Climate Change And The Ten Warning Signs For Cults
Reposted from Medium
Have you thought to yourself that the Climate Change movement seems more and more like a religious movement?
I have, so I researched how to identify a religious cult. Rick Ross, an expert on cults and intervention specialist, developed a list of ten warning signs for unsafe groups, which is published by the Cult Education Institute.
So let’s take a look at all ten signs and compare:
1. Absolute authoritarianism without meaningful accountability.
The leading advocates of the Climate Change movement are politicians, entertainers, and even children.
Climate preachers such as Al Gore and Leonardo DiCaprio lack any formal scientific training whatsoever and live personal lives of unparalleled luxury while prescribing carbon austerity for the masses.
Yet no one is permitted to point out their scientific ignorance or call attention to their hypocritical lifestyles.
Child advocates such as Greta Thunberg and the crudely indoctrinated children of the “Sunrise movement” are essentially sock puppets for their shameless activist handlers.
Refuse to bend the knee to these tiny fascists, as Diane Feinstein most recently did, and the mainstream left will relentlessly attack you as an accessory to mass murder.
The authority of Climate Change leaders is entirely unmerited and absolute, yet no one is permitted to hold them accountable for their ignorance, inexperience, or brazen lies.
Thus, the Climate Change movement clearly meets the first warning sign for unsafe groups.
2. No tolerance for questions or critical inquiry.
The conclusions of the Climate Change movement may not be challenged or questioned under any circumstances.
Those who dare scrutinize the conclusions, methodology, or prescriptions of “climate scientists” are categorically dismissed as a “Climate Denier”, an excommunicated untouchable whose opinion is no longer valid on any subject.
Questions and critical inquiry aren’t merely dismissed or refuted.
The unfortunate heretic immediately experiences a relentless ad hominem onslaught of scorn and hatred from the political and media left and is often subjected to accusations of outright murder. Simply question the effectiveness of a “carbon tax” and you may find yourself tied to a stake.
There is no tolerance for questioning the Climate Change movement, and thus it clearly meets the second warning sign for unsafe groups.
3. No meaningful financial disclosure regarding budget, expenses such as an independently audited financial statement.
Hardly anyone knows just how much money is spent on “Climate research” every year.
The cost is spread out among laughably useless study grants, wind and solar farm subsidies, carbon offset credits, “green” building code evaluation and enforcement, salaries for bureaucrats solely dedicated to “climate concerns”—you get the idea, it’s a lot of hazy money.
The abhorrent practice of “sue and settle” was a flat out money laundering scheme that allowed sympathetic government officials to transfer millions of tax dollars to radical leftist environmental groups.
The practice only ended when the Trump administration used executive power to clamp down on it.
The total amount of yearly financial expenditure on the Climate Change movement is vague, difficult to track, and often carried out in unethical manners. Thus, the Climate Change movement exhibits the third warning sign for unsafe groups.
4. Unreasonable fear about the outside world, such as impending catastrophe, evil conspiracies, and persecutions.
This one is pretty obvious. The Climate Change movement always shouts out revised and updated apocalypse predictions, eerily reminiscent of the stereotypical bum on the sidewalk with that “The End Is Near” sign.
“The world will end in X years if we don’t do X” is the constant refrain.
The years always pass, and the apocalypse never happens.Interestingly, this is a characteristic of multiple religious cults (such as the Seekers of Chicago, and the Order of the Solar Temple).
At the moment, we apparently have 12 years to nationalize the entire economy and phase out fossil fuels before we all die a fiery death.
There’s also no shortage of conspiracy theories about who is the Earth’s greatest saboteurs. They have an enemies list.
The fossil fuel industry is at the top of it, with widespread tinfoil hat theories about oil companies burying patents for efficient renewable fuel recipes to keep us all guzzling gasoline.
The “repent or burn” doomsday preaching is the most well-known staple of the Climate Change movement, and quite clearly exemplifies the fourth warning sign for unsafe groups.
5. There is no legitimate reason to leave, former followers are always wrong in leaving, negative or even evil.
Climate alarmists who leave, step back from, or even lightly criticize the movement are immediately subjected to vicious smear campaigns.
Dutch professor Richard Tol experienced this phenomenon firsthand when he removed his name from an IPCC climate report and criticized the reports excessively apocalyptic predictions.
The smear campaign was led by Bob Ward, director of policy at the London School of Economics’ Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change.
‘This has all the characteristics of a smear campaign,” Tol said. “It’s all about taking away my credibility as an expert.”
The treatment of Professor Tol is not uncommon and clearly demonstrates that the Climate Change movement exhibits the fifth warning sign for unsafe groups.
6. Former members often relate the same stories of abuse and reflect a similar pattern of grievances.
Professor Tol is not an anomaly. Dr. Richard Lindzen of MIT, Dr. Nils-Axel Mörner, and countless other former IPCC in-crowd climate experts were subjected to smear campaigns from their colleagues and the news media for the crime of throwing cold water on the outlandish predictions of the Climate Change movement.
This pattern is all too familiar to anyone who has studied what happens to individuals who leave the Church of Scientology and clearly meets the sixth warning sign for unsafe groups.
7. There are records, books, news articles, or television programs that document the abuses of the group/leader.
The abuses of the Climate Change movement are loud and proud. They vociferously attack their perceived enemies for public consumption and are cheered on by fellow travelers in the journalism class.
Most recently they brainwashed a bunch of kids and marched them into an octogenarian Democrat Senator’s office to beg not to be murdered by a ‘No’ vote on impossible legislation.
Have you seen those kids in Diane Feinstein’s office? You should, it’s creepy, here they are:
These tantrums and protests aren’t only meant to rally supporters of the Climate Change movement. They are a form of intimidation, a tactic used to silence those who question the gospel.
There is ample evidence that the Climate Change movement meets the seventh warning sign of an unsafe group.
8. Followers feel they can never be “good enough”.
The atonement process for Climate warriors always demands more. It started with using a recycling bin and grocery bags.
