Global warming deniers wish they could sound half as intelligent as this song.
“A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.”—Thomas Paine
“Climate change is occurring, is caused largely by human activities, and poses significant risks for—and in many cases is already affecting—a broad range of human and natural systems.”—National Academy of Sciences
Humanity has clearly caused global warming, by any honest study of the evidence, yet 46% of Americans believe otherwise, according to a recent Gallup pole. Despite a constantly increasing mountain of evidence that makes the cause of global warming indisputable, the number of American’s living in a fantasy land of disinformation has been increasing. In 2003, only 33% of Americans bought into denialist nonsense and 61% understood that we were responsible for the Earth’s changing climate. Now a bare 50% of Americans trust the facts about global warming.
The likely cause for this frightening decline is not some sudden drop in American intelligence, but greed. Corporations that contribute heavily to global warming have pumped enormous sums of money into a disinformation campaign to protect their profits.
Oil giant ExxonMobil has spent $23 million in funding groups that worked to confuse the public about the cause and risks of global warming. One of the groups it has funded is the Global Climate Coalition which worked fervently to destroy the public’s understanding of global warming even after its own scientists reported that “[t]he scientific basis for the Greenhouse Effect and the potential impact of human emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2 on climate is well established and cannot be denied.”
And ExxonMobil was not alone in funding this lie factory. Over the Global Climate Coalition’s existence it received support from Royal Dutch Shell, General Motors, Texaco, British Petroleum, Ford, DaimlerChrysler, the Aluminum Association, the National Association of Manufacturers (which once hosted its offices), Chevron, Amoco, the United States Chamber of Commerce, the American Forest & Paper Association, the American Petroleum Institute, Cyprus AMAX Minerals, Union Pacific, Union Carbide, Norfolk Southern, Edison Electric Institute, Association of International Automobile Manufacturers, Air Transport Association, Allegheny Power, Bethlehem Steel, Dupont, Cinergy, Goodyear, CONRAIL, Duke Power, Eastman Chemical, Dow Chemical, Western Fuels Association, Steel Manufacturers Association, McDonnell-Douglas, and other responsible corporations and business associations.
Another responsible corporate citizen, motivated by profits over people, is Koch Industries. Koch has funneled over $48.5 million into denying global warming and has funded such upstanding groups as the Heartland Institute, which has long played mouthpiece for Phillip Morris (now Altria) in denying the dangers of cigarette smoke. Denying the over 440,000 smoking-related deaths each year apparently was not enough for Heartland, so, with Koch’s money, Heartland took the same morally and scientifically vacuous stance of denying global warming.
This is just a small number of the greedy organizations and corporate mouth pieces that deny global warming and a short list of all the heartless corporations and business associations that fund them. To give a thorough account of each organization that has worked to undercut the safety and well-being of humanity would take a book, and a long one at that.
And these organizations stance against the truth is not all that bad, so long as global warming is not that bad. The trouble for them and for humanity is that global warming is bad. Very bad. Just ask the seven folks so far who have died in the East coast heatwave.
Global warming is already having adverse affects on the planet, which are likely to get worse. Weather will get more extreme, causing deadly heatwaves, massive snowstorms, and increased droughts. It is destroying towns in Alaska. It is, and will continue to, make food production more difficult and increase malnutrition and death around the world. Rising ocean levels are threatening island and coastal populations worldwide including Florida and North Carolina as well as low-lying countries like Bangladesh. While profit-mongers are doing their best to obscure the danger of global warming people around the world, and in America, are dying or being dislocated due to the current impact of global warming. This impact is only going to get worse, so long as we do nothing about it.
Global warming is happening. It is real. It is caused by human activity. And it is causing irreversible destruction to our environment and to our civilization. To deny the threat global warming poses for humanity is a lie of the most despicable kind. In the past, it was like denying the world is round—it flew in the face of all facts, but if the corporations that fund these lies have their way, it could soon be like denying the Holocaust.
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To learn more about who is lying to you about global warming and why, please check out the following sources: DeSmogBlog.com ExxonSecrets SourceWatch The Heat Is Online Climate Change Denial (Wikipedia) Deltoid No Impact Man: A list of companies who supported lies about global warming The books Climate Cover-Up, The Heat is On, and Boiling Point, also offer a clear picture of greed-driven lies behind global warming disinformation. To learn more about the science on climate change please read this post from our sister blog Isn’t it Infomantic?
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