Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
On their way to sunny Dubai, the private jets of those pretending to care about planetary warming were frozen on glaciated runways.
The planet had to be laughing.
On their way to sunny Dubai, the private jets of those pretending to care about planetary warming were frozen on glaciated runways.
The planet had to be laughing. It seems the Earth knows it is being used as a fall guy. Just to prove a point – that they are NOT in charge – Mama Gaia threw down the heaviest snowfall in Munich’s memory to show them who’s really boss.
Maybe she has finally grown weary of the luxury liner class who disguise their schemes for world domination with scary scenarios implying that they can “save the planet” if we just give them more power to diminish our lives.
Mind you, this was hardly the first time Mama G has brought the white stuff to embarrass the pseudo-warmists whose every dire climate prediction to date has failed to come true. Frigid weather has greeted climate meetings so often that pundits coined the term “the Gore Effect.”
Politico in 2008 described the Gore Effect as “a global warming-related event or appearance by … Al Gore … [that is] marked by exceedingly cold weather or unseasonably winter weather.”
The article cites as examples the March 2007 Capitol Hill media briefing on a Senate climate bill that was canceled due to a snowstorm; the October 22 (2008) global warming speech by Gore at Harvard University that coincided with near-125-year record-breaking low temperatures; and the marathon British House of Commons debate on global warming a week later during London’s first October snowfall since 1922.
But those three events are, shall we say, just the tip of the iceberg.
Climate Depot has chronicled a much longer list, beginning with a Gore speech decrying global warming during a bitterly cold day in New York City (December 2006). In December 2008, Gore ranted about global warming during a “rare” snowy, cold day in Italy.
Then, on March 1, 2009, the (then) “largest public protest of global warming ever in the U.S.” was literally snowed under in Washington, DC. The snow was so bad that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s plane (she was to be a speaker) could not land at any local airport. Again, in 2014, yet another global warming hearing in the nation’s capital was stifled by a heavy snowfall.
The Glasgow Climate Summit in 2021 provided the most recent (until now) demonstration of the Gore Effect. The October arrival of Arctic air froze the outdoor climate protestors, while inside, the caviar crowd accomplished literally nothing – but they all ate well, slept in comfort, and re-boarded their private jets.
No wonder, then, that the jet-setters chose the UAE – where it does not snow – to host this year’s charade. But once again, Mama G got the last laugh, though those who know their real agenda are not laughing.
The 2019 report, “The Future of Urban Consumption in a 1.5 C World,” asserts that to avoid worldwide climate breakdown (more honestly, “to ensure our total dominance over the rest of humanity”), major industries — energy generation, transportation, agriculture, construction, electronics, and clothing and textiles — will have to undergo significant structural changes.
First on the list, brought to us by C40 Cities, is limiting the number of new clothing items we can buy each year — in the name of reducing supply chain waste. A favored remedy involves returning to the “pre-industrial civilization practice of taking 760 hours to make clothing. Only the rich could afford new clothes. Also, say “Goodbye” to clothes dryers – remember those stiff, wind-dried jeans?
C40 Cities also demands we reduce car ownership (easily accomplished by mandating electric vehicles that most cannot afford or do not want) and limiting airplane flights — that can only use biofuels. Worse, biofuel production must be limited to avoid land use conflicts.
The barons also call for barring ordinary people from eating meat and dairy (except laboratory “meat”). Because they believe when people own property they create a multiplier effect on consumption, so only the “wise” elites will be allowed to own anything.
When the climate lords finally arrived in Dubai, to their dismay, they ran into a buzzsaw of opposition, led (to hardly anyone’s surprise) by the host (and Summit president) himself. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber told attendees that there is “no science” behind the global warming campaign.
The UAE’s minister of industry and advanced technology (who later backtracked from his bold statement) added that eliminating fossil fuels would not allow for sustainable growth “unless you want to take the world back into caves.”
Well, that’s pretty close to taking 760 hours to make a suit of clothing. And three billion still live in a pre-industrial world.
A coterie of “scientists and students” demanded that African leaders forego their nations’ bountiful natural resources and rely solely on the long-awaited influx of Western cash to finance wind and solar projects that, at best, would generate intermittent power to the select few.
NJ Ayuk, executive chairman of the African Energy Chamber, called this proposed surrender of African sovereignty “a horrible idea.” He took offense at the idea that Western aid gives the West the right to influence domestic African policy decisions. Worse, Western “aid” has all too often made things worse for ordinary Africans.
Another quick response came from the newest developing world spokesperson, Saudi Arabian Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, half-brother of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Responding to the demand by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres for a total phaseout of fossil fuels, Prince Abdulaziz said, “Absolutely not.”
To emphasize his point, he said, “I would like to put that challenge for all of those who come out publicly saying we have to (phase down). I’ll give you their name and number. Call them and ask them how they are gonna do that. If they believe that this is the highest moral ground issue, fantastic. Let them do that themselves. And we will see how much they can deliver.”
Prince Abdulaziz, like many in the developing world, has learned the lessons lost on the British and French diplomats who at Munich in 1938 callously allowed Hitler to seize Czechoslovakia without a fight. Their pitiful appeasement gesture at the Munich Conference failed to prevent World War II and led to the genocide of 12 million people (half of them Jews), “Munich” now symbolizes surrender to tyrants.
If these pontificating world leaders and billionaire dilettantes actually believed “global warming” was going to destroy all life on Earth, they would not fly private jets into the desert.
More and more people now realize that the true purpose of restrictions on human freedom has nothing to do with “climate change” and everything to do with depopulation, de-industrialization, and dehumanization.
To truly “save the world,” the Brussels sprouters and their mega-billionaire buddies must be stopped dead in their tracks.
