{"id":2334,"date":"2011-03-11T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-03-11T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/03\/the-politics-of-climate-change-denial.html"},"modified":"2011-03-11T17:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-03-11T22:00:00","slug":"the-politics-of-climate-change-denial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/03\/the-politics-of-climate-change-denial.html","title":{"rendered":"The politics of climate change denial"},"content":{"rendered":"Why do some people deny the overwhelming science of climate\nchange in a time when the evidence and analysis is so thorough\nand so conclusive that no reputable scientific organization\nin the world doubts any longer that humans are changing the climate\nof the whole planet for the worse:\nbecause it threatens their political and economic beliefs.\n\nNaomi Klein: Why Climate Change Is So Threatening to Right-Wing Ideologues<\/a>:\n
\n\n<\/a>\nAnd the reason is that climate change is now seen as an identity issue\non the right. People are defining themselves, like they\u2019re against\nabortion, they don\u2019t believe in climate change. It\u2019s part of who\nthey are.\n<\/blockquote>\nIt’s like denying the earth goes around the sun.\nWhy would they identify with such a silly thing?\nBecause of what actually dealing with climate change would mean:\n\n\n
\n\n<\/a>\nIt would mean upending the whole free trade agenda, because it would\nmean that we would have to localize our economies, because we have the\nmost energy-inefficient trade system that you could imagine. And this is\nthe legacy of the free trade era. So, this has been a signature policy\nof the right, pushing globalization and free trade. That would have to\nbe reversed.\n

\nYou would have to deal with inequality. You would have to redistribute\nwealth, because this is a crisis that was created in the North, and the\neffects are being felt in the South. So, on the most basic, basic, “you\nbroke it, you bought it,” polluter pays, you would have to redistribute\nwealth, which is also against their ideology.\n

\nYou would have to regulate corporations. You simply would have to. I mean,\nany serious climate action has to intervene in the economy. You would\nhave to subsidize renewable energy, which also breaks their worldview.\n<\/blockquote>\nAnd\n\nstop subsidizing oil.<\/a>\n

\nI don’t agree with her on this one:\n

\nYou would have to have a really strong United Nations, because individual\ncountries can’t do this alone. You absolutely have to have a strong\ninternational architecture.\n<\/blockquote>\nYes, you need a strong international architecture, in terms of widespread\ninformation sharing, especially about what works and what doesn’t.\nBut turning that into a single point of failure at the UN (or the U.S.) would\nnot help; it would just make everything more fragile.\nIn forty years the UN never got rid of Gadaffi:\ninstead it elected Libya to run its Human Rights Commission.\n\n<\/a>\nWhat we need is more like Wikipedia and\n\nWikileaks<\/a> than like the UN.\n

\nBut back to her main point:\n

\nSo when you go through this, you see, it challenges everything that they\nbelieve in. So they\u2019re choosing to disbelieve it, because it\u2019s easier\nto deny the science than to say, “OK, I accept that my whole worldview\nis going to fall apart,” that we have to have massive investments\nin public infrastructure, that we have to reverse free trade deals,\nthat we have to have huge transfers of wealth from the North to the\nSouth. Imagine actually contending with that. It\u2019s a lot easier to\ndeny it.\n<\/blockquote>\n\n<\/a>\nWhich explains why newly-elected Republican governors are turning\ndown rail funds while\n\nChina has operational high speed rail lines faster than 300 miles per hour\nand a dozen slower ones at only 200-250 miles per hour.<\/a>\n

\nShe goes on to say many environmental groups are also in denial,\nbecause they’re still trying to say climate change has nothing\nto do with politics or economy: “it won\u2019t really disrupt.”\nYes it will:\n

\nThis is about an economic model that needs constant and infinite growth on\na finite planet. So we really are talking about some deep transformations\nof our economy if we\u2019re going to deal with climate change. And we need\nto talk about it.\n<\/blockquote>\nThey may believe that there’s not enough to go around,\nbut they want to get theirs.\nActually, there are ways to share a finite planet so nobody lacks.\n

\nNow I say that you can have continued economic growth without\ncontinually increasing exploitation of natural resources.\nLook at the iPhone; look at the Internet.\nSure, both of those require some natural resources, but their\nmain value is not in their physical objects; their main value\nis in their computing complexity, their software, and in who and what\nthey connect.\nTheir degree of physical resource exploitation is nothing compared\nto, oh, a coal mine or a biomass plant.\nEspecially if they are powered by solar, wind, tide, or waves.\nNonetheless, changing to such an economy will be massively disruptive.\nWhich also means some people are going to get rich,\nwhile those who cling to dinosaur industries like oil are going to go down.\nPersonally, I’d rather we in the U.S. and in south Georgia\nprofit by the new economy instead of leaving all of it to the Chinese.\n

\nSpeaking of oil:\n

\n…we often hear, “Well, we\u2019re not doing anything about climate\nchange. It\u2019s just business as usual.” But it\u2019s not true that\nit\u2019s just business as usual, because we are now in the era of extreme\nenergy. The easy-to-get fossil fuels have pretty much been gotten, and\nnow it\u2019s the harder-to-get stuff, the more-expensive-to-get stuff and\nthe riskier stuff. And that means deepwater drilling, which puts whole\necologies at risk, as we\u2019ve seen on the Gulf Coast. And it means the\ntar sands in Canada. There\u2019s a proposal to have a tar sands project\nin Utah. It means fracking for natural gas, ….\nI mean, these are methods that are a lot riskier,\nand it\u2019s affecting many, many more people. And so, I think we need to\nget away from this idea that we\u2019re just going on as we\u2019ve always\ngone on. No, we aren\u2019t. If we don\u2019t get off fossil fuels, we are\naccepting a much, much higher-risk energy trajectory.\n<\/blockquote>\nEspecially higher-risk for us if other countries go to the new economy\nwhile we hang on to dinosaur fossil industries that directly destroy\nour environment.\n

\nThe point here is that climate change deniers cannot separate\ntheir doctrinaire disbelief in the science of climate change from\ntheir politics because it is their politics that causes their\nclimate change denial.\nFor that matter, it’s their politics that are in a large part\ncausing climate change.\n

\nThe same people care about their children.\nBut this is not a problem waiting for their children’s or grandchildren’s\ntime.\nTornado Alley has expanded to\n\nDixie Alley as close as a few counties away.<\/a>\n

\n\n<\/a>\nAs\n\nBen Copeland pointed out<\/a>\nrivers in Georgia already are not running the way they used to,\nas the aquifer continues to sink:\n

\nWater is going to be very important as we expand our industrial\nbase. Because we’re going to have folks who like to start up jobs here\nbecause of the water we have. How much of that water can be used to\nsustain jobs. Those are the questions….\n

\nPeople need to be informed; need to be aware; that we have to use\nresources very very carefully; at the same time in a way that provides\njobs to our citizens for prosperity.\n<\/blockquote>\nAnd he didn’t say “they” as in our children or grandchildren will\nsolve these problems.\nHe said:\n

\nAs we go forward we’re going to have to answer these questions.\n<\/blockquote>\nWe, here and now.\nClimate change is real and it is here in south Georgia.\n

\nHow many of us care about\n\nthe public good and the general welfare?<\/a>\nHow many of us care more about our families, our communities,\nour region, our country, and our world than we care about\ninsisting the sun circles the earth?\n

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