It's not laziness Bill, it's totally deliberate. Readers love a bit of 'phwoar what a scorcher!' with some young women in bikinis. What readers don't want is desiccated old people expiring in the heat nor to see red faced obese people gasping for breath and having heart attacks.
Nor do the proprietors of the NY Times or the BBC (mouth piece for government) want to show the reality of the climate crisis. Politicians and the media are of course funded by and carry ads for the fossil fuel, automobile and animal ag/pharrms/agrochem industries and don't want anything that might shock anyone into actually going vegan or green.
The thing is Jo, they may not WANT to see pictures of old or fat people or babies succumbing to death, but they need to see them. I did not enjoy seeing picture after picture of emaciated men stumbling from German concentration camps in 1945, I cried over pictures of bodies stacked like lumber ready for mass burial. I was 12 years old. I needed to see them to understand, never again. The trum cultists, and neo-fascists in this Country need to see the real effects of climate change - not pictures of handsome healthy couples lounging in the grass.
This all may well be true but news isn’t a public service- it’s the business of increasing market share, selling advertising and making dividends for share-holders.
Amazing, isn't it, that governance structures in the media allow as much climate reporting as they do. You can map the readership of The New Yorker, for example, to tony precincts of generational wealth steeped in profits of the oil and gas industry. Many of the most energetic, effective organizers for climate change hail from such places.
Hypocrisy? Or perhaps the tribute that goodness pays to sins.
That is true today, but 80 years ago news WAS a public service, it's purpose was to inform the public. In Toronto as in m,any American cities there were two daily papers, one more liberal/progtressive, the other more business conservative so you always got to see the news from different views and make up your own mind. And yes I did read the news papers and news magazines at age 12, in fact I started reading them at age 6.
Odd then that the BBC delivered superlative coverage of yesterday's landmark Supreme Court judgement that the development of new oil, gas, and coal reserves must take into account their future carbon emissions. This decision will likely bring all new hydrocarbon fields and mines to a screeching halt and the BBC made that very clear.
I don't disagree with much of what you say, but to call the BBC a mouthpiece for the government to enter Nigel Farage territory.
Oh, and the BBC is still a public news service and much, much more.
I believe it's time to move past that point, to outraged and radicalized.
For a great guide to what it's actually going to take to confront the genocidal, or omnicidal, folks bent on life's destruction in service to their next quarterly profits, I can't recommend highly enough Kim Stanley Robinson's *Ministry for the Future*.
And for what it looks like when a leading climate scientist takes the gloves off, and quits trying to be civil, read Michael Mann's *The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet*.
It's time to up our game.
Thank you, Mr McKibben, for all that you are doing.
Pressure should be put on the NY Times, NPR, and other news outlets. While they report on climate change, and ramp up hysteria over weather events, they continue to pedal exotic travel and plastic consumption (Wirecutter- ugh, call it consumer advertisement please). They ignore the oil money, they continue to act as though Trump is a viable leader of the free world.
Just as we are pressuring banks we need to pressure media. Tell the truth, stop being a mouthpiece for consumer capitalism.
I have decided to ditch the NY Times. I, too, write on climate change, seriously, for three years now and am disgusted by that paper. Occasionally, they publish something outstanding on climate, but mostly it's just stuff I have to throw out of my in box. I can find all the information I need from numerous other sources. And of course, they accept fossil fuel advertising. The gray old lady can go eat an exhaust pipe.
A few minutes ago I spoke with some Louisiana university students. They told me about being painfully aware of the ocean chomping on the southern coast and of brutal heat waves. One described moving into his dorm and the campus offering cooling shelters for the process.
Thanks Bill for this. Yeah heat waves in NYC are not bikini's in Central Park. They are subway platforms way over 100 degrees, kids in un-airconditioned schools and cooks in kitchens. I was one of those cooks in my second act. There are over 23,650 restaurants in NYC and the vast majority of those don't have AC. Kitchens are hot in January but in a heat wave they are seriously dangerous. Well over 100 degrees - I had a meat thermometer in my chef coat and it registered 102. Cooks would fill the huge sinks with ice water to douse ourselves between the rush. Cooks work for hours in this heat day after day. Wish more New Yorkers who say - "Its too hot to cook, lets order take out." would think about the person making their diner. If the NYT was actually a local paper they could tell that story and the peril to workers in a heat wave.
God, really is something I often think of these days. Climate denial makes no sense and costs more to clean up damage than spending to reduce the crisis!
The story of the Bennington legislator who harassed and bullied her colleague has hit the Washigton Post, The Guardian and no doubt other media. What is wrong with these people, and now death threats to local candidates??? Sometimes I despair.
