Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Andrew Tyndall, news consultant: If you don’t tie every event to climate change when reporting the weather, its like pornography
Andrew Tyndall, described as a news consultant, has accused Ginger Zee, a qualified meteorologist and popular TV weather presenter, of producing “weather porn”.
According to Tyndall;
“If Ginger Zee reported in the role of climatologist rather than meteorologist, I would praise ABC’s ‘World News Tonight’s’ decision as a daring intervention into a crucial national and global debate,” he said. “Instead, she is more like a pornographer.”
http://www.kansascity.com/entertainment/tv/article4446150.html#/tabPane=tabs-383c4c27-1
Ginger Zee’s sin, in the eyes of Andrew Tyndall, appears to be that she gives more airtime to reporting weather events, than to preaching climate fear to her TV audience.
However, Patrick Burkey, Nightly News executive producer, spoke up in defence of the way weather is reported on TV.
“Weather coverage can drive ratings,” Burkey said, but “you have to be careful that you’re not covering weather stories that aren’t real news every night. It’s an easy way to lose the trust of the audience about what is really an important weather story.”
Who knows – when climate alarmists find something interesting to say, rather than rehashing the same tired fear mongering nonsense every time they speak, their views might get a little more airtime.
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As much as I’d like to, I’m gonna go with the “ten-foot pole”.
For now.
Bullying the weather girls into become CAGW mouthpieces. Now that is what I call classy.
Pornography “The representation in books, magazines, photographs, films, and other media of scenes of sexual behavior that are erotic or lewd and are designed to arouse sexual interest.”
Hmmm…I wonder if Andrew Tyndall, who judging from his picture is a bit past it, gets sexually aroused when he sees Ginger Zee? Or when she reads thew weather? Or only when she fails to tie in weather with climate change?
He has a unique fetish, that can only be diagnosed if he comes clean, pardon the pun.
It’s still early, anyone else you want to disparage ?
You might want to start a blog, it will give you free rein.
Just in the interest of science. In the interest of science. Wondering what he finds pornographic about Ginger Zee.
Then again he doesn’t say whether he likes pornography or not. Judging from the fact he finds her pornographic and keeps watching her, I would say he has an addition at the very least.
I believe that is called “projection”.
I think that is auto-correction typo – it is spelt with an ‘e’.
Ralph
Yep Silver ralph, definitely with an e. I made a typo too addition instead of “addiction” so that makes u.k.(us), who has leaped (sprung, shot up) to Andrew Tyndall’s defence, and me even.
I’m lost about the “e” thing.
Care to explain ?
Did you mean “leapt” ?
Nope. You wouldn’t understand. Leaped and leapt are both correct methinks
Always seems the biggest “Anti-anythings” tend to be closet “Pro-anythings”. Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart come to mind, along with most of the Victorian Age.
Eric, I usually like your stuff but you seem to have missed the whole point of the linked article.
Which is that weather is not getting any worse, it is just that we are seeing a helluva lot more time devoted to reporting on it every day.
My first post on this disappeared. I would be very didappointed if it transpired that authors at WUWT are moderating out legitimate criticisms from sympathetic readers.
Did you read this in the article?…”and they’re rarely used in context of a discussion about climate change, Tyndall said.”
markl on December 20, 2014 at 9:27 pm says: Did you read this in the article?
Hi markl. In more context he says of the over enthusiastic, often irrelevant to the target audience coverage:
Almin Karamehmedovic, executive producer of “World News Tonight.” “Increasingly, we see it that way. I’m sure the weather is the same as it was 10 years ago, but we see much more of it.”….
…. The concern is that…. .. the amount of time spent on weather and natural disaster stories… .. has more than quadrupled since the early 1990s…..
… video makes weather stories catnip to producers, irresistible even with limited news value, said Patrick Burkey, “Nightly News” executive producer.
