And here we are, with the temperature records getting scratched (h/t to Kevin Pluck, and embarrassment that I didn’t get it when he made that gag on Twitter). And here we are with the Australian government saying yes to the extension to operate of thermal coal mines (none of the ambiguity you get over met coal). And here we are with people STILL peddling “trend denial” (meaning they deny there is even any warming, regardless of cause).  One of the key myths we like to peddle about ourselves, as homo sapiens sapiens is that we are ‘wise’, or, failing that, knowledgeable, rational whatever.  What a croc. 
At the expensive private school I went to, the headmaster at least got us looking at Edward do Bono, whose work encouraged some level of cognitive humility. Just to be able to pause and look at whether not just your senses were giving you an accurate picture o the world (sometimes not!), whether the framing devices in our heads allowed us to see what was in front of us if it were inconvenient.  

To be clear, you NEED framing devices. You can’t approach the world having to test whether at each given moment gravity is ‘real’.  But take something as simple as which side of the road to drive on.  That’s a societal choice (and famously Sweden switched over at some point in the 1960s). It’s “arbitrary” but it is most definitely NOT meaningless.  I remember dimly some case where a US Airforce officer arrived in the UK for the first time, was given a car to drive himself to somewhere and then, jetlagged, set off. And of course, on an unmarked country road, he had a head-on collision with someone,killing them.

Welcome to our species. So sure of its own rules, the pedal to the metal, about to have a head on collision….

The metaphor is cute, but faulty on two counts (at least). One is the very concept of the driver as an entity. It’s more like there’s a driver with a couple of goons with submachine guns who’ve herded everyone else into the back of a minibus and is flooring it, snoring cocaine off the dashboard while swigging from a vodka bottle labelled “Economic Growth” and chasing it down with rum “Personal Liberty”.  Any move by the passengers to even remonstrate is met with reminders of Guatemala 1954 or Chile 1973 or Nicaragua in the 1980s or [insert more up to date examples here].

Secondly, the idea that the collision is still about to happen (and therefore, in theory, could be avoided).  Ha ha ha ha. HAVE YOU LOOKED OUT THE WINDOW RECENTLY?

It’s here, it’s now.

So, ask me how I’m feeling.

Right, after that entire sane and definitely not spittle-flecked intro, on with the show.

The courts, media, cops etc

So, as per yesterday’s post, it’s really hard to escape the training and the framing we are given when young (inevitably – it’s not that our parents brainwash us, a la Warren Beatty in The Parallax View, though that does happen sometimes).  We’re taught about justice and law as being a Venn diagram with lots of overlap. How many of us could REALLY describe not just how laws are made (from their birth in thinktanks etc through the legislative process), or the huge array of regulations, ministerial ‘discretion’ etc?  What percentage of the population could give a tolerably accurate and detailed description? 20% 10%? 5%

Why aren’t we taught all this in school? (That’s a rhetorical question, btw).

How many people could go beyond ‘all journalists are liars’ to give a detailed and systemic explanation of why stories (a telling phrase) turn out why they do, why the media is in no way a ‘glass-bottomed boat’?  Again, 20%?  10%?  How many people could explain to you the Herman-Chomsky propaganda model?  Basic tools for understanding (nb I am not saying it’s perfect, that it doesn’t need supplementing with additional models, that there aren’t wrinkles and wriggle room).

It’s almost as if the last thing our lords and masters want is an informed, confident populace that is familiar with the mechanisms of control and mystification. I know, kuh-razy conspiracy talk, right?

So, if social movements are not going to help people come up with decent cognitive maps, they can expect to lose.  And lose big. And here we are.

(Someone I knew, I wouldn’t call them a friend, nor they me) once told me of being on trial for an RTS action.  And when a witness for the prosecution was giving testimony that shone a light on the media, the journalists in the press gallery all literally  downed tools.)

More recently, well, judges have been known to point to journalists reporting what was going on and offer thinly-veiled threats, which apparently worked – the journo stopped coming.  And here we are.

Responses to the questions on the Don’t Feed the Trolls blog post

I did a blog post last night about a climate denial letter I received, which I’d ‘fisked’ (gone through in detail to reveal the lies, evasions etc). I got a nice reply from a regular commenter, and because I need to get on with other stuff, to pad out my 1000 words I will quote in full and then reply.  (Upset you’re not getting 1000 words from me every day?  You get what you pay for…)

“Marc, I loved todays post, both the letter and your response. Having said that I am confused! I have always believed the more you listen and the more you read, the more you will learn, but in my case not so.
just what is “racism”? We have bigotry and ignorance, but “racism”, not to my knowledge. Surely 99% of the worlds population are of mixed blood.
Likewise “climate change”, just who created this term?. The climate has always changed, spring, summer, autumn and winter, nothing new here. The increase in CO2 is without doubt a result of human activity, but reducing it won’t save the planet. We are degrading it in so many ways, in fact suggested methods to reduce CO2 will in my view further degrade our world.

I’d suggest our leaders (world wide) and We (the people), need to address the real issue GROWTH.”

Racism is not bad manners based on not liking the colour of someone’s skin. That’s merely prejudice. Racism is when that dislike you have is backed up by laws, regulations, social norms reinforced by our old friends the school system, the media etc.  My favourite way of thinking about racism is the early years of white settlement in America, when the ruling class had both slaves and white indentured servants (slaves but with a fixed period – see Moll Flanders). The problem they found was that the slaves and indentured servants had enough common problems to be participating together in riots/revolts etc.  That’s super-costly to suppress. So the solution was to start giving the white servants enough extra privileges, and allow themselves to think they were ‘better’ than the slaves – problem solved, or solved-ish.  And this kept going, of course – famous Malcolm X talking about field n*****s and house n*****s  “Massa, Massa, they is burning down our house.”  Quentin Tarantino did well with this in Django Unchained.

Yes, on a genetic level racism makes no sense – but as one of those framings that helps us see the world in ways convenient to us (and beyond merely convenient – there’s serious money/privilege/status at stake) it makes perfect sense.  Repeat also for class, gender, able-bodied status, height, etc etc).

On climate change versus global warming – I won’t recap, but there’s a good article somewhere (I will try to track it down).  In the meantime, this from NASA will do 

“Anthropogenic global warming” (AGW) had a brief time in the sun (ha!) but is a bit of a mouthful.  “Global warming” fell out of favour because it sounded too pleasant and gradual, akin to “the minibus came to a halt” rather than the more accurate “the minibus with the coked-up dickhead driver and all the captive passengers sped off a cliff and fell 300 feet onto rocks below, exploding. The two survivors who somehow escaped were then eaten by sharks.”

Hope this helps