Thank you Bill. Although you didn't say it, I agree we are at the stage where mitigation is the best we can hope for. And another excellent reason to keep trump et al as far away from the White House as possible. Humans will survive the massive climate change, in much reduced numbers. The best we can hope is they've learned an important lesson: Their immediate desires are no nearly as important as they think they are, one must consider the effect those desires will have on Planet Earth.
Maybe the NYT read your substack yesterday because this morning the picture accompanying the heat wave news is a picture of paramedics carrying someone on a stretcher.
There are no fast chargers where I live or anywhere within 40 miles from the Kern River Valley. I am told there are a couple in Bakersfield. When I asked our local business men why they are holding off installing fast chargers this is the response I got: The electric company charges us by usage but they also have a demand charge that consist of all kinds of things that have nothing whatsoever to do with usage. Things like: Gird, Network, Transmission, Maintenance, forest fires, etc etc etc. And so the more things we connect up the higher this demand fee is weather we have any actual usage or not. This business owner also told me he envisions installing 8 to 10 fast chargers and then most of the time they would be just sitting there not being used and he would have to pay the electric company anyway. So this is a problem that needs to be escalated to the powers that be. We need to encourage more fast chargers not discourage them.
Second, when I talk to people who are shopping for cars the number one reason I am given that they are not looking at electric cars is the lack of fast chargers.
Good piece on the distorting impact of careless photo choices. I think it would be enriched if you also pointed to the research and recommendations of climate-focused social scientists who've revealed this issue, led by Saffron O'Neill of the University of Exeter: https://revkin.substack.com/i/79691907/not-fun-in-the-sun
Faced with hot weather, photo editors ALWAYS want to see hot babes in bikinis showing off their wares.
A newspaper in Fort Worth faced every heat wave or cold snap by recruiting a female secretary who was "structurally sound" as my father would say, to stand under a large outdoor clock, smile insincerely, reveal her cleavage and/or show off her equipment, with a headline of "W-h-e-w-w-w!" or B-r-r-r-r!"
Right now, News 12 has sent a reporter in shorts to Brick Beach to get footage of New Jersey residents beating the heat by lying on the sand. She also interviewed the Mayor and Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce, who gave their combined message: "Come to Brick Beach and don't forget to spend money."
It's not laziness Bill, it's totally deliberate. Readers love a bit of 'phwoar what a scorcher!' with some young women in bikinis. What readers don't want is desiccated old people expiring in the heat nor to see red faced obese people gasping for breath and having heart attacks.
Nor do the proprietors of the NY Times or the BBC (mouth piece for government) want to show the reality of the climate crisis. Politicians and the media are of course funded by and carry ads for the fossil fuel, automobile and animal ag/pharrms/agrochem industries and don't want anything that might shock anyone into actually going vegan or green.
Not an inconsequential post at all.
The thing is Jo, they may not WANT to see pictures of old or fat people or babies succumbing to death, but they need to see them. I did not enjoy seeing picture after picture of emaciated men stumbling from German concentration camps in 1945, I cried over pictures of bodies stacked like lumber ready for mass burial. I was 12 years old. I needed to see them to understand, never again. The trum cultists, and neo-fascists in this Country need to see the real effects of climate change - not pictures of handsome healthy couples lounging in the grass.
This all may well be true but news isn’t a public service- it’s the business of increasing market share, selling advertising and making dividends for share-holders.
Amazing, isn't it, that governance structures in the media allow as much climate reporting as they do. You can map the readership of The New Yorker, for example, to tony precincts of generational wealth steeped in profits of the oil and gas industry. Many of the most energetic, effective organizers for climate change hail from such places.
Hypocrisy? Or perhaps the tribute that goodness pays to sins.
That is true today, but 80 years ago news WAS a public service, it's purpose was to inform the public. In Toronto as in m,any American cities there were two daily papers, one more liberal/progtressive, the other more business conservative so you always got to see the news from different views and make up your own mind. And yes I did read the news papers and news magazines at age 12, in fact I started reading them at age 6.
Odd then that the BBC delivered superlative coverage of yesterday's landmark Supreme Court judgement that the development of new oil, gas, and coal reserves must take into account their future carbon emissions. This decision will likely bring all new hydrocarbon fields and mines to a screeching halt and the BBC made that very clear.
I don't disagree with much of what you say, but to call the BBC a mouthpiece for the government to enter Nigel Farage territory.
Oh, and the BBC is still a public news service and much, much more.
"Grumpy and peckish", Bill?
I believe it's time to move past that point, to outraged and radicalized.
For a great guide to what it's actually going to take to confront the genocidal, or omnicidal, folks bent on life's destruction in service to their next quarterly profits, I can't recommend highly enough Kim Stanley Robinson's *Ministry for the Future*.
And for what it looks like when a leading climate scientist takes the gloves off, and quits trying to be civil, read Michael Mann's *The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet*.
It's time to up our game.
Thank you, Mr McKibben, for all that you are doing.
