People send me stuff. This is an email solicitation claiming that if you send Avaaz £2 a week (About $3.07 USD at current exchange rate) they’ll somehow be able to help NSIDC’s Julienne Stroeve get started putting back that Arctic ice, much like as a previous subscriber, you may have given money to help dolphins from being sad (see below). There’s only 30 months left apparently, and salesmen operators are standing by to take your urgent call.
I wonder how much money Ms. Stroeve gets for endorsing this alarmist sales pitch, or maybe her name is being used to raise funds without her knowledge/permission? Inquiring minds want to know. What is most curious is that they don’t actually reference Stroeve’s papers or any NSIDC publications, only alarmist news stories.
Of course one only has to look at the WUWT Sea Ice page to note that sea ice disappears every summer, and comes back in the fall and winter. So, with summer just started, now is the perfect time to claim “vast areas of sea ice have disappeared” so as to snag money from the seasonally challenged. According to NASA and AP’s Seth Borenstein: “…after reviewing his own new data, NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: “At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions.” Well, that didn’t happen, so 2013 MUST be the year. No, wait, its 2015 now. Give while there’s still time!
I loved this line from the solicitation: Fatalism on climate change is not just futile, it’s also incompetent.
Dear Avaaz community,
This may be the most important email I’ve written to you. Scientists have found that vast areas of Arctic sea ice are disappearing, accelerating the destruction of our planet — it is a climate tipping point and we CAN stop it, if we act very fast, and all together. We have 30 months until the biggest climate summit ever. To win it, we need to blast out of the starting gate. Click below to pledge a donation of £2 to help us get there:
This may be the most important email I’ve ever written to you.
Scientist Julienne Stroeve has studied Arctic ice for decades. Every summer she travels north to measure how much ice has melted. She knows that climate change is melting the ice fast, but on her last trip, she couldn’t believe what she saw. Vast areas of Arctic ice have disappeared, beyond our worst expectations.
This is what the experts warned us about. As the earth warms, it creates many “tipping points” that accelerate the warming out of control. Warming thaws the Arctic sea ice, destroying the giant white ‘mirror’ that reflects heat back into space, which massively heats up the ocean, and melts more ice, and so on. We spin out of control. Already this year — storms, temperatures — everything is off the charts.
We CAN stop this, if we act very fast, and all together. And out of this extinction nightmare, we can pull one of the most inspiring futures for our children and grandchildren. A clean, green future in balance with the earth that gave birth to us.
We have 30 months until the Paris Summit, the meeting that world leaders have decided will determine the fate of our efforts to fight climate change. It might seem like a long time – it’s not. We have 30 months to get the right leaders in power, get them to that meeting, give them a plan, and hold them accountable. And it’s us vs. the oil companies, and fatalism. We can win, we must, but we need to blast out of the starting gate with pledges of just £2 per week until the summit — we’ll only process the donations if we hit our goal. For the world we dream of, let’s make it happen:
[donation link redacted]
Fatalism on climate change is not just futile, it’s also incompetent. The hour is late, but it is still absolutely within our power to stop this catastrophe, simply by shifting our economies from oil and coal to other sources of power. And doing so will bring the world together like never before, in a deep commitment and cooperation to protect our planetary home. It’s a beautiful possibility, and the kind of future Avaaz was born to create.
Facing this challenge will take heart, and hope, and also all the smarts we have. Here’s the plan:
1. Go Political: Elect Climate Leaders — 5 crucial countries have elections in the next 30 months. Let’s make sure the right people win, and with the right mandate. Avaaz is one of the only major global advocacy organizations that can be political. And since this fight will be won or lost politically, it could be at some points just us vs. the oil companies to decide who our politicians listen to.
2. Make Hollande a Hero — French President Francois Hollande will chair the Paris summit – a powerful position. We have to try every tactic and channel — his personal friends and family, his political constituency, his policy advisors — to make him the hero we need him to be to make the summit a success.
3. Take it to the Next Level — The scale of this crisis demands action that goes beyond regular campaigning. It’s time for powerful, direct, non-violent action, to capture imagination, convey moral urgency, and inspire people to act. Think Occupy.
