SCIENTISTS CONSIDER NEW NAMES FOR CLIMATE CHANGE

[iandhr]

NEW HAVEN After a report from the Yale Center on Climate Change Communication showed that the term “climate change” elicits relatively little concern from the American public, leading scientists are recommending replacing it with a new term: “You will be burnt to a crisp and die.”

Other terms under consideration by the scientists include “your cities will be ravaged by tsunamis and floods” and “earth will be a fiery hellhole incapable of supporting human life.”

Scientists were generally supportive of the suggestions, with many favoring the term “your future will involve rowing a boat down a river of rotting corpses.”

“Any of these terms would do a better job conveying the urgency of the problem,” Tracy Klugian, a spokesperson for the newly renamed Yale Center for Oh My God Wake Up You Assholes, said.


http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2014/05/scientists-consider-new-names-for-climate-change.html

[SidDithers]

1. Borowitz rec!...

Sid

[yeoman6987]

7. It is difficult to explain climate change to people when you can't really feel it or see it

I can't tell you how many times I have explained to people that we need to fix our destruction of the planet or we will be in huge trouble. I saw we put to many particles into the air and it is depleting the ozone. This one idiot said, "well one volcano does more damage than a million cars in 100 years".....I just looked at him crazy cuz he was and is today. He keeps saying that the World is over if Yellowstone erupts and it could be tomorrow or a thousand years from now. You can't argue with these types.

[brett_jv]

17. He is right about the Yellowstone part ... saw it on History Channel ...

There's also some island I think off the coast of Africa made up of huge sheets of rock that could fall off and cause a tsunami that could wipe most of the eastern seaboard off the map.

But ... do these facts mean we should avoid worrying about the effects of ACC? I think ... NOT!

[Fred Sanders]

2. Climate disruption? Climate catastrophe? Crispy Climate? Can not easily fix media deflection.

[ProfessorGAC]

5. I Like Disruption

Maybe chaos would work too. After 80+ mph straight line storms, lasting neraly 60 minutes, tore my town apart last Monday, took power out at my house for just short of 4 days, either would be apt.

[Fred Sanders]

6. I like climate disruption also, accurate, and not panicky but clear enough. Chaos is good, but

maybe too panicky for the comfort of the " do not tell me that" public?

[DirkGently]

23. A Defense Spending Angle? THE SOLAR BOMB!

Once we have enough solar panels and wind arrays, we can build a

GIANT PENTAGON LASER

TO KILL ALL THE BADS.

WITH THE TERROR AND THE DIFFERENT RELIGIONS AND SO FORTH.

ZZZZPPTT! WRITE YOUR CONGRESSPERSON TODAY!

[Skidmore]

3. The unfortunate truth is that

there is the notion among religious zealots that god is creating a new heaven and earth for the faithful after he destroys this one. The 1% have fanned the flames of religious fervor to line their pockets. In the meantime, undoubtedly the wealthy will be finding a way to buy a new earth somewhere else. Now tell me where we find the will to take effective measures while we have fools to the leftvof us and jokers to the right?

[DetlefK]

4. "Earth will turn into an apocalyptic wasteland and politicians and rich people will be blamed."

That's what I would call it.

[NV Whino]

8. Death by climate.

[Snotcicles]

9. Baked Alaska. nt

[Snotcicles]

10. Baked Alaska. Climate deniers just deserts. nt

[Gothmog]

11. I love good satire

[DirkGently]

12. "Oil Consumption Inhibiting De-population Effect Syndrome?"

"Coal Mine Flooding Risk Enhancement Factors?"

"Climate-based Threats to Fracking Expansion Activities?"

"Disaster-driven Anti-Business Natural Regulation?"



Or, let's just call Climate Change "Taxes."

That ought to do it.

[Amimnoch]

13. Forget the name, we need to put conservative xenophobia to use.

I've always believed that global climate change is one of those few issues that us and the conservatives can actually be bipartisan on. We've just been marketing it wrong.

For us, and our argument, we've focused on the human factor, the earth factor, the pollution factor.. Great arguments for us, and quite logical. Logical people can equate destroying the planet for profit as being a bad thing. Not so with conservatives.

Our problem is we try to argue with them using logic. This just doesn't work with them. So, let's change our approach to illogical arguments that they will actually get on-board with.

How about pointing out that switching to renewable clean alternative sources of energy will "make us less dependent on those evil foreigners oil." Hit them where they care.. use their own xenophobia to our advantage.

Use the argument that switching to renewable clean alternative sources of energy will save them money.. there's nothing conservatives love more than their money.

Go with the god angle.. switching to renewable clean alternative sources of energy is using the great gifts of sunshine and wind that god has graced us with. Right now we use oil which has to be drudged up from deep into the earth, and that's where the debil lives.

See, with the right use of illogical arguments, we can be bipartisan on this issue and get changes done!