Now, in 2019, being a good follower means imposing veganism on the masses and issuing fatwahs against innocuous objects such as plastic straws and grocery bags.
Despite all the efforts of the faithful, Climate minions maintain a constant state of dread and despair, knowing they can never truly do enough to stop the coming doom.
Clearly, the eighth warning sign for unsafe groups applies to the Climate Change movement.
9. The group/leader is always right.
When have the climate leaders been called wrong for their failed predictions? Regardless of the weather, they are always intrinsically correct.
Floods? Climate Change. Droughts? Climate Change.
No Snow? Climate Change. Too much snow? Climate Change.
Tornados? Climate Change. Hurricanes? Climate Change. Lack of hurricanes? Climate Change.
See how this works?
One of the best aspects of the movement is “weather is climate until it isn’t.” The acolytes of Climate Change will point out the window in a heat wave and say, “See? We’re right!”
If a skeptic points out the window during a blizzard, the same acolytes will simply cry “Weather isn’t climate!” It’s a game they can never lose, one in which they are never wrong and always right.
SEE ALSO: The Climate Alarmist’s Difference Between Climate And Weather
Thus, the ninth warning sign for unsafe groups clearly applies.
10. The group/leader is the exclusive means of knowing “truth” or receiving validation, no other process of discovery is really acceptable or credible.
The path to discovery for the Climate Change movement is an intentionally vague discipline referred to as “climate science”.
Did you carry out a study on gender and glaciers? Climate Science.
Did you think up the worst possible scenarios that have no actual chance of happening (an actual portion of the latest National Climate Assessment)? Climate Science.
Any “science” that confirms the tenets of the Climate Change movement is deemed “climate science”, while actual scientific research that disputes their conclusions is derided as “denialism”.
The tenth warning sign for unsafe groups is clearly met.
The Verdict: It’s a cult
According to the established, scientific guidelines developed by cult experts, the Climate Change movement fits the bill for a potentially unsafe group.
When I looked up these established warning signs, I honestly expected Climate Change-ists to meet two or three of them, NOT TEN!
The disturbingly religious nature of this supposedly “scientific” movement should alarm any thinking human being, especially since the movement now openly seeks to nationalize the entire economy.
It’s time for conservatives to realize what they are dealing with, and act accordingly. Rather than debating Climate Change activists, it may be time to start staging interventions.
If someone you know is a member of the Climate Change Movement, and you are interested in intervention strategies, please visit https://culteducation.com/prep_faq.html.
Read more at Medium
I don’t know about “climate change” as such but groups such as “Extinction Rebellion”, currently causing chaos in the uk (and elsewhere?) certainly have all the characteristics:
https://rebellion.earth/
Totally agree quaesoveritas. I’ve been watching Youtube videos of the Extinction Rebellion’s efforts to disrupt the transportation infrastructure and daily life in London this week. Businesses are already saying that they are losing million of pounds because of it.
The cult has its high priests with Roger Hallan and George Monbiot. They have their gloom-and-doom belief system as did Jonestown, The Branch Davidians (the Biblical Apocalypse) and Heaven’s Gate (Earth was going to be “recycled”). They have their evil enemy in fossil fuel companies (Jim Jones was Marxist and likely viewed the capitalist world around him as evil). So yes, the characteristics of a cult are all there in the Extinction Rebellion.
They no doubt relish the attention they get from what is probably a sympathetic mass media so that they can spread the Holy Faith, and its anyone’s guess when it will all end.
Whether it’s stated as a religion or something like this phony sanctimonious “Earth Saving”, it is a quest for power over others by demonizing them. They don’t fear being wrong because they will be the deciders when that time comes and they’ll have theirs. To Hell with the rest of us. Literally or figuratively.
Is climate change a cult? The simplest answer is “Yes”.
Even the use of children to promote it, which is a throwback to the Children’s Crusades in the Middle Ages, indicates that it is a cult, in addition to the excoriation and shunning of anyone who dares to question the pronouncements or disagrees with the “leaders”. We’ve even seen repeated self-inflicted deaths of these “believers”.
I sincerely hope that no disastrous event comes out of this. Stopping traffic in a city or making a nuisance of yourself toward other people are only small manifestations of a more violent leaning.
The whole greenie ship-‘o-fools is a cult. They used to just join Amway and worship money while selling soap, but now they worship a perfect Earth without humans (which are after all ‘earthlings’! hello! not aliens! from earth!) and sell perpetual doom instead. I preferred it when they avidly sold soap.
I enjoyed reading ” is climate change a cult?It’s very well written,and makes a whole lot of sense.I’m glad I’m not as naive as those that believe in this farce,and I’m so glad I’m a ‘denier’.
It is religion because it needs believing. The world itself is better place now when it´s a littlebit warmer.
Everybody can see it, if they look. Greenalarmists have brainwashed all nations to believe, not to look. If you look and understand you are denier.
We have seen this before, not so far in history. The whole manuscript is from Mein Kampf.
Global warming alarmism is the way to achieve power to change the whole world under Marxism-Leninism communism. And that is going to be a bloody hell, literally.
We are in a very serious war of freedom. And only leader who can see is Donald Trump. I trust him, because he is in position where he maybe can stop this revolution. He is our only hope. All other nations are lost.
Well, it’s pretty obvious that the people writing here are shills for the various fossil fuel industries. Of course they would not welcome an insistence that society should switch over to renewable energy sources.
Nobody here seems to address the rate at which animal, insect and plant species are dying out in what has been called the Sixth Great Extinction
All of this of great importance to all of us.
Don’t be foolish. Accept the reality of climate change. Don’t be dinosaurs. Ensure your survival.
.
LOL! See you in 12 years.
Marie Luyt
Please list all of the species that have actually gone extinct the past 10 years after a decade of “the world’s hottest ever” climate.
I know of only two – and one was a tree frog that was killed by the biologists who tracked a fungus into their living area.
Instead we are discovering new species at a very fast rate, are we not?
