Last night, Prad and I attended a fascinating presentation on the theme of ‘A Scoop in Time: Global Warming and the Press‘. Organized by E2, the event gathered a panel of environmental journalist luminaries, including Felicity Barringer from the New York Times, Chip Giller from Grist, and Peter Waldman, a recent export from the Wall Street Journal and now at Portfolio magazine. This was a timely talk given some of the discussions I have been participating in lately on DotEarth, the New York Times‘ environmental blog led by Andrew Revkin.
My main take away from the discussion were the difficulties facing journalists trying to report on the topic. The first point made by Felicity Barringer was the lack of immediacy of global warming. As Chip Giller put it, the thing oozes over time. Since the press thrives on news, this in itself makes it very hard to break global warming stories. There is also a lack of personal relevance. On the list of priorities in people’s mind, global warming comes way behind the economy, health care and immigration. This makes it hard for environmental writers to compete with writers from other desks, when the editor needs to decide which stories are going to make it in. Peter Waldman brought up the systemic nature of the problem, and the lack of easily identifiable perpetrator, as another source of relative low newsworthiness. All three of these hurdles are inherent to the topic of global warming.
The panelists confirmed some of the earlier research I discussed earlier in this blog, particularly Daniel Gilbert‘s theory, that stresses the need for the threat to have a human face, and be present and immediate, in order for it to trigger a human response. There is also Michael Oppenheimer‘s research on the need to make global warming as personally relevant as possible. According to Chip Giller, part of the reason Grist has been so successful has been their strategy of engaging their readers around friendly topics such as fashion, recycling, or practical green tips. All panelists agreed that the environmentalist movement has failed at rallying the public, largely because of its inability to meet people’s mindsets.
To this, I would like to add Maslow‘s hierarchy of needs. If I am worried about the recession and engulfed by a fear of losing my job, and of having no health care, I am going to naturally gravitate towards stories that address those immediate concerns, not news about ice melting in the Arctic, and possible flooding five, ten years from now. I am going to look for clues in the news that can answer my present needs for personal safety.
Last, Peter Waldman talked at length about the unrepairable damage from extensive misinformation campaigns over the last ten years. That the media are just now starting to come around to agree on the reality of climate change, cannot undo the negative effect misinformation has had on the public conscience and consequently, environmental U.S. policy.
La Marguerite 
What your journalist mates are failing to acknowledge is that as well as reporting issues, the press has the power to make things issues, simply by harping on about them until everyone pays attention.
I can understand why climate change is not a pressing and immediate thing for people. I cannot understand why immigration is, unless they themselves are or are connected to a migrant, legal or otherwise. If you’re born and raised in the US and have some job as an accountant or whatever, what’s it to you if the guy making your bolognaise in the restaurant is an illegal immigrant from Guatemala, or a legal one from Poland? Apart from racism, the only reason to care is for non-immediate things, like human rights, wage pressure, the general education of the population, and so on.
Now, from looking at the US media, I do think there’s a fair chunk of racism in why people care about immigration, legal or otherwise. But that said, it seems the US media have made a very strong effort to make the immigration issues feel immediate. They’ve taken what is really to most people an abstract issue and made it immediate. The media have shaped the discussion and perception of an issue. It became a big issue because they went on about it.
So I don’t think your journalist friends can dodge the climate change issue that easily. Things become issues because some journalist decides to write about them, hassles their editor until it gets published, and the editor keeps publishing stories about it. It’s true that the media is shaped by society, but at the same time the media does its own shaping. Things become issues because the media harps on them. There’s no other reason that Nixon got away with so much for years then was brought down by the Watergate affair, or that a stain on a dress was an issue of national attention.
Notice how your Dubya has got away with far more than did Nixon. Nixon just wiretapped political rivals and his own office, Dubya wiretapped the whole country. Yet Nixon came under great media pressure and eventually the threat of impeachment, while Dubya…? Remember the WMD in Iraq? Remember how unquestioning the media was, and how it all turned out to be made up? I think the journalistic media have in our generation abandoned their responsibilities, and are basically lazy.
