15 November 2009

21 Days - The Deniers Have Nothing to Gain Worth Gaining

Here in Canada, my once proud and peaceful nation that fell into the hands of war mongers and climate change deniers when we became complacent and dropped our vigilance, a small group of oil industry-funded climate change deniers (who gave themselves an official name that makes them sound scientifically official) are running denier/skeptic/ignorer/delayer radio ads across the country. Gee, right before the Copenhagen climate talks. What could their motive be?

First of all, for shame! Shame on the climate change diddlers who obfuscate the truth and tell outright lies by manipulating and confusing and cherry picking the science. The people in this and similar groups are putting the future of the children of all species at risk (risk being a scientific term: risk equals magnitude times probability).
Here's what they (as a teacher, I refuse to give them any publicity, which would be the same as rewarding a negative behaviour with a positive consequence) say about their own ads:

"The purpose of the ads is to demonstrate the futility of policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. They point out that global warming stopped about 10 years ago, and that the Sun is the primary cause of climate change. Climate alarmists refuse to debate the science as they have no evidence that man's emissions of greenhouse gases causes significant climate change."
They always seem to use the same old tired tactics:

1. Attack the policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. (These people must really hate their children, eh? And, by the way, WHAT policies? Our policies are still to keep increasing our greenhouse gas emissions.)


2. Lie about the warming itself. (Global warming has NOT stopped. The "0.78 degrees Celsius burner" is still on and the globe is still cooking. What this group would say if they had integrity is that the global average temperature has not increased any further in the last decade or so — because the oceans are absorbing the carbon dioxide and the heat (dooming coral reefs and devastating marine food chains) and because we are conducting a giant science experiment on latent heat of melting in the Arctic and the world's glaciers.)


3. Talk endlessly about the sun (even to the point of capitalizing it!), and in this case, stop making sense. "... global warming stopped ... the sun is the primary cause of climate change." Which is it? (Without the warmth of the sun, there would be no life on Earth, but its direct contribution to recent global warming is about 10 percent. That's a good chunk, but not a chunk we can control, so why not focus on our causes of the other 90 percent?)


4. Call us climate alarmists, as though raising the alarm is a bad thing.


5. Accuse us of refusing to debate the science. (I would rather debate the policies, but they know that most people, at least in North America, are scientifically illiterate, and therefore easily bamboozled by talking about climate science rather than which policies would safeguard their children's future.)

6. Completely ignore all the millions of people in the world already impacted by climate-change-exacerbated natural phenomena such as droughts, floods, erosion and wild storms. (These deniers are heartless bastards, apparently. Well, they must be to hate their children so much.)


What do they gain by wasting precious time, money and energy in this way? I just can't get into their heads (and can't find any hearts to get into).
Finally, why do these media outlets want to be complicit in this, what could amount to the greatest crime against humanity ever? Why will media outlets reserve the right to refuse counterculture ads from groups like Adbusters, but accept money from groups who bring shame on themselves,
on their country, on the complicit media outlets, on the name of science in general? Why are media outlets like this so blind and mindless when it comes to making money, except when it comes to making money by helping those who want to safeguard the future? For shame. You'll be hearing from me — and I'll be boycotting you!

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I would appreciate hearing your thoughts or questions on this post or anything else you've read here. What is your take on courage and compassion being an important part of the solution to the climate change emergency?