In response to the Dutch government’s new environmental regulations that would universally hinder farmers and effectively put at least 30 percent of them out of business, farmers took to the streets to protest. Many of them blocked roadways with their tractors and even set bales of hay on fire in front of various city halls. As one Dutch farmer put it, “We cannot invest. Our fathers, our uncles, cannot invest in the future. And so as young farmers we also have no prospect of…taking over a farm.”
For their part, Dutch authorities did their utmost to crack down on the protesting farmers by shooting tear gas and releasing attack dogs to break up crowds. Already, they have issued over 200 fines and arrested several protesters. There are even claims that police are firing their guns at unarmed civilians. It’s a truly ugly scene in a country known for its peaceful and polite citizens.
And all for what? According to ABC News, these extremes measures are being taken “to cut emissions of pollutants, predominantly nitrogen oxide and ammonia, by 50% nationwide by 2030.” In other words, they’re wanting to eliminate half the excrement produced by livestock and marginally purify the air and waterways of the country.
Orthodox. Faithful. Free.
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It’s difficult to say whether the Dutch government is profoundly stupid or downright evil. If the developed world’s response to Covid is any indicator, then the answer lies somewhere in the middle.
On the profoundly stupid side of things, nearly all modern-day crises—real, manufactured, or both—show just how out of touch elites are with reality and how ignorant they are on basic facts. In the case of Covid, authorities pushed for a number of policies that either did nothing or made the matter worse: vaccine mandates, social distancing, masking, preventing the use of cheap therapeutics, etc. Additionally, they relied on models that proved to be wildly inaccurate, and they continue investing all their hopes in corrupt health officials and the criminally dishonest pharmaceutical industry.
In the case of climate science, the same authorities show the same kind of ignorance. Although they themselves rely on things like food and energy, they will adopt policies that prevent the clean and efficient production of said necessities. There’s no way to produce as much food by solely going organic, and there’s no way to produce nearly as much energy by solely relying on renewable sources like solar and wind power. Furthermore, these alternative methods of producing food and energy are even more wasteful and toxic.
Of course, this ignorance is largely a consequence of bureaucrats and elected leadership coming from the cities. They grow up in a completely artificial world, and most of their knowledge comes from heavily manipulated digital media. This satirical piece from Genesius Times captures this situation well with an op-ed from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez entitled “I don’t need truckers. I get my food from the grocery store.” Knowing this, the American founders wisely devised the Electoral College, which would prevent an urbanocracy. Otherwise, Americans would be experiencing even more misrule from urban elites than they currently do.
Despite the prevailing ignorance undergirding environmental and public health policies, there is some method to the madness of progressives who promote them anyway—this represents the downright evil side of leftist rule. Leftist ideology offers abundant pretexts for elites to punish their opponents. If a conservative or Christian points out the flaws in their agenda, they will launch endless ad hominem arguments, denouncing them as hateful bigots, kooky deniers, and clueless Neanderthals.
Although absurd, these charges are powerful enough to get a person cancelled. Those who refuse to comply with “THE CURRENT THING” are not just ridiculed, they are practically silenced—terminated from their jobs, blackballed from other jobs, and ultimately cast to the undesirable fringes of society. This was the case with the doomed campaign to stop the spread Covid, and now it’s becoming the case with the doomed campaign to stop climate change.
This is likely a large reason why the elite lean Left in most countries and most churches, including the Catholic Church. It’s a mode of thinking and acting that gives the practitioner more power. By contrast, an authentically conservative or Christian mentality requires humility, charity, and patience. While the leftist ethics work off the premise that might makes right, Christian ethics are based in the opposite premise, “right makes might.”
Because it is based in a falsehood that leaves a culture bereft of sense and virtue, the potency of leftist authoritarianism eventually diminishes over time. Yes, for a while, it seems to put the world in order, as the masses are forced into compliance and the government can achieve its arbitrary goal of cutting ammonia emissions, jabbing a generation of children with a worse-than-useless vaccine, all while consolidating more political power. But, when it becomes evident that their policies don’t actually do anything for anyone, people start to notice and backlash ensues.
Clearly, this fact is dawning on the brave Dutch farmers who’ve had enough of the lies. Everyone who is tired of today’s shameless and ignorant elites should support their struggle and resist the hypocrisy in their own communities in solidarity. Their fight is the fight of all people wanting to return to the truth and a way of life grounded in physical reality (and it doesn’t get much more grounded than agriculture). Christ famously said that “the truth will set you free.” And so it will, when more people turn to God and their neighbors and away from the failed policies of today’s leaders.
[Photo Farmers block the entrance of the distribution center of a supermarket to protest against the government’s nitrogen policy in Nijkerk on July 5, 2022. (Credit: ANP/AFP via Getty Images)]