The sanctioned punishment of climate skeptics becomes more than just a few aberrant ideas, and is following some historical parallels
First, I loathe having to write essays like this, but I think it is necessary given the hostile social climate now seen to be emerging.
Yesterday, WUWT highlighted the NYT cartoon depicting killing “deniers” for having a different opinion, today I want to highlight Naomi Orekses and Suzanne Goldenberg, who seem seem to like the idea of having climate “deniers” arrested under RICO act for thought collusion, all under the approving eye of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard.
Watch the video: The RICO quote is about 1:12:30 in the video. Note that none of the panelists blinks an eye at the suggestion. They are all smiling after Oreskes finishes.
From the description of the video:
The science is clear: drastic global climate change due to human activities threatens our planet. Yet, a well-funded international campaign continues to deny the scientific consensus, foment public doubt and oppose action. The media—especially social media—have helped fuel false controversy and climate skepticism. How can climate change communication be improved?
Panel discussion with:
Suzanne Goldberg, U.S. Environment Correspondent, The Guardian
Dr. Naomi Oreskes, Professor of the History of Science, Harvard University
Dr. Peter Frumhoff, Director of Science & Policy, Union of Concerned Scientists
Moderated by:
Cristine Russell, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs’ Environment and Natural Resources Program
Introduction by:
Henry Lee, Director, Belfer Center’s Environment and Natural Resources Program
February 13, 2014
Of course, no prominent climate skeptics were invited to give a counterpoint, though WUWT does make an appearance.
An actual quote from Goldenberg in the video at 2:50
“I don’t know what CAGW was”
This makes me wonder just how competent she is to write about the topic. The irony is completed full circle though. At 2:20 she claims WUWT “actually isn’t about science” while our “best science blog” banners are projected near her head and while highlighting Justin Gillis, tell us again about “the Bigger Picture” (an opinion piece) and A relationship between Sea Ice Anomalies, SSTs, and the ENSO? (a science piece).
At least we know they are reading WUWT.
Goldenberg won’t cover the topics we cover, simply because she isn’t capable and is in the employ of a newspaper (the Guardian) with a clear goal to push only one viewpoint about climate. And, her objectivity, now that she runs in this circle of friends, is blown out of the water.
Oreskes, who authored the book Merchants of Doubt, seems to think that climate skeptics are little more than paid shills, deserving of criminal status, while Goldenberg works tirelessly to create strawmen houses out of the thinnest of research, which she publishes in the Guardian. She also follows the Oreskes mindset in thinking that we all must be on somebody’s payroll and that we are all part of a “secret network” of well funded climate resistance.
Lately, this sort of hateful and distorted thinking is getting a bit worrisome as statistician William Briggs observes:
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RICO-style prosecution. For what tangible crime? Well, heresy.
(Has to be heresy. The amount of money I have extorted from my skepticism hovers between nada and nil.)
This put me in mind of a passage from from Dawn to Decadence by the indispensable Jacques Barzun (pp 271-272):
The smallest divergence from the absolute is grave error and wickedness. From there it is a short step to declaring war on the misbelievers. When faith is both intellectual and visceral, the overwhelming justification is that heresy imperils other souls. If the erring sheep will not recant, he or she becomes a source of error in others….[P]ersecution is a health measure that stops the spread of an infectious disease—all the more necessary that souls matter more than bodies.
Even though not all admit this, their actions prove that souls are more important than bodies. Thought crimes are in many senses worse than physical crimes; they excite more comment and are more difficult to be forgiven for. Perhaps the worst crime is to be accused of racism (the charges needn’t be, and frequently are not, true; the accusation makes the charge true enough). It is now a thought crime to speak out against sodomy (and to say you personally are a participant is a matter of media celebration).
Barzun said that sins against political correctness “so far” have only been punished by “opprobrium, loss of employment, and virtual exclusion from the profession.” (I can confirm these.) Barzun said, “any form of persecution implies an amazing belief in the power of ideas, indeed of mere words casually spoken.”
