Cockaigne

193 countries signed a UN agreement in 2015 to end world hunger by the year 2030. The state of California is banning the sale of new petrol-powered cars by the year 2035. Germany is abandoning nuclear power plants by the year 2023, coal power plants by the year 2030 and gas power plants by the year 2038. This list could go on and on. What these deadlines have in common is that they are no realistic, practical steps in sight to make them work out. Neither regarding the availability of sufficient renewable energy nor regarding world hunger. These deadlines are only ideologically based - wishful thinking – not based on a reasonable course of conduct. It seems to be sufficient to present an admirable goal, to make people feel good - how this goal can be achieved doesn’t matter anymore as long as the ideology behind it is right. In this way, nowadays, politicians are trying to build a place like Cockaigne, the imaginary land of plenty and ease in medieval mythology.