A version of this article originally appeared at Town Hall
Sir, John Kirk (letters 5 Dec) and Alistair Ballantyne (letters 6 Dec) muse about future use of lubricating oil in wind turbines. This rather misses the elephant in the room. A 1.8megawatt onshore wind turbine weighs about 164 tons. The materials comprise concrete (foundations), steel (tower and nacelle), speciality metals (magnets), copper (generators) and composites (blades).
Is it time to ban fossil fuels in the construction of wind turbines?
Sir, John Kirk (letters 5 Dec) and Alistair Ballantyne (letters 6 Dec) muse about future use of lubricating oil in wind turbines. This rather misses the elephant in the room. A 1.8megawatt onshore wind turbine weighs about 164 tons. The materials comprise concrete (foundations), steel (tower and nacelle), speciality metals (magnets), copper (generators) and composites (blades).
The raw materials need to be mined using gigantic steel diggers and dumper trucks, the mined materials need to be ground using gigantic steel grinding machines before being refined in a furnace. In the case of steel (trucks, machines and tower) the iron ore is mixed with coal in a blast furnace in order to reduce the ore to metal.
The amount of fossil fuels embedded in wind turbines is vast. In order to declare wind turbines are sustainable and green, let us see all of the aforementioned mining, fabrication and installation being done using only intermittent wind energy. It is possible to use an electric arc furnace to smelt iron ore. And I’m quite sure Elon Musk will be happy to make battery powered dumper trucks. Let us not forget that all the lithium and cobalt in the gigantic battery should also be mined using only wind energy.
Oil and gas will play an instrumental role in Africa’s economy for decades to come, and as such, African producers will not agree to any phase-out of these resources.
By Robert Bradley Jr. — December 13, 2023
Ed note: As COP28 wound down, the African Energy Chamber issued this communication.
“African producers have not and will not agree to phasing out fossil fuels. Unlike the rest of the developed world, the continent has not yet had the chance to transform its economies through oil and gas. In order to develop, grow and address concerns such as energy poverty and industrialization, oil and gas will need to remain central for years to come.”
Oil and gas will play an instrumental role in Africa’s economy for decades to come, and as such, African producers will not agree to any phase-out of these resources.
Despite the fact that over 600 million people are still without access to electricity and over 900 million people lack access to clean cooking in Africa, the continent’s COP 28 negotiators are caving into pressure from the West, stating that Africa is open to a phase-out approach regarding fossil fuels. The African Energy Chamber (AEC), as the voice of the African energy sector, clarifies that this is not true. African producers – both established and emerging – are not willing to forfeit these previous resources for a global agenda, and their negotiators should not sell out the hopes and aspirations of Africa.
The African Group of Negotiators, established at COP 1 in Berlin, was created as an alliance of African member states to represent the interests of the region in international climate change negotiations. As a technical body that engages in discussions during COP, the group has an obligation to reflect the needs and objectives of the continent. However, what this COP is showing us, is that this group is not averse to pressures from the west. Rather, the group is promoting the idea that Africa is willing and open to phasing out fossil fuels.
Chaired by Ephraim Mwepya Shitima from the Republic of Zambia, the Group, while opposing a phase-out, has claimed that the continent would be prepared for a phase-down approach. This would entail the utilization of oil and gas in line with national development agendas, and thereafter a gradual phase-out. But this leaves Africa where? Argus Media reports that Nigeria’s Environment Minister Isiaq Adekunle Salako stated that the phasing down of fossil fuels was inevitable and that Nigeria is prepared to back a just and orderly approach. Similarly, Argus reports that Uganda’s Minister of Energy Ruth Nankabirwa would also only support a phase-down approach.
Rather than fight for the lesser of two evils, why not defend the continent’s right to keep oil and gas in its energy mix long-term? Why not promote economic development, defend the rights of the continent’s population and commit to an industrialized and energy secure future in Africa? Choosing a phase-down rather than a phase-out simply delays the inevitable: that Africa will one day be forced to give up its lifeline to oil and gas.
“African negotiators need to stop lying and misinforming. African producers have not agreed to, neither are they open to, phasing out fossil fuels. Negotiators need to be careful and remember who they are fighting for. Don’t let empty promises about technology and money cloud your judgement. This is not the time for Africa to fall into the trap of conforming to biased agendas. Don’t sell out – oil and gas will remain in Africa,” stated NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman of the AEC.
Oil and gas will be the backbone of Africa’s economic growth. Looking at countries such as Angola, Libya and Nigeria – some of the biggest oil producers on the continent – phasing down or out will essentially remove the lifeline of these economies, leaving people in the dark. In Mozambique, Uganda, Namibia and Senegal, where large-scale projects are set to come online in the coming years, oil – and more specifically natural gas – is of crucial importance. Gas provides a clean energy alternative that will power industry, households and development. The resources will generate revenue, expand infrastructure while upskilling the local workforce. Through gas, countries in Africa will be able to not only develop but thrive.
However, if these very countries are required to phase-down, their chances of reaching their full economic potential will be significantly reduced. Broken promises of technology and capital have not gone anywhere. Going forward, these same promises being directed towards the African negotiators will meet the same fate.
“African producers have not and will not agree to phasing out fossil fuels. Unlike the rest of the developed world, the continent has not yet had the chance to transform its economies through oil and gas. In order to develop, grow and address concerns such as energy poverty and industrialization, oil and gas will need to remain central for years to come,” Ayuk concluded.
The UK appears to have given up on steel. If steelmaking is to have a future, we will need to put an end to the elites’ Net Zero delusions.