…… Others use a more blunt term: weather porn. The extra time spent on these stories can’t be explained by an increased frequency of or interest in bad weather, and they’re rarely used in context of a discussion about climate change, Tyndall said.
The last few words there about climate change do not necessarily convey much ofTyndall’s opinion on climate change and have liitle to do with the main premise of the story: That the excess and exaggerated cover is simply for viewer titillation.
The whloe point of the article is that the excess focus on weather events serves little discernable purpose other than ratings and time padding, and has no discernable benefits whatsoever.
Eric is drawing a very long bow trying to portray this as climate change story and Tyndal’s statement as a ‘nil AGW coverage’ = porn statement.
Whether it is the main premise of the story is irrelevant. Tyndel clearly states that increased weather reporting is only valid if tied to climate change. That is an opinion on climate change, otherwise why mention it. He could have just said, there is too much puffed-up weather reporting, which btw I agree with.
I think you could say this about much of the news. News is entertainment geared toward getting ratings, in order to get advertiser revenue. There is public service mixed in, but it is no longer the primary driver.
Tyndall’s own words;
If Ginger Zee reported in the role of climatologist rather than meteorologist, I would praise ABC’s ‘World News Tonight’s’ decision as a daring intervention into a crucial national and global debate,” he said. “Instead, she is more like a pornographer.
Seems pretty clear to me.
Anyone asked Tyndall if he has wind farm “investments”? And he knows Ms Zee would laugh at him.
[trimmed, off-subject. .mod]
I wouldn’t want this kid tracking me………
A modern day Annie Oakley!
I see Skill, Discipline and respect.
My breath has gone.
My Accolade’s to the young lady.
FYI. This is a form of competitive shooting called 3-gun. Semiautomatic rifle in 5.56 NATO, semiautomatic shotgun and handgun.
Seemed like that first gun was “fully automatic”.
Wish I had one of those 🙂
Her eyes are just slightly crossed. I’d be cautious.
The Man is total airhead full of rot Sudo climate rot.
The hashtags #cloudporn #weatherporn and others similar are widely used in Instagram and other social media as humorous ways to describe cloud or weather-related eye-candy images, dramatic and colorful photos of clouds, storms systems, tornadoes etc. There is nothing sexual about it at all.
The writer of the story seemed to be making the simple point that there is a lot more coverage of local weather events in the national news than there used to be. Viewers apparently like it and the networks are keen on getting good ratings.
see also this blog post by Lawrence Camera:
“For those seeing the term cloudporn for the first time, let me explain. It’s one of countless hashtags people use on social networking sites such as Tumblr, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Hashtags provide a simple way to label what you share online, kind of like connecting your stuff to a worldwide index. Take a beautiful photograph of clouds, post it on your social networks, caption it with #cloudporn, and voila: People who dig really cool photographs of clouds can now find yours, by searching for anything hashtagged cloudporn.”
http://lawrencecamera.wordpress.com/2013/10/03/cloudporn-photography/
Confused by this story- sorry just not intelligent enough to ‘get it’ not coming from a US background – could be interpreted very differently – await confirmation
No it is ok…let her report weather event in persective of climate…
Is this event out of normality?
is this snow storm not normal?
this hurricane, this drought , rainfalls, winds etc…
The result will be :”we can not attibute this weather event to climate change”…
OK, I’ve been a good sport, had my fun in the comments.
Now, can anyone tell me what we’ve been going on about, I never watch broadcast tv weather, seeing as I have an internet connection.
another smear attack!
21 Dec: Sydney Morning Herald: Nick O’Malley: Warming world’s rising seas wash away some of South Florida’s glitz
What was not so widely reported was that South Beach stank of shit. There is no nice way to put it. The place smelled of human waste. There had been a brief, heavy downpour but the water could not escape, so the sewers backed up and filled the roads…
A couple of days later I stood on a sealed road in a park in the southern suburbs of Miami – again ankle deep in water – with Harold Wanless, chairman and professor at the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Miami, to discuss why the place was so wet. The answer was not complicated. “The ocean has risen,” he says with laugh. “It is what it is.”…
While much of the nation argues about whether or not California’s once-in-a-thousand-year drought or the $US71 billion devastation of Hurricane Sandy might have been caused or exacerbated by climate change – or indeed whether or not the phenomenon even exists – in Southern Florida today you wander about in the water and see what it looks like when rising seas hit a modern western city.