The Enlightened, who simper when calling each other “free thinkers”, in one of their favorite myths tell us how they left the crime of heresy behind. The word has been forgotten, maybe, but not the idea.
Stalin sent his victims to the firing squad for the crime of “counter-revolution”, not heresy. Being repulsed by sodomy is not heresy, it is “homophobic”. Believing in God and practicing that belief is not heresy, but “fundamentalism.” Cautioning that affirmative action may cause the pains the program is meant to alleviate isn’t heresy, but “racism.” Saying that unskillful Climate models which routinely bust their predictions should not be trusted is not heresy, but is “anti-science.”
Boy, has Science come up in the world to be a personage one can sin against.
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And AlexJC notes in Der Ewige “Denier” on the NYT cartoon depicting killing “deniers” that a pattern is emerging.
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Some commentators on WUWT have likened this little scene to Nazi anti-Jewish propaganda in the 1930s, and I’m inclined to agree. There’s a pertinent article, called “Defining the Enemy” on the website of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum:
One crucial factor in creating a cohesive group is to define who is excluded from membership. Nazi propagandists contributed to the regime’s policies by publicly identifying groups for exclusion, inciting hatred or cultivating indifference, and justifying their pariah status to the populace.
There’s a picture you can find online of the “stereotypical Jew”, which was drawn by Nazi cartoonist Philipp “Fips” Rupprecht and published in the newspaper Der Stürmer sometime before the end of World War II. Although different in some respects to the “stereotypical Denier” in the NYT, there are a number of similarities. Both subjects are male, well-dressed, rather plump and well-fed and standing with their chests slightly thrust out. Both have distinctive noses – the Jew has a large hooked nose and the Denier has one that is more reminiscent of a pig’s snout. Both are smoking a cigar, which is clearly the mark of an evil plutocrat anywhere, Jewish or otherwise. The similarities are quite unsettling.
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Indeed, they are, and worse yet, few if any, in the general science community seem to have the courage to stand up and say anything about these people and the actions they do and/or suggest as being inappropriate or antithetical to science.
Roy Spencer is the exception for scientists who have decided to speak out against this hate and smear, and has decided to fight back by labeling anyone who calls him a “climate denier” as a “climate Nazi”. I’m not sure how effective or useful that will be, but clearly he’s reached a tipping point. He adds:
A couple people in comments have questioned my use of “Nazi”, which might be considered over the top. Considering the fact that these people are supporting policies that will kill far more people than the Nazis ever did — all in the name of what they consider to be a righteous cause — I think it is very appropriate. Again, I didn’t start the name-calling.
The parallels with what occurred in pre-WWII Germany seem to be emerging with the constant smearing of climate skeptics for the purpose of social isolation, and now Oreskes is calling for members of this group to be charged with crimes under RICO. This isn’t new, we’ve heard these calls for climate skeptics to be arrested before, such as Grist’s David Roberts who proposed Nuremberg style trials for climate skeptics, but lately it seems to be picking up speed.
We even have people in the same climate clique playing virtual dress up as Nazis, such as we’ve learned recently from the “Skeptical Science” forum showing proprietor John Cook in full Nazi uniform in the image seen at right. There were several Nazi images depicting SkS.
And, there’s the call for removing dissenting opinion from the press, such as from “Forecast the Facts” (a funded NGO that attacks media)
“Brad Johnson (@ClimateBrad), the editor of HillHeat.com and a former Think Progress staffer, boasted on Twitter that 110,000 people had urged the newspaper “to stop publishing climate lies” like the Krauthammer piece.”
We’ve already seen one prominent newspaper refuse to publish letters from climate skeptics with others following suit.
What is most troubling to me is that Oreskes and Goldenberg appear to be of Jewish descent (as does Dr. Michael Mann) and yet they all seem blind to the pattern of behavior they are engaging in and advocating; the social isolation and prosecution of climate skeptics which seems so reminiscent of the ugliness in times past. I honestly don’t understand how they can’t see what they are doing to silence climate skeptics is so very wrong.
