If you were to ask Joe Romm, Jim Hansen, Bill McKibben, Al Gore, and some of the other hard core angry people who use this word daily, they’d probably say “no”. They think nothing of it, they’ve desensitized themselves to it and use it without even thinking about it any more. It’s a sad form of commentary.
But ask reasonable and rational people who don’t have anger and angst wound up in the climate change debate, and the answer is likely to be different.
Andrew Bolt has a disturbing piece on the use of the word by Australian PM Julia Gillard, who is so far the highest level government official to use the word as far as I know. He writes:
Six million Jews didn’t die so Combet could smear a sceptic
It is deliberate and it is grossly offensive – a foul smear acceptable only to the shameless:
The manager of opposition business Christopher Pyne said that after 11 years as chair of the Parliamentary Friendship Group on Israel, he was offended by the form of words – which he likened to the term “Holocaust denier”.
Amid uproar in the House of Representatives, Mr Pyne asked the Prime Minister to withdraw the comment…
“We know that she is trying to allude to the Holocaust. It is offensive and it must stop”.
Speaker Harry Jenkins refused to accept the basis of the complaint.
…
But while Abbott shows the appropriate sensitivity, Combet insists on appropriating the horror of a genocide to make his cheap political smear:
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott accepted the Speaker’s judgment but placed on the record that he found the term “climate change denier” offensive and untruthful.
Climate Change Minister Greg Combet was undeterred by the opposition’s sensitivity to the term.
“When you stop denying the climate science, we’ll stop calling you a denier. That’s the fact of the matter,” he told parliament.
Combet should realise that people with a historical memory and a love of reason find his language contemptible.
==============================================================
Read Bolt’s piece here.
For our Australian readers, you can take ABC’s poll here if you wish.
==============================================================
In other news:
TONY Abbott will address a rally of climate sceptics in Canberra today as the Opposition tries to defend Labor accusations that it is a party of climate change deniers.
Strongly supported by right-wing shock jocks, the rally is expected to hear from a range of voices questioning the scientific evidence for climate change.
Scores of buses, filled with opponents of the planned tax, are heading to Canberra for a rally outside Parliament House this morning.
…
The Opposition Leader is expected to address the Canberra rally and yesterday renewed his attack on the Prime Minister’s pre-election promise not to introduce the tax.
He told parliament the PM suffers from truth deficit disorder and is clocking up frequent liar miles.
Godspeed to our friends in Australia, may the light soon shine for you.
h/t to Tom Nelson and to WUWT reader Michael R
UPDATE: ABC Closed the poll within about two hours of it being mentioned on WUWT, voting is no longer allowed.
The result of the ABC’s Drum poll is nothing more than a reflection of the audience they attract. The organisation exhibits blatant left wing bias and promotes AGW alarmism in almost every aspect of it’s news and current affairs programs. So that poll result would be little surprise to most of us here in Australia.
Andy G says:
March 22, 2011 at 10:47 pm
I’ve said before that the reply ought to be using the term “extremist” or “apostle” or “zealot” or “fanatic”.. there are a lot of words that could be used.
how about.
“CO2 Jihadist”, “CO2 control freak” , “denier of plant life”
come on guys, your turn 🙂
Surely the word ‘Cult’ is the best way to describe the AGW fanatics.
I would not worry too much about the term. Language shifts.
Interesting point, The Government is made up of Greens and Labor + some independents. The Greens have, as policy, an Anti-Israel denial policy. They have implemented the policy in some local councils (Marckville). So by strict definition they are Holocaust Deniers. And they are controlling the Green Tax debate.
So don’t worry, a lot of these people don’t even know the connotations.
I’m with BrianH @1:34am
But it is incontestable that “denier” is certainly intended to be offensive by the hyperthermalists.
I’m surprised no one else so far has remarked on Jolly Jim Hansen’s repeated use of “death trains” and “death factories” for coal trains and power plants.
But that is indicative of the moral bankrupcy of Hansen and so many of the alarmists. Similar to UK’s Green Party MP Caroline Lucas and her statement that someone taking their family on holiday to Spain is equivalent to someone stabbing a stranger in the street.
It is the AGW people who are the climate change deniers; skeptics accept natural climate change, they don’t.
The entire issue ( of labeling the opposition ) is so freaking stupid, I can’t believe grown people waste their time with it. Both sides should quit acting like 3 year old children whining to Mommy.
Fact of the matter is, The liberal party are out of touch and ignorant. If they don’t bone up on their c.c. knowledge, soon enough. they will have earned the title ‘denier’ for putting opposition before argumentation.
Frankly, the political landscape in Australia is dire. We are taking priministerial orders from a Marxist; Mr. Brown, Julia Gillard is politically impotent and The ABC regularly, and strategically make fools of liberal candidate’s buffoonery on national TV.
Can someone please get over here and give them some coaching?
Tim Flannery is given open slather to sermonise on the ABC and he is left unchallenged because frankly, Liberal politicians argue with catch phrases and conjecture and are therefore no better.
Luboš Motl says:
March 22, 2011 at 10:48 pm
Quite right. Many of the natural processes driving climate change are poorly understood and, as they are researched, increasingly introduce ‘inconvenient facts’ into the debate.
You touch on a mode of thinking and argumentation that is common among the more extreme proponents of CAGW. They ‘project’ their own flawed thinking onto those they see as threatening their beliefs. This is a form of ‘psychological projection’. and is often coupled with a ‘best-form-of-defence-is-attack’ approach to debate.
Some people, particularly politicians, use this purely as a rhetorical device. For those that truly believe what they are saying, the implications, for them, are far more serious…
Quit while ahead on red herrings. Some greenhouse gasses are toxic enough to be used in gas chambers and bad air days reported in all non-US cities.