As with every other serious issue facing the United States, the acceptance of climate science has fallen down along partisan lines.
It is generally accepted among leading Democrats and often denied – or at least ignored – by Republicans…
Back in America there are some signs that popular concern about climate change is beginning to increase.
A 2014 poll by the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication shows majorities of women, minorities and young people support candidates who strongly endorse climate action, the New York Times reported earlier this week. “That poll found that 65 percent of Hispanics, 53 percent of blacks and 53 percent of unmarried women support candidates who back climate-change action.”
As the Times noted, those were all groups crucial to the outcomes of the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections…
http://www.smh.com.au/world/warming-worlds-rising-seas-wash-away-some-of-south-floridas-glitz-20141220-129wub.html
& sydney-based journo Paul Wallis spreads the smear in digital journal:
20 Dec: Digital Journal: Paul Wallis: Op-Ed: Climate change denial wading in sewage in Miami
Miami- It doesn’t NEED to get much more bizarre than this. High water in Miami caused sewers to back up in America’s Retirement and Organized Crime Mecca. The local governor, a Republican, of course, says there’s no problem.
Sydney Morning Herald reporter Nick O’Malley has a truly hilarious report on the solemn denial of any environmental issues related to the long-predicted high water in Miami. It would be a real shame and insult to the guy’s journalistic chutzpah to synopsize a great article, which you can read on this link…
http://www.digitaljournal.com/news/environment/op-ed-climate-change-denial-wading-in-sewage-in-miami/article/421580
The oceans have been rising for millennia. Miami is sinking from over building and other factors. The trend in Miami is to build as close to the water as possible. This isn’t ‘climate change’, it’s man’s stupidity. It’s unresearched factoids like this that are making people understand they’ve been duped by AGW.
If possible, I watch only the weather on the local news because most of what else is reported is not news but left-leaning fluff or outright advocacy of left-wing positions. The weather (at least the gentleman I watch) is, so far, blessedly free of that. Yes, the weathercast is longer than it need be: we need not learn the current temperature of every hamlet between D.C. and Raleigh, and the “hour-by-hour forecast” is vital only on those days when a change is expected (the infamous derecho in summer 2012 was a good example where “hour-by-hour” might actually have been a bit slow). But believe me, rather than get sick with anger at hearing the other “newscasters” prating their good-Democrat propaganda and feel-good nonsense, I’ll turn over to Judge Judy, who is at least interesting and largely apolitical. My work here–when I can get outside to do it–depends immediately and intimately on the weather: I can’t weed or dig when it is too wet, cold, hot, or windy, and it is useful to have the best data and forecasts that the local weatherman can supply (much more trustworthy than TWC or even the new weather channel for local conditions and events).
That guy seems to be more familiar with pornography than with wx and climate and the ways they change.
What is it with men with beards…they are all insane..
http://vps.templar.co.uk/Cartoons%20and%20Politics/Beards.png
Those are not proper beards those men are sporting.
Brings to mind Maynard G. Krebs http://iv1.lisimg.com/image/6243961/600full-maynard-g.-krebs.jpg
“What is it with men with beards…they are all insane..”
It’s the women with beards I try to avoid……
Those aren’t men.
The irony of her name is without parallel, indeed is this all a wide-up.
She needs a sidekick named Mary Ann, and a professor who seems unaroused by either of them.
Obviously a man who confuses climate with weather and an attractive woman with pornography should not be listened to.