4. Out the Spoilers — Billionaires like the Koch brothers and their oil companies are the major spoilers in climate change – funding junk science to confuse us and spending millions on misleading PR, while buying politicians wholesale. With investigative journalism and more, we need to expose and counter their horrifically irresponsible actions.
5. Define the Deal — Even in the face of planetary catastrophe, 195 governments in a room can be just incompetent. We need to invest in top quality policy advice to develop ingenious strategies, mechanisms, and careful compromises so that when the summit arrives, a critical mass of leaders are already bought in to a large part of the deal, and no one can claim that good solutions don’t exist.
We need tens of thousands of us to pledge small donations to blast out of the starting gate on this plan. The amount doesn’t matter as much as much as the choice – to hope, and to act:
[donation link redacted]
At the last major climate summit in Copenhagen 2009, we played a pivotal role in German and Japanese ‘climate’ elections, in shifting Brazilian policy, and in helping win a major global deal on financing, with rich countries promising $100 billion per year to poor countries to help them address climate change. Back then, Avaaz was 3 million people. After Copenhagen, we reflected that we needed to be a lot bigger to meet the challenge posed by climate change. Now, we’re 23 million, and growing by 1 million per month.
Climate change is the ultimate global collective action problem, requiring cooperation from every government in the world. And Avaaz is the ultimate collective action solution, with millions of us united in common vision across every nation. This is our time, to build a world for our children that’s beauty matches our dreams. Let’s get started.
With hope and appreciation for this amazing community,
Ricken and the entire Avaaz team
MORE INFORMATION:
With Arctic sea ice vulnerable, summer melt season begins briskly (The Christian Science Monitor)
Arctic sea ice levels to reach record low within days (Guardian)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/aug/23/arctic-sea-ice-record-low
Five Reasons We Need a New Global Agreement on Climate Change by 2015 (Switchboard NRDC)
http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/jschmidt/five_reasons_we_need_a_new_glo.html
The Doha climate talks were a start, but 2015 will be the moment of truth (The Guardian)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/10/doha-climate-talks-global-warming
Arctic sea ice melt disrupts weather patterns (NBC News)
The Arctic Ice “Death Spiral” (Slate)
Avaaz.org is a 22-million-person global campaign network that works to ensure that the views and values of the world’s people shape global decision-making. (“Avaaz” means “voice” or “song” in many languages.) Avaaz members live in every nation of the world; our team is spread across 18 countries on 6 continents and operates in 17 languages. Learn about some of Avaaz’s biggest campaigns here, or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.
You are getting this message because you signed “Save the Saddest Dolphins ” on 2011-xx-xx using the email address xxxxx@xxxx.com
h/t to reader “JP”
===========================================================
Now here’s the real kicker, Dr. Stroeve doesn’t think sea ice will disappear this summer. See her official forecast in the ARCUS June 2013 Sea Ice Outlook:
Of course, NSIDC may not care that Stroeve’s name is being used to raise money, after all, she has a current history of activism while employed there. Your tax dollars at work? This photo was taken on 09/11/2012:
Source: Greenpeace
Ryan – even assuming that the models were meaningful, what do you think contributing to these people will actually do to change that? So they manage to elect the ‘RIGHT’ people. Then what?
^^ Heh, regarding my comment above, lots has changed in the campaign since I got the email last week, particularly:
“And it’s us vs. the oil companies, and fatalism. We can win, we must, but we need to blast out of the starting gate with 40,000 pledges of support — we’ll only process the donations if we hit our goal. For the world we dream of, let’s make it happen: “
Looks like they only need 20,000 to reach their goal now. That’s surprising – since there’s no end date and they’re scrounging for recurring weekly donations. I guess they plan to announce victory with a fanfare to boost their fleecing of the gullible. I wish them great success: anyone stupid enough to believe in dangerous global warming is liable to do something really damaging with excess cash otherwise.
Julienne sounds a bit thick to me. She does not understand arctic seasonal ice yet claims to be an expert on it ? How the hell did she get a PhD ??
