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Anyone at Friday's climate strike couldn't help but notice just how much the terms of the debate have shifted in recent years. The crisis is one of being. Climate change denialism isn't simply a political position anymore. To deny the science is to embrace nihilism; it is to be complicit in one's own extinction.
Like the flying saucer people documented in When Prophecy Fails, they don't change their minds based on new material. Rather, the discomfort fresh edvidence causes them results in a renewed proclamation of their denialism, as they double down on that identity. The rhetoric might change but the structure remains the same.
The problem with the discussion about nuclear energy is that it is a distraction; an ideologically driven misdirection by those who are more concerned with opposing renewables and the 'green-left' than solving our country's energy problems. Nuclear just doesn't make sense for Australia at this stage of the game.
From overly sheltered baby boomers to millennials too fatigued with the state of the world to care, the reality of climate change can be a lot to handle. Here's a snapshot of the people living with their heads in the sand, employing tactics including pessimism, cognitive dissonance and deflections to stay where they are.
Whole industries have sprung up dedicated to help alleviate climate stress. Tote bags. Metal straws. Zara has announced 100 per cent of its fabrics will be sustainable by 2025 while Apple has said it plans to eventually stop mining. All of this looks great, but it doesn't help the underlying issue: We are still buying way too much stuff.
As Adam Goodes paid heavily for his defence against racism, defending country continues to be a costly business for the people of the Flinders and Kimba regions, whose communities are irrevocably torn apart by the National Radioactive Waste Management Facility project.
People living in the outer suburbs would benefit just as much (if not more) from having access to attractive public space and to being able to meet their daily needs on foot. The social and environmental benefits would also flow to all of us in building healthier, more resilient communities and significantly reducing pollution.
There are thousands of Australians old enough to remember: hot summers starting before Christmas and tailing off into autumn in the weeks after their return to school; the buddings and flowerings and wiltings in suburban gardens and country main streets; the first chill in the air as they unwrapped their Easter eggs ...
The media often portrays climate change as a political issue. But politicians are the least trusted messengers for climate information. They really turn off the public. The most trusted are scientists, firefighters, farmers and weather presenters. Of these, only weather presenters have a large audience and are already skilled communicators.
Extinction Rebellion is the biggest environmental movement we've seen in Australia in years, and the group is well aware of the disruption they are causing — it's baked into their strategy. Is the inconvenience, disruption, and vitriol worth it? Is it actually going to turn public opinion one way or another? History suggests it just might.
The debate around climate change shows the danger in believing we humans are principally rational. History gives example after example of how our biases can make us do very irrational things. In the words of Dan Ariely, our species is 'predictably irrational'. It is helpful for us to know this, so that we can become better.
Five years ago I woke in the middle of the night and wrote a letter to myself about climate change. 'The world around you no longer exists. The conditions that created it have already changed and the society you know remains the same only due to inertia.' Now I know I'm not the only one who's lain shuddering with this awful premonition.
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