Tough luck everyone, OP said he already pays too many taxes, so unfortunately climate action has to go on the back burner. But good news, at least while we are still alive he won’t feel like the government is taking took much.

You’re mocking a useful data point: governments operate by the consent of the governed - if you put too much pressure on people, they will replace you democratically or otherwise.

I am painfully aware. The person I replied to is obviously not the only one with that mindset, which is what makes this such a tough sell. At the same time, this is an absurdly shortsighted way of looking at the problem. I get that paying taxes suck, but if the consequence is unmitigated climate change, then maybe taxes are the lesser evil?

To me this whole thing is absolutely absurd, most everyone agrees that we need to do something about climate change, as long as it isn’t them having to change. This isn’t going to get us out of this, at some point we’ll have to realize that “it’s only the big corporations at fault and I’m just a humble innocent cog in the machine” isn’t true and we are all complicit in this. That we all have to do something about this. But hey, finding a scapegoat is always the nice and easy solution. Now we can lean back, pat ourselves on the shoulder because we have identified the problem.

We, collectively as humans, are borderline insane.

For example, even if the greens get majority in Germany, they'll be in a very tough spot. Their core electorate will think they're underdelivering. But their proposed measures won't be accepted by others.