Psychoanalysis on Climate ‘Denial’? (stranger and stranger)

“CO2 is not the threat but the friend, as are fossil fuels that make an unsafe world safe and pleasant for billions of people despite the forces of Statism and … elitist climate policy.”

Climate alarmists live in a self-righteous bubble where humankind is the scoundrel. Nature is optimal and fragile; anthropogenic change cannot be good, even toward greening, warming, and moistening. Think about that nonpolluting trace gas, carbon dioxide (CO2).

To the Church of Climate, there cannot be any debate against the narrative of alarm–or pushback against forced energy transformation. The opposition is evil against the common good, defined so vaguely as to preclude real human betterment. So psychological explanations emerge.

Consider this post on LinkedIn by self-described PR specialist Tanya P. (since deleted or I am blocked):

There’s something I have noticed when I engage with climate change deniers on LinkedIn. I have noticed that fossil fuels has, for them, become about identity… and one kind of identity in particular: hypermasculinity.

The analogy to nicotine and tobacco then comes in, despite what James Hansen had to say about the specious comparison. [1]

This is the same kind of strategy that was used by Big Tobacco to sell toxic products and ideologies to men, even as cigarette smoking killed men by the 100s of 1000s. Big Tobacco understood: if you can make something about *identity* then it is nearly impossible to dislodge that belief, uproot the bad habit or argue any counter perspective.

“This is, in a nutshell, how effective propaganda works,” Tanya concludes. Continuing into psychoanalysis:

I have noted a deeply emotional reaction among deniers. There is a kind of almost religious fervour in some climate change denial arguments. Deniers, conspiracy theorists have, at times, almost seemed to wind their entire personalities up with …the decomposing plants and animals that humanity has burned for a scant 150 years to create our present disaster and climate emergency.

It’s all a conspiracy in her mind.

As a veteran marketer who ran large-scale international communication and persuasion campaigns, I do understand why this sort of transformation happens within people. Oil and gas companies have constructed very sophisticated disinformation campaigns that have equated fossil fuels with masculinity and toughness.

In so doing, fossil fuel companies have enlisted, activated and outraged these fringe surrogates by the 10s of 1000s, witting, unwitting or witless, to do the work of these sophisticated fossil-fuel propaganda campaigns.

She probes deeper into her (imaginary) foes:

These climate change denial activists identify deeply and almost spiritually with the dirty and destructive burning of decomposing plants and animals that make up fossil fuels. These deniers will debase themselves to fight for oil and gas even when it hurts them economically, and socially. Tragically, I see it every day.

I do not know who she is describing, and I know myself and a hundred others in the fight against the Climate Industrial Complex. We are quite the opposite. She should engage with us to shock her simplistic belief; CO2/climate optimists are intellectually grounded and open-minded.

She ends:

Deniers been enlisted and activated by powerful interests, most of these advocates/dupes fully unaware that they’ve become puppets on strings held by powerful interests. These useful, credulous surrogates wrap themselves in the supposed masculine mantle of fossil fuel advocacy, all the while not realizing how weak, feeble and depressing their activities appear to the wider world. It would be deeply sad and heartbreaking if it weren’t so destructive.

One can only turn the tables on Tanya and the many like her who fantasize about the problem and the enemy. CO2 is not the threat but the friend, as are fossil fuels that make an unsafe world safe and pleasant for billions of people despite the forces of Statism and … elitist climate policy.

[1] “Let’s be clear: the frequent comparison of the fossil fuel and tobacco industries is nonsense. Fossil fuels are a valuable energy source that has done yeomen service for humankind.” – James Hansen, June 1, 2021.

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