How often have you heard folks in the media, and climate alarmists such as Nobel Laureate Al Gore, state unequivocally that the global warming debate is over?
Too many to count, yes?
On the flipside, did you ever think you'd see a major media report suggesting the environmental movement, including global warming alarmism, was "premised on a 'politics of fear'?"
Well, on Wednesday, Sewell Chan posted a rather lengthy piece at the New York Times City Room blog concerning an exceptionally provocative discussion about environmental politics that occurred Tuesday evening at the New York Public Library.
Frankly, readers are going to be shocked by some of the article's contents, especially the astounding opening paragraph (emphasis added throughout):
Is the environmental movement, like the war on terror, premised on a "politics of fear"? In other words, does it try to unify people by scaring them with threats to their basic survival?
Sounds a lot like arguments put forth by global warming skeptics including yours truly, wouldn't you agree?
But that was just the beginning, as one of the lead panelists, Alex Gourevitch, a doctoral candidate in political theory at Columbia University, offered some observations that must have made many attendees' jaws drop:
Let's say it: Environmentalism is a politics of fear. It is not a progressive politics. When I say it is a politics of fear, I don't mean that it just deploys hysterical rhetoric or that it exaggerates threats, which I think it does. I mean it in a much deeper sense.
[...]
Environmentalism is not just some politics. It's a political project, a full-bodied ideology, and one that presents itself in terms of progress and aspiration. But when you look at what this ideology is built on, it's built on the idea that a collective threat that makes security the basic principle of politics and makes the struggle for survival the basic and central aim of our social and political life. This, to me, is not a progressive politics at all.
Quite right, Alex. This is regressive politics:
What is it that moves us? It's not actually ideals. We're not stirred to action by ideals. We're compelled by the force of circumstances. It's the sheer spur of necessity that drives us forward. What's more, this ostensible politics is really an antipolitics, because the idea is that we should put to one side the conflicts of interest and ideals that are the real cut and thrust of politics.
Of course, not all the panelists shared Gourevitch's views, and the reader is encouraged to review the entire article.
That said, it is indeed quite fascinating that the Times would share such a discussion with its readers, one that clearly goes against the liberal conventional wisdom that the debate is over.
On the other hand, as this is just a blog piece, who knows how many people actually read the Times' blogs?
Regardless of the answer, the mere existence of such content was indeed encouraging.
—Noel Sheppard is the Associate Editor of NewsBusters.
Editor at Large
Comments Policy
Never fear
October 31, 2007 - 18:53 ET by celatorIt's not that the left wing, socialist, lying, Marxist, irrelevant, unreadable, predictable NYT is changing colors. It's more like they are losing money as leftist propagandists and are desperate to keep their cushy, sit-on-your-butt all day jobs. The NYT is in the absolute financial toilet. What a disgrace they have become.
What do you think?
October 31, 2007 - 19:50 ET by pbthinkerSince they don't have the facts all they can do is use the politics of fear, to win people over. The ultimate con is when they say, "Hey, what can be wrong with cleaning up the environment, even if we aren't right?" Now, you know the facts aren't with them.
Democrats: Specializing in "high tech lynching" since 1987.
What?
October 31, 2007 - 22:56 ET by PopularTechSince when did the NYT become a denialist publication funded by exxon?
The Anti "Man-Made" Global Warming Resource
So enviros are mirroring the war on terror?
November 1, 2007 - 06:19 ET by BlindSightClearly, Gourevitch is right, at least for climate change politics. (Environmental politics generally is much more complex.) Gore and others ARE trying to gather political will based on creating the perception of a threat to our collective environment - but is this really a new insight? Indeed, much of our politics is about persuading others that there is something-that-we-need-to-do-something-about, and that we accordingly have to put aside petty partisan differences and to engage in "a war on" that something.
The NYT blog says that "Most provocatively, Mr. Gourevitch compared the environmental movement to the war on terror, which he said relies on a unity based on fear", but what's provocative about that? Those who advocate a "war on terror" unapologizedly assert that there is an external threat that we all need to band together to address. This is an old and instinctive tribal politics that runs deep and powerful (which leaves us very susceptible to manipulation by those who are happy to privately profit from state action), and it is no surprise that we see that in the AGW warmers or, indeed, in anyone else.
The problem that this approach to politics presents is it that it is an express appeal to emotion that tends to swamp our logic - and THIS is what seems to bothers Gourevtich, which is why he says that "'What the science cannot tell you is what our political and social response should be.' Science cannot determine whether humans should focus on mitigation or adaptation, he said." and that this is "not a progressive politics" but an "antipolitics, because the idea is that we should put to one side the conflicts of interest and ideals that are the real cut and thrust of politics."
Gourevtich is right to be concerned, not because climate change is not a real issue and a serious challenge, but because wise policy cannot be made in a rush based on simple existential fear.
Our mad rush into Iraq, with the meter still running at $2 billion/week, should be proof enough of that.
We need to coolly evaluate both our threats and responses. Since climate change doesn't pose "mushroom cluds"-type threats, I have no doubt that we will continue to evaluate it with greater consideration than we have been giving to our other "existential" threats that put alot of money into the pockets of those in power and other insiders.
A clear difference between the two is that the evidence climate change has been growing for decades and our allies are also all lined up to share the cost of action, whereas in the other we acted rather hastily, largely unilaterally against the strong disapproval of most allies, on the basis of evidence that remains disputed and certainly not directly related to the 9/11 attacks.
We will see if we let our emotions get the better of our judgment again in the near future.
Pres. Bush: "Our guiding principle is clear. We must lead the world to produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions and we must do it in a way that does not undermine economic growth or prevent nations from delivering greater prosperity for their people."