In a move that is just downright daffy, not to mention leaning hard into totalitarianism, 14 American cities are aiming at what is sure to be an elusive target: banning meat and dairy consumption and the use of private automobiles – in just seven years.
Fourteen major American cities are part of a globalist climate organization known as the “C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group,” which has an “ambitious target” by the year 2030 of “0 kg [of] meat consumption,” “0 kg [of] dairy consumption,” “3 new clothing items per person per year,” “0 private vehicles” owned, and “1 short-haul return flight (less than 1500 km) every 3 years per person.”
C40’s dystopian goals can be found in its “The Future of Urban Consumption in a 1.5°C World” report, which was published in 2019 and reportedly reemphasized in 2023. The organization is headed and largely funded by Democrat billionaire Michael Bloomberg. Nearly 100 cities across the world make up the organization, and its American members include Austin, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Portland, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Seattle.
There is, of course, one thing all of those cities have in common; indeed, it’s the same thing most major urban areas have in common.
Just to belabor the obvious, these people are elitists of the worst sort. There is an apocryphal quote attributed to the Duke of Wellington, who supposedly opposed the development of passenger railroads. The Duke supposedly claimed that these railroads would “promote unrest by allowing the lower classes to travel too freely about.” That is, as you can see, precisely the mindset we see in play here:
Climate activists are also advocating for “climate lockdowns,” in the same way there were Covid lockdowns. Ideas floated for a climate lockdown have ranged from shuttering people in their homes and restricting air travel to providing a Universal Basic Income and introducing a maximum income level.
Climate dystopianism doesn’t end there. WEF-linked “bioethicist” Dr. Matthew Liao has proposed the idea of scientists genetically modify humans to be allergic to meat. Liao has also discussed shrinking the physical size of humans via eugenics or hormone injections so they consume fewer resources.
It’s unclear how a “maximum income level” (which certainly wouldn’t apply to grafting politicians) would help with carbon emissions unless, of course, it’s set so low as to prevent people from being able to afford to travel, or eat well, or heat their homes. It’s too bad there isn’t some kind of historical example these leftists could examine to see how well their model works.
It is, of course, the grossest of understatements to say that all of these proposals are anathema to the concept of personal liberty. It’s also pretty obvious that were any of these cities to attempt to legislate any of this, they would be hit with mass unrest and would certainly be slapped down in the courts. There is just no justification, climate change or no climate change, to completely rewrite the very basis of our society like this. We are, or at least are supposed to be, free people, with a government that protects our rights, especially our liberty and property. Liberty, of course, includes “I’ll eat what I want, I’m paying for it myself, and if anyone doesn’t like it, I’ll tell them where to head in.” But liberty isn’t the goal here; as my colleague Becky Noble recently wrote, these elites are more than willing to force compliance.
Eating meat is the very basis of humanity. People have been eating meat since there have been people. Human society had its beginnings in the act of banding together to hunt game that a single human couldn’t take on alone; the beginnings of technology were when people started sharpening sticks to hunt with. The primary thing that makes us human, our brains, are huge metabolic gas-guzzlers and are made possible only by a diet that contains protein and plenty of it. It’s possible to meet all of your body’s energy needs with a plant-based diet, but it’s a lot easier to do it with some animal protein, be it meat or dairy. And it’s much more delicious, too. That matters, no matter what anyone thinks. Our diet is a big part of our quality of life; we should be able to enjoy eating.
I’ll keep on eating meat, and nobody better try to prevent me from doing so. As long as there are grouse in the forests, moose in the marshes, and fish in the rivers, we’ll continue making our diet including healthy animal protein, no matter what anyone at Davos thinks about it, no matter what the green activists think I ought to eat.
Frankly, I’d rather take dietary advice from these guys.