Absolutely we as citizens have a responsibility. But journalists have a special responsibility because of the career they’ve chosen. They should go on about it and by God MAKE it an issue. Did Woodward and Bernstein just wait until enough people had written letters to the newspapers wondering if Dick was tricky?
so personally true, (for so many)
from the grass level here, i take an hour to shop for groceries, due to the art of juggling green stuff and greenbacks. container versus content.
if climate change happens to my purse and blows my roof away, it happens to concern –me. i also love polar bears and penguins, but i greenly love family and self.
the news threaten us with impending doom, in scientific parlance and plant fear in the plexus of ill-informed folk.
hardly conducive to problem solving.
one (news-media) article at a time from green bloggers will accomplish what Greenpeace could not—trickle down the consumer’s conscience, one small solid solution at a time.
should lamarguerite have a syndicated column, in Sunday papers?or other medium…mmm
Nadine, you are too kind. I will take your compliment 🙂
Kyle, I understand your exasperation, and I also put myself in the shoes of the journalists I heard, and I can see how things are not so simple when you are a journalist working for a paper or a magazine, who has to get a story through the sift of editors and a publisher. Even with all the goodwill in the world, there are aspects of global warming that make it a very tough subject to communicate on, regardless. Many of whom have already been discussed on this blog. Practically, I wonder, what do you suggest? If you were the environmental journalist for the New York Times, let say, how would you manage?
I do not have an answer, hence all my questions.
If I were the environmental journalist for the NYT, I’d simply push and push to get my columns written more or less as I write today.
Boohoo, journos’ jobs are difficult – everyone’s jobs are difficult in some way. The key to doing your job well is consistent effort.
Yes, there are aspects of climate change, peak oil and the like which make it difficult to communicate – but the same is true of many other issues, such as the subprime mortgage crisis, and so on, and they manage to communicate them effectively.
On the other hand, even on simple issues they’re too often unquestioning.
Government: “Iraq has WMD, and will give them to Islamic terrorists.”
Journo CouldHaveSaid: “But 10 years of UN inspections have shown that Iraq has no WMD. And anyway Saddam hates Islamic terrorists, none use his country as a base. It’s our “friends” in Saudi Arabia who fund terrorism.”
Journo DidSay: “Oh no! Millions of Americans could die! Invade Iraq now! Can we come along and watch and get images straight to tv live from the battlefield? That’ll be great for ratings!”
Iraq was a simple issue: either they had WMD, or they didn’t; either they supported terrorism, or they didn’t. And journalists did not press our governments on this issue. Why? They’re lazy.
They also fear losing access if they ask “difficult” questions; this is another excuse journalists often give about issues like WMD and climate change. The answer to that of course is to go ahead, lose the access, then write the articles anyway. Soon they figure out it’s better to talk to you than not.
For example, here Down Under around 1970 we had a tv programme where journalists invited politicians to speak. The Prime Minister and his Ministers refused, as they felt that tv was a superficial medium. So the journos invited bot the Opposition and the government ministers on to the show. Of course the Opposition showed up because they wanted to get into the public eye so they wouldn’t have to be the Opposition forever. Then the government realised that only the Opposition was getting to have their say.
Likewise, the journalists who fear losing access if they ask difficult questions can simply say, “we invited the Secretary for Energy to come but he wouldn’t. However we have here the chairman of Greenpeace who will speak for half an hour giving his point of view.” SecEng would be along pretty shortly, I’d say.
Consistent effort gets results. You just have to have balls, and not be lazy. Sadly, many modern journalists are cowardly and lazy. Again, what else could explain why Nixon only wiretapped a few political rivals and had to resign, but Dubya wiretapped the whole country, admitted on national television that he’d done it even though he knew it was illegal, but is still with us? Lazy journalists. Persist. Keep at it.
Boohoo, it’s difficult, sob sob poor me. Bah, go write for National Enquirer, then! :p
The relationships among journalism, the “public good” and global warming should be seen in a larger context than journalists, apparently, currently conceive.
I attended the Focus The Nation event yesterday at Stanford, which was great. And, I’ve informally followed the media on the issue of global warming.
One thing (among several) is amazing to me: People who have some substantial understanding of the global warming problem, as well as a high degree of concern (including those of us here on this blog), understand that many aspects of “the way things are” need to be substantially altered or, in some cases, reinvented. We want the coal industry to change, the power generation industry to change, the auto industry to change, consumerist behavior to change, political leadership to change, China to change, India to change, and so forth. We (appropriately) hope and want many things to change. And many of the people who understand this immense and far-reaching need for change, or who at least talk about it, and who call for it in private, are (in some cases) in the media and in academia.
But, if you dare ask the media to change (at least with respect to this one immense issue), the typical and strong answer is, “oh no, we can’t do that.” “You may not realize this, but journalistic theory is thus-and-so, and journalism has to work this way, and so forth.” Many reasons and excuses are given. Journalists (those who are concerned about global warming) want much of the world to change, but their own profession (apparently being already perfected or impossibly constrained, as if by the powers of Nature herself!) is beyond the need, or any ability, to change.