Sorry Marie, but all I see from you is the standard ad hominem from the Climate Faithful that all your enemies are in the pay of your Great Satan, Big Oil. Followed by an assertion that some great plague is now happening because of our unbelief, one that anyone that has dug into the claims knows is false.
You did nothing to argue against any of the items listed in the article above. Instead you actually proved several of them in 2 short paragraphs.
You should consider getting help. It really is only a matter of time before your ‘thought leaders’ end up leading you to a dead end.
We are lucky to be experiencing a mild thaw up out of the coldest era of the past 8000 years (called the Little Ice Age). A little warming and CO2 fertilization has allowed us to prosper…
The climate change hysteria is but the latest iteration of Marxism, picked up, dusted off, and given a new baggy suit. Gotta keep those peasants marching in lockstep to their betters’ cadence!
1000 years ago there was a hot period where the temp went up higher than anything we have seen .this was called the” medieval warm period” afterwards there was a cold period in which the Thames froze solid….will there be global cooling cult when that starts ?
Other cults: Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Charles Manson, and so on. Too easy. Are there any cults which are benign?
I think the cult of Duke’s mayonnaise hasn’t caused any notable problems.
https://www.foodrepublic.com/2013/08/09/the-cult-of-dukes-mayonnaise-has-inspired-dukes-mayonnaise-fan-art/
What makes this cult different and more dangerous is the mass media buy-in to the operation. Historical cults usually have received highly critical examination by some element of the media — for example, the Unification Church, Scientology, Jim Jones, David Koresh, etc. all have been investigated by major media sources. The Climate Catastrophe Cult is too far embedded to get the same treatment.
Mass media owners are behind the curtain, so they are all in, in this neverending daily propaganda BS.
This Cortexafan woman gives airheads a bad name.
I must admit, when I saw the headline I was expecting it would meet a majority of the criteria (perhaps as high as 80%) and thus was slightly surprised that hit 100%. That’s even more than 97% 😉
Spot on. The Climate Change doctrine has become what it’s most fanatical adherents could only dream about a few short decades ago. Insane screeds of a coming apocalypse call for mindlessly destructive policies NOW. The recent provincial elections in Alberta Canada offer some hope that we will be able to defeat this monstrosity but only by taking it head on.
The cult leaders say “what is your climate plan” our answer has to be that we will follow the science and nature that show no adverse effects from a mild natural warning period. Better forestry practices, better water control projects to address growing populations in water scare regions, better use of the natural resources available to us. Those are the practices that raised us out of endemic poverty and short brutish lives. Many here understand all to well the frustration of debating the nuances of obviously roached ideologies. Civilization continues forward when stop being polite about things and call them what they are.
In the opening statement… …the Climate Change movement seems more and more like a religious movement?
I’ve been calling it a religion for a long time. Consider, if you voice skepticism to a believer they’ll ask you, “you don’t believe in climate change?” with a somewhat incredulous tone. Think about it, what things do you believe in? Nobody asks you if you believe in gravity or laws of physics or standard temperature and pressure laws. But climate change, you have to believe in it or there is something wrong with you. If you have to believe in it that is because it can’t be proven. And if it can’t be proven then it is a religion.
I have my religion and religious beliefs, I can’t prove them though I feel I can justify them, but unless you are open to a discussion and the possibility of conversion, I don’t push them down your throat. BUT, warmists, they have to attack you and berate and belittle you, call you names to intimidate you into believing or to silence you if you have even a slightly cogent argument.
“And if it can’t be proven then it is a religion.”
Or at least a philosophical belief. Being a religion requires a few more characteristics – you need a canon, some person or group selected to evangelize it, some kind of organization, a place to gather, rituals, sins, etc. Not every religion may have all of these, but this is a pretty good list. Missing several or most of these and you just have one or more people sharing a similar philosophy.
OK, so AGW has a canon (the so-called science behind it), IPCC and friends to lead it, I am not sure I could call it organized, conferences to gather at, the banning of CO2 because that is what Earth wants, the burning of fossil fuel is a sin…So yes it is a mostly unorganized religion (or a group of many similar ones).
As for “Cult”, it matches several definitions of a Cult. It is a strange unsupported belief, it is fashionable, and the members in it are often excessive in their beliefs.
This leads me to ponder something…Should everyone and everything dealing with AGW be tax free, protected as freedom of religion? Maybe they are on to something here…
“Consider, if you voice skepticism to a believer they’ll ask you, “you don’t believe in climate change?” with a somewhat incredulous tone. ”
A good riposte to that is, “I believe in AGW, like 90% of skeptics; I don’t believe in CAGW—the contention that the effects of AGW will be catastrophic or that “we” (Westerners) can do anything effective if they were.
I just say, I don’t believe in wild eyed alarmism.
I’ve often wondered if that is their only religion. If they claim to be Christians or Jews then according to those religions God is the owner of this planet and He isn’t going to let us destroy it. He will step in and ‘rule with a rod of iron.’ The only way that one can think that we are going to destroy this planet is if he/she truly don’t believe in an omnipotent “owner” who cares about what kinds of s**t we try to pull.
I do not think it reasonable to equate cults with “religions”. The whole point of defining some movement as a cult is that it is not a religion.
Some cults arise headed by a figure who claims a religious inspiration. That doesn’t make his or her cult a religion. I could claim anything. Claims don’t make things true. Cults are well defined by social anthropologists.
There is a cult that runs the town of Auroville just over one hour south of Chennai, India. It was started by a “guru” lady from Switzerland. They have a whole town to themselves built from scratch. They do not allow the formation of any formal religious organizations there. They have their own money, akin to Permaculture money which can be used within “the movement”. They are interesting people, if a bit odd.
This is a classic example of a successful cult, initially of personality and later, a shared vision under constant review. It is habitually bankrupt but it manages to do some amazing things, one of which is the reforestation of the entire region. In 1971 the place was a parched desert with a few tall scraggly coconut palms and starving cattle. Now it is thickly forested and the birds are so plentiful it is impossible to sleep after Dawn. In terms of greening, the desert blooms.
