In TV there’s been this saying forever: “if it bleeds it leads” referring to what story would be the lead story in the TV newscast. It stands to reason then that “environmental catastrophe” would get more airplay and print. This study confirms what I’ve known for a very long time – chaos sells newspapers and makes ratings. Except…now people are getting saturated. AGW has become the O.J. Simpson story of our time, it has worn out its welcome. – Anthony
Media Tend To Doomsay When Addressing Environmental Issues
ScienceDaily (July 9, 2009) — This study, undertaken by researchers from the University of the Basque Country (UBC), analyses the role played by the media in creating and spreading a stance regarding the protection of the environment, sustainable development and natural heritage.
This research, published in the latest issue of the Revista Latina de Comunicación Social (Latin Journal of Social Communication in English) proposes and performs an analysis of the dialectic strategies used by the daily press to treat environmental information. Jose Ignacio Lorente, a lecturer at the UBC and one of the researchers who participated in the project told SINC that the study was concerned with “the way in which social communication media, particularly news media, contribute to creating and spreading social visions of sustainable development and the conservation and protection of the environment in general and natural heritage in particular”.
The research team studied the information published in connection with the environmental summit held in Bali in 2007. Apart from this analysis, the researchers complemented this information with a survey carried out in Urdaibai the Basque Country. The questions referred to the perceptions, attitudes and willingness to participate in mitigating the adverse effects of climate change, aspects in relation to the social representations identified in the analysis of the contents of the study.
The extensive analysis of the dialectics included an evaluation of the so-called news agendas, as well as framing procedures (the way in which the media determine how they will consider and publicly present information) and priming procedures (which ensure the relevance of certain aspects of the news that sustain the reasoning behind a given interpretation of the facts).
Lorente believes the conclusions of this study suggest that “the media make an active contribution to tackling the complexity of the sustainability crisis of the current model of development, by confining their interpretation to environmental problems, but also fail to consider the social, economic and cultural aspects of a production system based on growth and the massive exploitation of natural resources”.
What Happens and What the Media Says
According to the results of the study, the news agenda that the media developed regarding the Summit in Bali focused on scientific evidence of the global dimensions of climate change, the fact that its potentially devastating effects could be immediate and its anthropogenic nature. However, according to the researchers, this agenda “avoided addressing the real reasons behind the political argument in detail, by means of a narrative strategy in which dramatising conflicts, threats and delays regarding CO2 quotas prevailed,” becoming the top priority for the Bali Summit.
However, Lorente adds, “the emphasis the media placed on scientific evidence regarding the human nature of the causes for climate change was not linked to citizens’ sphere of activity, despite fact that their everyday decisions and behaviour – transport, energy saving, recycling – account for 20% of the problem”.
According to the research by the UBC, alarmist and catastrophist news focusing on the risk of natural disasters and the urgency of political and economic action “places the emphasis on the heroic efforts of abstract and distant individuals whose motives are not always clear”. This approach, they say, appears to lack references to or be based on citizen’s everyday life.
Furthermore, the prominence of the eco-efficient approach (based on expectations that techno-scientific development is enough to mitigate the effects of climate change) results in the media not covering the debate in connection with the social, economic and cultural model that citizens are willing to assume and share, reinforcing instead, according to Lorente, the perspective that our current way of life, production and consumption is the only option available when it comes to interpreting development and sustainability.”
Journal reference:
- José Ignacio Lorente; José Enrique Antolín; Francisco Javier Doblas. La construcción mediática de lo ecológico. Estrategias discursivas en la información de actualidad. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social, Number 64, pages 315-327
To be honest, this is not a surprise. How often do you read an article about the climate in the MSM which was written by a meteorologist?
If anyone were to measure such a thing, I feel sure that the majority of climate column inches in the MSM these days would turn out to be penned by writers who hold positions along the lines of “Environment Editor/Correspondent”. Where did they come from and, equally important, where will the future “Environmental Correspondents” come from?
