Yesterday, the Times published an extract from a booklet I’d put together - a Condensed Version of Climate Change aimed at people like me who read the articles but felt a long way from the facts.
Following its publication, I temporarily deflected some of the venom that usually gets fired at the regular eco pundits.
The messages I received were split roughly into 3 categories.
1. You’re rubbish, you’re a musician so you don’t count, your songs are rubbish even though I haven’t even heard of you but if I had heard of you I’m sure they would be rubbish, you’re a hypocrite because you go on tour whilst telling us all this, you’re a second rate singer that doesn’t deserve a comment, but here’s a comment….etc etc
2. You’re a gullible idiot like everyone else, close minded and believing the lies you’re being fed. It’s all a natural cycle/sunspots/1500 year cycles or it’s not warming up at all.
3. You’ve haven’t thought of this, that and the other.
Category 1
You’re rubbish etc. Not much to say here, apart from the hypocrite angle. Touring is a tricky one, especially in a world where music is free and gigs are the only way to make a living. However, most people commenting seemed to think that we travel like U2, with a cast of thousands and stage sets the size of small cities. It’s not quite like that, with 15 of us sharing a bus, pulling a trailer full of gear, and an ‘entourage’ (a word that came up a lot) consisting of the bus driver. So if you’re going to exclude musicians who do that from having an opinion on climate change, then you need to exclude the hundreds of thousands of business men who fly as much as we do, and probably also regular burger eaters, given the contribution to global warming from beef cattle. I suggested we let everyone discuss it now, work out a solution, then standby that solution, even if it requires lifestyle changes from local food and holidays, to virtual-only touring. Not everyone agreed.
Category 2.
The gullible idiot. There are two sides to this. If global warming is a scam perpetuated by scientists keen to make a buck, then it requires 1000s of researchers the world over to have conspired together to persuade the world of the need for urgent action, purely to guarantee their research budgets. I find that unlikely. Secondly, even if you decide you’re going to blame it on sunspots or natural cycles, it doesn’t alter the fact that things are getting warmer, no-one disputes that greenhouse gases trap heat, so it can’t help to put 27 billion tons of them in the atmosphere each year. And it doesn’t alter the fact that fossil fuels are running out and getting more expensive, they require us to give trillions of dollars to a handful of governments, and the air pollution alone claims hundreds of thousands of lives. So why not spend that money becoming self sufficient in our energy supplies? I kept asking that question at the end, but I think everyone had said their bit. I got no reply.
Category 3. You haven’t thought of this, that etc. There were lots of good points raised here. The annoying bit was that the article in the paper was 1/6th the length of the original booklet and a lot of things raised were issues dealt with in the full length version.
So I now understand the pain of people who get edited down, and the fact that going above the parapet on this issue requires a thick skin. Who knows what abuse must land on Al Gore’s doorstep every morning.
Meanwhile, if you’re planning to have a big night out in Holland on Saturday night, postpone it. 447 churches are going to ring their bells 350 times on Sunday, to mark the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere (350ppm) we need to return to if the dutch are not going to go under. And if you’re in London tomorrow, don’t be alarmed by a 9 ton bear in Trafalgar square. Sculpted from ice, it will slowly melt as the negotiators try to finalise a deal.
More bad news for marine life. 100 european scientists released a report yesterday stating that the oceans were acidifying so fast, we are looking at mass exctinctions within decades. Not so said the meeting of climate sceptics held in Copenhagen yesterday. Lord Christopher Monckton a UK peer who used to advise Margaret Thatcher, thinks that the Copenhagen talks are part of a UN plot to install world government. If it is, it’s a plot so big it will take James Bond to foil it. Fred Singer, the climate sceptic author, raised a glass to China “Let’s all thank China for emitting more beneficial CO2. It benefits agriculture” The Chinese might not necessarily agree with this. They’re running out of water and have become a net importer of food.
Sarah Palin is right behind the sceptics though, stating yesterday that “The agenda-driven policies being pushed in Copenhagen won’t change the weather but they would change our economy for the worse.” A poll revealed that the stolen emails from the UEA have worked their magic in the US where less than 50% of people now think that climate change is man made.
Gerald Warner could smell blood. Blogging for the Telegraph, he wrote “We (I mean by “we” the sane, the scientifically informed, the defenders of freedom, the opponents of socialism and world government) must fight on to victory. We must attack, discredit, harass and, if necessary, disobey climate laws and refuse to pay AGW taxes, until this evil pseudo-religion is thrown into the dustbin of history.”
I hope he’s checked that his dustbin floats. The International Organization for Migration stated that in recent years, the “number of people affected by natural disasters has more than doubled”
Andy Cato