It is a sort of cross between a Mennonite intentional community, an ashram, a Permaculture course with biodynamic gardening and a hippie commune with its own schools. They have a golden temple, of sorts (huge thing) but it is not religion and doesn’t claim to be. They have an enormous solar cooker of advanced design.
The climate cult is a blend of the Gaia Hypothesis, Mother Nature and Mother Goose, Star Trek and a Zoroastrian-style pair of deities – a good God and a bad God, each with their own followers, wrapped in a think layer of “just so” stories.
When religions, spaced about a thousand years apart, historically, degenerate as the leaders lose sight of their purpose, they split into myriad cults. Neutral observers incorrectly assign these perversions to the Originator and claim it was always like that.
For some “science” is/was a Path leading to all truth, and that story held up for a while, but it’s leaders are also found to have feet of clay.
What is happening now, and not only with respect to the climate cult, is the thorough discrediting of science leadership as somehow the righteous saviours of humanity. They are not “inspired”, they are not infallible, they are just as odd and crooked and mixed up as the priests became when they assumed they had the measure of life and it’s ultimate meanings. It’s Issac Asimov meets Ron L Hubbard meets Stephen King (with apologies to Mr King).
It will lead ultimately to a general crisis of confidence in formerly unimpeachable authorities, including political leaders who have been getting away with so much, followed by the emergence of a new paradigm. “Experts” will not “save” humanity. In fact humanity will rescue the term from those who now abuse it.
This is no trivial matter. When cults abound, a paradigm shift is taking place, and the result is always unexpected, unimagined, and eventually glorious.
It doesn’t take thousands of years for cults to splinter from the main religion. Both in Islam and in Christianity cults started forming within decades after the leader ‘left the scene.’ In Christianity they were called heretics, they were cults nevertheless. In Islam it started within years after Mohamed died. The Sunnis call the Shiites a cult and vice versa.
Richard P
I think we should be a bit conservative in the distribution of the pigeon holes. A sect is still a religious movement. I consider the Montanists (followers of Montanus, from 44 AD) a cult even though it lasted for a very long time – more than 500 years. The early Moslems haggled over the right of leadership, the older generation refusing to accept Ali as the appointed successor (because he was “too young”).
We do not see this in the climate catastrophe movements. They are cult-like in numerous ways, including a fanaticism without opportunity for independent investigation, and their sheer number and discordant, verbose and socially violent attitudes. In a sense some are death cults, planning on the initiation of some catastrophe “to bring about the coming Nirvana sooner” – that sort of thing. We have witnessed cults where everyone kills themselves to bring about The End, and then those who want to kill others with a similar goal. It is the narrative of, “If we create a sufficiently large death-event, super-natural forces will emerge to save the Earth.” Cue Gaia.
It is very dark. The coordination on the catastrophic message is evidence enough to show that there are some backroom boys pulling strings to weaken the developed countries, at least to the point of being able to initiate some starvation. People are malleable when they are hungry and cold. They accept all sorts of leadership deals when threatened firmly. In a proper global crisis, Europe will starve in the cold.
But strictly on the matter of cult v.s. religion, one can learn from the characterisation of Communism as “a religion of irreligion”, and that nothing like this has existed before in the history of humanity. Instead of arguing that communism is a cult with a Party as its head, and the state as God, the use of the term “irreligion” has connotations of its being more than a cult. It requires ideological possession. Apparently one can have a good or bad sort of ideological possession. Jordan Peterson has posted some good examples of what ideological possession is and what it looks like. Were it a positive thing, one could expect a better outcome.
I am not convinced being “religious” requires it, however. Of the very positive people who I know who are deeply religious, none exhibit ideological possession as it is presently criticized.
The climate catastrophists appear to me to be “cultish” in their behaviours but the vast majority of followers would quickly change if the narrative evolved. I think it is peaking – maybe one more year. Next up are air pollution and water pollution. What they are attempting is just so far-fetched it is easily seen through in a single casual encounter with reality.
One has to wonder what they plan to do if they get all that power. Once you are riding the tiger, perspectives change rapidly as “being a meal” threatens.
You know climate change is a cult
because they have kept making the same
scary predictions since the 1970s —
a warming rate of +3 degrees C.
per CO2 doubling, when reality
has been one third of that since 1979.
And only +0.6 degrees C of warming
since 1940, in the era of man made CO2
emissions, over the past 78 years —
only +0.077 degrees C. per decade,
or +0.77 degrees per century !
But who cares about reality
when there are scary predictions !
Completely ignore those 78 years of actual
experience with rising CO2 emissions,
accompanied by slow, harmless warming,
which may or may not be related to CO2 levels.
Reality means nothing to the climate cult
— they could not care less
about the past climate,
with mild, intermittent warming
that has been 100% good news.
They only point to the future climate,
and have been doing so since the late 1950’s,
and they keep claiming the future climate change
is ONLY going to be bad news
— we’ve been waiting for over 60 years —
but bad climate news NEVER shows up.
Meaning their “CO2 is Evil” theories can NEVER
be falsified — they are based on belief, and faith,
and superstition, and ALWAYS coming in the future !
The climate change cult is a cult of climate science deniers!
It’s a bad idea to make analogies between climate doomism and other cults.
The situation in the UK is strange. Climate change is now the main green movement recruiter; and for the left, recruitment is everything. Strangely, the people doing the best recruitment for them are our establishment. In UK, only 5 out of 650 MPs voted against the 2008 Climate Change Act; which was written by a former Friends of the Earth activist. Over the last year, BBC radio turned into raving loony green propaganda channel. Almost 24-hour propaganda. UK establishment are now the most hard-core anti-capitalists in this country. I wonder if they realize that this anti-capitalism is not just a green slogan? It will be a political and economic program if they ever gain any power. Actual UK climate scientist hide. They never engage one in debate. They prefer to just talk among themselves. I think they hide from activists as well as skeptics. When Red Guards (or is it Green?) rule the roost – it pays to keep your head down.
You should have seen the latest programme on the BBC purporting to give the facts about climate change.