The transition to eco- friendly steel is already threatening thousands of livelihoods.
By JAMES WOUDHUYSEN
Lo and behold, the real cost of Net Zero. Last weekend, roughly 400 workers from the steelworks in Port Talbot, Wales marched in protest against the prospect of up to 3,000 redundancies.
Earlier this year, Tata Steel, the Indian owner of the Port Talbot factory, struck a deal with the UK government – it would receive £500million for switching to ‘greener’ methods of steel production. And that means redundancies. Spiked Online has the story.
Port Talbot’s two low-productivity, high-CO2 emissions blast furnaces are to be switched for a high-productivity, low-CO2 electric arc furnace (EAF). With this transition, 3,000 of the plant’s 4,000 jobs may become obsolete.
Both Tata and British Steel have justified their redundancies in terms of reaching Net Zero by 2050. And while it’s true that the Port Talbot plant is the UK’s biggest single carbon emitter, this needs to be put into perspective. Replacing the blast furnaces in Port Talbot would cut UK carbon emissions by just 1.5 per cent. Given that Britain emits just one per cent of global CO2 each year, an EAF at Port Talbot would reduce the world’s CO2 quotient by a grand total of 0.01 per cent.
In any case, even if transitioning to EAFs would make a huge dent in global emissions, would it be worth it? Probably not. Like so many green technologies, EAFs are not a direct substitute for the technology they seek to replace. They rely on scrap steel rather than iron ore for their input, and therefore aren’t ideal for making the ‘virgin steel’ that car-making and most other industries require.
EAFs are prone to other snags, too. They can’t handle electricity blackouts, which is worrying given Britain’s ill-advised decision to rely on intermittent and unreliable wind power. And they’ll be vulnerable to increases in electricity prices, which are only likely to worsen with the drive to Net Zero.
EAFs also use electrodes made of graphite. The trouble is that more than 90 per cent of the world’s graphite is refined in China. And last month, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) imposed export permits for some graphite products on national-security grounds. Prices for graphite are therefore likely to rise. And it will be 10 or 20 years before the West is able to produce anywhere near as much graphite synthetically.
Of course, none of this matters to our eco-obsessed elites. The unachievable goal of Net Zero trumps all other considerations.
Business secretary Kemi Badenoch has tried to present the ‘transition to sustainable steel’ as some sort of win for Britain’s ‘economic security’, ‘resilience’ and ‘sovereign capability’. But a government document on ‘securing’ the future of Welsh steel concedes that there will be job losses. In a footnote, it tries to reassure any workers ‘affected by the proposals’ that they will have access to Universal Credit and retraining through Job Centre Plus.
The UK government clearly has very little interest in boosting the steel industry or in supporting the people who depend on it. Funding for research and development into steel processes and products is so miniscule as to be basically worthless. Besides, almost all of this research funding, whether it comes from the private sector or the state, is skewed towards making greener steel, rather than on improving the productivity or competitiveness of our steelworks.
The UK appears to have given up on steel. If steelmaking is to have a future, we will need to put an end to the elites’ Net Zero delusions.
James Woudhuysen is visiting professor of forecasting and innovation at London South Bank University.
Past global warm epochs were bursting with abundance and life, but apparently this time the computer models tell us we’re all going to die.
Climate change: if warming approaches 2°C, a trickle of extinctions will become a flood
Published: December 11, 2023 11.37pm AEDT Alex Pigot Principal Research Fellow, Centre for Biodiversity and Environment Research, UCL
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Our world has warmed by roughly 1.2°C since the pre-industrial period. Many species are already exposed to increasingly intolerable conditions, driving some populations to die off or contract at the hottest edges of their geographic ranges. Biodiversity is feeling the heat in all ecosystems and regions, from mountain tops to ocean depths.
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Are there thresholds of warming beyond which the risks to wildlife accelerate? And if so, where and when might we cross them? In short, what does the future hold for Earth’s biodiversity?
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My colleagues and I overlaid the projections of climate models with data on the geographic distributions of more than 35,000 species on land and in the ocean. We found that the area over which each species will be exposed to intolerable temperatures is likely to increase abruptly during the coming decades.
Most populations may initially appear safe. But then, suddenly, a threshold of global warming is crossed beyond which multiple populations across widespread areas face intolerable conditions in rapid succession.
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This scenario is already playing out on coral reefs. Just a few decades ago, coral bleaching events driven by extreme sea surface temperatures were rare and localised. Today, these events degrade reefs globally on an almost annual basis.
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Burying our heads in the sand will not alter the hard biophysical limits that govern life on Earth – and through which we are rapidly crashing.
Abrupt expansion of climate change risks for species globally
Alex L. Pigot , Cory Merow , Adam Wilson & Christopher H. Trisos
Climate change is already exposing species to dangerous temperatures driving widespread population and geographical contractions. However, little is known about how these risks of thermal exposure will expand across species’ existing geographical ranges over time as climate change continues. Here, using geographical data for approximately 36,000 marine and terrestrial species and climate projections to 2100, we show that the area of each species’ geographical range at risk of thermal exposure will expand abruptly. On average, more than 50% of the increase in exposure projected for a species will occur in a single decade. This abruptness is partly due to the rapid pace of future projected warming but also because the greater area available at the warm end of thermal gradients constrains species to disproportionately occupy sites close to their upper thermal limit. These geographical constraints on the structure of species ranges operate both on land and in the ocean and mean that, even in the absence of amplifying ecological feedbacks, thermally sensitive species may be inherently vulnerable to sudden warming-driven collapse. With higher levels of warming, the number of species passing these thermal thresholds, and at risk of abrupt and widespread thermal exposure, increases, doubling from less than 15% to more than 30% between 1.5 °C and 2.5 °C of global warming. These results indicate that climate threats to thousands of species are expected to expand abruptly in the coming decades, thereby highlighting the urgency of mitigation and adaptation actions.
