Exxon Should Stop Promoting The Denial Of Climate Change

Climate change is one of today’s most hotly debated topic. Scientists for many decades have made supposed claims that current energy creation and reliance on fossil fuels will lead to inevitable changes to the planet. Today, climate change denial is still a popular to most of the world despite the mounds of evidence to support that it exists. The climate change issue suffers from being mismanaged by various parties through focusing on the wrong issues and the lack of true commitment from the general public, according to Sandra Steingraber.

Christine Todd Whitman chose to write this op-ed months into the Trump presidency at a time when many natural disasters plague the country. In it she addresses both the administration and her fellow Republicans, many of whom do not view climate change as a threat. Whitman’s principal grievance with Scott Pruitt, the current director of the Environmental Protection Agency (E.P.A.), is his creation of a “red team” to research an opposing view to the scientific consensus on climate change. In her op-ed, Christine Todd Whitman condemns the way Scott Pruitt runs the E.P.A. and tries to convince the reader that climate change is a tangible threat. Whitman makes it clear that her criticism is not that of a lay person or a contrarian but comes from experience and a common worldview.

The election of 2000 took place during a time that was mostly peaceful, unemployment rates were historically low, but however, there were a record number of terrorist threats (Muhlhausen). Despite all of these headlining topics presidential candidate Al Gore and Vice President Joe Lieberman were far more concerned about global climate change (“Al”). Gore was, and still, is very passionate about this topic (“Al”, 9). He has challenged the two biggest polluters in the world, China and The United States to, “Make the boldest move in climate change.” Figure 5

The following paper is a summary and response to the article “Besieged by Climate Deniers, a Scientist Decides to Fight Back” written by Michael E. Mann, April 12th, 2012. This paper will identify the subject of the article, the occasion that prompted its composition, the intended audience, and the purpose the writer hoped to accomplish in writing it. The purpose of this paper is solely to report the information read in the article.

In his essay titled “Climate of Denial”, Al Gore, a well known environmental advocate and former vice president, verifies the reality of climate change and global warming. The piece is an attack on corrupt companies and news outlets that attempt to persuade the public that global warming is not a critical issue. Gore also earnestly conveys our environment’s current state and offers possible solutions that would increase awareness about global warming and begin to revert the planet back to a healthier, more sustainable state. The overarching purpose of Gore’s work is to call attention to the widespread climate change that is occurring. However, he also focuses on the corruption and bias within the media, and their attempts to conceal the truth about global warming. Writing to those who are conflicted about who to believe, he makes a valid argument that defends the beliefs of he and his fellow activists and encourages others to become more active in the climate change issue.

This paper will address the institutionalized road blocks in the United States that have prevented successful climate change action for the last twenty-five years. First, the United States government has become increasingly influenced by and connected to private industries. The private industries and the government work together as partners. While this likely has been beneficial in some ways it has kept out innovation, competition and prevented the implementation of successful health and public welfare regulations. Second, the Banking, Energy and Media Industry are linked together to promote consensually agreed to messages. These industries work together to keep fossil fuels as our major energy source. Third, each industry works together in non-profit

According to scientists the burning of fossil fuels is the main source for the large amounts of pollutants humans are creating. Fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas produce large amounts of carbon when burned to create energy that we all use. Many people think that the burning of these fossil fuels is not that big of a deal and there are other major contributors in the climate change controversy. The burning of these resources produce thousands of tons of carbon that are released into the atmosphere everyday Most everyone in the United States uses some source of energy produced from fossil fuels. Without the fossil fuels the major cities would not have enough energy to keep everything going. While they are working on increasing the amount of renewable energy sources, they are still dependent on the fossil fuels. Scientists are trying to link human pollution to the extreme weather changes that have been going on in recent years. An article found on www.edf.com Climate Changes Effect Plunder the Planet brings up some of the ideas that are caused by climate change. With the large amounts of carbon and other greenhouse gasses that are released they are effecting our ozone layer by trapping heat from leaving the planet, causing an increase in the global temperature around the world. www.study.com Fossil Fuels, Greenhouse Gases, and Global Warming states that over the last 800

Governments would traditionally act as a force of the people, by the people and for the people, but recently however, corporations have placed themselves within this relationship, to influence governments to act in their favor. A notable example in this sense is represented by the oil drilling companies, which continue to pollute and prevent alternative sources of energy from developing. Exxon Mobil has for instance spent millions of dollars to prove that global warming is a make belief phenomenon, rather than a real threat (Mandia).