It does seem true, that those who don’t learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.
From my viewpoint, the only way to combat this ugliness is with taking a stand. These tactics must be called out when they are used. I urge readers to write thoughtful and factual letters, guest commentary where accepted, and blog posts, countering such smear whenever appropriate.
MODERATION NOTE: Comments will be heavily scrutinized, keep it civil.
Some people know how to fast-forward the video, too…
Several aspects of this need to be discussed. I do this not from a partisan viewpoint but in taking a lifelong look at politics and certain aspects of the means of influencing people.
First you need to come to terms with the fact that H. sapiens is a very good single variable processing unit. In its perhaps simplest form think of good vs. bad. It took us almost a million years (perhaps much more) to go from chipping a single cutting edge on rocks to cutting two, setting off the Acheulean tool period, which we continued up to and well beyond when we learned how to cook metals out of rocks.
A few years ago we were introduced to this:
“We show how the prevailing majority opinion in a population can be rapidly reversed by a small fraction p of randomly distributed committed agents who consistently proselytize the opposing opinion and are immune to influence. Specifically, we show that when the committed fraction grows beyond a critical value pc ≈ 10%, there is a dramatic decrease in the time Tc taken for the entire population to adopt the committed opinion.
“Commonly used models for this process include the threshold model [8] and the Bass model [9]. A key feature in both these models is that once an individual adopts the new state, his state remains unchanged at all subsequent times.”
http://journals.aps.org/pre/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevE.84.011130
So we now know that we are much better at processing a single variable than we are multiple ones, and that once a population reaches a critical value of just 10% believing a single idea, then the entire population can be switched over to that idea in very short shrift.
Now let’s examine another aspect of ourselves. For lack of knowledge of any formal designation I call this one Reverse Pretzel Logic (RPL). In my lifetime, my first exposure to this came in the Nixon administration and the Watergate scandal. From Wikipedia on the “Smoking Gun” tape:
“President Nixon had denied any involvement in the scandal, He claimed there were no political motivations in his instructions to the CIA, and claimed he had no knowledge before March 21, 1973, of involvement by senior campaign officials such as John Mitchell. The contents of this tape persuaded Nixon’s own lawyers, Fred Buzhardt and James St. Clair, that “The tape proved that the President had lied to the nation, to his closest aides, and to his own lawyers – for more than two years.”[46] The tape, which was referred to as a “smoking gun” by Barber Conable, proved that Nixon had been involved in the coverup from the beginning.”
RPL involves the ability to hear a thing of controversy and come to the realization that the reverse of what was promoted is most likely to be the truth of the matter. In other words, listen carefully to what has been said, reverse it, and see if it does not stand the test of time.
Recent examples of the eeffectiveness of RPL as a personal operating system might be:
“I did not have sexual relations with that woman” Yes, you did.
“”major combat operations in Iraq have ended.” May 2, 2003, deck of the carrier USS Abraham Lincoln by President Bush II. That was before the “surge”, which would have to qualify in anyone’s addled brain as a “major combat operation”. Starting to get it?
“If you like your current healthplan, you can keep it. Period. No one is going to take that away from you.” And the reverse of that would would be what we have been seeing recently.
On Super Sunday we learned from Obama himself regarding the IRS “scandal” “Not even mass corruption — not even a smidgen of corruption.” Which, when RPL’d, means the IRS has been totally corrupted.
Susan Rice on Meet The Press yesterday said ““But the notion that somehow I or anybody else in the administration misled the American people is patently false. And I think that that’s been amply demonstrated.” Run “patently false” through your new RPL processor and it comes out “patently true.”
What you need to understand is that whenever a definitive statement is made these days, the opposite is likely to be the truth of the matter. But the most interesting thing of all is why so few of us seem to get this plain and simple truth.
This rather simple psychological conundrum is actually the basis for the single most valuable commodity in all of human existence to date: flexible ethics. See Enron, Madoff et al etc. The final question each of us should ask ourselves before plunking down on, well anything, is how vulnerable are we to flexible ethics?
