Talking about climate change #25

In bad faith (6 minute read)

Climate change is not a hoax

Put aside your differences...

Oindrilla Ghosh

Earlier this month, climate scientist Michael Mann won an important court case. Scientists like Mann who speak publicly about important topics often deal with people saying awful things about them, and to them. Sometimes, it’s more than just the ranting of people fired up by social media – in Mann’s case it was a concerted campaign linked back to the fossil fuel industry. As far as I can tell, not much ever happens to those responsible. But when a couple of articles were published claiming that Mann’s work was fraudulent, and one writer made a particularly vile analogy for his work, Mann decided to do something. He sued the writers and publishers.

The publishers got away with it, because the writers weren’t employees of the publications. But Mann won against the writers and was awarded US$1 million in compensation. It’s an important victory for scientists who have to deal with unjustified accusations of serious misconduct, and worse, simply because people don’t like what their evidence says.

In honour of this well-deserved victory, this month I’m sharing resources to help with understanding the tactics of those who are acting in bad faith about climate change. I don’t mean people who genuinely believe climate change is a conspiracy, or that it’s not really a problem. I mean those who know perfectly well that climate change is a problem, or simply don’t care whether it is or not and are trying to prevent action, because it suits their interests. Sadly, they do exist, and they succeed in convincing honest and well-intentioned people that there’s no problem and that we don’t need to do anything about climate change.

Denial no longer

For decades, the main strategy of the fossil fuel industry and other vested interests was to deny that climate change existed, or deny that humans were causing it. This strategy has been well-documented – I’ve included two short articles on the subject written by Geoffrey Supran and Naomi Oreskes, who have extensively researched these tactics. The articles contain links for further information.

ExxonMobil misled the public... | The Guardian (4 minute read)

The forgotten oil ads that told us climate change was nothing | The Guardian (7 minute read)

If you prefer to listen or watch, here’s a podcast episode featuring Geoffrey Supran and a video conversation featuring Naomi Oreskes.

Geoffrey Supran: ExxonMobil's Dirty Secret (youtube.com) (30 minute audio)

Naomi Oreskes On Exxon's Decades-Long Doubt Campaign (youtube.com) (46 minute video)

Xanthorrhoea/ grass tree (image credit: Melanie Newfield)

The new D-tactics

Denial still exists, but it has lost credibility with most people, so the fossil fuel industry has changed what they are saying. Michael Mann does a great job of explaining the new tactics they’ve adopted to protect their profits. He’s actually written a whole book on the subject. When I first heard about the book, I thought it might be incredibly depressing to read, but it’s not. I definitely recommend it.

The New Climate War | MICHAEL E. MANN (michaelmann.net)

If you don’t feel like reading a whole book on the subject, I’ve summarised some of the tactics here.

Delay – the tactic of delay is often seen in efforts to focus attention on untested, unproven or not-yet-invented technology as the solution to climate change, rather than burning less coal, oil and gas. This tactic has worked its way into international climate change negotiations in the form of references to “unabated” fossil fuels.

Divide – this is the tactic of trying to get people who are worried about climate change to turn on each other. One example is criticising Al Gore for his energy bills or trying to discredit climate activists over what they eat or how they travel.

Downplay – this is the tactic of trying to make climate change seem as if it’s not as bad as it really is. One example is to frame climate change as a risk (something which might happen) rather than reality – something happening right now.

Deflect – this is the tactic of trying to shift responsibility for climate change. The most egregious example of this is in BP promoting the concept of personal carbon footprints, to try and get people focused on individual actions rather than more meaningful measures such as regulating the companies which contribute most to the problem.

Doomism – if it’s all hopeless, if it’s too late to fix the problem, then there’s no point in doing anything and we might as well keep buying, and burning, fossil fuels. Feeling as if nothing we do matters is great for fossil fuel companies and petrostates like Russia. So, they’re encouraging it.

Downsides – this tactic is a tricky one. It involves focusing on the negative aspects of what we need to do to reduce climate change. It’s a tricky tactic, because it’s valid to debate the merits of different actions. This is the area where there’s a lot of uncertainty and where science doesn’t have all the answers. But those who want us to keep using fossil fuels are trying to get us to focus on the downsides of new technology, such as the impact of lithium mining, and trying to get us to forget the impact of coal mining and oil drilling.

For more on these tactics, here are a few resources, most featuring Michael Mann.

On YouTube, climate denialism takes a turn (nbcnews.com) (6 minute read)

Climatologist Michael E Mann: 'Good people fall victim to doomism.' | The Guardian (12 minute read)

How to recognize the new climate change denial, interview with Michael Mann - Vox (13 minute read, 25 minute audio)

Four tactics used to dismiss climate change – BBC World Service (17 minute video)

water on glass (image credit: Melanie Newfield)

Scare tactics

As well as the D-tactics, there are scare tactics, attempting to frighten people into inaction. An analysis by a couple of Italian disinformation experts looked at 300,000 messages on Twitter (now X) to understand the scare tactics being used to prevent action on climate change. The summary article below is well-worth reading, but it’s quite long so I’ve summarised it.

There are four main fear-based messages:

Doomsday Scenarios – these are messages that action to limit climate change will be a disaster. A classic example of this was COP-28 President and fossil fuel executive Sultan al-Jabar’s statement that the world couldn’t phase out fossil fuels “unless you want to take the world back into caves”.

A Trojan Horse to Socialism – this message seems to relate particularly to the USA, implying that climate change policies have nothing to do with the environment and are actually a plot to turn the USA communist.  While this sounds wildly implausible to me, it was the most prevalent message in the analysis.

A Threat to Hamburgers – this message was amplified by Fox News, which was eventually forced to admit that no, Biden didn’t actually have any plans to limit how much meat Americans could eat.

Totalitarian New World Order – this message links to Q-Anon and conspiracies about COVID-19, vaccines, the Great Reset and more. They are all connected, according to some. It sounds delusional to most of us, but the message is encouraged by opponents of climate action because it contributes to politicisation and polarisation.

Here is the full article.

Climate Deniers Are Using These Four Major Scare Tactics to Stop Climate Action - DeSmog (14 minute read)

This month’s climate poem

This month’s poem comes from Oindrilla Ghosh. It’s part of a set of poems by young people about issues which are important to them. Her poem is called An Illusion Called Future and there’s a recording of her reading it at the link below.

A Mixtape for Hope: Youth Poems for Change | Voices of Youth

palm frond (image credit: Melanie Newfield)