Our wonderful BBC weather announcers manage to find the warmest cities when reporting nationwide temperatures, usually London, and the West of the country. Newcastle upon Tyne (where I live) barely gets a mention.
A climate pimp claiming someone else is in the porn business. Climate con-artists just never stop giving.
I’m not a meteorologist or a climatologist. I’m a driver of a van in hot shot freight. So– my “scientific” base is shaky at best.
When I follow the weather, I’m not the least bit interested in climate fear-mongering. It’s not the least interest to me that we might have terrible floods 50 years from now. On the other hand, tonight I have a trip coming up from Chicago’s big airport going to Traverse City, Michigan. You better believe I’m looking at the reports and radars to see if I’m likely to run into lake-effect snow on the way there and back. Right now, the radars look clear (I’ve checked) but tonight calls for flurries and it probably changes to rain here in Chicago tomorrow. What it’ll do on the East side of Lake Michigan– I have’t seen yet,
About the other thing: I’ve heard the “weather is not climate” thing so often when debating this subject that it’s not funny. I stick my nose out the door and get it froze off on a below-zero day and report that– “Climate is not weather– the climate is getting warmer!” Report average temps during the summer– it’s been awhile since we got a real stinker of a hot day– and “Climate is not weather– the climate is getting warmer, and it’s warmer now than it’s ever been!” Really? I’ve been around 59 years, and I can remember warmer summers without scratching my head. Wild guess says we’ve had warmer summers before my time—“warmer than it’s ever been” is a real long time you know, not just the past couple of years.
So— let’s see what the weather-porn star– who in this case is strangely enough a male– has to say about local weather, shall we? But, don’t tell my pastor, he has this “thing” about porn being a sin you know.
I live 12 miles west of Traverse City, the roads are in great shape, U.S.31, is dry as a bone. Some of the county roads have slick spots in the shady areas. For what it’s worth The Weather Channel is clueless about the micro-climates here, and TWC winter driving tips are beyond bizarre.
I checked— Traverse City is expecting flurries tonight, Ludington– which I have to pass both going out and coming back– is expecting flurries switching to rain tonight and tomorrow. Looks like I can save worries about lake-effect snow for another day. Northwest Indiana shouldn’t be bad tomorrow either, too warm for the snow-machine to kick in.
That’s your “Lake Michigan Snow Report Porn” for today. 🙂
Doesn’t Ginger realize that she should follow the money that 97% of us agree to receive?
He prefers “climate porn” to “weather porn”. That’s the trouble with using the word “porn” as an epithet meaning “that which has been over-exaggerated and hyped”. Plus, as in this case, you risk being viewed as sexist, and who knows, perhaps there is a latent misogynistic bent there.
The irony is that he may have been correct in his criticism of how ABC News presents the weather, but for entirely the wrong reason. In fact, hyping climate change is far, far worse. Although, the way weather is hyped does lead people to think that “the weather is getting worse”.
In any case, his attack on Ginger Zee was unwarranted and piggish. His beef is with ABC News, which he has criticized as being “disneyfied”.
Tyndall’s thesis can be extended to news casts in general.
“Tonight we first take you to the scene of a massive car bomb that killed …”
“We now take you to a live broadcast where demonstrators have just stormed a police barricade…”
“And turning to weather, meteorologists are tracking a massive storm that may develop just in time for Christmas…”
“And in the sports world, athletes continue to behave badly…”
“And finally tonight, a good-news story about a lost dog …”
I tune in to the weather report to hear about the weather; what’s likely to happen over the next few days. I don’t need to tune in daily to hear about what they think is going to happen in decades or centuries from now!
I can’t help but think that Tyndall’s model in life is: ‘Hi, I’m miserable, therefore you must be miserable. And, if you go watching Ginger Zee and you’re not miserable while you’re watching her, well then you must be made to feel miserable. Now, that may not transport any of my miserableness off of my shoulders and onto your’s but at least, if I glimpse you being as miserable as me, I will feel better about feeling miserable.’