I’m Spartacus!
I’m not a climate change denier. I think it is getting colder.
@ur momisugly Andy
Thanks for the link.
“as people who said “so much for global warming” and similar comments were punched in the face.” — NewYorker (The Borowitz Report)
This fantasy is brought to you by people holding on to a belief system faced with hard truths that are incompatible with that belief system.
As a Christian that does understand evolution I often find myself in discussions/debates/arguments about evolution. A lot of people have been programmed to believe that either evolution is true or creation is true, that they are mutually exclusive. Communicating the evidence for evolution is pointless until this false dilemma has been neutralized. Emotions override rational thought and they just want to punch me in the face for challenging their belief system with undeniable truths. It’s the same thing with the warmists. The facts don’t matter. They believe in a future of ruin and the wickedness of humanity. Their religion revolves around there being too many people ravaging a delicate planet. CAGW has become the primary doctrine of this religion therefore any detraction from CAGW is an attack on their personal belief system. Global warming simply must be real, primarily caused by human activity, and dangerous. That’s why any evidence for any warming, human contribution, or inconvenience immediately morphs into proof of CAGW and why any “snide remark” about it being cold inconsistently with global warming theory is met with such vehemence.
Re: my February 24, 2014 at 11:23 am
12 words. Totally on topic. Where did I go wrong?
highflight56433 says:
February 24, 2014 at 10:17 am
Interesting that some folks here get a free pass to make accusations at the person rather than the comments rather than move on or just observe. By doing so, the victims are left to defend themselves in what ever logic they muster. But the personal attacks continue. Then it becomes trash talk with ever increasing intensity.
Obscure and yet vague. What are you talking about.
@jim Davidson-I have a hard time figuring out how the hell it is fortunate that the American electorate disagreed with an obviously true statement, indeed perhaps the most beautifully expressed political truism in history.
I also have a hard time figuring out how it is fortunate, that we are now stuck with a massive welfare state bequeathed to us by Lyndon Johnson. One which is driving our entire nation to backruptcy.
And I very much doubt that anyone who died in Vietnam considered it fortunate.
But no, go ahead and call one of the few politicians ever to fight for liberty the same as these people. I’ve got news for you-these are the people Goldwater was fighting against.
The parallels with what occurred in pre-WWII Germany seem to be emerging with the constant smearing of climate skeptics for the purpose of social isolation, and now Oreskes is calling for members of this group to be charged with crimes under RICO. This isn’t new, we’ve heard these calls for climate skeptics to be arrested before, such as Grist’s David Roberts who proposed Nuremberg style trials for climate skeptics, but lately it seems to be picking up speed.”
The parallel is even much stronger than you present it as.
Hitlers Germany didn’t just use similar tactics, they also targeted similar issues. They was extremely ‘green’ when he was able to use the environmentalists concerns to his advantage. Many of his early laws were of the ‘save the environment’ kind and targeted everything from land use to pollution, while he was always quite concerned with population levels. It gained him a lot of support amongst the people, and allowed him to seize Government control for a lot of areas.
The environment minded eventually came to realize they had been used, but at that point it was too late.
“Climate parasites” seems to be an apt description. Without a care as to all the harm that they’re doing to their host, they have evolved to open the blood supply more and more over time, allowing them to feed and multiply.
Efforts to dislodge them seem to make them redouble their efforts and cling ever tighter, increasing the harm done.
Like most parasitic infections, they will either win, leaving their host weakened and enslaved; or they will be purged.
I’d normally be a lot more optimistic about humanity’s chances, but it’s managed to infect the leader of the free world and only a few T-cells seem to have woken up.
@crosspatch at 10:44am
In fact, I would suggest going deep into the various communities that push this “carbon pollution” agenda and start exposing more of their stuff to the general public.
An alternative is to wake up someone deep in the communities.
Most of us believe ClimateGate was an inside job from someone who “burped.”
Edward Snowden made quite a burp.
