Comment by wisty

I think this is wrong.

Descriptively / "objectively" if you make your demand cleaner, you decrease demand for dirty consumption. You can't say individuals don't matter by comparing them to the world, that's invalid.

Normatively, is it a useful lie? Maybe, to some extent. People are lazy, selfish, and stupid. Peter Singer points out that we might be nice to people nearby, but we don't give money to people starving in other countries even if we think it will make a real difference. And no human can really know how even a pencil is made, so we make poor decisions. A carbon tax would unleash the free market on the problem. But saying individuals can't act is not good leadership, if even the people who say they want to fix the issue won't make personal sacrifices, why should the average voter?