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With all due respect to Don Draper sometimes the best way to sell a message isn’t a clever campaign but the truth. A recently exposed whopper conjured up by climate change deniers highlights exactly what is behind the fight against climate change solutions: lies. The site Fight Clean Energy Smears has been tracking the attempts by a very small minority of deniers out there who are using, quite simply, lies to protect their interest in the status quo.
In this vain attempt, a small group of Heartland Institute enthusiasts petitioned the American Physical Society’s stance on acknowledging global warming and the causal links of human activity. The 206 signatures on the petition challenged the 47,000 member strong stance on the merits of scientific fact. Now the funny part… Not only did the APS reject this lame attempt at spreading propaganda, but it issued a 128-page report debunking the science, exposing the petitioners qualifications, diagramming the how the "gaggle is not a consensus" group try to distort the truth of science.
When is enough going to be enough with this type of public distraction. This is not a trial of public opinion. And if it were Mother Nature would have all the expert witnesses on her side saying, "Global warming exists and it is caused by human activity". End of story.
Truth in advertising is usually the domain of the Better Business Bureau, but one of the Smears of the Week comes straight from the Edward Bernays playbook on manipulating public opinion. A Washington Post ad taken out by the oil funded Citizensenergy.org group claimed that the Kerry-Boxer Bill on climate change will cause the loss of 2-million jobs. Fear monger! The source of their research – studies by the climate change denier National Association of Manufactures and the Exxon funded American Council for Capital Formation. Fortunately, a group with more legitimate research credentials known as The University of California, Berkley produced a study showing conclusive data that adopting clean energy and climate legislation could produce 1.9-million jobs.
It is so concerning that in an age where infinite information lays at our finger tips, there are still such a tolerance for purveyors of lies and deceit. These are not even the elaborate concoctions from Lost writers. They are just plain ole’ "tell the opposite of the truth and hope nobody fact checks" lies. Climate change is real and without action it will continue to have serious consequences on humanity. Yes – our very existence is riding on the truth that science has unequivocally provided. There is no need for doomsday fear mongering. Facts are facts. The good news is there is hope. There is hope the climate bill will pass. There is hope that the economy will recover on the back of new jobs provided in the clean energy sector. And there is hope that smear campaigns will be abandoned.
If you come across smears denying climate change exists or its connection with human activity expose it. Post it to Fight Clean Energy Smears and we can end the nonsense and get to the real work of solutions.
3 Comments
I understand why oilco dispenses these falsehoods.
I am unable to understand why anyone believes any of it.
Who do you believe?
A. Thousands of scientists who have spent their lives studying the subject,
or
B. Talk show hosts, and paid lobbyists with no qualifactions of any kind.
For some reason, a lot of people choose B.
Sometimes I think that because people can understand the television weather forecast (at least somewhat), they believe that they can have a valid opinion about climate change. based on what the weather is like today, in their neighbourhood.
IE. Would you ask a talk show host for his opinion on a problem in nuclear physics? Would you have one yourself?
But everyone feels qualified on climate change. stupid, pathetic, horrible, dumb.
Only a few years ago, the current Prime Minister of Canada Harper, said that climate change was a socialist plot.
From a 2002 letter he wrote:
It is more complicated than that. There has been a concerted effort by FOX media persons and others to discredit ecology as a false religion.
They are expressing their own ‘christian’ view that pagan religions take climate change seriously and we are the devil or evil, therefore they are against the very idea of ecology as a matter of a religious anti-pagan principal.
It is not rational, but it is very easy to manipulate enough of these ignorant people to make a serious impact on legislation. Especially when the very people who mis-educate them come back and use opinion polls of the very opinions they have so carefully cultivated to justify their next set of lies.
What smear campaign? Releasing emails between Warming alarmists? Truth is smear? Since when? We all should have the proper data and honest unbiased opinion from the scientific community. Its very clear from these emails that we don’t and political ideology is playing a large part on what information is being released.