because they’re just a small subset makes zero sense. It makes less than zero sense when they’re among the worst culprits.

“Everyone aboard the boat needs to stop drilling holes in the hull” “Okay but we the shuffleboard club isn’t gonna stop because we’re just one eighth of a percent of all the passengers on this boat and we’ve seen other people drilling too! 🎼🎵 Drill drill drill 🎶” “But you’re among the ones drilling the most! Not as much as the dining club and you’re not as numerous as the dance club but– wait, what, you’re increasing your drilling in the middle of this conversation!?” “🎵 Drill drill drill 🎶”

On a fundamental level the designation of this group as “the shuffleboard club” is arbitrary. We went and talked to someone in the dance club who was a real drillmaniac and she said “uhm we with shoesize 37.293 doesn’t need to stop drilling, we’re just one percent of a percent of the passengers, why are you going after us shoesize 37.293 folks? It doesn’t matter what we do, we are so few”.