The usual suspects were paraded, Mann, Oreskes, Hansen et al, along with a series of disaster scenes.
All in all it gave the appearance of an update on Gore’s movie. No doubt it will influence the thinking of the public who haven’t looked at the science in any critical way.
Did anyone who saw it manage to get more detail of the points made, and could give a critique of the programme?
The latest with the Extinction Rebellion is that they are planning to shut down Heathrow Airport tomorrow at the start of the Easter Holiday. How to win friends and influence people!
3 years ago I thought ECS = 3. Now I think ECS = 0 ±0.2 Climate temperatures are so overdetermined we’ll, maybe, never know whether more CO2 warms. Who cares; it’s negligible. That happened because I studied climate science. If BBC propaganda encourages more people to study the climate; there will be more skeptics. Ordinary people are not as dumb as climate activists think.
I think the plan is to have embedded laws in place before that happens. Most elective rights will have been cancelled “for the greater good of the movement”. You know the drill.
What they’re hoping is that most will, as opposed to being inspired to “study” the climate science, simply accept the propaganda uncritically as fact. Climate activists are counting not on a lack of intelligence of ordinary people, but rather the tendency of ordinary people to be influenced by emotions rather than facts.
We need another Finest Hour !
But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science
https://winstonchurchill.org/resources/speeches/1940-the-finest-hour/their-finest-hour/
@ Stephen P
“Did anyone who saw it manage to get more detail of the points made, and could give a critique of the programme?”
Full detail here –
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2019/04/19/attenboroughs-climate-change-the-facts/
“Is the climate change movement a ‘cult’?”
Yes. Next Question, Please.
Is it a Millenarian movement?
No, the millennium just happens to coincide with the second major information revolution (the first being printing).
These cults are to be expected, so too are changes in politics (as Trump demonstrates). So too are the “inquisition” burning books (deplatforming opposition), etc.
It’s also predictable that the cultism will reach a peak and then begin to fade as the “establishment” finally accept the changes brought by the revolution … and indeed as ordinary people learn to ignore the stupid cults.
Good post, and like him or not, Trump is the first leader of the west to challenge the climate cult. On this issue he is a breath of fresh air.
Catastrophic AGW aka “climate change” is like a religion. The issue is one of optics as opposed to reality.
Like religions, climate change offers damnation or salvation, but only in the future and without supporting evidence.
Like religions, climate change also depends both on authority of those that a lay public accedes to and the peer pressure from a popular consensus.
Like religions, the journalists on the global warming file are like a choir in perfect harmony on a one note score singing the settled-science-symphony of the IPCC and Al Gore.
And finally, like religions, for the political believers, the money from the carbon tax collection plate is just too much to resist.
Although the scientific support for the Catastrophic aspect of AGW is nonexistent, the idea is strong. To quote Rupert Darwall:…“Global warming’s success in colonising the Western mind and in changing government policies has no precedent.”
“like him or not, Trump is the first leader of the west to challenge the climate cult. On this issue he is a breath of fresh air.”
Problem is,the AGW gang have challenged us to a cockfight with a turkey. The only bird willing to challenge is the Common Crested Orange Tit, and his battle cry of “Chinese hoax” isn’t scaring anybody. In his pre-match interview he was heard to say “errrmmm.. uhhh.. welll.. ummm.. they might be right, but uhhhh.. I don’t believe it”
Nicely articulated, Donald..
All the cultish propaganda described hasn’t been enough to convince “the turkey” that CAGW is real.
Further, the Chinese did not create the CAGW Cult, but clearly recognize the usefulness of it to spar with the West. They use the teachings of the Cult to their ends. I’m not sure what a “hoax” is, but will give Trump and A+ for recognizing what the Chinese are doing.
Maybe he is less of a “turkey” than you think!
Trump also calls the Mueller investigation a “hoax”. I think he uses that term to describe something that is false and used to advance particular agenda. Pretty good description of climate claims.
“Trump also calls the Mueller investigation a “hoax.””
I don’t think he has ever called the investigation a hoax. The investigation was real…. he thought the subject of the investigation was a hoax.
“Trump is the first leader of the west to challenge the climate cult.”
The first was that guy in Czechoslovakia. Others who preceded Trump were Harper and Abbott. And Trump hasn’t really “challenged” the climate cult the way the new president in Brazil has done.
“Trump is the first leader of the west to challenge the climate cult.”
The first was that guy in Czechoslovakia.
That rather depends on what you mean by “the west”. During the Cold War, Czechoslovakia was considered part of Eastern Europe/The Eastern Bloc, and thus not part of the west.
I would say that pulling the US out of the Paris Accord was certainly challenging the climate cult. I can’t see any of our other Republican primary candidates having the stones to do that.
I can see why this fraud could be called a hoax, but I think it is more accurate to refer to it as a scam. As others have said, this entire facade was an attempt to get poor people in rich nations to give money to rich people in poor countries. Trump pulled the plug on that by withdrawing from the Paris scam and was subjected to barrages from all sides as a result. But their feeble shots just bounced off of him as if they were blanks. And we rarely hear anything about that anymore.
A more modernized term might be a Nonprofit Advocacy Oligarchy.
Very easy to flip your 10 points and make as strong a case that denial of anthropogenic climate change is a cult.
Um, no.
If it’s so easy, why don’t you try it?
I can’t think of a single item on the list that can be applied to the climate realists.
@Andrew_w: No Andrew. A cult is built on a belief system and blind faith in it. The CAGW alarmists are the ones with the belief system here, not the skeptics.
Skeptics are using science to challenge the belief system of the climate alarmists. Questioning and challenging the belief system of others is not a belief system in and of itself. Arguing that something is untrue is the opposite of a belief system. It is the absence of a belief.
If you still think otherwise Andrew, feel free to explain why.
“A cult is built on a belief system and blind faith in it.”
Well put, and as we have seen there is blind faith amongst many “skeptics” that AGW isn’t happening.
We have seen an accelerating increase in SLR.
We have seen a steady decade after decade decline in Arctic sea ice levels.
