By Olivia Murray
“[T]he use of hyperbolic terms to describe global warming has no effect on people’s perceptions of the urgency of climate change.”
As it turns out, all that hysterical language, tsk-tsk finger-wagging at we commoners to abandon our modern luxuries like personal vehicles and gas stoves, and temperature map graphics with exaggerated red shading to suggest that we’re in an emergency situation didn’t do anything but turn the people off of to the whole “urgency” of the narrative.
Here’s the story, from a new report out by Dr. Thomas D. Williams at Breitbart News today:
A report released Monday by USC’s Understanding America Study (UAS) suggests the use of hyperbolic terms to describe global warming has no effect on people’s perceptions of the urgency of climate change.
The study notes that climate crusaders like the UK’s Guardian newspaper have officially opted for expressions like ‘climate crisis’ and ‘climate emergency’ in an attempt to raise concern and convey urgency, yet it would seem that such efforts are in vain.
‘Instead of ‘climate change’ the preferred terms are ‘climate emergency, crisis or breakdown’ and ‘global heating’ is favoured [sic] over ‘global warming,’ although the original terms are not banned,’ the Guardian stated in 2019 on announcing updates to its official in-house style guide.
Now to backtrack a little bit: According to Williams, in April 2019, a “team of advertising consultants” published another study that suggested the climate terms commonly used at the time (“climate change” and “global warming”) didn’t do enough to whip the average media consumer into a panic—they suggested buzzwords like “climate crisis” and “environmental collapse” as it elicited a stronger “emotional” response. Yes, you read that correctly: They didn’t want to encourage a more rational response, or be more objective, but play to a person’s emotions… and exploit them. Without facts on your side, what else do you have?
Here’s more, per Williams:
The expression ‘climate crisis,’ for instance, got ‘a 60 percent greater emotional response from listeners’ than ‘climate change,’ the study found.
…
Of six different options, ‘global warming’ and ‘climate change’ performed the worst, beaten handily by ‘climate crisis,’ ‘environmental destruction,’ ‘weather destabilization,’ and ‘environmental collapse.’
The CEO of SPARK Neuro, Spencer Gerrol, said that ‘global warming’ and ‘climate change’ are both neutral phrases with nothing ‘inherently negative or positive’ about the words themselves, which could help explain why they elicit such a feeble emotional response.
Furthermore, both global warming and climate change are ‘incredibly worn out,’ Gerrol said, and no longer produce the reaction they might have once.
Fast forward to the new study, published today:
Across a national U.S. sample, we found that the more traditional terms ‘climate change’ and ‘global warming’ were rated as more familiar than the relatively newer terms ‘climate crisis’ and ‘climate emergency.’ Perhaps due to being less familiar, the terms ‘climate crisis’ and ‘climate justice,’ which were introduced to emphasize urgency … actually elicited somewhat less concern. Moreover, ‘climate crisis’ or ‘climate emergency’ did not elicit greater perceptions of urgency than ‘climate change’ and ‘global warming.’ The term ‘climate justice’ was least familiar and generally performed most poorly on all dependent measures. This may, in part, reflect low familiarity with the idea that climate change disproportionally affects vulnerable communities (Schuldt and Pearson 2023). Additionally, the term ‘climate justice’ may resonate less with people than the other terms.
Well, well, well, the propaganda and fear porn has a very limited shelf life.
Let me help out these not-so-brilliant researchers—it has nothing to do with unfamiliarity, but everything to do with the “worn out” sentiment noted by Gerrol in 2019.
We commoners don’t feel a sense of urgency because we see the pseudo-elites jetset around the world, to climate conference after climate conference, while they demand we stop using our modest personal vehicles.
We commoners watch Kamala Harris cook on a gas stove, while she and her colleagues demand we give up ours.
We commoners aren’t ignorant to the fact that temperature gauges are placed near airport blacktop to skew the results.
We commoners don’t care about a trivial rise in global temperatures in the centuries ahead when we need to feed our children now.
We commoners aren’t so stupid that we would actually believe carbon, a building block of life, to be a poisonous element.
We commoners have had it with the theft via taxation and devaluation to support the “green” agenda that is only destroying the environment.
We commoners have had one too many go-rounds with the mainstream media to treat its members like a serious and informed group of individuals.
We commoners are “worn out,” or sick and tired of being treated like we are the inferior class, mere subjects of globalist powerbrokers.
If credibility were important—and it should have been if they wanted to keep up the grift and control—it would have behooved them to have read The Boy Who Cried Wolf and they would have learned you can only lie for so long before the people ignore you completely.