Re:Kneejerk Bans Don't Work (Score 1, Interesting)

In fact, to people with a brain, flourescents are already cheaper, there's no need for another attempt by government to micromanage the population by taxing - taxes are supposed to be a necessity to collect money used to run government, not change our behavior.

These bans are an affront to personal freedoms. I hear so many people claiming they want personal freedoms, yet a lot of these same people are thrilled when the government oversteps their boundries to control, through threat of fines or imprisonment, peoples behavior.

Personal freedoms are an illusion. They are a useful illusion but an illusion nonetheless. Planet earth is a finite system and resource base. While it seems large, we can afford the notion of personal freedoms. But when there are 10 people for every bathroom you no longer have freedom to use the bathroom as you please, do you?

The core problem which so few people wish to discuss is that of overpopulation. GHG emissions are a problem because the total emissions by the given human population exceeds the capacity of the ecosystem to absorb without deleterious side effects. Water availability issues are, at their core, overpopulation issues. Excessive soil erosion issues are also overpopulation issues. In an overshoot population situation, personal freedoms lose meaning and may even have to be abandoned in order to simply ensure survival. The correct overall solution is to lower the population - not just stop growth but actively lower it. In the meanwhile, we will continue to see these sorts of hackneyed "solutions" thrown about because no one wants to touch the real problem - overpopulation. Even most of the "greens" are unwilling to discuss the population problem. But fear not! If we don't solve it, nature will. The only difference between us solving it ourselves and nature solving it is that most of us may not like nature's choice of methods.