Playing the Green Card: Don't Leave Home Without It

Nope, not the ICE version, rather the one you flash to assure everyone you're a proper member of the environmental movement. Even HuffPost Notices Academic Climate Hypocrisy

Huffington Post has noticed that many university academics are utter climate hypocrites, that many of them rate their personal importance by how many professional air miles they can accumulate every year.

Recently, we witnessed a fascinating conversation among a few of our professorial colleagues about their frequent flyer status on a prominent airline. Two of them had achieved “Diamond” status ― the very top of the priority boarding pecking order. They spoke the most and were the loudest. The others, with either Platinum or Gold frequent flyer medallions, also noted how “busy” they were with “all this travel.”
The group casually mentioned the various benefits ― such as seating upgrades and access to airport lounges ― that come with their statuses, but the bragging was not really about those perks. It was about importance and recognition. After all, only the most successful academics fly around the world, attending conferences, participating in workshops and giving lectures. Congratulations all around!
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But while these universities are working to help their communities take on climate change, academics are accumulating big carbon footprints with their jet-setting professional styles. As The New York Times noted, “Your Biggest Carbon Sin May Be Air Travel.”
This is a notable disconnect between what universities preach and what their culture incentivizes and their star professors do. Academics are probably among the people most aware of the threats posed by climate change. But might their own carbon-profligate lifestyles undermine their moral authority to demand that coal miners, Teamsters working on oil pipelines and mining-dependent Native American tribes sacrifice their own economic well-being to fight climate change?

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Read more: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/opinion-dolsak-prakash-carbon-tax_us_5abe746ae4b055e50acd5c80

The author notes that in 2014, University of Washington academics submitted claims for 136 million miles of professional travel – enough for a return trip to Mars.

This issue goes beyond feeling outraged at the blatant climate hypocrisy.

Why should any of us take academic warnings about anthropogenic CO2 seriously, when behind closed doors those same academics demonstrate their true level of concern by competing with each other to create the largest possible professional carbon footprint?

World and nationwide travel is one of the less trumpeted perks of a successful academic career. Going to conferences in warm, beautiful places in winter, and cool interesting ones in summer, feted with catered drinks and  meals, and plied with interesting side trips are just bonuses to the mingling with colleagues, and the adulation of younger researchers and students is part of the reward for a successful academician. They're not about to give that up just to save the world from overheating. Besides, what happens in Bali (say for example) stays in Bali.