In Solidarity,
Steve Woodward
Fairfax, CA
Pressure should be put on the NY Times, NPR, and other news outlets. While they report on climate change, and ramp up hysteria over weather events, they continue to pedal exotic travel and plastic consumption (Wirecutter- ugh, call it consumer advertisement please). They ignore the oil money, they continue to act as though Trump is a viable leader of the free world.
Just as we are pressuring banks we need to pressure media. Tell the truth, stop being a mouthpiece for consumer capitalism.
I have decided to ditch the NY Times. I, too, write on climate change, seriously, for three years now and am disgusted by that paper. Occasionally, they publish something outstanding on climate, but mostly it's just stuff I have to throw out of my in box. I can find all the information I need from numerous other sources. And of course, they accept fossil fuel advertising. The gray old lady can go eat an exhaust pipe.
A few minutes ago I spoke with some Louisiana university students. They told me about being painfully aware of the ocean chomping on the southern coast and of brutal heat waves. One described moving into his dorm and the campus offering cooling shelters for the process.
All of what you write is alarming. Everyone has to make an effort however small. Please continue to add to the narrative.
Thanks Bill for this. Yeah heat waves in NYC are not bikini's in Central Park. They are subway platforms way over 100 degrees, kids in un-airconditioned schools and cooks in kitchens. I was one of those cooks in my second act. There are over 23,650 restaurants in NYC and the vast majority of those don't have AC. Kitchens are hot in January but in a heat wave they are seriously dangerous. Well over 100 degrees - I had a meat thermometer in my chef coat and it registered 102. Cooks would fill the huge sinks with ice water to douse ourselves between the rush. Cooks work for hours in this heat day after day. Wish more New Yorkers who say - "Its too hot to cook, lets order take out." would think about the person making their diner. If the NYT was actually a local paper they could tell that story and the peril to workers in a heat wave.
God, really is something I often think of these days. Climate denial makes no sense and costs more to clean up damage than spending to reduce the crisis!
The story of the Bennington legislator who harassed and bullied her colleague has hit the Washigton Post, The Guardian and no doubt other media. What is wrong with these people, and now death threats to local candidates??? Sometimes I despair.
Every gallon burned in your ICE produces 7 lbs CO2. Trade it in buy an EV.
Thank you Bill. Although you didn't say it, I agree we are at the stage where mitigation is the best we can hope for. And another excellent reason to keep trump et al as far away from the White House as possible. Humans will survive the massive climate change, in much reduced numbers. The best we can hope is they've learned an important lesson: Their immediate desires are no nearly as important as they think they are, one must consider the effect those desires will have on Planet Earth.
Maybe the NYT read your substack yesterday because this morning the picture accompanying the heat wave news is a picture of paramedics carrying someone on a stretcher.
There are no fast chargers where I live or anywhere within 40 miles from the Kern River Valley. I am told there are a couple in Bakersfield. When I asked our local business men why they are holding off installing fast chargers this is the response I got: The electric company charges us by usage but they also have a demand charge that consist of all kinds of things that have nothing whatsoever to do with usage. Things like: Gird, Network, Transmission, Maintenance, forest fires, etc etc etc. And so the more things we connect up the higher this demand fee is weather we have any actual usage or not. This business owner also told me he envisions installing 8 to 10 fast chargers and then most of the time they would be just sitting there not being used and he would have to pay the electric company anyway. So this is a problem that needs to be escalated to the powers that be. We need to encourage more fast chargers not discourage them.
Second, when I talk to people who are shopping for cars the number one reason I am given that they are not looking at electric cars is the lack of fast chargers.
So there you go.
PS Doesn't 'peckish' mean, simply, 'hungry'?
Good piece on the distorting impact of careless photo choices. I think it would be enriched if you also pointed to the research and recommendations of climate-focused social scientists who've revealed this issue, led by Saffron O'Neill of the University of Exeter: https://revkin.substack.com/i/79691907/not-fun-in-the-sun
Bill, re the unfortunate pulling of pension divestment bill SB 252 in CA, I think you were quoting Assembly Leader Lena Gonzalez. https://sd33.senate.ca.gov/news/majority-leader-gonzalez-teachers-workers-climate-advocates-respond-committee-amendments
thank you
Faced with hot weather, photo editors ALWAYS want to see hot babes in bikinis showing off their wares.
A newspaper in Fort Worth faced every heat wave or cold snap by recruiting a female secretary who was "structurally sound" as my father would say, to stand under a large outdoor clock, smile insincerely, reveal her cleavage and/or show off her equipment, with a headline of "W-h-e-w-w-w!" or B-r-r-r-r!"
Right now, News 12 has sent a reporter in shorts to Brick Beach to get footage of New Jersey residents beating the heat by lying on the sand. She also interviewed the Mayor and Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce, who gave their combined message: "Come to Brick Beach and don't forget to spend money."