Climate change is the long term shift in global climate patterns attributed mainly to the use of fossil fuels. Many people are aware of this issue, however, there has been an increase in the amount of people who deny climate change. 23 percent of Americans (compared to last year’s 16 percent) believe that climate change is not a problem (Atkin). To conclude that people do not accept cli­mate change because they do not under­stand it or need to be educated about it, is reasonable. However, I believe that it isn’t skepticism driving this denial. Rather, it is the phenomenon of reaffirming one’s identity. Instead of analyzing the evidence, it is intentionally interpreted in such a way as to maintain a pre-existing belief.

Those who are the most vocal about debunking the science in the United States tend to be mostly to be coming from the right. A recent study by Politifact determined that a remarkable 8 out of 278 republican congress members believed that man made climate change is actually happening. While all other 270 republican congressman in 2014 having a large sense of skepticism against the issue. This is certainly alarming considering that the majority of congress in 2016 are republican and several key environmental issues in the United States require approval from congress. The most notable issue recently was one regarding the congressional approval of Keystone Pipeline XL, an extension of the disastrous environmental pipeline that goes from Texas and into Canada that was vetoed by President Obama. Many of those standing against the truth of climate change in congress include Jim Inhofe, a senator from Oklahoma. Jim Inhofe is arguably the posterboy in the fight for climate denialism. Ironically, Inhofe is in charge of the Senate committee on Environmental Policy, and is infamously remembered as the guy who “proved” that climate change is giant hoax by bringing in a snowball to the senate floor as justification, saying that “this ball of snow” definitely proves that “it is certainly cold outside”. When looking

The global span of ExxonMobil makes the importance of ethical behaviour paramount; however, this has not always been the case. Investigations (Banerjee 2015 & Various 2015) have revealed that ExxonMobil discovered the link between human activity and climate change years before it became a public issue. Instead of adapting its business model

“Climate change has revealed this underlying dynamic in its starkest form: the potentially cataclysmic trade-off between economic and environmental well-being,” Christopher Wright and Daniel Nyberg remark in their book Climate Change, Capitalism, and Corporations. [HOOK]. Indeed, human beings are risking the whole planet existence by stepping more forward in the endless path of economic growth [CONNECTION]. In her book, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. Climate Change, Naomi Klein, a Canadian filmmaker, social activist, award-winning journalist, and author known for her political analysis and criticism of capitalism, explains why capitalists are denying the obvious fact of climate crisis and how they are procrastinating the appropriate

They looked at two scenarios, inaction, where business’ continue finding and using carbon as they see fit, and action, where business’ use a low-carbon energy mix. They found that not only would the investment cost of the action scenario be no more than inaction, but it would even cost a bit less- 190.2 trillion dollars for action and 192 trillion dollars for inaction. This is before even considering the amount of money saved by the effects of the action scenario itself. The report found that, “the difference in climate damage costs between low (1.5°C) warming and high (4.5°C) warming scenarios could be as high as $50 trillion” (Business Insider). The effect of such a large economic company reporting this data is the perfect example of how using economics for the sake of reversing global warming can be really beneficial. The argument often used by economists is that becoming more sustainable would hurt the economy, but the data in this report proves just the opposite, and how terrible it would be if we did nothing. For the sake of investment in industry’s like coal and gas, this information is often denied. But this is not anywhere near the first time industry’s have had to adapt due to uncontrollable events. This report emphasizes the importance of recognizing

Among these people is Robert Stavins, an Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School. Stavins argues “divestment doesn't affect the ability of fossil fuel companies to raise capital”. Like many people, Stavins feels divestment is the wrong way to make real change happen. Stavins points out that even if universities and colleges divest from fossil fuel industries, “There are other investors that take its place.” A better way to make real change, according to Stavins, in regards to climate change is “public policy at the international, national and sub-national levels”. This suggests organizations such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the Environmental Protection Agency and local organizations are more practical and equipped to deal with the issue of climate change. Stavins believes “the real contributions of Harvard and other great research universities to climate change policies will be through our products: our research, teaching and outreach to policy makers.” This statement is true but also exposes the hypocrisy of this argument. The ethics of a university researching climate change and simultaneous funding the main industry driving it is definitely

The problem that the pro- global warming theorists have created is that of social standing and little else. While there may be scientific backing to support some of the theory, the media presents the problem with great sensationalism. Global warming and energy conservation has thus become a trend and losses some of its validity through this. The scare tactics used by the media to “promote awareness” are just that, a linguistic ploy to gain favor. “Awareness of this global threat reinforced public concern and environmental problems and thereby provided environmental activists, scientists, and policy makers with new momentum in their efforts to promote environmental protection.” (McCright, 2000) This statement draws line to the potential benefits that would be received if the pro-global warming theorists were to draw enough attention to the issue. Driven by social empowerment and conviction to environmental protection, these activists misrepresent the actual threat and paint it as being much more