We Don’t Need No Stinking Giant Fans

Sustainable poverty;

However, we must not look at wind and solar as anything more than short-term solutions to fix serious, immediate problems. They do not equal real economic development or really improved living standards. Our cities need abundant, reliable electricity, and for faraway villages wind and solar must be only temporary, to meet basic needs until they can be connected to transmission lines and a grid.
Only in that way can we have modern homes, heating, lighting, cooking, refrigeration, offices, factories, schools, shops and hospitals – so that we can enjoy the same living standards people in industrialized countries do (and think is their right). We deserve the same rights and lives.
That is why I react strongly to people and organizations that think wind and solar electricity and solar ovens should be enough, or the end of our progress, and everyone should be happy that their lives have improved a little. I do not accept that. But I see it all the time.

h/t DB

14 Replies to “We Don’t Need No Stinking Giant Fans”

It’s called eco-imperialism, Steven, and you are wise to reject it. Modern day environmentalism has got NOTHING to do with the environment, but it certainly knows greed, corruption, destruction and profiteering.

Solar and wind aren’t even a “short term solution”…..they haven’t replaced a single base power plant. They always require base power plant backup or the areas go dark. They are both a fraud.

‘Sustainable poverty’ is what the eco-fanatic Luddites want for all of us. But of course not for the ‘speical’ people like Al Gore and our very own David.

I am embarrassed to say, but I have well meaning relatives who have participated in pedaling fraudulent technologies in Africa. They do no good and raise false hopes and they do it because.in truth, they are looking to justify the almost carnal pleasure they enjoy the adulation accorded to them by their almost celebrity status. What they – and the world in general – don’t realise is that western culture is not the solution to sub-Saharan Africa’s problems.
I can’t write more now because I have to get my granddaughter off to school but I will gather my thoughts and write a further comment in a couple of hours.

Great article. A point he misses is that solar panels need maintenance. They wear out, become covered with dust, damaged by rain and lightning, the village dogs piss on them, enterprising people steal them and, in remote areas, baboons will find more use for them. The times when electricity is need for cooking is sunrise and sunset when the sun is weak. A fridge is a luxury as the poor people having nothing to keep cool. As Blackfox says ” What they – and the world in general – don’t realise is that western culture is not the solution to sub-Saharan Africa’s problems.”

Au contraire ! It isn’t called “sustainable poverty” … it’s called “environmental justice”. Africans are taught (by pampered American University Black students and Org.’s) that they need to REJECT the “white mans” capitalism and corporate mechanisms which “exploit” the poor (and the planets) resources. Cheap, clean, efficient, energy is the “white mans” construct and should be rejected by people “of color” across the planet.
its SO EASY … to create the eco-narrative from a warm, well-lit, dorm room. Lunch will be served at the cafeteria at NOON … but snacks are available 24hrs/day.

I said that I would make a further comment but, upon reflection, the subject is too complex to adequately discuss in a this kind of forum. However, I will repeat this old Kikuyu proverb: “When we take away from a man his traditional way of life, his customs, his religion, we had better make certain to replace it with something of value.”
European colonisers came in and destroyed the old culture but did not stay long enough to complete the job of replacing the old with “something of value.” Now middle Africa is broken and it will remain that way for a thousand years. The application of trendy technological band-aid solutions only prop up an unnatural and completely dysfunctional culture. Left alone, middle Africa will heal. Western meddling only prolongs the suffering.

Of course they want to keep third-world poverty sustained at some “acceptable” level. How else would they maintain a large pool of unskilled or semi-skilled labor. And they want easy immigration for those laborers, so they can hire them as disposable workers at the lowest possible wage.

The colonizers were CHASED OUT of every corner of the unevolved, primitive, world they (my people) visited. At first, there was free trade and exchange of cultures … (think Marco Polo and the Silk Road) … then … came the white guilt. So we left prematurely. Our seeds were incompletely planted. Were mistakes made ? Sure. Of course. But cultures have evolved. It’s what cultures DO. I hear NOBODY ever DEMAND that my people return to their Anglo-Saxon culture of hunting-gathering and slaughtering each other … yet … that is EXACTLY what all the “noble” brown cultures are told to do (by guilt-ridden whites). The Brown cultures are told they must live in a museum constructed for them by guilty white overlords … in the name of “compassion” … when it nothing of the sort.

Let the stone age Africans develop their own technology.

Kenji, our culture is composed of several thousand years of cultural evolution. It includes Greco-Roman intellectualism married to Judeo-Christian theology. We are, primarily, a northern people who were forced to evolve technologically by geographical and climatic necessity. I submit that you cannot just drop our culture with all of its cultural underpinnings and geographical imperitives into the equatorial jungle and expect a version of western culture to magically emerge. You may as well try to pull a rabbit out of a hat.
I would also submit, Kenji, respectfully, of course, that you know nothing of pre-colonial Africa. It survived for thousands of years and created quite advanced cultures in agriculture and animal husbandry. It had an artistic culture. It carried on trade and commerce. And more.
I could point you in the right direction in these matters but, then I think you are not that interested.

Then the Africans shouldn’t need any help in developing whatever energy resources they see fit.

African governments are not doing enough to build the energy, transportation and communication systems we desperately need. They are not standing up to Europeans, global banks or environmentalists who oppose big power plants in Africa. They need to do better at helping their people.
Our leaders also need to remember that Europe and the United States did not have a World Bank or other outside help when they modernized and industrialized. They did it themselves. National and local governments, groups of citizens and businesses, and various banks and investors did it. They invented things, financed big projects, and built their cities and countries. China and India have figured this out.
Now Africa needs to do the same thing – and stop relying on outsiders, bowing to their demands, and letting them dictate our future.
The audience for this article is clearly stated. Why is this our concern?