Perhaps if we ship all our surplus refrigerators to the Arctic and leave them on full blast with the doors open…
No, I’d better shut up, I might give them ideas!
Avaaz….Sounds like a four-year-old. (“Let’s” do [some childish prank]) but lies like a politician, in hopes of roping in the hopelessly worried. I see them lolling by on Facebook, like flotsam on a flood, and none-too-pleasant flotsam at that….complete with the pile of likes and wooden remarks in support. Like RealClimate, only worse.
This writer and hundreds of others from the MSM with their over the top alarmism are helping us win the battle. Go to almost any internet MSM alarmist news article about climate change and look at the comments. In the US skepticism rules. A surprising amount of comment content is information that is regularly discussed on this site. WUWT is arming the climate “rebels”.
I think there needs to be a small point of clarification. Greenpeace’s Arctic Sunrise is an icebreaker.
[So, what? We have icebreakers in the US navy too, she could have asked to use one of those rather than engage a biased money driven organization like Greenpeace.- mod]
Steve from Rockwood 5:37;
“What happens if the Arctic ice extent rebounds in 2013?”
That would prove beyond all shadow of a doubt that your £2 donation did the trick. Thanks.
“Ryan says:
June 24, 2013 at 6:13 am
Regardless of how you feel about their tactics, arctic sea ice is dropping much faster than models predicted. The fact that it “comes back every winter” doesn’t really change that.”
The most reliable thing about “model prediction”, in a chaotic and mostly little understood system we call climate, is that model prediction *IS* garbage. Actual observation contradicts “models”. Nuff said!
/Ryan – even assuming that the models were meaningful, what do you think contributing to these people will actually do to change that? So they manage to elect the ‘RIGHT’ people. Then what?/
Not sure about this particular donation, but I bet it will do more good than wandering around the net suggesting that winter ice disproves a melting arctic or suggesting that a lack of year over year records somehow eliminates the need for alarm.
hmmmm. Shouldn’t that be “donations already in the millions of dollars” per their member count? Or is this an organization with no-account members? I am betting that investigative journalism would not be their friend.
Avaaz boasts 22 million members. So, three bucks from each of them? Lucrative racket.
AVAAZ is another MoveOn.org created/funded astroturf group. I can’t imagine why Dr. Stroeve would knowingly be involved with MoveOn.org.
Just what size baseball bat does one need to beat some basic science into these clowns brain cells. Every where on Earth,every time the temp goes above 0C,ice melts! But then again,aren’t these the same people saying that ice in Antarctica melts at -50C?? Julienne? (and isn’t julienne something one does with string beans)
Ryan says:
June 24, 2013 at 6:13 am
Regardless of how you feel about their tactics, arctic sea ice is dropping much faster than models predicted. The fact that it “comes back every winter” doesn’t really change that.
=====
so, the computer games were wrong about everything
Julienne, told me that she would consider anything less than 1 million sq km…… ice free
…I reminded her that’s the size of Egypt
Ryan says:
June 24, 2013 at 6:13 am
arctic sea ice is dropping much faster than models predicted.
================
The models predicted a drop in BOTH arctic and antarctic ice. No models predicted a decrease at one pole and an increase at the other pole. Yet that is what is happening. As one warms, the other cools, which is NOT the signature of AGW. It is the signature of the “polar see-saw”. A natural event that predates industrialization.
Every legitimate scientists should know this. Yet, some continue to cherry pick data from the arctic while ignoring or minimizing data from the antarctic. In this fashion they seek to mislead rather than inform. They use this misinformation to panic the general population, to pressure governments into providing funding. Hardly the behavior of legitimate science – it borders on criminal fraud and extortion.
Worse, the diverted funds represent lost opportunity. Money that could have been spent profitably today to improve the lives of people living today is instead being spent in a vain attempt to change the weather 100 years in the future. At the cost of massive debts and unemployment to burden future generations.
Forcing them into a form of slavery to the global banking system, whereby the total GDP of each generation is increasingly going to service the interest on the debt of the previous generations. In effect, each child born inherits the debt of the previous generations, and must work to pay of the debts their ancestors incurred. Debt slaves from birth.
