On the second day of class we watched a 2000 video from PBS on Global Warming, What's Up With the Weather. Students were also asked to read several articles in advance and discuss the role of the media in covering global warming. A nine-year-old video was chosen to show, historically, how the press has been covering the issue. It is unlikely the skeptics today would get as much time as they received in this program.
- Bob Wyss
Reporting on the environment, its crises, and its changes, is not the simplest thing to do. The environment, being, by definition, “everything around us,” is not the simplest of systems. There is, therefore, much ground for diversity of opinion, on almost any environmental issue. This is a headache for scientists and policymakers, who end up with an endless stream of alternatives to investigate, evaluate, and then shoot down or incorporate into their own views. But these people at least have the convenience of having a fixed opinion of other people’s views of reality: ‘This guy’s right,’ ‘this guy doesn’t understand the topic,’ or ‘this guy’s lying.’ Journalists have it even tougher. In the spirit of journalistic balance, journalists often are in a position to report what is going on – what is going on in complicated environmental debates, for example. Of course, there are some opinion-articles in journalism, where a writer can act like a normal person, and admit that he endorses some view, is uncertain of some others, and of yet others, he is patently dismissive. But such editorials are not the bulk of journalism. When one is concerned with the reality of what is going on in the debate, rather than the ideal of what (the author at least, thinks) the ultimate truth really is, the issue of journalistic balance rears its ambiguous head again.
This is truly a difficult problem in covering science. In science, much of the time, there is one right answer, out there somewhere, and a bunch of people who end up being proven dead wrong. It would not be in the ethical spirit of journalistic balance to give truth and each distinct untruth equal weight and print. On the other hand, if the specialists themselves are having a tough time finding the truth, the journalist has little hope of knowing which theory is right, which is partially-right, and which are dead-wrong, and so, it is not feasible for him to, with any degree of confidence, weigh the amount of print he gives each competing view of reality, by its credibility.
But what I just described, is a rational appraisal of journalism’s approach to covering science, were science a black box, into whose intricacies no non-specialist could ever hope to see clearly. But, science is not a completely-black box; were it so, science would scarcely be worth writing on, in a publication intended for a general audience. Ideally, as Ross Gelbspan says in his Mother Jones article, Snowed, “A reporter should learn where the weight of scientific opinion falls – and reflect that balance in his or her reporting.” The premise of this ideal is that a reporter covering a field of science, should, and can, and therefore is nearly obligated to, be conversant in the current state of knowledge in the field.
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Obviously, that would entail a lot of hard work; it is not entirely realistic to say that all journalists should be experts about whatever they are reporting on. But, on the other hand, there is significant danger in treating science as a black box, where we can know what the competing ideas are, but cannot parse the credible ones from the incredible. If all ideas are given equal weight and print in journalism, regardless of their clout in science, then a well-funded special-interest group can, even having lost the argument among the scientific community, maintain uncertainty among the public. If an idea, however demonstrably invalid in science, is repeated enough, it can look as if it is a credible possibility. And, unacquainted with the actual state of scientific knowledge, journalists may take the bait, and misinform public opinion, saying the scientific jury is still out, when, in fact, it is not. This has been the case with the issue of climate change: a scientific consensus was reached a decade or so before a public consensus was settled upon. The vigorous lobbying of special interests was able to obscure the scientific consensus from the reporters, from whom the public gets much of their information. So, there are potentially-serious drawbacks to being ham-fisted about journalistic fairness – a decade of public misinformation about a most-serious issue, requiring quick and strong action, for example. Opinions may have an aspect of intrinsic equality, but when reporting on science, one is often also dealing with facts, which are a different animal from opinions. Fairness matters, but so does truthfulness.
- Justin Maher
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Ross Gelbspan in "Snowed," focused on how all the more recent natural disasters, severe rains, hurricanes, etc., are caused by drastic climate changes. The author writes that when the news media covers these disasters they do not cite the drastic climate changes as the cause. He wrote, "Conflict is the lifeblood of journalism, and the climate issue is riven with conflict." In other words, he believes that the drastic climate change is very newsworthy. He reported that a newspaper in Britain wrote three times as many stories on climate change, and the only the New York Times' Andrew Revkin reports regularly on the subject. He wrote then, “Any time reporters wrote stories about global warming, industry-funded naysayers demanded equal time in the name of balance." Basically, editors didn't want to "scare" their readers with the obvious threat of global warming. The author ultimately put the blame on the editors in the end of his piece. He accused them of betraying their profession and said climate change constitutes immense drama of uncertain outcome. I enjoyed reading this article because I really didn't realize how little attention the news gives to climate change.