There are plain little lads who have been lied to for years. If a few get a little bit mad, they can burp and shake the thrown of the king.
Duster:
I copy your comment at February 24, 2014 at 11:19 am because it is too important for it to be missed so a repeat presentation may be noticed by some who may have overlooked it.
You say
All very well, but the intent is to radicalize their “support.” This leads ultimately to the Unabomber, Krystallnacht, bombed abortion clinics, bombed syangogues, folks in concical white hoods marching with torches, book burnings, cultural “revolutions,” great leaps “forward,” the disappeared, gulags, jet liners used as weapons, etc. The behaviour is independent of political “wing.” It relies on absolutist thought and an insistence that there is a “correct” way to think, whether that way be political, religious, or apparently, “scientific.”
Yes! And that is why such hate speech needs to be opposed whomever it is aimed at whether we agree with them or not.
Richard
In a previous generation if a tenured scientist at a place like MIT uttered such language he/she would have found themselves unemployed or teaching algebra at the local Community College.
A vocal/visual campaign should be immediately initiated with posters, placards, patches, etc., with the following message imprinted upon said and politicized in the media and throughout the populace.
Reject the CAGW Inquisition
of the
Natural Sciences
If you value your life, liberty and Religious freedom
Heating up: Climate change advocates try to silence Krauthammer http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/02/24/heating-up-climate-change-advocates-try-to-silence-krauthammer/
I would have bet one of the requirements to be met under the RICO statue involves money actually changing hands. However with the current lawless administration and the spineless Supreme Court, statutory requirements are not an effective barrier to creative prosecution. Remember, he has a pen and a phone …
“So let it be written; so let it be done”
They have much of the world brainwashed……….even to the point so that they can tell that world that record cold is the result of global warming……….and the world will believe.
Or that heavy snowstorms and blizzards are caused by global warming……….and the world will believe.
Or that the first widespread severe drought in the US Cornbelt in 24 years, is the result of global warming…….. and the world will ignore the 24 years of the best growing weather in history and believe it.
Or that the law of photosynthesis and key role of CO2, which is causing massive benefits to our biosphere and contributing greatly to record world food production doesn’t matter…….and the world believes it.
Or that Super Storm Sandy was unprecedented and caused by global warming……..an the world believed it.
Once you have the world believing, you have millions of brains that will readily accept your propaganda because of what you have convinced them of. They have accomplished this task well. The biggest problem is scientists presenting authentic empircal data from the real world over the past decade+ that contradicts the brainwashed position which threatens to expose their position and reveal the truth.
Who will the loyal followers of CAGW believe? Their high priests of climate science and government that they have faith in or the evil skeptics………errrr, I mean deniers?
The marketing strategy is simple. Destroy us by crafting a negative, even evil image as being anti science or pro pollution or bribed mouth pieces.
Anybody that believes in CAGW that reads this post for instance will think I am one of them and am making all this up to try to sabotage the efforts of so many good people trying to save the planet.
My intent is only to be honest about what I see as an operational meteorologist for 32 years, studying this field closely the past 12 years. I get no money. I have adjusted my position slowly during that period based entirely on what the scientific evidence shows.
If the planet started warming catastrophically like global climate models have predicted, I would incorporate that into my view and adjust accordingly…………………..not ignore it and look for reasons to explain why the catastrophic warming fits well into what my view was a few years ago.
Climate science is rapidly evolving as we have learned a tremendous amount over the last decade. The ones trying to lead the way with new understanding of how the atmosphere, oceans, land, magnetic fields, sun and other factors work together are being vilified for doing so.
They are trying to silence us because the new information/knowlege does not line up with the belief system of the party in control. The party in control decided a long time ago that humans burning fossil fuels is the dominant factor and the “science is settled” and “debate is over”.
Rather than relying entirely on legit science and authentic real world evidence/data to prove that we are wrong and their theory is right, the objective is to destroy our reputation and credibility and silence us.
For heaven’s sake, go COMMENT on their Youtube video! Its open to comments!