The study admits they didn’t consider migration in their study, because of their belief that global warming is happening too fast?
… A gradual spread of thermal risks would provide more time for species to adapt via dispersal12 or evolution13, and more opportunity to implement conservation interventions and adaptation policies once the adverse effects of thermal exposure are first detected. ……. While species will be adversely impacted by exposure to multiple abiotic and biotic variables, we focus our analysis on temperature, which provides a universal driver of species distributions across both marine22 and terrestrial23 realms; thus, it is a logical starting point for understanding the spatiotemporal dynamics of climate change risks to species. We do not consider processes of evolutionary adaptation, changes in phenology and behaviour or dispersal to new locations. While these processes will determine the resilience of species to climate change, in this study we focus on the first key step of understanding the spatial and temporal dynamics of thermal exposure that will ultimately drive these biological responses. …Read more: Same link as above
The paper assumes abrupt pulses of global warming.
The paper admits shortcomings in terms of considering short term responses to these assumed pulses of global warming.
… While strong local adaptation in space greatly increases risks, other factors could lead to risks from thermal exposure being overestimated in our models. In particular, many species will be limited by environmental23 or biotic33 factors other than temperature and have fundamental thermal tolerances that exceed their upper realized limit4,34. Species can also be buffered against warming (at least temporarily) by behaviours to exploit cooler microclimates35, changes in phenology36,37, the evolution of higher thermal tolerance13,32 or the contraction of populations into thermal refugia38, such as higher elevations on land or greater depths in the ocean. Thus, while the abruptness of projected thermal exposure is a ubiquitous phenomenon occurring across all terrestrial and marine organisms we studied, our simple temperature-based model of exposure will not be equally useful in understanding climate risks for all species39. However, uncertainty in thermal tolerances and heterogeneity in responses to thermal exposure is unlikely to alter our conclusion that thermal risks will expand abruptly across species’ existing geographical ranges under future warming. …Read more: Same link as above
The biggest problem with the claim that species are at risk from abrupt climate change is such a change has already occurred – and species did just fine.
The Younger Dryas was a severe and abrupt cooling event which occurred 12,900 years ago, and lasted for around 1200 years – possibly triggered by the collapse of Lake Agassiz, the giant glacial lake which once covered much of Canada and North America, though the exact cause is still hotly debated.
The abruptness and severity of the cooling event cannot be overstated – the full impact was possibly experienced in as little as a couple of months.
… Around 12,800 years ago the northern hemisphere was hit by the Younger Dryas mini ice age, or “Big Freeze”[which] lasted around 1300 years.
Until now, it was thought that the mini ice age took a decade or so to take hold, on the evidence provided by Greenland ice cores. Not so, say William Patterson of the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, and his colleagues.
The group studied a mud core from an ancient lake, Lough Monreagh, in western Ireland. Using a scalpel they sliced off layers 0.5 to 1 millimetre thick, each representing up to three months of time. No other measurements from the period have approached this level of detail.
Carbon isotopes in each slice revealed how productive the lake was and oxygen isotopes gave a picture of temperature and rainfall. They show that at the start of the Big Freeze, temperatures plummeted and lake productivity stopped within months, or a year at most. “It would be like taking Ireland today and moving it up to Svalbard” in the Arctic, says Patterson. …
But the Younger Dryas is not described in the scientific literature as an extinction event. The Younger Dryas was no dinosaur killer. Animals and plants adapted just fine to the abrupt change in temperature, other than some large macrofauna which proved too tempting a target for hungry humans armed with spears. Human populations declined in North America during the Younger Dryas, as the land became less productive, then rebounded as temperatures recovered.
The natural world is resilient. You can see this just by watching your own garden lawn.
In wet, cold weather, my neglected house lawn sprouts broad leafed weeds, which take advantage of the damp conditions. In scorching hot dry weather, the broad leafed plants recede, and the lawn is dominated by long, thin stemmed grasses with yellowed tops, which reflect the sunlight. The biome of my back yard, which is heavily shaded, is wildly different to the biome of the grass in my front yard which receives the full blast of subtropical sunlight. The biome of lawn plants near my citrus trees, which I love and water regularly, is also very different to the biome of lawn plants further away from the water source.
You know the most interesting thing about my lawn? Our urban kangaroos don’t care what kinds of plants dominate my lawn. They eat the hot weather thin stemmed grass just as happily as they munch on the broad leafed wet weather weeds.
Northern Hemisphere animal and plant species survived the Younger Dryas, because the abrupt temperature drop of the Younger Dryas didn’t kill everything, it just shifted some balances. It was an opportunity to plants which had always been in the background to dominate and outcompete formerly dominant plants which prefer warmer conditions. Then when the Younger Dryas receded, so did the plants which preferred extreme cold – but we see them again whenever there’s a cold Summer.
It takes a lot more than a few degrees of abrupt temperature change to set off a mass extinction.
Professor Pigot and the other authors admitted in their study that their work didn’t consider several important factors, and that the study might be overestimating the risks. It’s a pity this qualification didn’t come through clearly in Pigot’s press release.
Today the Town of Churchill finally published the final problem bear reports of the season, which presents an opportunity to do a quick comparison to recent years.
Today the Town of Churchill finally published the final problem bear reports of the season, which presents an opportunity to do a quick comparison to recent years.