- Kendra Richardson
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I was also particularly struck by this line from the Mother Jones article: "But when the subject is a matter of fact, the concept of balance is irrelevant." All too often, it seems reporters (especially those on broadcast news, I think) tend to forget this important idea. Being fair and balanced is of course one of journalism's guiding tenets, but when one side is espousing facts and the other opinion or (possibly worse) misinformation, stubbornly clinging to the "he said-she said" approach does a disservice to readers/viewers.
- Dora Wilkfeld
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“Snowed” explained why there is so much controversy on the subject of climate change. I really liked how the author put it, that things that are a matter of opinion, like gay marriage, deserve equal coverage of both sides, but a factual scientific discussion does not. The end was a little harsh though, that all editors and reporters are too lazy to cover this topic properly. I also found the comments from readers at the end a little disturbing.
- Mary Powers
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"Snowed" - I don't know how I feel about “Snowed.” Gelbspan does have a point that journalists are a little too even handed from time to time. If the oppositions argument is weak then let it be known, don't make it seem stronger out of some warped balance. Still, I don't think it is as bad as Gelbspan claims. I think he could give journalists a little more credit and his finally statement was way to bold and came across as ranting or foolish.
- Rafal Wilson
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In “Snowed” Ross Gelbspan attributes part of the problem to the journalistic approach to climate change. In failing to mention climate change regularly in news, the American public is unaware of its connection to modern occurrences, such as extreme weather events. This may be due to the very successful campaign of deception from the fossil fuel lobby, the misguided journalistic balance, which still causes journalists to approach global warming as an opinion with equal weight given to either side, and the dominant culture of newsrooms, which favors political conflict rather than the substantial science behind it.
- Christine Sullivan
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Global Warming is no longer a matter of opinion. The evidence is irrefutable, but the projections for the future are uncertain. However, industries dependent upon fossil fuels have largely taken advantage of this uncertainty. In “On Climate Issue, Industry Ignored Its Scientists,” Andrew Revkin exposed the tactics of deception used by the Global Climate Coalition in an extensive campaign against the fact that emissions of greenhouse gases would lead to global warming. The coalition disregarded and suppressed information provided by their scientists creating enough doubt to stunt public concern and delay government action. Revkin also reported in “Yelling ‘fire’ on a Hot Planet” that what we are dealing with in the subject of global warming is an “urgency problem.” Warming is happening alarmingly fast in geologic time, but since it appears to be in slow motion in present time, there is no sense of urgency. This is dangerous because climate change is a long term threat that can only be mitigated by immediate action. Urgency cannot be imposed on the public because it may be dismissed as alarmism, so it may be time to start suggesting adaptation as a solution to climate change.
- Christine Sullivan
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"Yelling Fire on a Hot Planet," was different from most of the other articles you read on global warming. It tells you that global warming is a problem that people are basically overlooking and it outlines what we do know about global warming. It asked questions such as "is global warming now a reality," and if scientists are just alarming us with information. The author, Andrew Revkin, writes that global warming is happening but not as fast as people may think. Global warming is a confusing subject and people don't really know what to believe now. He concludes with that it is a problem that humans have control over, basically.
- Kendra Richardson
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The readings covered some of the basics of environmental and climate-based reporting in the American media--and its all-too-frequent absence from the front pages. I hadn't realized that, until recently, this type of coverage was pretty spotty at best. Andrew Revkin's article made two interesting points; this first one I found hard to believe: "...few scientists agree with the idea that the recent spate of potent hurricanes, European heat waves, African drought and other weather extremes are, in essence, our fault. There is more than enough natural variability in nature to mask a direct connection, they say." Maybe when it was published three years ago, that was the case, but it seems to me that the anthropogenic nature of climate change and its visible side effects (droughts, the California disasters, etc.) have become more accepted, although of course it's still a highly contentious issue. Revkin also noted this surprising statistic: "A Gallup survey last month shows that people are still not worried about climate change. When participants were asked to rank 10 environmental problems, global warming was near the bottom, far below water pollution and toxic waste (both now largely controlled)." I wonder how much that's changed since 2006.
- Dora Wilkenfeld
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In “Yelling Fire on a Hot Planet” the author really broke it down into what is known fact and what is stilling being debated. As a reader I really liked the simplicity of that, it was kind of global warming for dummies. It was also the only article that suggested just adapting to the climate change, which is a topic I had never heard of before. “On Climate Issue, Industry Ignored its Scientists” dissected how the fossil fuels industry employed the same tactic as the tobacco industry to confuse the public, distort the science, and stop legislation to regulate fossil fuel emissions.
