The Japanese have a saying: “A satiated mouth quickly forgets its benefactor.”
Some would easily argue that this is the case with Detelf Flintz, a commentator and highly paid director at ARD German public television, which is funded in most part by legally mandatory license fees levied on every German household. Refusing to pay these fees could easily land you in prison.
Needless to say, Flintz enjoys a high and secured salary that the average public television fee payer could only dream of.
Energy price shock? “Good!”
Recently Flintz commented on the skyrocketing energy prices that we now see regular people across Europe struggling to cope with. You’d think you’d hear a little sympathy from privileged journalists like Flintz and the generously funded networks that pamper him. You’d be totally wrong.
In his recent commentary, Flintz snobbily stated on ARD television:
It’s there, the price shock. Good! Only when oil and gas are markedly more expensive, will we be able to get global warming under control. More wind and solar energy? We can’t wait that long, and so we should be happy that we are being forced to alter our consumer production, heat more sparingly. use less energy for the household, no short flights…”
Image cropped from tagesthemen
When he says “we”, he of course means “us” – and not him.
The comments unleashed a wave of outrage from the public. Yet the ARD sniffs and refuses to hear any of it. It’s time, after all, for the unwashed peasants to be put back where they belong – out fending for themselves in the cold mud.
German climate science critical site Die kalte Sonne comments:
The well-paid director Detlef Flintz (annual income approx. 120,000 euros + great benefits) is delighted about the rising energy prices. This is the only way for us to change our behavior. Us? With his salary, Flintz notices the rising prices about as much as an elephant notices the fly on its back, namely not at all. The fact that a large part of the population does not have such a salary does not even occur to him.
For every average wage earner, the energy price increases mean that savings have to be made elsewhere. While 30,000 euros for a new electric car may be a trifle for Flintz, for many people it is beyond their means. As an economist, Flintz should also know that the savings that now have to be made elsewhere have an impact on completely different areas of the economy. Every euro can only be spent once. But perhaps that’s too much for him to grasp.”
Perhaps Flintz should accept at 60% pay cut, that way he too would be forced to scale back his profligate consumption and energy use to a level that still would be higher than the average German public television fee-payer. At least then he would be taken a bit seriously.
via NoTricksZone
October 19, 2021
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