This season lasted 24 weeks, the longest I can remember but apparently only the 5th longest on record. There were a total of 265 incidents by the end of November, more than 100 less than the most recent late-freeze-up year of 2016, which didn’t end until the first week of December (after bears had spent 22 weeks onshore). However, two recent years when freeze-up didn’t come until the end of November (2017 and 2020) had far fewer incidents (more than 100 less each compared to this year).
Last report of the 2023 season
At the end of week 24 (the last week of November, 20-26) all bears in holding were released to return to the rapidly developing sea ice after a total of 265 incidents:
Compare to 2017, last week of November (end of season):
2020, last week of November (end of season):
2016, end of season, first week in December (week 22 that year):
CNN recently posted an article claiming that climate change is causing an uptick in bear attacks in Japan. There is no evidence climate change is behind the bear attacks. In fact, there are several more relevant and direct factors likely contributing to the increase in dangerous bear encounters.
CNN recently posted an article claiming that climate change is causing an uptick in bear attacks in Japan. There is no evidence climate change is behind the bear attacks. In fact, there are several more relevant and direct factors likely contributing to the increase in dangerous bear encounters.
The CNN article, “Bear attacks in Japan are at a record high. Climate change and an aging population are making the problem worse,” opens describing a bear attack that was caught on camera, in which an Asiatic black bear attacked a man on his way to work. CNN interviewed supposed experts who say the bears are leaving the wild and entering urban areas more, in part because “climate change is interfering with the flowering and pollination of some of the animals’ traditional sources of food.”
The bears particularly enjoy acorns and other tree nuts. CNN quotes an associate professor from Nagaoka University of Technology, Maki Yamamoto, who explains that “you can have years of bad harvests and years of good harvest of acorns,” and during those bad years, bears “get closer to human settlements looking for fruits, chestnuts, persimmons, walnuts, and farm products in general[.]” CNN reports that indeed this year’s low acorn yield is a major contributing factor pushing bears into human populated regions.
But boom-and-bust cycles of acorn production both for oak trees and beech, among other nut-producing trees, are completely natural and not historically unusual. Scientists are not sure what the mechanism is or why large groups of trees will stop producing acorns at the same time, but it is well documented that nut producing trees evolved to have low-producing years seemingly to increase tree survival and expansion by limiting predation by fruit and nut consuming animals, like bears. This has nothing to do with climate change.
CNN goes on to quote Tsutomu Mano, senior research fellow at the Hokkaido Research Organization, who said climate change “is likely to have a significant impact on the flowering time of plants and the activity of insects responsible for pollination, which is necessary for fruiting.”
In terms of the threat to pollination, climate change is already expanding plant pollination and along with growing seasons, which is a good thing for pollinators and animals that consume the fruits, as discussed in several Climate Realism posts, here, here, and here, for example. There is no reason for believing this trend won’t continue.
Also note the future tense, not present tense, of the claim that climate change is likely to have an impact on plant flowering timing. If Japan was already seeing a sustained change in this timing over the course of the past decades’ warming, the expert would almost certainly have mentioned it. What speculatively might happen in the future, can have nothing to do with present incidences of bear attacks.
A much more comprehensive look at the complex bear-encounter dynamic can be found in an article posted to Nippon.com, “Seeking Balance with the Bear,” which details how habitat destruction in the forests, due to the Japanese government endeavoring to plant more non-acorn producing timber-friendly trees like pines, has driven bears out of their normal range. Also, the reduction in agrarian practices in Japan has led to many abandoned farms. Attracted by the fruit, bears migrate into the abandoned orchards closer to other human dwellings than they have been in the past when the bears had more options for food, and there were more people living in rural villages to keep the bears wary of encounters with humans.
The Asiatic black bear in Japan is listed as “vulnerable” on the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) Red List. Despite this, IUCN reports that the Asiatic bear’s population is either stable or increasing depending on location in Japan, with 12,000 to 19,000 bears inhabiting the small island nation. If it is true that their numbers are increasing, this may lead to more food competition between bears on dwindling habitat, pushing them to seek food outside their normal range. Additionally, the human population in Japan has risen over time, although it as leveled off in recent years, and before the COVID-19 pandemic there was a massive spike in tourists visiting. Both of these trends these have likely contributed to a rise in human/bear encounters. The same is true in urban areas in the United States. Also, expanding arctic villages face similar problems with growing polar bear populations, as discussed in Climate at a Glance: Polar Bears.
CNN’s attempt to tie the increase in bear attacks in Japan to climate change is misguided at best and intentionally misleading at worst. No evidence supports the assertion that climate change is responsible for increased bear/human conflicts in Japan. Even the claims that that warming is (or will begin) impacting acorn production due to a change in pollination timing is weak, unsupported by data, and actually contrary to rainfall and greening trends. Many factors, like, growing bear populations amid habitat changes and loss, are likely contributing increased reports of bear attacks on humans; climate change is not among them.
Climate campaigners from Al Gore and John Kerry, down to the oddest imported student radical, are freaking out over the draft final text as the climate talks in Dubai near their conclusion.
Climate campaigners from Al Gore and John Kerry, down to the oddest imported student radical, are freaking out over the draft final text as the climate talks in Dubai near their conclusion.
At issue is whether the “outcome” will call for the “phase out” of fossil fuels, or merely call for fossil fuel “reduction” and similar “weasel words.”
Either term will leave nations with tons of wiggle room to avoid, or delay destroying their economies through energy starvation.
As veterans of the UN climate process since the whole shebang began, CFACT has seen this drama play out before.
The UN conference nears its end with no agreement in sight and goes into late night extra innings.
No matter what happens, the conference officials emerge bleary-eyed and proclaim a major victory, leaving it up to the rest of us to sort through what happened and figure it out. Often, as is likely this time, the conference ends in de facto collapse.
