Merchants of Doubt: Sowing the (Tobacco)
Seeds of Denial
BY ·
From the introduction of snow balls on the floor of the
Senate as “scientific
evidence” that global warming isn’t happening to smear campaigns aimed at actual climate
scientists, the real battle over climate change is one of narrative, not
science.
“The one thing we’ve learned,” says Robert Kenner, director of
the upcoming documentary Merchants of Doubt, “is that
when you explain science to people, it hardens those who don’t believe in the
science.”
“I didn’t think that we’d have a chance of getting anyone to go
to the theater to see a film about climate change,” says Kenner. Merchants of Doubt isn’t a
film like Al Gore’s 2006 An Inconvenient Truth, trying
to convince its audience on the science of global warming. Instead, it is a
“film about doubters and how people are able to stop us from believing
inconvenient science.”
The communication war around climate change is rooted in the
1950’s, when “Big Tobacco” realized they had a potential PR nightmare on their
hands. The objective then is the same now: confuse the issue and delay or stop
action. Business-as-usual is the only profitable path forward.
Which cigarette
does your doctor recommend?
The documentary is based on the book by Naomi Oreskes and Eric
Conway, following the development of the tobacco industry’s public relations
campaign to confuse the public, and scientists themselves, sowing doubt as
the poisonous nature of their products came to light.
From television commercials featuring doctors recommending their
favorite brand of cigarette to tobacco CEO’s swearing on the
honor of their word that “nicotine is not addictive,” the strategy was as
masterful in its execution as it was deceitful of its intent.
In the end, however, Big Tobacco may have won the initial
battle, but it ultimately will lose the war. So it is with climate change and
energy policy. The problem is that, for global warming, the stakes are even
higher than the damage and loss of human lives from cigarettes and tobacco.
Senators with
snowballs
We are quickly running out of time to effectively deal with the
transition to a new, sustainable, energy economy or avert the global impacts
from climate change, already underway.
As long as people pay any credence to senior senators offering
snow balls as proof that climate change isn’t happening, the merchants of doubt
win the battle.