[PADemD]

14. ^^^This^^^

Conservative Christians operate by emotion, not logic.

[DirkGently]

15. Ah, but now they have "fracking."

I always liked that tack, too, but we are now already a "net exporter," because of all the natural gas being pumped through people's drinking water and into industry pockets.

And the next big talking point is how soon (after decades of expensive, theoretical development) we'll be exporting all the wonderful new natural gas to the Ukraine and so forth.

I'd love to see Middle East oil reserves become irrelevant because everyone has renewable energy. But until every drop of cheap, dirty fossil fuel has been turned into cash, we will have to fight for every millimeter.

[brett_jv]

19. Not sure if you meant something else, but the USA is by no means a 'net exporter' of Oil ...

All we've done is reduce our dependence on foreign oil from like 60% to 52% (or thereabouts), and a lot of that has actually been via demand destruction.

[DirkGently]

22. Yes, we are a "net exporter" of oil.

That's going to vary at different times depending on a number of factors.

It is not the same as "energy independence."

One problem with all of the talk of increasing domestic production as a way to be "free" of the Middle East is that we don't earmark everything produced here for domestic use before selling any. We buy and we sell, at all times, because it's a worldwide market.

We continue to import oil, yes, but domestic demand is down, and U.S. domestic production is up, so, for the first time since 1949, we sometimes send out more than we take in.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-29/u-s-was-net-oil-product-exporter-in-2011.html

The U.S. exported more gasoline, diesel and other fuels than it imported in 2011 for the first time since 1949, the Energy Department said.

Shipments abroad of petroleum products exceeded imports by 439,000 barrels a day, the department said today in the Petroleum Supply Monthly report. In 2010, daily net imports averaged 269,000 barrels. U.S. refiners exported record amounts of gasoline, heating oil and diesel to meet higher global fuel demand while U.S. fuel consumption sank.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/13/us-oil-production-exceeds-imports/3518245/

The United States tiptoed closer to energy independence last month when — for the first time in nearly two decades — it produced more crude oil than it imported, federal officials said Wednesday.

The nation has been moving toward this milestone, because two trends are converging. Domestic oil production is at a 24-year high while foreign oil imports are at a 17-year low. The result: production exceeded net imports for the first time since February 1995, although the nation still imports 35% of the petroleum it uses.

[Moostache]

16. I recommend the following names and slogan:

For those mental midgets sporting the "I miss W." t-shirts:
ECO-TERRORISM

For those who can understand things beyond a 6th grade level:
CLIMATE DESTRUCTION

Or for the Glenn Beck crowd of tinfoil hat wearers:
FEMA FUNDING MANDATORY INCREASES

Ad campaign:
YOU ARE KILLING YOUR GRANDCHILDREN TODAY.
(in dripping blood superimposed on pictures of elderly people holding infants)

YOU ARE FUNDING TERRORISTS NOW.
(Pictures of oil sheiks and suicide bombers and explosions)

YOU ARE THE PROBLEM.
With a shiny reflective mirror in print ads or a visual of a mirro on TV/Video)

JOIN THE SOLUTION.
(Solar panels, Wind turbines and Geo-thermal heat pumps with a pan out to a photo of Earth from orbit....pulling all the way out to the pale blue dot photos between Saturn's rings)

[NealK]

18. K&R

Good satire.

[malaise]

20. This

a spokesperson for the newly renamed Yale Center for Oh My God Wake Up You Assholes

[FSogol]

21. Flyover Country becomes Damnation Alley.

[WilliamPitt]

24. "Learn to swim."

[LiberalEsto]

25. Extinction Lite nt

[Louisiana1976]

26. Excellent post. K&R

[Quantess]

27. Real Estate Agents in Florida might need to chew on this.

Also Real Estate Agents in New Orleans.

[NM_Birder]

28. How about a little intellectual honesty ? it would go farther than more scare tactics.

1) we outsource heavy industrial/manufacturing to countries that have little to NO air quality standards, then pat ourselves on the back for being "green".... because the air pollution was produced in a foreign land "we are progressive". The pollution is still created, probably in much greater amounts because of the lower regulations. LOOK HOW BAD CHINA IS, well we are buying our crap FROM CHINA, a country that is proven to not care about environmental anything. The cost of action is example, ..... "scientists" reporting half the data to support an agency agenda is the reason people don't take it seriously.

2) the scare tactics are not working, that is why re-naming anything is pointless. For 10 years "the tipping point", "no return", "too late to do anything", "BETTER WATCH OUT", etc etc etc has dulled the message to to flat warm beer, in other words ignored and discredited. The tipping point has been passed how many times now ?

The science is real, but the propaganda is stale, speculative, and in some cases just plain ignorant for the sake of the agenda.

"We're ALL GONNA DIE" ! yeah, that's a plan, sure has worked so far.