“COP28 is now on the verge of complete failure,” Al Gore said Monday. “This obsequious draft reads as if OPEC dictated it word for word. It is even worse than many had feared. It is ‘Of the Petrostates, By the Petrostates.” Gore concluded.
OPEC, along with Russia and China, did in fact write the text.
“The fact that the U.N. chose a petro-state, the United Arab Emirates, to host COP28 was an ominous sign to begin with.” Wrote Michael Mann of debunked temperature hockey stick fame. “The UAE’s appointment of a fossil fuel executive, Sultan Al Jaber, to preside as COP28 president made matters worse.”
CNN reports that, “The secretary-general of the oil-producing group OPEC, Haitham Al Ghais, called on members and allies last week to ‘proactively reject’ any language that targeted fossil fuels rather than emissions. The letter, written before the latest draft was posted, noted the previous option for a “fossil fuels phase out” and said it would be ‘unacceptable that politically motivated campaigns put our people’s prosperity and future at risk.’”
The announcement at COP 28 that next year’s climate summit will be held in Azerbaijan, another oil producing state, has team climate up in arms. Next year is Europe’s turn, but Russia vowed to veto any E.U. member nation as host in protest of E.U. support for Ukraine. Azerbaijan is a former member of the Soviet bloc, but not a member of the E.U. or NATO and was acceptable to Moscow.
Soon we will find out how far climate campaigners will be able to reshape the COP 28 outcome in the waning minutes of the summit.
The actual choice will be between a text which gives Russia, China and OPEC clear language enabling them to keep their fossil fuels, or whether they will agree to simply lie about “phasing them out.”
There’s nothing I can add to the self-parody that is this paper. I will get the obligatory citations out of the way and then just paste extensive quotes from the open access paper. Let the hilarity ensue. For masochists who wish to read the paper in its entirety use this link.
There’s nothing I can add to the self-parody that is this paper. I will get the obligatory citations out of the way and then just paste extensive quotes from the open access paper. Let the hilarity ensue. For masochists who wish to read the paper in its entirety use this link.
Globally, democratic politics are under attack from Electorally Legitimated Misogynist Authoritarian (ELMA) leaders who successfully use misogyny as a political strategy and present environmental concern in feminine and inferior terms. The ascendancy of such projects raise questions involving socioeconomic structures, political communication, and the psychological underpinnings of people’s attitudes. We offer misogyny, conceptualized in a specific way – not simply as hatred or disgust for women, but as a way of accessing a gendered hierarchy whereby that which is labeled “feminine” is perceived as inferior, devalued, and amenable to be attacked – as a relevant transmission mechanism in how ELMAs like Trump may connect with public opinion by systematically investigating the interplay between misogyny, authoritarianism, and climate change in the context of the United States. Using a survey methodology (N = 314) and up-to-date questionnaires, we provide a concrete empirical underpinning for recent analytical and theoretical work on the complexity of misogyny. We analyze how misogynist and authoritarian attitudes correlate with climate change, adding to the literature on opposition to climate change policy. An additional exploratory aspect of our study concerning US voter preferences clearly indicates that Trump supporters are more misogynist, more authoritarian, and less concerned with the environment.
And so, it is 100% clear that there is this toxic package or bundle of right-wing ideology, nationalism, exceptionalism, racism, sexism, anti-immigrantism, and anti-climate-change that goes with it. That is what drives many of them.
[Katharine Hayhoe, interviewed by Bjork-James & Barla, 2021, p. 389]
Gender is a game-changer, like the Archimedean fulcrum, with the potential to shift economic logics from profit-exploiting systems of injustice to functional praxes of life-affirming care for ecosystems, human others, and planetary co-habitants.
Many contemporary democracies are under severe strain from right-wing majoritarian political projects, and these are headed by electorally legitimated misogynist authoritarians (henceforth, ELMAs) who continue to command significant public support in spite of their many contradictions and policy failures. As Kaul (2021) argued, ELMAs come to power claiming a monopoly on nationalism denouncing their critics as anti-national, and claim to challenge neoliberalism, while benefitting from crony capitalism. Their exclusivist majoritarian nationalisms are both neoliberal and nationalist, and result in perverse outcomes for human security. Even so, these projects continue to draw upon support from the public in multiple democracies; the ELMA project examples are many and range the gamut from Bolsonarismo in Brazil, Modification in India, Dutertismo in Philippines, Erdoganism in Turkey, and Trumpism in the United States. Especially, Trump exemplifies such leadership and hence here we focus on the United States, but we expect that the main arguments that we lay out here may also be salient in several other countries that are the focus of our continuing work.
For social scientists, the ascendancy of such projects raises confounding questions involving socioeconomic structures, political communication, and the psychological underpinnings of people’s attitudes. The purpose of this article is to offer misogyny, conceptualized in a specific way, as a relevant transmission mechanism in how ELMAs like Trump may connect with public opinion by systematically investigating the interplay between misogyny, authoritarianism, and climate change. As a prelude to presenting our own survey findings, we bring together the conceptual and empirical research on the subject so far, bridging literatures across disciplines, particularly psychology and politics. The extant psychology research informs us of the extent and existence of beliefs, the conceptual political work offers clues as to why such beliefs might be held. Bridging these subsets of work that have generally proceeded in parallel with little interconnect is important for developing a more comprehensive account of the contemporary political transformations in democracies, and their implications for policy. The particular policy area that we target relates to climate change, an urgent domain of collective human security.
