Essay by Eric Worrall
It’s not that nobody cares, its just people worried about the imminent end of the world are too shy to speak up.
COVERING CLIMATE NOW / MARCH 19, 2026
The Silencing Power of Big Oil’s Climate Lies
A new report suggests that the majority of people think new economic rules are required to curb climate change. The issue is that those majorities think they are a minority.
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Over the years, companies like BP and ExxonMobil have employed various strategies to deflect public anger and the changes in policy it might encourage. For decades, the strategy was simply to lie. By the 1970s, their own scientists were telling senior management that burning fossil fuels would threaten the survival of civilization. But the industry chose to hide the truth anyway, spending millions of dollars on advertising, phony research, and other forms of propaganda to convince the public, government officials, and the press there was no cause for alarm.
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One reason Big Oil has worked so assiduously to manage public opinion is simple enough: Most people understandably don’t want to see global warming ruin the planet. As CCNow’s 89% Project has reported, 80 to 89 percent of the world’s people want their governments to take stronger climate action. However, these same people think that they’re the minority, so they mostly stay silent. It’s a perverse tribute to the industry’s propaganda, which has many people convinced that climate change is too divisive to even talk about, much less to tackle.
A report by Climate Majority Project, a nonprofit based in the UK, argues that climate change is not the only issue where most people favor radically different approaches than what the status quo is delivering. The report finds that the majority of people around the world feel threatened by climate chaos, fear societal breakdown, and want less consumerism. But these majorities also mistakenly think that they are a minority, so they tend to say, and do, nothing. For example, a “climate concerned business majority” believes that new economic rules are needed to avoid catastrophe, but they don’t lobby for such rules. The result is a “spiral of silence” that blunts the action that most people want, according to the report.
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Read more: https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/the-silencing-power-of-big-oils-climate-lies/
I guess it was inevitable that greens would lay claim to supporters who are too shy to speak up. I mean, anyone who claims we are in the midst of a climate emergency nobody can see has the capacity to imagine supporters who nobody can hear.
The greens say we don’t need fossil fuels. And we cut ~10% of the supply from the Gulf Ststes & the price of oil doubles …. Data says fossil fuels are still essential in current day situation. Greens … read it & weep
A resurgence of The Silent Majority?
The Climate Majority Project has no legal status i.e. it’s not a limited company or registered charity. Funding comes from “philanthropists” and “companies”. As they have no legal status, there is no need for them to declare how much cash is donated by their funders, not where the money goes.
One of their projects is the indoctrination of children using school teachers. The National Curriculum and impartiality rules prevent schools from teaching any external group’s unbalanced “version” as official content – not sure how that works giving the school curriculum but, hey, who knows how the “donations” are spent.
Interestingly, the owner/operator and founder is Rupert Read, former Extinction Rebellion spokesperson.
For Read, climate change is the grift that keeps on giving.
This is another example of making stuff up if the actual reality does not support your preferred storyline.
The silent majority are probably statistically aligned with the non silent.
Why wouldn’t they be?
With that as the basic reality of humanity we can conclude, those who are prepared to be open saying the Climate Crisis is a hoax, it’s likely the silent members of society feel exactly the same way.
Paraphrasing Rumsfeld. You will never know what you never know…. 😉
Even raving madness has its own logic. Awesome!
“By the 1970s, their own scientists were telling senior management that burning fossil fuels would threaten the survival of civilization.”
Not that BS again. Even now climate science is at the elementary level- but the oil companies had scientists in the ’70s who definitively knew ff would threat civilization. Who knew “the science” was settled half a century ago?
As CCNow’s 89% Project has reported, 80 to 89 percent of the world’s people want their governments to take stronger climate action.
…and Big Biz too of course but when it comes to the individual themselves taking climate action and making sacrifices it’s a case of- Who moi! In your dreams dude. It’s the magic wand theory.
If this were true then those 80-89% hypocrites could/would voluntarily alter their lives, scrap their ICVs and buy new EVs while installing rooftop solar plus Powerwall Batteries at personal expense AND have their current gas devices removed in favor of installing all electric devices in their homes.
But they don’t and won’t because they really DON’T believe at the 80% level, as indicated in the article, to do what would be required without Government Edict
No because that 80%-89% want everyone else to make the sacrifices whilst they keep enjoying their lifestyle – the Al Gore and Meghan Muckle model.
I have never seen any advertisement from BP and ExxonMobil on the subject at all.
Let alone billions worth.
“It’s not that nobody cares, its just people worried about the imminent end of the world are too shy to speak up.” Really? They won’t shut the hell up about their religious hysteria.