In your great, and very helpful, post, Marguerite, you included several words and phrases which apparently reflect the discussion of journalists you attended, including: “difficulties facing journalists”, “lack of immediacy”, “lack of personal relevance”, “hard for environmental writers to compete with writers from other desks”, “lack of easily identifiable perpetrator”, and “relative low newsworthiness.” Although I agree that some important characteristics of the global warming problem (and let’s not forget solutions) make it more difficult to communicate, nevertheless, I agree energetically with the essence of Kiashu’s post. Journalists (and the media) should get creative, take into account the psychological dynamics of humans, give the issue the weight it deserves, adjust their normal journalistic paradigm, and get to work, quickly. Again, I find it amazing that we know that many sectors of the economy must change, but journalists apparently see themselves as exceptions.
By the way, if the subject were Cricket, I could understand why the media’s excuses would apply. But, given the immensity and importance of the global warming issue (and wise solutions), are those excuses sufficient and beyond solution?
Also by the way, and very important, I think the same (major) problem exists in academia, on average (with some individual exceptions, of course): People in academia who understand the immensity of the global warming issue, and who feel that many large changes are needed in industry and society, often have a very strong (and seemingly inflexible) view of academia’s role in society. Academia’s role, apparently, is precisely “thus-and-so”. Should academia energetically and creatively engage with society-at-large (beyond campus boundaries) to move progress on this issue quickly along? From what I can tell, many in academia feel that doing so is, simply, not within the role of academia. Academia’s role is already perfected, I guess, and beyond question, even when issues such as global warming come along. Or, there are excuses: If academia speaks out, there would be too much of a backlash, some apparently think.
Consider this: Although I’m not an expert on endowments (so some of the following figures may be out-of-date or incorrect), as far as a quick search suggests, Stanford’s endowment is approximately $18 billion, and Harvard’s endowment is approximately $35 billion. If my understanding is correct, you can buy a full-page ad in the main section of The New York Times for about $80,000 or $90,000 if you plan ahead and don’t care about picking the exact day for the ad to run, within a given week. So, Stanford, or Harvard, or both together, could run a series of 10 (ten) full-page ads, in the Times, to creatively and genuinely communicate a message of fact, concern, and suggested solutions, for less than a million bucks. Out of endowments of $18 billion and $35 billion! Remember, the global climate is at stake. And remember, informed members of academia want much of the rest of U.S. industry to change. My guess is that these endowments spend far more money when they invest in new shopping mall developments.
Of course, it’s common for people to come up with all sorts of reasons why NOT to change, when the change involves them. But, we are talking here about academia and journalism. These include many of the people who are asking (privately, among themselves) for major changes in the economy. And, they are two institutions whose very roles involve, presumably, educating and informing the public. So, in my view, there is a MAJOR disconnect between the change that these segments would like to see throughout society and the change that these segments are willing to creatively implement in their own fields.
I’ll end with four quotes, for the media and academia to consider:
“The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them.”
– Albert Einstein
“Anyone who wants a certain result, but is quite happy with the absence of what would bring it about, has obviously no understanding of either causes or effects.”
– Petrarch
“Up to now you have done what many people do; as Virgil has it: ‘The mind remains unmoved; the tears pour down in vain.’”
– Petrarch
“Her greatness lay in doing what everybody could do but doesn’t.”
– Jennifer Granholm, first female governor of Michigan, speaking of Rosa Parks
Great topic. Given your location and audience, I think you should consider doing a post regarding Stanford, including both positive and other elements. And, of course, the same comments apply to Berkeley and Harvard and Santa Clara and San Jose State and so forth.
Jeff, Kyle, thanks for your comments. Maybe, I am being too ‘understanding’ of journalists, and I should be asking more . . .
On a similar note, one of my thoughts has been all along that a group of private citizens, companies, wealthy donors should gather to create a massive ad/PR campaign to support the climate fight, and work with ad/PR agencies interested in doing probono work.
Marguerite,
it was not so much a compliment, but a real challenge. if you are involved, you must be in the forefront. your communication skills and knowledge are essential to the subject.
i will have to instill a little testosterone in my literary voice in order to be taken seriously in the blogging medium. or be the Rosa Parks on the run-away climate bus. give me a couple years.
as an unsung casualty of the academic concert, and a dejected small papers loss; i understand the plight of both journalists and instructors. it takes a totally dedicated person to breach the impervious barriers of academia and the financial barriers of the media.
economics: everyone protects their funding sources. when the funding comes from ecologically correct sources, the whole system will follow. any eco-lobbyists out there?
The California gov. did quite well pushing the solar industry’s agenda while introducing McCain… funding, funding. Obama has a 96% green voting ratio, Clinton a 90%, so where are the supporters? not in Washington.
a solid submission campaign should be set up to flood the pages of the media before Nov. submit to your papers, they may publish you. they may hear us. i’ll be in the middle of the bus let them get used to me before i take one of the front seats.
Thanks Nadine for the nudge. I have been thinking . . . I have some ideas. Time is the missing piece!
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