CO2 is your sin. The bank your confessor

by Emanuele Mastrangelo

Carbon dioxide is the new mortal sin and the bank is your confessor. With all due respect to a two-thousand-year-old religion that has built cathedrals, inspired saints and artists, and formed the backbone of our civilization, the parallel with the most detrimental and trivialized aspect of the sin-penance relationship is compelling.

Naturally, the times and modes have changed. No longer is there the stern preacher shouting from the pulpit admonishing the people about the pains of hell awaiting the unrepentant, but colorful, toy-like apps. Even sin is different: from what displeases God to what displeases Greta. And, of course, in place of the church is the bank, the new Temple of the 21st century.

It is the 33 billion Canadian dollar Vancity banking institution that has launched for its account holders an app, linked to their Visa credit card, with which it gives them the very useful possibility of knowing what their "carbon footprint" is, that is, how much CO₂ each of their transactions is supposed to emit. "More and more users are asking us about it," is the excuse used by the bank's top management to announce the innovation for their account holders. "A great example of how we can enable consumers to understand their environmental impact and honor Visa's commitment to a sustainable future," gloats Stacey Madge, Country Manager and President of Visa Canada.

After all, the polls are telling: 70 percent of Canadians surveyed by Visa say that "sustainability is very important" (kind of like asking, "Are you in favor of world peace?" on a beauty pageant stage, in short). Half of the sample surveyed by Visa is curious to "learn more about their carbon footprint." All questions that asked in this way can only get complacent answers toward the interviewer. Who is careful not to show what the medium-term consequences of such enthusiasm will be....

The mechanism implemented by Vancity based on the design of a European company specializing in the field - Ecolytiq - is for the time being a nice accessory. Like the pedometer on your smartphone. You can know how many steps you take or how much CO₂ you have emitted. Obviously with the first mechanism you can also be geolocated and know if you have come in contact with a "covid positive" and, for that, lose your personal freedom by ending up in quarantine. And with the second, impressive opportunities open up for the control of our constitutionally guaranteed rights. Once the criterion that every human action is "responsible" for the emission of CO₂ (quantifiable according to arbitrary criteria that cannot be controlled by the individual) has been spread and accepted, and once it has been imposed that this CO₂ is a "mortal sin" to be penitent for, the extent of the Paters and Hail Marys is in the hands of those who control the mechanism.

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Already we have seen how there are experimental systems that establish a card spending ceiling based on the account holder's carbon footprint. That these cricket-for-the-head systems of the radical chic environmentalist zealot will be turned into an obligation for citizens is only a matter of time, in the absence of the lawmaker deciding to subvert the globalist agenda and secure constitutional rights. Then again, we all remember very well when having a credit card was a status symbol or at best a convenience, while today we can no longer even take the bus without an electronic payment system because our pocket change is no longer accepted by ticket machines. All without any real law by which cash has been taken away from its legal value. Slowly, very simply we are finding ourselves deprived of the right to take public transportation without owning an electronic payment system. Just as we can no longer work, pay taxes, receive pensions or other state commissions without having an IBAN.

It is necessary for those with political responsibility to reverse these trends, re-establishing the hierarchy of rights starting with those of the citizen.