Conceptualizations of masculinity, nationalism, climate change
Gender is deeply imbricated in any discussions of climate change. As Allen et al. (2019, p. 1) point out, gender roles are socially constructed and shape climate change vulnerabilities and how society responds to climate change. The most upfront manifestation of this is the ways in which outspoken female advocates of addressing climate change in substantive ways are targeted. Gelin (2019) referred to the “gender reactionaries to climate-denialism” with reference to the attack on figures such as Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and Greta Thunberg. Cavaliere and Ingram (2021) raise wider questions of knowledge infrastructures and policy directions, pointing out how the patriarchy of late modernity and the role of the industrial movement in it requires a human versus nature binary, and attempts by women to challenge this as individual activists or as part of male dominated environmental organizations means confronting entrenched gender biases. They quote research on a gender gap in media reporting on climate change (Guo, 2015) for the United States according to which in 2014 less than15% of the individuals quoted in print or broadcast or cable media were women, the percentage being even worse for low-income areas, and male sources or anonymous sources are preferred over female sources (in Cavaliere & Ingram, 2021, p. 7). While women tend to be seen as more pro-environment, the same emotions are perceived differently for women and men; anger by women is stereotyped as negative and anger against outspoken women including those who speak on climate change is validated (in Cavaliere & Ingram, 2021, p. 8).
The link between far-right nationalism and “industrial breadwinner masculinities” has been under scrutiny in different countries (see Hultman & Pulé, 2018; Pulé & Hultman, 2021). In much empirical work, the focus has been on the production and circulation of digital media or online campaigns. Studies such as Vowles and Hultman (2021) detail how previously silent Swedish digital media attacked Greta Thunberg. The far-right digital ecosystem was constructing hostility toward a female environmental campaigner using historical tropes of “irrational femininity.” Likewise, Pettersson et al. (2022) refer to the ways in which Finnish far-right political campaigns used humorous misogynist messaging in a campaign film that drew upon polarized political communication on climate change – pitting the “rational males” who opposed stronger measures to tackle climate change against “irrational females” who propose such measures. It is important to note the reach of such media; 6%–12% of the online population in Sweden was reached by just four websites in 2020 (in Vowles & Hultman, p. 415). The polarization of online climate change communication and the overlap of climate change denialism with antifeminism and anti-immigrantism has been seen as a kind of “alliance of antagonisms” (Kaiser & Puschmann, 2017).
Climate change denialism has received focus in connexion with masculinity, for example through the probing of climate denial amongst right-wing white males in the United States (see Daggett, 2018; Nelson, 2020), or work on reactionary and eco-modern masculinities, or in relation to anti-immigration in multiple countries (see Agius et al., 2020; Keskinen, 2013; MacGregor & Seymour, 2017; McCright & Dunlap, 2011; Vowles & Hultman, 2021). Hateful reactions to women and to care for the environment that are visible in right-wing views are sometimes simply accepted as beleaguered and victimized reactions of a racialized idea of an impoverished working class in late capitalism. Yet, there is significant theoretical and empirical evidence that identity factors, political rhetoric, and the complex interlinkages between neoliberalism and nationalism are much more relevant than arguments about economic deprivation of the white working class in making sense of why ELMA leaders receive support (see Schaffner et al., 2018). Vengeful masculinity-reclaiming reactions to climate care can actually include deliberately polluting as a form of “petro-masculine rebellion and revenge” (see Daggett, 2018; Nelson, 2020). The act of “coal-rolling” requires alterations to vehicle engines to attract attention so that it can produce blacker smoke more loudly, a form of “pollution porn” (Kulze & Eyges, 2014, in Nelson, 2020, p. 287); “It’s just a testosterone thing. It’s manhood. It’s who can blow the most smoke, whose is blacker” (Weigel, 2014). This aspect of climate change denial and destructiveness is linked to an idea of “petro-vitality” for subsets of white conservative American males where the macho coal-rolling is about testosterone, an idea of masculinity which feeds into how these rugged individualist outdoor men see themselves.
Misogyny-Authoritarianism-and-Climate-Change
Sexist, authoritarian, and climate change beliefs and correlations
In relation to the present topic, the well-established research on prejudice in psychology has typically sought to uncover the cross-sectional correlations, usually between a pair from among the following – social dominance orientation, right-wing authoritarianism, climate change denial, and hostile or benevolent sexism.
The explanation for various kinds of prejudice in individuals is often found either in social dominance orientation (SDO), or in right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) (see, for instance, Altemeyer, 1998; McFarland, 2010). SDO connects with the need to maintain dominance over subordinate others, such as preserving socioeconomic privilege, and RWA connects with the need to protect oneself from those who might pose threats to order (Altemeyer, 1981, 1998; Pratto et al., 1994; Stanley & Wilson, 2019). Making sense of human domination of the environment and of non-humans in terms of SDO was the focus of some studies (Dhont et al., 2014; Milfont et al., 2013), and a sub-literature grew to look at the links between SDO and climate change denial specifically. In earlier work, the link between SDO and climate change denial was found to be strong in cross-sectional studies (Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014), but later longitudinal studies find a stronger link between RWA and climate change denial (Stanley et al., 2019; Stanley et al., 2017).
Centers (1963) found a correlation between authoritarianism and misogynistic attitudes, and argued that this reflected authoritarians’ desire to maintain a status quo in which women were restricted to traditionally “feminine” roles. This hypothesized anti-feminist agenda was also reflected in the finding of Sarup (1976) that more authoritarian people had more anti-feminist attitudes. Duncan et al. (1997) also reported that authoritarianism was associated with anti-feminist attitudes, and a belief that both men and women should adhere to “traditional” gender roles. While right-wing populism and climate change denial tend to be linked (Lockwood, 2018), the investigation of this has often focused on anti-establishment attitudes. However, studies such as by Jylhä and Hellmer (2020) reported that RWA is indirectly predictive of climate change denial and the endorsement of traditional values explained some unique part of climate change denial. They find the strongest link between exclusionism and anti-egalitarianism on the one hand and climate change denial on the other.