The University of East Anglia (coincidentally the home of the UK Met Office’s Hadley Centre) now offers a 1-year course to obtain an MSc in “climate change and development”.
http://www.uea.ac.uk/dev/MScCCID
Applicants for the MSc programme should have a good first degree in “either the social sciences or science” (note the juxtaposition of these two!!). The course will cover, inter alia:
• Conflict, Peace and Security
• Contemporary World Development
• Educational Policy and Practice in Development
• Food Systems and Rural Development
• Gender, Difference and Social Policy
• Globalisation, Industrialisation and Development
• Health and Development
• Policies and Issues in Environment and Development
• Rural Policies
Oh, and there are optional modules covering:
• Development Perspectives
• Gender Concepts for Development
• Governance, Democracy and Development
• Gender and Rural Livelihoods
• Introduction to Education and Development
• Introduction to Social Development
• Research Techniques and Analysis
Hang on! Where’s the meteorology in all that?
This course almost guarantees an alarmist, non-science, outcome.
I would expect that anyone who successfully obtains an MSc in Climate Change and Development from the UAE would easily beat a meteorologist, no matter how qualified or experienced, if competing for an editorial position in the environmental section of a mainstream media outlet.
Thus we can expect no change, I’m afraid.
Sounds like a study lamenting the way the media presents the AGW story and not whether there’s even a real story to present. And how can you blame the media when folks like Gore & Hansen keep feeding the media gloom and doom spin on the supposed dangers of AGW?
As for real folk (forget the silliness of celebrities), most people have to live within a modest income, pinching pennies – they’re quite aware of sustainability (though they might not use such terms).
There ain’t no news like bad news. Don Henley wrote a song about this in the 80’s. It was called Dirty Laundry. Is it any wonder why TV news and newspapers are losing ratings and subscribers rapidly? People now know they can get more objective and better news through the internet.
Thanks for the article Anthony.
What struck me is the fact that the conclusions of this article directly relate to the behavior of our politicians.
Motls publication about the G8 summit makes a lot clear.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2009/07/g8-err-g7-ban-ice-ages-and-order-global.html
The fact that the press was not allowed to ask any questions during the press presentation at the end of the G8 summit is remarkable.
The mainstream media is just an arm of the government.
The government is an arm of the Democrat party.
In a nutshell.
This article makes a valid point. Recently a good friend of mine was interviewed regarding his company’s efforts in carbon capture and storage. His view is that he is not scientifically qualified to offer an opinion as to whether AGW is real, but that if society wishes to address that issue, he can help in a meaningful and verifiable way.
The reporter tried many times to lead him into making an outrageous or catastrophic statement. When he refused, the interview ended up on the cutting room floor.
So much for unbiased media treatment.
This is why the AGW storyline is basically an IQ Test. If you fall for the bamboozle and propoganda, you are said to “care” about the environment. If you see through this scam, you sir, are a denialist and worse than Hitler and should resign. We are witnesses to the use of a lie to create a national ponzi scheme of rationed energy to enrich Algore and his merry band of thieves.
Algore should either be prosecuted or put in a straightjacket. And our laws should not be based on a foundation of lies. No matter how big the lie or how often it is told.
The mainstream media will go to any length to feed the 24 hour news cycle. the Alarmist and Green propaganda is easy fodder for the masses to digest in quick easy soundbites.
But if one major outlet would get off it’s butt and devote the resources, effort, and political will it would take to truly investigate the question without preconcived biases, and with all of the resources available, the wheels would come off the AGW wagon…..sigh just a pipe dream.
One can yell “Fire” just so many times until it gets boring and no one cares anymore especially if the fire happens to be a small camp fire rather than an enormous inferno.
In this same issue of Science Daily(which appears to feature mostly pro-AGW material) there is another article on the media:
“Climate Change Is Not Taken Seriously Because Media Is Not Highlighting Its Significance, Expert Says”
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090225073213.htm
Possibly the one you featured Anthony, is a “token” to show balance?
Doug Ferguson
Mankato, MN
“places the emphasis on the heroic efforts of abstract and distant individuals whose motives are not always clear”.
This evidently refers to NGOs that play a main role on these matters, so the problem is greater as far as “doom” or, more generally, scandal sells, but to those cases where the media is actually paid by NGOs, journalists belonging to NGOs payroll, or NGOs directly being the owners of media.
but, but, but…i thought those electric cars were the panacea!
