Carbon emissions
Isn’t this a lovely demand from the usual sources?
One of the key lessons of the Covid-19 pandemic is that strong policies require strong public engagement: people needed to understand the nature of the virus before they would tolerate constraints on their lives or provide the government with a mandate for action.
Yet the world faces another major problem that is already transforming economies, infrastructure and way of life: the climate crisis. And in this case, governments have miserably failed to inform or consult their citizens. Not one of the highest-polluting nations attending Joe Biden’s climate summit last week has a coherent strategy or dedicated national budget for public engagement.
We must have more climate change propaganda Comrades!
The people must be educated into desiring more poverty.
And can they be surprised if people resent and resist policies for which a mandate has never been sought or earned?
Only if we scare the bejabbers out of the peasantry will they consent to remaining as peasants.
It’s time for governments to launch a sustained and informed engagement with their citizens.
Propaganda!
Hmm, I wonder, is there anyone who might be suitable to run such a system of brainwashing the citizenry?
George Marshall is the founding director of Climate Outreach,
Ah, George, how fortunate you’re here.
Governments must resist the instinctive urge to blow budgets on short-lived campaigns of advertisements, celebrity endorsements and political sloganeering. Some background publicity is valuable, but our research shows that communicating about the climate crisis also requires a more sustained approach: recruiting authentic and trusted communicators, training scientists to speak skilfully, tailoring messaging to the values of different audiences, and reaching people through their communities, workplaces and faith networks. After all, the aim is to build shared understanding, not to sell a product.
Perhaps we could institute a two minute hate each day?
Whitehall would do well to look north of the border. For the past 13 years, the Scottish government has been quietly and steadily supporting community organisations to initiate local conversations about the climate on a modest, £8.5m annual budget. We know what to do, but it must be scaled up.
And wonder of wonders. That Scottish campaign does indeed involve the Scottish government giving lots of money to Climate Outreach, the organisation run by Our George who is urging more climate change propaganda.
George Yosser Marshall.
Finally, the government must accept that building a collective mandate requires it to reach all people, paying particular attention to those who are sceptical, marginalised and disengaged. There are excellent models from health, addiction and literacy campaigns that provide clear strategies, targets and measures of success. At present, climate engagement has none of these.
And as we approach the Cop26 climate conference, we must question the technocratic culture that assumes carbon targets can be delivered solely through smart engineering and spreadsheets. We hear much about leadership, but leadership is meaningless without followers, and ambition is a fantasy unless it is widely shared and supported. Public engagement is not window dressing; it is the essential foundation for all policy.
And unless we manage to propagandise to everyone then the peasantry will tell us to piss off when we make them poorer. And can’t be having with that, can we?
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Tim, wasn't your colleague Ricky Murphy going on about freedom from fear just the other day? But governments and anyone with a soapbox are allowed to scare the spit out of everyone about a nonexistent crisis.
'your colleague'. Most excellent.
Yesterday on the World at One on BBC R4, Sarah Montague was interviewing a meteorologist about the past month of April. Very sunny and clear, but by far the coldest for a few years. April 2020 was quite warm, apparently. After listening to his explanations (airstreams, lack of cloud cover, clear night skies meaning lost warmth) she then had to ask the obvious question: Is this anything to do with long term climate change caused by human activity?
The middle class in this country thrive on fear and self-loathing. Or perhaps the loathing of others who aspire to the same standard of living. I don't know a single person who has got rid of their gas boiler or (before the lockdown) who has stopped flying.
Sam, what was the answer to Vine's question re: human activity?
And I wonder why they don't show the model 'scenarios' produced in1980?
Perhaps it's because reality has shown their predictions to be consistently wrong?
He was reluctant to see this as (in Montague's terms) "sinister or serious", but then went on to talk about how computer models say polar warming will affect the jetstream. No falsifiable predictions, of course, but a general tone of concern based on modelling. You can hear it here, near the end, about 42 minutes in.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000vqqr
I don’t know a single person who has ...............stopped flying.
Errrr
I do. Not because they want to, but on account of guvmint mandated airline closures brought in to combat the spread of a deadly virus that affects less than 0.5% of the population
Where—no, where in hell—does a democratically elected government get the authority to "quietly and steadily support...community organisations to initiate local conversations" that the government should do as it likes?
Just about any side that loses an election explains that "we didn't get our message out". Couldn't possibly be that you did & the people liked the other side better. The peons aren't on board with painful solutions to Global Warming - we must have not be yelling at them loudly enough.
A good point. The mega difference between "educating" people about Covid and Climate is that, once educated, the plebs see that doing Covid stuff makes them not-poorer, ie alive, whereas doing Climate stuff makes them poorer.
Yes, if Covid "education" means: It's a once-in-a-century outbreak that is going to kill millions, we are all in this together, and exchanging a smile with a stranger from whom you're already minding your distance means Grandma is going to die.
So I expect Climate "education" sufficient to convince us (with Covid as precedent) that failure to obey the shifting "guidance" of authorities will make one not-alive, i.e. poorer.
There is no difference between the Covid "crisis" and the Climate "crisis."
If they did that I would be happy. Instead we are treated to endless fear.
We have people who now wash their hands to prevent an air-borne disease. People who persist in thinking that crossing the path of someone outside is a risk of infection. People who haven't worked out that even if the vaccines work, that the risk of giving them to children outweighs the rewards.
Most people think that the risk of Covid to themselves is at least ten times what it actually is. And many overestimate it by a factor of 100.
So it is with climate. Real problems that might arise in the future are blown out of all proportion. And the "solutions" proposed won't work.