There’s a saying that’s quoted often at the Instapundit blog: “Things that can’t go on forever won’t.” And there are encouraging signs that people may have finally had enough of the freedom-crushing, anti-science jihads of the woke elites and are finally speaking up, fighting back and saying, “Enough!”

For a long time, Europe has been under the sway of radical greens demanding that civilization be dismantled to appease the climate gods. It’s gotten so insane that unelected EU bureaucrats are forcing farm families of generations standing off their land without regard for what people would eat, and shutting down power plants with no viable alternatives available. The self-destructive virtue signaling was papered over by buying food from Ukraine and oil from Russia, but suddenly, that protection from their own insanity was cut off by the war.

https://hotair.com/tree-hugging-sister/2023/05/19/sadz-not-all-moonlight-and-unicorn-farts-anymore-in-the-eus-green-dreamland-n551926

Now, reality is suddenly making a surprise comeback. Dutch farmers are fighting back, and some nations are fed up with unreliable, high-priced “renewable” energy sources. Finland recently opened a nuclear power plant that was delayed by 14 years, and power bills dropped by 75%. The Greens are blasting France as “crazy” for building nuclear plants, but as the linked article notes, they’ll be begging to buy electricity from France soon enough. Even in Germany, a hotbed of radical environmental lunacy, unreliable and inadequate wind turbines are being dismantled to make room for a coal mine expansion.

(As a reminder of how loony German greens are, they rushed to ban nuclear energy after an earthquake caused a tsunami to flood the Fukishima nuclear plant in Japan in 2011, despite the fact that Germany is not prone to earthquakes or tsunamis.)

Speaking of Germany and unscientific ideas that liberals refuse to give up, five German researchers have stood up against the rigid pro-mask narrative with a new study warning of hidden health dangers from longterm mask-wearing and arguing that mask mandates should be reconsidered. 

https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-harm-caused-by-masks

Even with the pandemic far in the rearview mirror, you still see people wearing facemasks everywhere. But this study isn’t about the effectiveness of masks at blocking viruses, or even the unhygienic practice of putting a dirty mask over your face. It’s about carbon dioxide (CO2.) The human body is built to breathe in fresh air and exhale CO2. Fresh air is about 0.04% CO2. Chronic exposure to CO2 levels of 0.3% is considered toxic. From the article:

“At levels between 0.05% and 0.5% CO2,” one might experience an “increased heart rate, increased blood pressure and overall increased circulation with the symptoms of headache, fatigue, difficulty concentrating, dizziness, rhinitis, and dry cough.” Rates above 0.5% CO2 can lead to “reduced cognitive performance, impaired decision-making and reduced speed of cognitive solutions.” Beyond 1% CO2, “the harmful effects include respiratory acidosis, metabolic stress, increased blood flow and decreased exercise tolerance.” And the US Navy limits CO2 levels on submarines to 0.8% to reduce the risk of stillbirths and birth defects for pregnant female personnel.

So how much C02 are mask wearers breathing in? According to this study, people who wear masks for five minutes or longer are inhaling CO2 levels of 1.41% to 3.2%, or 35-80 times the normal level.

But if you try telling some people this, they call you a science-denier and refuse to remove their masks. Maybe they’ve living proof that longterm masking really does cause “reduced cognitive performance” and “impaired decision-making.”