Is Europe Creating A Generation of Citizens Living Under House Arrest, Instead of Giving Up on Endless Oil Profits?
“I'm a champion of the hyper-local, as certainly we need more resilient, climate change-resistant cities.” said Pitter, who works on public space designs in a number of U.S. cities. “However, I am averse to this concept. It doesn't take into account the histories of urban inequity, intentionally imposed by technocratic and colonial planning approaches, such as segregated neighborhoods, deep amenity inequity and discriminatory policing of our public spaces.” This statement from a report by Bloomberg publication highlights the problem with the concept of a 15 minute city a culture of overzealous policing, corporate controlled legislators, and partisan judges cannot tolerate a restriction of basic freedoms that can so obviously lead to a fasicst totalitarian nightmare.
But the idea that has been popularized during the pandemic is that all cities — including European ones — must center future planning on the goal of ensuring car-free access to basic necessities, such as health care, schools, employment and food. And whyvis this so urgent? Because these nations don't want to give up on oil profits by investing 100 percent in renewable energy instead they want to slow down the adverse affects so we are subconsciously remaining hooked to the monkey on our collective backs called Big Oil!
Carla Francome a Twitter influencer recieved disturbing messages according to the Bloomberg article when Francome recieved an image of the Warsaw Ghetto with a message: “There were already 15-minute cities in Poland during the Nazi occupation … In 1941 the Nazis introduced the death penalty for going out.”
The aggression of the messages has left Francome shaken. “How can I put us at risk from someone for just saying that we’d like to be able to walk to the local pub?” she says.
Anytime we talk about restricting human freedoms from smoking cigarettes to breathing clean air without cigarette smoke their will be backlash, discussion and hopefully a logical and fair conclusion that benefits all.
The problem is we have already exceeded the anticipated temperature rise predicted in 2022 and have reached the turning point 25 years ahead of schedule. A 2 degree celsius rise that will shortly be apparent to everyone on the globe the level of the climactic impact this seemingly small temperature change has on disrupting the quality of lives of urban communities, especially for those who reside in coastal regions and low-lying lands.
This is critical as it is evident that already, over 55% of the global population are based in urban areas and it is expected that before 2050 the global urban population will reach a high of over 68% (United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), 2020). Further, urban areas in so-called industrialized nations are the main engines of different economies (contributing over 70% of the global GDP) across the globe, and any disruption will have a cascading effect on almost all major sectors in global economies.
Although the 15 minute city may work in a limited fashion inEurope the obvious aims of this paradigm is to push it toward the global south in order to control the growth of those nations.The quest for more sustainable and smarter cities is urgent for Europeans who have grasped that global warming is the catalyst for their demographic decline, as cities contribute more than 60% of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the deaths during the pandemic and heatwaves that come more frequently and harsher each yearhave thus demanded a redefinition of some contemporary urban policies, especially around mobility.
The ‘15-Minute City’ currently in application in major European Cities, such as Paris and Barcelona, is quickly gaining popularity as a potent solution for encouraging urban sustainability transitions. As the model approaches urban planning via humane socio-economic dimensions, the European narrative is that they wish to further develop it to "benefit urban communities, globally" in an equitable fashion. But what does equitable fashion mean? In short they will pay to lockdown cities of the global south especially in nations intent on using their own oil for the benefit of their own citizens! I gues the images of African nations having beach parties while European cities were devastated by covid still resonates and they want the prosperity party to stop.
What is ironic when the world questioned why Africans werent devastated by covid it never occurred to them they would have a biological immunity to the deadliest strains of the virus. Which is what was later found to be true. Coupkled with the fact that Artemisinin is a drug which is the most second popular for curing malaria is also a main part of the cure g iven to African nations by President Roelina of Madagascar now hailed as an international African hero. Although this is not spoken of in western media. Why is this fact important because organizations like C40 Cities, a city-led coalition focused on fighting climate change, have gone as far as promoting the 15-minute city idea as a blueprint for post-Covid-19 recovery.
Who wants to vacationin a permanently lockdowned city? Any takers? Free airfare! Cmon!...
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