We have seen a steady decline in ice cap mass.
We have seen a steady increase in average global temperature.
We have seen the expected stratospheric cooling.
We have seen the expected increase in atmospheric humidity.
All the trends predicted are happening, but still the Cult of Denial cherry picks data points that go against the expected trends, placing ridiculous importance on them even though such noise is obviously to be expected. I suppose, given the importance of ideology in the AGW debate, the noise from those placing ideology above science on both the “right” and the “left” is also only to be expected.
”Well put, and as we have seen there is blind faith amongst many “skeptics” that AGW isn’t happening”.
Not enough time has passed to be sure there is any permanent warming at all. Let alone AGW.
The only real warming above ”average” (whatever that means) is a 0.2 degrees C jump after the massive thermal shock of ’98. Hasn’t warmed much since. CO2 is sleeping on the job?
Are you being satirical?
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1880/to:2018/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1880/to:2018/plot/rss/from:1979/to:2018/offset:0.2/plot/uah6/from:1979/to:2018/offset:0.4
Andrew_W
April 18, 2019 at 9:14 pm
Are you being satirical?
What has satire got to do with the price of fish?
Here is UAH – with UHI effect included by the way….Where is the co2 signal?
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-
content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_March_2019_v6.jpg
The UAH graph clearly shows warming since 1979, your inability to see something when it’s there in front of you demonstrates how powerful your faith is. Here’s the linear trend for UAH to make it easier for you:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah6/from:1970/to:2019/trend
“We have seen a steady increase in average global temperature.”
At one-half the predicted rate, which wobbles the models.
“At one-half the predicted rate, which wobbles the models.”
Nope, Hansen’s scenario B was the closest to the level of forcings that actually happened, it was still high by about 30%, correct for that and Hansen’s projections are spot on. You’re claim of the temperature rise being half that predicted is popular amongst adherents of the Denialist Cult but it’s based on Hansen’s scenario A, which was itself based on GHG levels far higher than those that have eventuated.
“The Arctic’s sea ice level has been flat, on average, for a decade.”
Which is why I said decade after decade rather than year after year. The average sea ice minimums have been lower for every decade than those of the preceding decade for the last 5 decades. You obviously aren’t aware that there’s a thing called noise that make claims based on short term trends unreliable (obviously you can’t know this, otherwise, assuming you’re not a cultist, you wouldn’t have made a claim basing it on such a short term).
Me: “The Arctic’s sea ice level has been flat, on average, for a decade.”
Andrew: “Which is why I said decade after decade rather than year after year. The average sea ice minimums have been lower for every decade than those of the preceding decade for the last 5 decades.”
I didn’t deny that, I just provided a fact that indicates that your four-decade trend of steady decline has stopped. That’s a relevant fact, like it or not.
“You obviously aren’t aware that there’s a thing called noise that make claims based on short term trends unreliable …”
But four decades of decline can be noise too, in a larger and more climatologicvally appropriate context. The starting point from which the cvurrent decline is measured was a high point in ice extent in the 70s. Before the 70s ice had been increasing for decades. There had been lower levels of ice extent than the current level in the 20s and 30s, as far as we can tell from observations then.
Me: “At one-half the predicted rate, which wobbles the models.”
Andrew: “Nope, Hansen’s scenario B was the closest to the level of forcings that actually happened, it was still high by about 30%, correct for that and Hansen’s projections are spot on. You’re claim of the temperature rise being half that predicted is popular amongst adherents of the Denialist Cult but it’s based on Hansen’s scenario A, ….”
Nope, it’s based on the IPCC’s 1990 claim that warming would occur at a rate of 0.3 degrees per decade. Actual warming has been half, or less, than that. See “Global Mean Surface Temperature: Early 20th Century Warming Period – Models versus Models & Models versus Data” by Bob Tisdale at:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/02/01/global-mean-surface-temperature-early-20th-century-warming-period-models-versus-models-models-versus-data/
“We have seen a steady decade after decade decline in Arctic sea ice levels.”
The Arctic’s sea ice level has been flat, on average, for a decade (chart):
“We have seen the expected stratospheric cooling.”
But not at the predicted rate, IIRC.
Also, one of the measures of stratospheric temperature has been flat since 1995—see the second “stratosphere” chart in the “Reference pages” tab atop this page, at the “Atmospheric” item in the drop-down list, at http://data.remss.com/msu/graphics/tls/plots/RSS_TS_channel_TLS_Global_Land_and_Sea_v03_3.png
“We have seen an accelerating increase in SLR.”
Mostly in 1) untrustworthy satellite measurements to which 2) an unjustified, propagandistic 0.3 global isostatic (sp?) adjustment has been added. The tide measurement gauges show only a slight recent acceleration, which is not in accord with consensus climatology’s higher estimates of what should be happening.
PS: The charts under the Reference Pages for Oceans stop in 2015 for some reason.
As I said, we have seen an accelerating increase in SLR, the fact that you choose to dismiss the evidence is your choice.
Andrew: “As I said, we have seen an accelerating increase in SLR, …”
No, you and your cult have seen an accelerating increase, through your chosen “lens,” the unreliable satellite system which conflicts with “ground truth,” and the transparently propagandistic isostatic adjustment. (If the ocean’s basins were becoming shallower rather than deeper, would the U. of Colo. have made an adjustment that lowered the rate of sea level rise? The question answers itself.)
“… the fact that you choose to dismiss the evidence is your choice.”
“Saying the evidence “begs the question.” I.e., what is “the” evidence? That’s the question under dispute. What you’ve got is some evidence, not all of it as your wording implies. There are often situations where some evidence points one way and other evidence points another. To assert the infallibility of one’s preferred set of evidence and attempt to dismiss contrary evidence is … (what’s the word?) cultish.
No we don´t. Non adjusted SLR is not rising. Try to live in reality.
I could say that sea level has declined. And it´s true. It´s going down 11mm/year. No acceleration in that measure.
Don´t you believe? What´s your choice?
“We have seen a steady decline in ice cap mass.”