Not So Fast With Those Electric Cars
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/ArticlePrint.aspx?id=481690
now, i like the idea of an electric car, but my current work situation is such that they’re not very useful. i really hope battery technology improves in the next few years, making such car much more functional.
If I was a reporter I would never get the story from a guy dressed in a polar bear costume. Obviously, that guy has no clue that the polar bear population is doing better than ever.
This morning, on the radio (radio-canada), the first piece of news was about the RETURN of EL NINO (or “Enano Nino” – http://pichicola.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/enano.jpg for D. King) but they never said anything about the frost in PEI or all those other places with unusual cold weather. Pathetic!
One can yell “Fire” just so many times until it gets boring and no one cares anymore especially if the fire happens to be a small camp fire rather than an enormous inferno.
i sure hope the “fire” we’re seeing here in Texas abates soon! i can hardly bear the thought of August after a June and July like we’ve had!
Back when I was in journalism classes in college I was told “Dog bites man is not news, but man bites dog is.”
What that means is that stories saying the climate changes, just like it always has, and there are few if any indicators of human caused influences on it are not news. But Gore,because of his public stature (which is getting bigger all the time) and Hansen with his NASA (the rocket guys) credentials make news by opening their mouths.
This study is not news because it tells us what we already know.
Mike
Pearland Aggie (09:18:58) : Pray Saint Gore. If he appears around temperatures will drop at least 50 degrees, for sure.
“i can hardly bear the thought of August after a June and July like we’ve had!”
not too different from every other june and july we’ve had. It comes down to rain each year – if we have a wet June, it’s pretty nice. If we’re dry, we fry. Now do you remember the summer of ’80? THAT was one for the record books!
In Texas and most of the south, almost every high temp for the month of June was set in that infamous summer of ’80. nearly 30 years of supposed warming later, and we still haven’t got close to that one. Thank god!
Pearland Aggie (09:16:27) :
I fear the worst with those electric cars. We all know that now and then cell phones and laptops spontanously burst in flammes because of faulty batteries. The risk of combustion increases with the packing of more energy in smaller batteries. Is it going to be safe to park your electric car in a garage or close to your home? What about when you are actually driving the car or incolved in a crash?
You can bet that the MSM won’t ask those questions anytime soon.
Don’t forget that some media outlets have a vested interest in pushing this theme to promote their business connections. Case in point is NBC, MSNBC. Some of the most over-the-top coverage of climate change, anywhere in TV news, comes from Ann Thompson, their environmental correspondent. NBC is owned by GE, which has been pushing green technology in a major way in the last several years. I think this is the core of Immelt’s corporate strategy at GE.
July 05, 2009
History Unfolding
Wil Wirtanen:
Don’t think he is far off in his assessment.
This is a must read. What a parallel he is describing. God help us.
David Kaiser is a respected historian whose published works have covered a broad range of topics, from European Warfare to American League Baseball. Born in 1947, the son of a diplomat, Kaiser spent his childhood in three capital cities: Washington D.C., Albany, New York, and Dakar, Senegal. He attended Harvard University, graduating there in 1969 with a B.A. in history. He then spent several years more at Harvard, gaining a PhD in history, which he obtained in 1976. He served in the Army Reserve from 1970 to 1976.
He is a professor in the Strategy and Policy Department of the United States Naval War College and has previously taught at Carnegie Mellon, Williams College and Harvard University . Kaiser’s latest book, The Road to Dallas, about the Kennedy assassination, was just published by Harvard University Press.
Dr. David Kaiser
History Unfolding
I am a student of history. Professionally, I have written 15 books on history that have been published in six languages, and I have studied history all my life. I have come to think there is something monumentally large afoot, and I do not believe it is simply a banking crisis, or a mortgage crisis, or a credit crisis. Yes these exist, but they are merely single facets on a very large gemstone that is only now coming into a sharper focus.
Something of historic proportions is happening. I can sense it because I know how it feels, smells, what it looks like, and how people react to it.. Yes, a perfect storm may be brewing, but there is something happening within our country that has been evolving for about ten to fifteen years. The pace has dramatically quickened in the past two.