We focus on the RWA since it is strongly correlated with anti-feminist dispositions and because RWA predicts an increase in climate change denial in longitudinal work, and was found to be a stronger predictor when directly compared to SDO (Stanley et al., 2017). Clarke et al. (2019) find that the aspect of RWA concerned with adherence to tradition and social norms is most important (conventionalism, RWA-C) in predicting all forms of climate denial. In meta-surveys that do not consider established scales, Hornsey et al. (2016) found the link of political affiliation and political ideology to be the strongest with environment beliefs. In a meta-analytic overview of 25 polls and 171 academic studies across 56 nations, examining 27 variables (table on p. 625), they found that the largest demographic correlate of climate change belief is political affiliation with an effect roughly double the size of any other demographic variable (p. 622). They found that the traditional societal faultlines of gender, age, sex, race, and income, while intuitively appealing, were far less relevant to climate change beliefs than values, ideologies, and political affiliation. Thus, “findings showed the benefit of moving beyond the question of ‘who’ disbelieves that climate change is real… to the psychological factors that explain ‘why’ people hold their views about climate change… climate change beliefs are influenced by distal psychological and political beliefs that shape people’s assimilation of ‘the facts’” (p. 624–625).
Research aims and hypotheses
Here, we investigate whether the associations seen in analyses of political rhetoric are reflected in the attitudes of the wider population, focusing on links between misogyny, authoritarianism, and climate change denial. There is evidence that these three attitudes are closely interlinked. Yet, little research has considered the three simultaneously, in order to understand the overlap between them. In particular, we will examine the relative contributions of misogyny and authoritarianism to climate change denial and to more general concern for protecting the natural environment.
We will also ask participants a number of additional questions about their political, gender, and environmental attitudes, and combinations thereof (for example, do these US participants support Donald Trump, indicating support for an ELMA leader; do they see care for the environment as a gendered issue; do they perceive environmental concern as related to other social justice issues). We advance no hypotheses about answers to these questions. They are exploratory in nature, and are intended to help interpret or contextualize the findings of our main analyses.
This goes on and on and eventually presents “data” from “surveys” reaching this conclusion section.
CONCLUSION
Connecting the political rhetoric of ELMA leaders with the opinions of the general public, this article joins the theoretical and analytical literature with an empirical methodology to provide support for a preliminary understanding of the specific ways in which public understanding on social issues (such as views on climate change, in relation to the environment) is the key to the transmission between misogyny in action and authoritarians in power in contemporary democracies.
Misogyny allows a coherent thread of support on policy issues across demographics for right-wing authoritarian leaders in democracies. The gender hierarchy of values allows a mapping of other concerns on it. The links between misogyny, authoritarianism, and climate change denial are not straightforward and are generally only partially illuminated, but need to be seen as salient and more comprehensively understood. Our investigation is the first to bring misogyny, authoritarianism, and climate beliefs together. We draw upon existing arguments that misogyny is not just about a hatred of women, but about the functioning of gender as power. This is crucial because it allows for the understanding that women can also support misogyny and play important roles in the political projects of ELMA strongmen even as these projects negatively impact women (for example through effects such as prolonged recession or environmental disasters, which disproportionately disadvantage women). The environmental policies of leaders like Trump, including on climate change, create present and intergenerational insecurity including for their supporters, and yet they manufacture consent for such policies from these very people, women and men both. Misogyny in the sense of feminization as devaluation is part of the dynamic through which they obtain and sustain support for anti-environmental (and other militarized masculinist anti-indigenous and anti-human rights) policies.
In our conclusion, we would like to briefly highlight specific implications of this work, as they relate to security and policy. First, there are growing concerns about the future of democracy in the United States, and the threats to it from violent right-wing extremists who support Trump and abide by his political rhetoric. These people are not just partisan political actors in a functioning democracy but prepared to mount direct insurrections against democratic institutions. Quite importantly, these men and women subscribe to a coherent set of beliefs on a range of issues that map well onto support for authoritarianism and anti-feminism; they support electoral legitimation for misogynist authoritarians like Trump, and a conceptualization of misogyny as political strategy that includes feminization as devaluation works for them. We expect that other concerns that are linked to care, and therefore available to be feminized in the same way as concern for the environment, will elicit similar responses from them. This adds up to a systematic effect at the very macro level whereby democratic principles are threatened and a range of security concerns are synergistically aggravated; the increasing insecurities relates to direct violence but also increased insecurity in human terms through support for policies leading to removal of protections for women, marginalized and minority Americans, and environmental protections.
Tackling climate change is thus part of a portfolio that includes seriously attending to the working of misogyny and gender hierarchies on the one hand and the authoritarian challenge to democracy on the other. We might emphasize this with a simple question – Why should misogynists not care for the environment? The environment, for instance through the impact of climate change, affects everyone and yet we can see that climate change denialists are also misogynists. Misogyny is not merely about a hatred for women; it functions usefully for authoritarians through feminization as devaluation to undermine opposition. Environmental messaging and climate change thus also requires subverting of structures of misogyny. It is paradoxical how the ELMA leaders promise security yet make for ever greater multidimensional insecurity. Urgent political and planetary concerns are at stake in how we confront the threats to democracy and to the environment. Our research reveals that there are interlocking insecurity generating mechanisms that are embedded in the analytical links between misogyny and authoritarianism that deserve greater recognition and action.
Climate Realism by Paul Burgess
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