With regard to the Carbon dioxide tax (note NOT CARBON) we should all call them polluters of the atmosphere because they breath out carbon dioxide. The best thing the believers of AGW can do to improve the future lives of everyone is to keep their mouth tightly shut.
Personally I find the denier tag all a bit rich coming from the original ‘data deniers’. Still we shouldn’t generalise as there are AGW adherents like Prof Richard Muller who can look at their silly policy prescriptions logically and dispassionately.
Andrew Bolt has also alerted us to a useful 10 point roundup of their ‘consensus science’ by Joseph D’Aleo here-
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/The_failures_part_1.pdf
and here-
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/The_failures_part_II.pdf
My take is, the more these particular Team fans hurl abuse and throw their tantrums, the more inclined reasonable people are to delve further and deeper into the facts of the matter. AGW fanatics never recovered their kumbayah mojo after Copenhagen and their frustration and anger really shows nowadays.
Flip side of “alarmist”. The question is whether it’s accurate. If one denies global warming, one’s enemies might call him a “denier”. However, to call a sceptic a denier is to be factually incorrect.
I deny that human activity is causing climate change. I don’t really care what Climate Change Hucksters call me. But, You have to admit, they have a much catchier title.
OLD TIME SAYING: If you knew how seldom some people think, you wouldn’t care what they think.
Sure, turnabout is fair play. But I wouldn’t give them ‘climate change’. It’s just a weasily hedge. They are ‘global-warming Nazis’.
/Mr Lynn
“Fergus T. Ambrose says:
March 23, 2011 at 4:43 am”
CO2 won’t be any of those toxic GHGs you talk of, well not in concentrations on Earth currently and into the forseable future.
Did anyone scroll down to see the results of the previous ABC polls? They don’t make encouraging reading for Australia.
If 10% of the population are of an ethnic group or religion and you use words which they find offensive then the words spoken are offensive.
If we take the Australian poll on its merits and 46% find the term denier offensive then the term is offensive. QED
It is the AGW’s that have politicized this issue and they constantly attack rational people as that is the game they play
This whole nonsense does not come from looking at emprical data it is derived from climate models that do not reflect reality the bottom line being they can take a given amount of CO2 and predict positive feedback (warming) but the models cannot account properly for negative feedback (cooling).
I stand to be corrected but when Bob Carter challenged CRU in 2006 over there being no warming since 1998 the answer from CRU was along the lines of “we did not attempt to estimate internally generated natural variations…ect (or words to that effect).
In other words the temp will increase by X over thee next 100 years…..BUT that does not allow for clouds, rain. volcanic ash in the atmosphere and other things such as ocillation of the oceans…and many other things.
The point I am trying to make is that the AGW’s try to discredit us by avoiding the science…so learn some “one liners” that make them discuss the science such as “what are you allowing for negative feedback in your climate models?”…..and await a response.
I am sure there are people on this site who can do a better job than me but we must learn to play te game on our terms…..not theirs.
It’s offensive, yes, but more disturbingly, it’s ignorant.
Stefan says:
March 23, 2011 at 3:20 am
It is the mentality of the Dark Ages, where you just execute or exile anybody whose views you don’t like.
Stalin did that too. And when the Census Bureau produced that about 16 million people had disappeared since the last census, the Census Bureau officers were all sent in an excursion to a nice, quiet place in Siberia.
You want a catchphrase?
DOGMA KILLS.
Hm, dogma causes erectile dysfunction?
When Warmistas use the “denier” label for those who disagree with their Warmist ideology, it is of course meant to be insulting, though it isn’t neccessarily. Thus, we have the “I’m a Denier” video: http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/29754, and Lawrence Solomon wrote a book called “The Deniers”.
On the other hand, the phrase “climate change denier” is certainly a deliberate reference to “holocaust denier”. In an interview on CBS’s program “60 Minutes”, Scott Pelley was asked why he “did not pause to acknowledge global warming skeptics” when he did broadcasts on the subject, and his reply was “If I do an interview with Ellie Wiesel, am I required as a journalist to find a Holocaust Denier?”
As has been pointed out, the phrase is also idiotic, since no one claims that the climate hasn’t changed, or indeed isn’t continually changing, as well as dishonest. But, that will not stop the climate bedwetters from using it.
I don’t find it offensive, just stupid, puerile, combative, misleading, etc.
I deny that we will ever know everything about everything. I affirm that we will make successive approximations to the truth through repeated and verifiable science. Sadly the AGW folks do not provide a platform to test their drivel.
There is no doubt the climate is changing. Despite several revisions in the name, the core agenda has always been to pin the blame on human activity from which would spring the political will to impose rules that only sought to destroy personal liberty and power, particularly of advanced western countries. This is doubly the case since these same advocates were happy to give China and India a pass for their contribution to the presumed causes.
But it remains to be established to what extent human activity is causing the climate change we observe, for we are still wrestling over the factual basis of the changes we observe.
If saying the above makes me a “denier”, than what exactly am I in denial of? A self-loathing leftist agenda? Yes, I happily call that out for what it plainly is. Am I denying a human role in climate change? No, as a pilot I have seen weather downwind of a city that is slightly different than the upwind weather. However, nobody has yet to show me hard data that proves the change is for the worse. That for me is an open question. And nobody seems to care for the economic implications of spending trillions of dollars to nudge the global temperature down by 0.05 degrees, as if the health and welfare of the people from whom that money must be extracted did not have their own plans for that mountain of wealth. Of that fact, those who now resort to hateful rhetoric are certainly in denial themselves.
The term Climate Change Denier is not offensive. It describes alot of us. I deny the “Climate Change” myth that AGW Warmistas perpetuate.