We demand and then codify into law the requirement that our banks make massive loans to people we know they can never pay back? Why?
We learned just days ago that the Federal Reserve, which has little or no real oversight by anyone, has “loaned” two trillion dollars (that is $2,000,000,000,000) over the past few months, but will not tell us to whom or why or disclose the terms. That is our money. Yours and mine. And that is three times the $700 billion we all argued about so strenuously just this past September. Who has this money? Why do they have it? Why are the terms unavailable to us? Who asked for it? Who authorized it? I thought this was a government of “we the people,” who loaned our powers to our elected leaders. Apparently not.
We have spent two or more decades intentionally de-industrializing our economy.. Why?
We have intentionally dumbed down our schools, ignored our history, and no longer teach our founding documents, why we are exceptional, and why we are worth preserving. Students by and large cannot write, think critically, read, or articulate. Parents are not revolting, teachers are not picketing, school boards continue to back mediocrity. Why?
We have now established the precedent of protesting every close election (violently in California over a proposition that is so controversial that it simply wants marriage to remain defined as between one man and one woman. Did you ever think such a thing possible just a decade ago?) We have corrupted our sacred political process by allowing unelected judges to write laws that radically change our way of life, and then mainstream Marxist groups like ACORN and others to turn our voting system into a banana republic. To what purpose?
Now our mortgage industry is collapsing, housing prices are in free fall, major industries are failing, our banking system is on the verge of collapse, social security is nearly bankrupt, as is Medicare and our entire government. Our education system is worse than a joke (I teach college and I know precisely what I am talking about) – the list is staggering in its length, breadth, and depth.. It is potentially 1929 x ten…And we are at war with an enemy we cannot even name for fear of offending people of the same religion, who, in turn, cannot wait to slit the throats of your children if they have the opportunity to do so.
And finally, we have elected a man that no one really knows anything about, who has never run so much as a Dairy Queen, let alone a town as big as Wasilla , Alaska . All of his associations and alliances are with real radicals in their chosen fields of employment, and everything we learn about him, drip by drip, is unsettling if not downright scary (Surely you have heard him speak about his idea to create and fund a mandatory civilian defense force stronger than our military for use inside our borders? No? Oh, of course. The media would never play that for you over and over and then demand he answer it. Sarah Palin’s pregnant daughter and $150,000 wardrobe are more important.)
Mr. Obama’s winning platform can be boiled down to one word: Change. Why?
I have never been so afraid for my country and for my children as I am now.
This man campaigned on bringing people together, something he has never, ever done in his professional life. In my assessment, Obama will divide us along philosophical lines, push us apart, and then try to realign the pieces into a new and different power structure. Change is indeed coming. And when it comes, you will never see the same nation again.
And that is only the beginning..
As a serious student of history, I thought I would never come to experience what the ordinary, moral German must have felt in the mid-1930s In those times, the “savior” was a former smooth-talking rabble-rouser from the streets, about whom the average German knew next to nothing. What they should have known was that he was associated with groups that shouted, shoved, and pushed around people with whom they disagreed; he edged his way onto the political stage through great oratory. Conservative “losers” read it right now.
And there were the promises. Economic times were tough, people were losing jobs, and he was a great speaker. And he smiled and frowned and waved a lot. And people, even newspapers, were afraid to speak out for fear that his “brown shirts” would bully and beat them into submission. Which they did – regularly. And then, he was duly elected to office, while a full-throttled economic crisis bloomed at hand – the Great Depression. Slowly, but surely he seized the controls of government power, person by person, department by department, bureaucracy by bureaucracy. The children of German citizens were at first, encouraged to join a Youth Movement in his name where they were taught exactly what to think. Later, they were required to do so. No Jews of course,
How did he get people on his side? He did it by promising jobs to the jobless, money to the money-less, and rewards for the military-industrial complex. He did it by indoctrinating the children, advocating gun control, health care for all, better wages, better jobs, and promising to re-instill pride once again in the country, across Europe , and across the world. He did it with a compliant media – did you know that? And he did this all in the name of justice and …. . .. change. And the people surely got what they voted for.
