Wednesday, September 22, 2010

George Monbiot is down in the dumps

And no wonder -- here's a professional alarmist, who writes alarmist books and numerous alarmist columns, delivers alarmist speeches, and generally makes a good living* by striving to alarm everyone, who is now waking up to the fact that his ride is over. As the title of his latest effort says, "Climate change enlightenment was fun while it lasted. But now it's dead" (with accompanying tear-drop from melting ice -- not quite as aww-inspiring as the lost polar bear, but similar):
Perhaps we [environmentalists] should have made people feel better about their lives. Or worse. Perhaps we should have done more to foster hope. Or despair. Perhaps we were too fixated on grand visions. Or techno-fixes. Perhaps we got too close to business. Or not close enough. The truth is that there is not and never was a strategy certain of success, as the powers ranged against us have always been stronger than we are.
Pretty depressing stuff, no? A last ditch effort to stir up the remaining True Believers, do you think? Are the concluding words maybe hinting at some more drastic action?:
All I know is that we must stop dreaming about an institutional response that will never materialise and start facing a political reality we've sought to avoid. The conversation starts here.
Might George be turning revolutionary?

Oh, probably not. More likely, as the first comment on the column indicates, he's just casting about for a new bandwagon, another scare.  The comments themselves are interesting, by the way -- half seem made up of symbolic hair-shirt types who feel bad about their own wasteful ways and are frustrated that everybody else doesn't share their neuroses; the other half people fed up with Monbiot's Chicken-Little alarmism, and  basically telling him to get over himself.

Two additional points:
First, I got this link from Tim Blair, who does a better, more thorough job on Monbiot than I do. And second, for those sincerely and practically concerned about real climate change -- as opposed to those who are merely signalling their status as evolved, spiritual beings or whatever -- there are a large number of actions other than immediate emission curbs that can and will be brought to bear, without the hysteria, over time. One of the more interesting, for example, is the idea of carbon re-cycling, mentioned in this earlier post.

(* I don't actually know how good a living Monbiot makes, admittedly, but if it's any significant fraction of fellow eco-crusader AlGore, he's making out just fine.)

5 comments:

  1. The evidence of warming over the last few decades looks fairly convincing morf. That doesn't mean the explanations offered by the Gore/IPCC/Monbiot crew can account for it (e.g. the alleged man-made Co2 claims), which are admittedly difficult scientific issues, not just eco-politics. Besides Monbiot suggests the politicians are not solving the problem, not claiming the problem doesn't exist.

    you are generalizing also by assuming all democrats, or liberals, or non-teabaggers uphold Gore or Monbiot's views. Not the case. Google around for a debate between Monbiot and Alex Cockburn, hardly a conservative (or even liberal, but more like ...neo-marxist) where AC more or less said Monbiot was full of scheisse (with some scientific support people). I don't completely buy AC's skepticism (temp data looks pretty solid) though he and his supporters raise a few interesting points.

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  2. you are generalizing also by assuming all democrats, or liberals, or non-teabaggers uphold Gore or Monbiot's views.

    No, as before, that's you wrongly generalizing me. As for the evidence of warming, I'll just quote a sentence I've already written above: "for those sincerely and practically concerned about real climate change -- as opposed to those who are merely signalling their status as evolved, spiritual beings or whatever -- there are a large number of actions other than immediate emission curbs that can and will be brought to bear, without the hysteria, over time. One of the more interesting, for example, is the idea of carbon re-cycling, mentioned in this earlier post."

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  3. Blair does a sort of macho-Tory act on Monbiot (typical it seems of brits and aussies), but doesn't say much of anything. The carbon recycling's a drop in the bucket. As are most of the other carbon reduction plans (tho Monbiot overlooks the Waxman markey bill, which at least holds oil-coal companies to higher standards). Monbiot may be a bit of a crybaby, but temps continue to rise, and time will tell, however trite that sounds.

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  4. I don't get a sense you're actually interested in the issue, J, which would just reflect the general drop in interest that Monbiot is moaning about anyway. Got to find another lever to go after that evil capitalism, I guess.

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  5. Not exactly, m. I write on energy-related topics (when time allows), including global warming. Monbiot's not one of my preferred writers on this topic. He has done pretty well popularizing the problems but does tend to alarmism of a sort. Monbiot's a capitalist anyway, or at least moderate, as are many AGW types. It's only libertarian wing-nuts and tea-bagger types who consider Al Gore--as corporate as like Hillary-- a pinko commie.

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