Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Pope Francis has waded into the climate debate again, by attempting to link human trafficking and climate change.
According to the Daily Mail;
Pope Francis has urged world leaders to take a ‘very strong stand’ on climate change ahead of the United Nations summit in Paris this year.
He was speaking at a conference of mayors and governors, who signed a declaration saying it may be the last chance to tackle human-induced global warming, at the Vatican today.
The meeting linked climate change and modern slavery because, according to an introductory paper, ‘global warming is one of the causes of poverty and forced migration’.
…
The cleric, speaking to the group in unprepared comments in Spanish, said he hoped the UN conference would address ‘particularly how it (climate change) affects the trafficking of people.
There is just one problem with this claim: where are the climate refugees?
As WUWT recently reported, the world’s only climate claimant just lost his case. The reason: In relation to the Refugee Convention, while Kiribati undoubtedly faces challenges, Mr Teitiota does not, if returned, face serious harm and there is no evidence that the government of Kiribati is failing to take steps to protect its citizens from the effects of environmental degradation to the extent that it can
I’m not suggesting climate change cannot cause migration – a number of towns in the Swiss Alps were destroyed by advancing glaciers during the little ice age. The beginning of the current interglacial saw huge migrations, as people settled land which was liberated from the vast continental ice sheets.
A number of countries also have serious self inflicted environmental problems, caused by poor resource management, such as soil erosion from over intensive farming.
But if anthropogenic climate change were a major cause of “poverty and forced migration”, not to mention slavery, then why can’t green activists find someone who has a compelling case for claiming climate refugee status? If the unfortunate Mr Teitiota is the best example green activists can muster, we can surely conclude that there currently is no verifiable connection between anthropogenic climate change, forced migration and human trafficking.
Human trafficking is not the same as environmentally induced migration or economically driven migration. Human trafficking smacks of exploitation in my opinion. A willful act by a person to change their residency is quite different than a person captive buy another malicious person and then sold as a commodity to the highest bidder.
270 years ago my ancestors abandoned Germany largely due to warfare and poor crop yields. Coincidentally they abandoned their ancestral home right in the middle of the Maunder Minimum. My ancestors migrated to North America through an act of will determination and hope.
Victims of human trafficking have little to say about what happens to their bodies when they are held captive by their handlers . The people who traffic human beings do not do so because of global warming they do so because of the incentive of money.
This whole weird conflagration of economics politics pseudoscience on display now hosted by the Vatican is going to give birth to a new monster with many heads one of which is human trafficking.
I’m sure through reasoning like that of which is found in the butterfly effect people will conclude that any of the ills which we suffer can be connected to the myth of global warming. Al Sharpton has also jumped on the bandwagon claiming that climate change has caused black people to suffer disproportionately, that is black people in the USA, not in sub-saharan Africa.
The Vatican will be getting all kinds of advice from every extreme corner of the anthropogenic global warming activist catalog of misery. None of this is actually new it is in fact the same old song that we’ve been hearing for 20 years. Anthony has done a very good job publishing many of the extreme claims that we’ve had to listen to.
I think it is absolutely despicable that the crime of kidnapping and transportation of people, then the selling of those people into a form of slavery is associated to the myth of human caused global warming.
This is the cheapest form of demagoguery.
Who are you and what have you done with Paul Westhaver?
I planted a small seedling next to his bed. He is far more cooperative now, but his smart phone spelling is fat finger terrible.
Good grief, what next?
Has the pope joined ISIS?
http://www.danbymp.com/content/photos5/sharrouf.jpg
Wrong hand. You know, like the man’s earring thing.
Next it’s going to cause tooth decay.
Well, sort of…
Some of the migrating folks are bound to have forgotten their toothbrush.
It has been predicted that this would be the final pope. I wonder if rather than the reason being Armageddon he may just be so willfully foolish that the Church collapses in embarrassment?
Or perhaps that’s due to an upcoming title change, renaming the position as CFO and Director of Operations of the Church of Omnipotent Greenhouse in Carbon.
(CFODoO-CoOGiC)
OT, but I only discovered today that the silly hat popes and cardinals wear is called a “zucchetto.”
I’m told it’s actually vegetable based – a cross between a courgette and a zucchino.
BREAKING NEWS : new source of global warming found: “all along we thought it was CO2. Turns out, its not but its definitely anthropogenic, and proportional to our population. its the Stupid, it burns.”
There has been human trafficing for as long as we have written records, well over 5000 years.
Global warming has only been happening for the last 100 years.
What caused human trafficking for the other 4900 years?
Since he’s linked himself to CAGW (or whatever he may call it), might “the pause” be “the Fall of the Roman Empire”?
I suspect that somebody mistranslated “migration” into “trafficking.”
I think I see a link between CO2 and human trafficking.
http://img.pcauto.com.cn/images/upload/upc/tx/auto5/1505/07/c2/6452986_1430964482699.jpg
http://www.entonnoir.org/c4/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2013/07/p42embout1.jpg
@max, did anyone get there on time?
This is what you get from government funded high density forced housing in cities built for manufacturing.
Let’s change the subject, nobody really listens to the Pope anymore.
Al Gore might be the only one polling lower, when asked ” who most influences your thoughts/life”.
Maybe.
” nobody really listens to the Pope anymore”
..
Except for the fact that about 1.2 billion inhabitants on the Earth think of the Pope as their spiritual leader.
Not when it comes to survival: food, shelter and security ?
I have not been so embarrassed to be a Catholic in my entire life.
Greed and povery cause human trafficing. This pope is broken can we have another?
“…When he speaks the world listens,
On his proclamations they reflect,
Now being used by politicians
Makes this church more suspect.
Serving God or the UN?
Seems like he’s made his choice,
Denying the poor cheaper energy,
I’m sure they’ll rejoice.”
http://rhymeafterrhyme.net/a-communist-pope-but-are-the-poor-rejoicing/
Given this pope’s apparent Malthusian leanings, I think that it is time that we proclaim him MisanthroPope the First.
Good one!
New study: Climate change causes religious confusion. The Aggressive Advocacy Dark Ages are upon us.
It seems to me that the trans Atlantic slave trade occurred entirely within what we now call the little ice age. Not good evidence for the “warming leads to human trafficking” idea.
it may be the last chance to tackle human-induced global warming, at the Vatican today.
==============
The same message we heard in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, …
Whatever happened to 3 strikes you are out?
Imagine governments worked this way. Vote on a question, and if it gets defeated, call for another vote on the same question. Each time there is a vote, if it gets defeated, call for another vote. Until finally people give up and vote in favor just to end the voting.
Sad part is, that is pretty much how governments work. We keep voting until the civil service gets the answer it wants. Then the voting ends.
Is there a prediction yet on when the holy water is expected to boil, to go with the boiling seas prediction of Hansen?
Nigh about tea-time
@asybot “One of the main reasons I left the Catholic Church is the fact that from the pope on down they seem to think they are “infallible” . Perhaps in the past, though never was such a claim doctrinal. The present Pope exudes humility. I don’t think you can charge him with arrogance.
Obscene obsession in a world were tribalism and sin causes all the poverty, violence and suffering there is to bemoan 🙁
Are there any peer-reviewed scientific papers that link human trafficking with climate change? If not, does the Pope expect the UN conference to follow the science or just make it up as they go?
When the human trafficking on the Southern border of the U.S. migrates to the Northern border, let me know. That might indicate that global warming plays a roll. Or it might indicate that Canadians have become so wealthy that they can afford to import slave labor from the poverty-stricken South to perform all their menial tasks.
Who needs peer review when it is divine insight flowing through the Pope to the masses?