Greenland’s icecap has grown in the past two years. According to Zwally, the Antarctic cap has grown too. These offset losses elsewhere in the Canadian and Russian Arctic.
“Greenland’s icecap has grown in the past two years.”
GRACE measured an accelerating decline in icecap mass for Greenland and Antarctica through to its decommission in 2017, you again resorting to such short periods when you know they’re unreliable in measuring long term trends does your credibility no good, it makes you look like a cultist selectively looking for evidence to support your faith.
“resorting to such short periods when you know they’re unreliable in measuring long term trends does your credibility no good,”
An interruption in the trend undermines the inexorable insinuation of your claimed “steady decline”
“GRACE measured an accelerating decline in icecap mass for Greenland and Antarctica through to its decommission in 2017”
And Zwally measured a subsidence in the underlying rock that threw off GRACE’s estimate. Just because you have one piece of evidence on your side doesn’t mean it’s conclusive, let alone entitle you to sneeringly insist that it is so. That’s unscientific, to put it mildly.
Andrew_W
Who´s living in the past?
“We have seen the expected increase in atmospheric humidity.”
Specific humidity has increased, but the expected (?) increase in relative humidity has not occurred. See the “Atmosphere” page under “Reference Pages above and search for “humidity.”
Yes, as expected specific humidity has increased.
The projection is strong with this one.
Huh? Now “not believing in something” is “like a cult”?
This is an entirely new twist to logic. You don’t believe in something means you are part of a cult.
But let me be VERY CLEAR in what I don’t believe in…
I DO believe:
1) the Earth has warmed since the Little Ice Age
2) the Earth is likely still warming, on average
3) CO2 plays a role in keeping the Earth warm, so more CO2 might lead to measurable additional warming.
I do NOT believe that doubling or tripling of a trace amount of CO2 is going to lead to catastrophic change, catastrophic warming, or the end of all life in 12 years. I do NOT believe there are ANY detectable increases in severe weather due to CO2. I do NOT believe the Oceans are turning into acids, nor is it likely that an increase in atmospheric CO2 is leading to an increase coral bleaching.
I DO believe:
4) the Earth is greening at least partially due to the increase in CO2
5) food production is increased with an increase in CO2
6) Many things BLAMED on CO2 are actually due to either pollution (I mean real pollution) or natural cycles.
I am not paid by oil companies to believe this (or paid by them for any other reason). I I do not believe releasing CO2 into the atmosphere is a sin. I do not wish ill on other people who believe differently. I you demonstrate that I am wrong about a belief, I am willing to change it.
So how EXACTLY am I (or any skeptic) part of a cult? You really need to sit down and think about your own logic.
Robert of Texas, given the points you make I wouldn’t include you as a member of the cult, the cultists challenge the points I make above, arguing that the science behind them is faked, so they build their beliefs around there being a leftist conspiracy creating AGW when there is no or negligible AGW. So if a better way of looking at it is a belief in there being a false narrative rather that a disbelief in AGW.
You do however state that “I do NOT believe that doubling or tripling of a trace amount of CO2 is going to lead to catastrophic change, catastrophic warming. . .” That’s a bit ambiguous, if you’re claiming an absence of belief that’s a reasonable nonreligious position, if though you’re claiming a disbelief “that doubling or tripling of a trace amount of CO2 is going to lead to catastrophic change, catastrophic warming” that is not a position firmly based in science, it’s a matter of faith. The cultists have the latter perspective, they believe that doubling or tripling of CO2 will NOT lead to catastrophic change, catastrophic warming, but the science is uncertain on that one. Those certain either way aren’t basing their belief in the available science – though the two sides usually use different definitions of “catastrophic”, often strawmanning each other over the definitions used by the other side.
“Catastrophic” as used by the scientists holding the IPCC position often doesn’t mean end of civilization, more large cost to civilization both financially and in increased loss of life.
”Andrew_W
The UAH graph clearly shows warming since 1979, your inability to see something when it’s there in front of you demonstrates how powerful your faith is. Here’s the linear trend for UAH to make it easier for you:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah6/from:1970/to:2019/trend”
Woopdy do! Of course it shows warming since 79. That’s because it is coming back up from an earlier low…Get it? You cannot separate it from noise yet. Therefore your evidence of permanent warming is not worth a piece of shite. It means nothing Get it? What happens to your linear trend if you start it a few decades earlier? Oh Dear, it vanishes. Like I said, NOT ENOUGH TIME HAS PASSED TO BE ABLE TO CLAIM PERMANTENT WARMING. IT IS PURELY CIRCUMSTAIAL. IT DOESN’T REALLY MEAN ANYTHING YET. Like I said, it has stepped up by about 0.2 degrees since 98. Not much since then. That does not prove a damn thing other than it has stepped up 0.2 degrees.
Does that make it easier for you? The trouble with you warmists is that you cannot seem to look past the end of your nose.
UAH starts in ’79, go back a few decades using surface readings and you’ll find the rate of warming has been increasing.
The antithesis of a cult member is a fact checker. WUWT is all about fact checking and support of good science process, not pal review and paid media spots on the polluted airways.
Dr Robert Jay Lifton
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/03/27/why-i-dont-believe-in-science/#comment-2666378
Dr. Robert J. Lifton’s Eight Criteria for Thought Reform
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/03/27/why-i-dont-believe-in-science/#comment-2666384
Yeah…Like a cult, but this one is different.
There is no “Leader”. There is some kind of social pack mind-frame that is self-enforced, self-policed, and self-rewarding. Anyone within the social construct can temporarily rise up to a “high priest” status, but then they generally get replaced by some other worthy one.
There is nothing more dangerous than someone who voluntarily leaves a religion. When they don’t die instantly by an act of God, well, someone has to make them pay or others will do it. Kind of like how Great Britain is being treated in the EU.
It’s kind of fascinating – in a mindless “lemming running off a cliff” sort of way. I actually would not care if they were not so hell bent on destroying all of Western Civilization and more importantly my right to use an air-conditioner.
