Learning from the global warming fiasco
All of us, whether as private citizens, working in government or especially in the Church structure, should quickly learn from the most embarrassing fiasco of the global warming/climate change madness.
As emerging now in the news abroad but not yet duly played up locally, many of the so-called scientific data made as basis for the scary, supposedly man-made global warming scenario, portrayed as inevitably coming to us, are now found to be seriously flawed.
It’s now widely seen as a case of bad science getting mixed up with bad politics. The sources of the data were indubitably compromised. The findings were not peer-reviewed. There was lack of transparency in the whole process of reaching the disturbing conclusions.
Skeptics and critics of this global warming/climate change brouhaha now naughtily concede that there’s indeed a man-made impending disaster in that all the hype and spin about it are just made up by some men.
The whole issue is now summarized as “climate-gate,” after that notorious Watergate scandal that forced American President Nixon to resign in 1974. It involved abuse of power by public officials, violation of the public trust, bribery, contempt of Congress and obstruction of justice.
In this case, as reported by Fox News, it involved the so-called
- “Africa-gate,” an exaggerated prediction of drought and crop losses on the continent;
- “glacier-gate, a false claim that Himalayan glaciers would disappear in two decades;
- “disaster-gate,” an unsubstantiated claim that extreme weather, caused by global warming, was responsible for growing billions in financial losses;
- and “Amazon-gate,” predicting that the Amazon rain forest was dangerously shrinking.”
I remember that just recently some of our local environmental officials made presentations of disaster scenarios in our country if the sea level would rise by some meters. That claim of the water level rising due to the melting of the glaciers was also recently debunked by scientists.
What now? I suppose we just have to learn our precious, if painful lessons. Our problem is that we sometimes are too quick to believe science fictions and urban legends, to ride on a bandwagon phenomenon, more eager to enjoy the perks than to examine the findings closely.
We like to play fawning pawns in the games of world big powers. When a big government delegation recently went to Copenhagen for a world climate change summit, I wonder if it was really worth it and if the delegation really had something substantial to contribute. It looked to me a pure waste of money and time.
What makes things worse is when some clerics and nuns start mouthing global warming slogans. Again I wonder if they really know what they are screaming to high heavens.
At these times, we should not be that naïve not to realize that there are powerful network of groups playing games to satisfy all sorts of self-interest. There’s the ideological angle, the political angle, the economic angle, etc, all pulling strings to generate mass hysteria and herding.
We need to be more discriminating or at least be more prudent by listening to both sides of a given issue. The media should be most sensitive to this requirement, since their work easily shapes public opinion.
They should be very clear about their capabilities and limitations, and try their best to work within these dimensions, resisting the temptation to overreach themselves and sensationalize. They can foster more exchange of opinions in the hope of having a clearer picture of a given issue.
Thing is nowadays truths and falsehoods are often mixed together, intentionally or unintentionally. The line between the two is made blurred. All kinds of propaganda tools are used, more to attract attention than to spread real news.
Notice the shrill and affected voice used in the TV newscasts to convey what actually are normal occurrences in a city—fire, petty crimes, frivolous gossips, etc. You’d think the end of the world is coming with all the exaggerated excitement injected into the stories.
Let’s hope that we can overcome this tendency, making it a thing of the past, dead and buried. We need to learn temperance and sobriety in handling our communication requirements, and to go into more in-depth reporting, delivered calmly and allowing viewers to think and reflect things properly.
Another issue akin to the global warming fiasco is all this buzz about reproductive health. This issue, more serious than global warming, deserves utmost scrutiny.
(Fr. Cimagala is the Chaplain of Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE), Talamban, Cebu City. Email: roycimagala@gmail.com)
