In tracking my local newspaper (The Miami Herald) for three weeks, they have featured** 267 stories, mentioned climate change in 5 of them and had 25 stories were a link to climate change was obvious and did not mention it. It's so embarrassing.
** I am tracking their daily AM and PM digest emails to subscribers, their print front page main story and the main story on their website at 6AM and 6PM.
I am reading an article "The Construction of News: Energy Crises, Advocacy Messages, and Frames towards Conservation" by Toby Bolsen (2011) for my sustainability master's program, and a section resonated with me after I read your piece here, Emily. Bolsen says that events play a central role in the process of news construction (messages from advocacy groups & government also do), and he cites Gamson and Modigliani who argue that "world events create perturbations that spark changes in the content of frames towards issues".
Ie: energy crisis of the 1970s --> new frame in people's mind associated with nuclear energy/energy independence
drought & extreme temps in the US in summer of 1988 focused public attention on global warming and led to more news coverage of the issue
The media have the PERFECT opportunity to start framing climate change as associated with these natural disasters... wildfires and hurricanes. Why aren't they doing it? These well-known publications need a climate reporter in EVERY other department. They should work together, not separately.
Thank you for all the reporting you do! I support you and keep spreading the word!
Just a little spiel about the use of the phrase "climate change," and I say this as someone who agrees that the changing climate is the greatest challenge facing us. If you ask any climatologist what the climate is, you will get a reply that includes something like this: climate is an abstraction that is determined by averaging the sum of the past 5/10/30 years of data, whether it be temperature, precipitation, extreme weather event of your choice, etc. In other words, the term "climate" is a bit like a baseball player's batting average or a basketball player's shooting percentage or other seasonal averages of your favorite player's performance in your favorite sport: it's the averaged sum of your player's performance over the season.
Now when you see a baseball player's batting average suddenly go up from .250 to .350 during the season, folks take notice. It means that he is hitting a lot more pitches that come his way and successfully getting on base and/or rounding all the bases in home runs. Now that doesn't just happen; it's not easy to make your batting average go up that much over a season. There is a cause: maybe he started using steroids, maybe he has a new, excellent batting coach, maybe the stresses in his life have resolved--most likely it is a mix of several factors. But the reason I'm bringing up this extended metaphor is because when he steps up to the plate and gets on base 3 times and hits a home run in a single game, folks don't say "he had a great night tonight because his batting average has improved." Rather, they say that he's just been tested for steroid use, or that the new batting coach has really been helping him, or his marriage has really improved his game or whatever. The changing batting average alerted us to some underlying things that have changed his constellation of behaviors that is causing the number of hits he is getting to go up significantly.
In the same way, it's important NOT to say that "climate change changed the weather," rather saying that "human activities have released enough greenhouse gases to change the chemistry of the atmosphere, which has resulted in way more extreme weather events, shifting the climate we live in" or something like that. Part of the reason for doing this is that climate is an abstraction like a baseball batting average, something that nobody can touch, smell, see or feel. But extreme weather events can be experienced directly in the short and long term, and so telling folks that they are going to experience more of these heat waves, wildfires, hurricanes, floods, droughts and the like creates a very visceral response. It means that more folks are more likely to buy more energy efficient homes, support solar and wind, tell their legislators to stop subsidizing fossil fuels and the like because they don't want to have more intense wildfires and heat waves like we just had last weekend.
The science is there to back up connecting the dots between increased extreme weather events and increased atmospheric greenhouse gases, and it's easier for folks to "get it" when they are talking about the real life impacts of those "hits" rather than trying to get folks to change their habits because of an abstraction like "batting average" is changing.
And was dreaming of how he could have educated the audience on WHY the rising temps and fire risk and name human and big business actions. Too far fetched?
Your thoughts on *why* the US news avoids making the connection? Perhaps that deserves a "Drilled" like post of its own, but still interested to learn what ppl think.
The UK and French press do report the "direct line" with CC:
Reminds me of last week when watching Cobert's Late Show and screaming at the TV when they were discussing the hurricane and said "nothing" about climate change. His band leader has family in the area. Thankfully, later in an interview with Pelosi, she made the connection quite loudly. Peace was somewhat restored in our household. But really, Cobert needs to up his game on climate change.
Well, if California just raked its forests, none of this would be happening. Our illustrious President said so, and why would he lie? ("eye roll emoji")
What if we all just printed this and mailed it to the editor of every major paper.
Honestly? This shit slaps.
In tracking my local newspaper (The Miami Herald) for three weeks, they have featured** 267 stories, mentioned climate change in 5 of them and had 25 stories were a link to climate change was obvious and did not mention it. It's so embarrassing.
** I am tracking their daily AM and PM digest emails to subscribers, their print front page main story and the main story on their website at 6AM and 6PM.