They have several leaders, stated in another comment: Mann, Hansen, Oreskes, and that political wacko Ocasio-Cortez. She’s right on board with them, even if she doesn’t say so.
But at least, we know about them and what they’re up to.
Sounds to me like a case of “”Sin and Guilt”” Now where did I hear those words before.
MJR VK5ELL
I believe most commentors here were pretty certain of the cult status of AGW even withoput this list. The important question is do we let this cult burn itself out (hopefully with them causing damage to all of us, or can we perform deprogramming en mass in some way?
So if it’s a religion, fight it as a religion.
“We must act now!”
“NO!” It’s not the heartless offerings that are required but a personal response to the issue of the day.
Let us urge each and every person to adapt to the challenge that face them in their day.
And leave futile sacrifices to the hypocrites.
Thee is no need for any cutting of living standards now out of a sense of righteousness. Only when it’s a sense of need.
Climate change is natural. Climate Change is a political campaign. Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming is a cult.
No it’s an ideological movement subverted by the globally powerful wishing to instill a new Feudal Order on the planet.
The Climate Change religionists obviously believe the horrible predictions which have NEVER come to pass. Their behavior reminds me of my favorite definition of “Faith.” Faith is when you truly believe something which no one in their right mind would believe. Isn’t that a perfect definition of the AGW cult gang?
I’ve been saying this for years.
One of your better white papers.
This climate histeria not about science. It has never been about science, but about Malthusianism.
Malthusianism is an idiotic nonsense, where causes – favorable conditions and abundant resources – and consequences – thriving life (and among this, humans) – are inverted (and the conclusion is negated).
Its decades if not centuries since Malthusians try to impose their foolish agenda.
They found that the AG warming (in the 1930s) then cooling (in the 1970s) then warming again (in the 1980s) climate scam was a perfect means to do this, and they were right since most people are frightened by bad weather vents, are gullible and have neither memory nor historic knowledge.
Leftists, green activists, climate zombies protesting in the streets, main stream propagandist media, green business snake oil salesmen etc. are just corrupted and/or useful idiots, nothing more.
The fact is that most of the politicians has been converted (by idiocy, ignorance, corruption) to Malthusianism cult.
Official warning to banks: Get real about climate change or risk going bust
Central bankers and finance regulators have warned banks to act urgently to fight climate change or risk going bust.
The policymakers argue in a new report that banks must lend to responsible partners and invest sustainably or face severe economic disruption and a collapse in asset prices.
The Network for Greening the Financial System, which produced the report, includes 34 central banks and regulators from countries including the United Kingdom, France, Germany, China and Japan.
The group argues that financial companies face major risks from climate change
Snip
Another major risk from climate change is a sharp decline in the value of assets owned and traded by financial institutions. Potential examples include stock in oil companies or stakes in coal-burning power plants.
The group warned that climate risks are not being properly reflected in asset prices, and they pledged to take steps that will make banking more responsible and “green.”
“The enormous human and financial costs of climate change are having a devastating effect on our collective well-being,” members of the group, including Bank of England boss Mark Carney, said in an open letter.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/17/business/banks-climate-change-warning/index.html
Looks like downright Marxism to me. Believe as you’re told, do as you’re told or be ridiculed and put down…or worse. No questions asked. You know the climate change movement is totally fake because there can be no debate, questions or deep research into the methods used to come to these conclusions. This is true for everything leftist…you must accept our word and there can be no debate about it. It is pure 100% unadulterated propaganda.
The Church of Warming is just a sect of the post modernist religion of Secular Socialism, whose deity is the government. Religions are man made constructs that first reenforce and then usurp an individual’s spirituality for their leaders enrichment and power. There is very little difference between Joel Osteen and Al Gore.
There are infinite permutations of stupidity.
Constant discussion of stupidity produces a droning echo of the offending stupid.
Stupid can not be cured, so what’s the point?
The only way to get rid of it is to immunize a person before exposure.
Do you mean Rick Ross, the human rights violating kidnapper? https://www.standleague.org/bigotry-and-hate/exposed/rick-ross.html
High Tech doomsday Cult – love it. Send me $5 or you will die from climate change.
Man, I wish I could express my views on this as well as you have. Well done, sir! A big, fat, juicy steak for you!
The climate change hysteria is but the latest iteration of Marxism, picked up, dusted off, and given a new baggy suit. Gotta keep those peasants marching in lockstep to their betters’ cadence!
I live in California. I couldn’t even watch that clip of Feinstein and the ‘children’ all the way to the end. Those kids were just trained parrots, repeating lines they had previously learned to say. Pathetic!
And they say conservatives are mind-numbed robots. They should look in the mirror.
In reality, all of us a prone to repeat things we have heard; we investigate almost nothing for ourselves. It is a rare individual that does not take anybody’s word for anything and checks it our for themselves. It’s time-consuming, but it’s the only way to get close to the truth.
This post conveniently ignores scientists and scientific evidence. Sure, there is BS out there from some journalists, entertainers and Facebook groups. However, the scientific evidence has been very strong for over 50 years and new scientific evidence that greenhouse gases are causing dangerous climate change now appears in scientific publications on a weekly basis. No, there is no vast conspiracy among scientists. Anyone with a scientific background should try reading peer-reviewed scientific articles. While many journals require access to a university library, enough good quality science is open access to keep anyone busy reading.
I have been following this subject for many years and I have yet to see even a single piece of evidence that supports your contention. Repeating claims regardless of how often or by so many people in so many “respected” sources has no standing in science. Show me one, just one, set of data that demonstrates the connection between human-generated CO2 and any important climate variable. I challenge you. You can’t do it! I am waiting.
Of course it’s a cult. A stupid cult, but be careful how you say that….
Kudos to the author for this well-argued piece. Climate hysterics seem to illustrate a human need for self-flagellation, which of course is especially attractive when the person’s own comfortable life is not under any immediate threat.
It became clear to me when here in the Netherlands the churches proposed to ring their bells on the day of the Kopenhagen Climate Conference.