- Mary Powers
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I liked Yelling Fire on a Hot Planet." Revkin did a fine job at explaining some problems with the argument. This piece was definitely an eye opener to how fuel companies pulled the cigarette stunt of confusing the argument and effectively delaying any progress on the subject by years. I also liked his organizations in this article. The short one-liner sentences made it easy to follow where he was going, and I also found it aesthetically pleasing, although i know not why. The facts used in this article were effective for the argument he was making. I like this story more than "On Climate Issue, Industry Ignored Its Scientists." This was too preachy for and I felt that some of his statements were too bold and opinionated. Still the bulk of the essay has important facts that could sway people to his side of the argument. Or at least make them think about it a little more critically.
- Rafal Wilson
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In the from the Yale Forum on Climate Change and the Media, author Michael Coren wrote that Americans thought journalists overstate the threat of global warming. This is very different from the article I just read which criticized how little journalists focus on gobal warming. It's surprising how very different the American people's opinion on media coverage of this issue is. He then wrote about different organizations that cover global warming, and where people are most likely to try to find this news (the internet).
- Kendra Richardson
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Hopefully, as the Yale Forum article notes, the new media of online-based journalists will be able to fill the need for well-researched, fact-based climate reporting. The list of articles about Californian weather/climate issues from KQED News suggests this may already be happening.
- Dora Wilkfeld
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Michael Coren contrasts Gelbspan’s criticism in “Growing Role for New Media…” by optimistically analyzing the potential for expansion in coverage, primarily in multimedia and video operations on the Internet. These may better convey the scientific substance and emotional angles of this issue in a way television and internet alone are incapable of doing. The problem is that this news resource may only reach those that are already engaged in the subject, but it needs to be extended to reach the average reader. By making climate change news and information interactive, like KQed News Climate Watch, we may see a better distribution of the valid information available to the public.
– Christine Sullivan
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The article from the Yale Forum was solid. The article was effective at showing the need to environmental journalism to get involved with multi-media online production. We do need to reach more viewers if there is to be anything done about the issue. This would be an effective way to explain science and i think this article made that point very clear. The KQED page is a well executed website. I like how it's all right there in a column, text and then radio. Very effective. I couldn't find much in the area of video though, which could improve the site drastically I think
- Rafal Wilson
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I think it’s really interesting how people react to the big issues in climate change. One of the articles mentioned that showing people pictures of drowning polar bears may help to make a movement toward active involvement in stopping global warming. People often feel a
disconnect form what doesn’t harm them directly. Complimenting this idea, another article stated that it’s difficult to persuade the government to do anything when nothing will happen for another 100 years or so. I find this to be astonishing considering the effects that could be mitigated if action is taken now instead of waiting until it cannot be fixed. At the same time, I drive a car and do everything that everyone else is doing to harm the world and I am not an environmental activist. So here, I am experiencing the disconnect that everyone else, including the government, feels.
I like the description that one of the articles used to explain this issue – that it’s a “perfect problem.” People can recognize that something needs to be done, but not now and not by us individually. Also contributing to this idea is possibly that people think that the little they can do can’t affect the outcome drastically enough. Thus, they won’t sacrifice their luxuries to a useless cause. However, if everyone thought it did count, then it would and there would be a change in the future. But how does this kind of action begin to ripple?
These articles spoke a lot of confusion among the public and silence among the media. The fact that major corporations own much of the media and ad sales drive the production is a damper for the reporting of environmental news. If the media could report more factual articles about
the issue, the confusion among the public would probably be cured. I liked how one article said that the differing messages “confuse, alarm, and paralyze the public.” People don’t know what is going on, but they’re scared and can’t do anything. Going back to the idea that this is a
“perfect problem” -- the same article suggested that if the issue of global warming was presented with urgency then people would think it was an overreaction and unreasonable.
Global warming is something that everyone knows at least a little bit about. Sadly, the movie, “The Day After Tomorrow,” was my first real glimpse of what global warming could possibly do. The movie takes place mainly in New York, a place semi-close to my home, and connects what happens in the world directly to global warming. The beginning shows a scientist saying that natural disasters will occur across the world because of global warming, but no one listens… and then it happens. This movie made me think that this was what was happening now but at a slower pace. Even though it is just a movie, the idea behind it seems factual to me. If there was a specific timeline that scientists could give the world as to when all of the effects are going to take place, then I think that people would work harder to avoid it. However, in the movie no one listened until events started taking place, and that’s probably going to be the same in real life.
- Samantha Henry
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