30 Months? Whatever happened to five years?
Still, if they have actually started counting down, then is it too much to hope that they will go away and leave us alone after that? ….I have an urgent appointment to watch some paint dry.
If Slushies are really that dangerous they should be banned from the 7-11’s
I’m also on their mailing list. Avaaz is a peculiar organization because they often have sympathetic humanitarian actions. But their climate issues are utterly silly as if the texts are written by ten-year old children. This time is no exception. About a year ago Donna Laframboise wrote something about this club. Does anyone know more?
Ryan says:
June 24, 2013 at 6:35 am
suggesting that winter ice disproves a melting arctic or suggesting that a lack of year over year records somehow eliminates the need for alarm.
===========
An ice free arctic would be a huge benefit to the peoples of the countries that border the Arctic. Rather than be a cause for alarm it would open up vast areas for commerce and exploration that to date has been largely inaccessible due to the ice.
To see this as a cause for alarm is to ignore history. The arctic was largely ice free for a period of 1500 years, between 8500 and 6000 years ago. The area of permanent ice was much smaller than today. The polar bears did not die out. The world did not end. In fact, that time period marks the beginning of human civilization in many parts of the world.
http://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/o.o.i.s?id=24890&news_item=5634
strike says:
June 24, 2013 at 5:42 am
This is her:
http://nsidc.org/research/bios/stroeve.html
and she is with the union of concerned scientist, ahh.
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/climate-scientist-julienne-stroeve.html
[note: The Union of Concerned Scientists will take anyone who offers a valid credit card -mod]
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Anthony, perhaps you could suggest Kenji say something to this poor soul at the next meeting of Concerned Scientists. You know, kind of bring a fellow Concerned Scientist up to speed, as a professional courtesy.
I wonder how often Concerned Scientists meet?
Or has Kenji sent a letter of resignation because of the UCS position on CAGW? (I could easily understand this decision as a way of protest)
cn
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/333/6043/747.full
A 10,000-Year Record of Arctic Ocean Sea-Ice Variability—View from the Beach
We present a sea-ice record from northern Greenland covering the past 10,000 years. Multiyear sea ice reached a minimum between ~8500 and 6000 years ago, when the limit of year-round sea ice at the coast of Greenland was located ~1000 kilometers to the north of its present position. … The lack of uniformity in past sea-ice changes, which is probably related to large-scale atmospheric anomalies such as the Arctic Oscillation, is not well reproduced in models. This needs to be further explored, as it is likely to have an impact on predictions of future sea-ice distribution.
Science 5 August 2011:
Vol. 333 no. 6043 pp. 747-750DOI:10.1126/science.1202760
FWIW, I hope many alarmists donate to the cause. After all, I would sooner THEY pay for this stupdity, rather than us! And as for the gullible moronic sheeple that get duped – sorry, but I have no time for them anymore either. Again, it is their money – and the (certain to come at some point!) backlash at the futility of the AGW hype from ordinary people is what we want to see at a later date!
If folk won’t be educated, or open their eyes, or mouths, to raise questions and/or objections – they get what they deserve. My patience with humanity has all but expired, and trying to ‘help’ them – when 16000+ muppets donate to such a stupid ’cause’ – is not very high on my list of priorities anymore!
As for Stroeve – hopefully, she will see this is a racket and deal with it – but somehow, I’m guessing not………
I just love the idea of turning President Hollande into a hero – have they not noticed quite how badly he has handled just about everything since his election. I doubt he will be taken seriously even by sympathetic politicians (the British left-wing parties have stopped associating with him as it becomes clear how bad a leader he is for example). If your lobbying ideas are to promote the influence of a man with this sort of reputation (and apparently touch) then you may have problems.
Over 16,000 fools so far? I just heard the top 50 charity scams in the US ( http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2013/06/13/tonight-on-ac360-the-50-worst-charities/ ). 3 of them are owned by the same family (husband, wife, son). And out of $26m collected, they have donated about $20k.
Seems they have opened up another front in the charity scam.