I am reading an article "The Construction of News: Energy Crises, Advocacy Messages, and Frames towards Conservation" by Toby Bolsen (2011) for my sustainability master's program, and a section resonated with me after I read your piece here, Emily. Bolsen says that events play a central role in the process of news construction (messages from advocacy groups & government also do), and he cites Gamson and Modigliani who argue that "world events create perturbations that spark changes in the content of frames towards issues".
Ie: energy crisis of the 1970s --> new frame in people's mind associated with nuclear energy/energy independence
drought & extreme temps in the US in summer of 1988 focused public attention on global warming and led to more news coverage of the issue
The media have the PERFECT opportunity to start framing climate change as associated with these natural disasters... wildfires and hurricanes. Why aren't they doing it? These well-known publications need a climate reporter in EVERY other department. They should work together, not separately.
Thank you for all the reporting you do! I support you and keep spreading the word!
Just a little spiel about the use of the phrase "climate change," and I say this as someone who agrees that the changing climate is the greatest challenge facing us. If you ask any climatologist what the climate is, you will get a reply that includes something like this: climate is an abstraction that is determined by averaging the sum of the past 5/10/30 years of data, whether it be temperature, precipitation, extreme weather event of your choice, etc. In other words, the term "climate" is a bit like a baseball player's batting average or a basketball player's shooting percentage or other seasonal averages of your favorite player's performance in your favorite sport: it's the averaged sum of your player's performance over the season.
Now when you see a baseball player's batting average suddenly go up from .250 to .350 during the season, folks take notice. It means that he is hitting a lot more pitches that come his way and successfully getting on base and/or rounding all the bases in home runs. Now that doesn't just happen; it's not easy to make your batting average go up that much over a season. There is a cause: maybe he started using steroids, maybe he has a new, excellent batting coach, maybe the stresses in his life have resolved--most likely it is a mix of several factors. But the reason I'm bringing up this extended metaphor is because when he steps up to the plate and gets on base 3 times and hits a home run in a single game, folks don't say "he had a great night tonight because his batting average has improved." Rather, they say that he's just been tested for steroid use, or that the new batting coach has really been helping him, or his marriage has really improved his game or whatever. The changing batting average alerted us to some underlying things that have changed his constellation of behaviors that is causing the number of hits he is getting to go up significantly.
In the same way, it's important NOT to say that "climate change changed the weather," rather saying that "human activities have released enough greenhouse gases to change the chemistry of the atmosphere, which has resulted in way more extreme weather events, shifting the climate we live in" or something like that. Part of the reason for doing this is that climate is an abstraction like a baseball batting average, something that nobody can touch, smell, see or feel. But extreme weather events can be experienced directly in the short and long term, and so telling folks that they are going to experience more of these heat waves, wildfires, hurricanes, floods, droughts and the like creates a very visceral response. It means that more folks are more likely to buy more energy efficient homes, support solar and wind, tell their legislators to stop subsidizing fossil fuels and the like because they don't want to have more intense wildfires and heat waves like we just had last weekend.
The science is there to back up connecting the dots between increased extreme weather events and increased atmospheric greenhouse gases, and it's easier for folks to "get it" when they are talking about the real life impacts of those "hits" rather than trying to get folks to change their habits because of an abstraction like "batting average" is changing.
Pretty scary and I agree we have not seen enough coverage by the news media:(
Hey has there ever been an effort to influence TV weather forecasters to name climate change/crisis as they discuss the weather? I was just watching this: https://www.nbcbayarea.com/weather/jeffs-forecast-very-unhealthy-air-and-what-could-help-smoke/2361950/
And was dreaming of how he could have educated the audience on WHY the rising temps and fire risk and name human and big business actions. Too far fetched?
I don’t know if this is “good news” but at least there has been significant coverage of the link between climate change and the fires in the NYT the past two days. This one even has it in the title: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/12/climate/oregon-wildfires.html?referringSource=articleShare
Sadly, even weather.com did not mention climate change in this article about western wildfires: https://weather.com/news/news/2020-09-09-western-wildfires-california-oregon-washington.
Your thoughts on *why* the US news avoids making the connection? Perhaps that deserves a "Drilled" like post of its own, but still interested to learn what ppl think.
The UK and French press do report the "direct line" with CC:
https://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2020/08/22/les-incendies-se-poursuivent-en-californie-plus-de-100-000-personnes-evacuees-de-leur-domicile_6049647_3244.html
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/08/california-wildfires-torch-2m-acres-blazes-force-evacuations
Reminds me of last week when watching Cobert's Late Show and screaming at the TV when they were discussing the hurricane and said "nothing" about climate change. His band leader has family in the area. Thankfully, later in an interview with Pelosi, she made the connection quite loudly. Peace was somewhat restored in our household. But really, Cobert needs to up his game on climate change.
Well, if California just raked its forests, none of this would be happening. Our illustrious President said so, and why would he lie? ("eye roll emoji")