Climate change realists should take heart. The desperation of these people is an excellent barometer of just how badly they are losing the debate (which, of course, doesn’t exist).
If you’re an alarmist, it’s time to consider retirement or a new career.
I consider this type of behavior definitive oppression. The only way to combat such is to organize, focus efforts and implement a full frontal assault. I would offer the thought once again relating to organizing the masses. Who would stand shoulder to shoulder against the perveyors of failed conjecture and their self appointed omnipotence.
I put forth the rally cry once again for the formal formation of the “Union of Concerned Citizens, Scientists, and Businesses” or the like.
Everything has a starting point!
Could this be the start of the Renaissance or even revolution in climate science?
I think it is fair to say we certainly need one!
If their lack of intellectual rigour wasn’t bad enough their easy embrace of a police state mentality should appall us all. We all need to reiterate until we are blue in the face the one big overwhelming and irrefutable fact; the models have all failed. Every last one of them.
Let them deny that.
Carol Costello did a piece on CNN this morning that says, among other things, the “Deniers” are funded by $568 million dollars annually. She was rather vague about who was doing the funding other than saying the various fossil fuel related industries were involved. I’m still waiting for my check.
This whole climate change campaign strikes me as having more of a communist flavor to it rather than a fascist taste.
@Bob Fox at 9:59 am
I think that Godwin’s law is quite pernicious because it tries to silence the use of a very important example from history.
You are right. But Godwin Rule is ” a memetic tool to reduce the incidence of inappropriate hyperbolic comparisons. “Although deliberately framed as if it were a law of nature or of mathematics, its purpose has always been rhetorical and pedagogical: I wanted folks who glibly compared someone else to Hitler or to Nazis to think a bit harder about the Holocaust”, Godwin has written.[11] – Wikipedia
Well I actually listened to reporter Suzanne Goldberg’s complete political speech. I say political, because she cited not a single item of scientific evidence or data in her entire speech; which was mostly an anti-republican (in Congress) and anti-conservative diatribe, unsupported by any fact of any kind.
For the record, I am neither a Republican, nor a conservative; and in the interest of fairness, I am not a Democrat, or a liberal either. And no I don’t belong to any fringe groups either.
For the record, I have current paid up membership in the Optical Society of America, which is one of the founding parties of The American Institute of Physics, which is an organization of scientists. Just this morning, I received a written invitation to apply for senior membership status, because of “my stature in that field.” Well maybe they are trying to raise money.
I am also a fully paid up member in good standing, of SPIE ; the Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers, with some 17,000 members world wide; a scientific organization.
Other than those, I belong to nothing; well I do have lifetime membership in the University of Auckland Society. (Aumni Association)
But back to M(r)s Goldberg. It seemed that the root of her message, was her dismay that the “legacy media” ; her words for “late news items on dead tree” has been supplanted by more open and available communication media, that no longer has the power of censorship by editorial veto power, that once controlled what the people were allowed to be told.
Sorry Suzanne; you are one with the American Eastern elk; or more likely the dodo. But if you actually told the people some science, rather than say you could see Siberia from some Aleut village in Alaska, you might find redemption.
By the way, when you were there in Alaska listening to the plight of those villagers; did it occur to you to explain to them, that the reason they are being flooded by sea level rise, is claimed by YOU and climate change scientists to be their use of fossil fuel burning snow mobiles instead of clean green free renewable energy, traditional sleds, and their use of stored chemical energy fire arms to shoot whales, instead of their traditional spears. Why didn’t YOU tell them the cause of their plight, or did that not occur to you, while seeking some story sensationalism.
But anyhow, thanks for the free publicity for the WUWT readership; is it now a 97% consensus that this is the top #1 SCIENCE NEWS information medium in the world ??
I just couldn’t get past the first ten seconds of Dr. Professor Oreske’s speech.
I did note the professional introductions to Susanne, Naomi, and Peter, at the start; right chummy it was; very professional, and kinda scientifically rigorous.