If you think I am exaggerating, look it up. It’s all there in the history books.
So read your history books. Many people of conscience objected in 1933 and were shouted down, called names, laughed at, and ridiculed. When Winston Churchill pointed out the obvious in the late 1930s while seated in the House of Lords in England (he was not yet Prime Minister), he was booed into his seat and called a crazy troublemaker. He was right, though. And the world came to regret that he was not listened to.
Do not forget that Germany was the most educated, the most cultured country in Europe . It was full of music, art, museums, hospitals, laboratories, and universities. And yet, in less than six years (a shorter time span than just two terms of the U. S. presidency) it was rounding up its own citizens, killing others, abrogating its laws, turning children against parents, and neighbors against neighbors.. All with the best of intentions, of course. The road to Hell is paved with them.
As a practical thinker, one not overly prone to emotional decisions, I have a choice: I can either believe what the objective pieces of evidence tell me (even if they make me cringe with disgust); I can believe what history is shouting to me from across the chasm of seven decades; or I can hope I am wrong by closing my eyes, having another latte, and ignoring what is transpiring around me..
I choose to believe the evidence. No doubt some people will scoff at me, others laugh, or think I am foolish, naive, or both. To some degree, perhaps I am. But I have never been afraid to look people in the eye and tell them exactly what I believe-and why I believe it.
I pray I am wrong. I do not think I am. Perhaps the only hope is our vote in the next elections.
David Kaiser
Jamestown , Rhode Island
United States
“i sure hope the “fire” we’re seeing here in Texas abates soon! i can hardly bear the thought of August after a June and July like we’ve had!”
Sorry, PA.
Anecdotal and therefore meaningless.
Andrew
Dr. Hansen spoke in my hometown last night. Here are his comments in today’s Corvallis Gazette Times newspaper regarding the media’s treatment of the global warming issue:
“News releases, he said, were tossed in the trash can or edited to make the issue seem less serious.” – Dr. James Hansen
That’s not been impression of media coverage of this subject.
Here’s a link to the full article:
http://www.gazettetimes.com/articles/2009/07/10/news/community/3aaa04_climatechange071009.txt
Thanks to NickB (08:12:03) for revealing that amongst other things, climate change and development is considered a gender issue by the University of East Anglia. The mind boggles at any causal links here – would anyone care to speculate?
For a variety of reasons, I’ve been interviewed by the media many times. Several news print, one radio show, I’ve even been on a few TV shows. I was put through an intensive training program by one organization (I was on the board of directors) on how to deal with the media.
The bottom line:
The media comes in with a pre-written story in mind. Sometimes they may change a bit of it, but not often. The entire goal of interviewing someone is to create enough volume that they can edit it down to the story they want.
For that reason, the training included how to ALWAYS stay “on topic” for what YOU wanted to communicate and NEVER “reflect” the leading question point of view of the media interviewer (since you know which soundbite will be cut…). It is harder than you might think.
For example, if I were an oil driller doing an environmentally responsible drilling plan with 100% capture of all pollutants, I would only EVER say things like “We capture and treat all drilling effluents”. You would NEVER say “Yes, you are correct that most drilling operations release lots of pollutants, but we capture and treat all drilling effluents”. Since all that would be aired is Oil Driller Says: “most drilling operations release lots of pollutants”!!!
If you are a normal human being, it is very hard not to “reflect” your opponents position prior to responding to it or for contrasting your position. It takes specific training and practice to never screw up and do it even when under the pressure of being on stage.
FWIW, I now will not do any press interview at any time (unless, of course, someone wanted to pay me enough to do it… since it is work). The risk is just not worth it and the media experiences I’ve had have convinced me that you are just raw material for them to cut and paste into a “collage” of their preconceived story.
There may have been “news” at one time, but now it’s all just “infotainment” (yes, that is the term of art used by the media to describe what they do on the ‘nightly news’…) Everything is “tabloid journalism” these days.
re: Ron de Haan (9:43:22)–This is an incorrect attribution (see http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/proportions.asp ), not from David Kaiser–but appearing a while back on AtlasShrugs.com (Pamela Geller).