Bishop Hill Another journalist threatened
Dec 7, 2009 Climate: other Media In the comments to an earlier thread, this:
I am a journalist and have been "warned", in a manner similar to the one posted, by a social economics professor.
The "offence" was a summary of Lord Monckton's opinion that AGW is diverting resources, causing food price hikes and adds to human misery.
The threat was that the mere reporting of information would be taken as a direct adoption of Monckton's views and the writer and the magazine would be seen as oil industry shills. The prof threatened by phone but refused the invite to write his own two page response in the form of an article, not just in the letters page.
My temper is very elastic, but not infinite. Having recycled (certifiably) my last car in March 2000 and being a 100 per cent bike commuter ever since, I got pissed at being called an oil industry shill.
The lesson- you will be surprised how quickly these people slink back into the darkness when told unequivocally to bugger off. They are also very vulnerable to humor, probably because they are humorless themselves.
I've made a minor change in the punctuation to the first sentence to clarify the meaning.
Reader Comments (8)
JCCT
Journalist Concerned for Climate Truth
Time to set up a coalition with a website?
I think we need to find out who has been threatened first.
The easiest answer to the 'oil shill' slur is surely now to point out the Shell/Tyndall connection.
Big oil don't care whether the world is warming or cooling - they will find a way to make healthy profits whichever way it goes. Whether that is by selling oil or cornering the market in alternative energy sources.(They do afterall have large pockets to buy a raft of patents in whatever looks credible) Hell, they're as keen as any other corporations to get on with emissions trading because they can make money at that too.
I'm more than happy to endorse the idea that humour is a solution, or at least an effective weapon. A bit of mockery never comes amiss either provided it is reasonably intellegently done and not gratuitously offensive.
Like all religious fanatics they are indeed quite humourless which, if we did but know it, is where we will (hopefully) win in the end.
We've just had a Google Wave discussion on "Climategate" vandalised. All links to "sceptical" reports or clips have be corrupted with links to Anime cartoons. Text has been changed and video removed. In a separate "wave" the perpetrator said he was paid to do it to all such discussions, and would go away once Copenhagen was over.
It's a shame because it was good balanced debate - always polite, and very informative.
The fact is there’s a tremendous amount MORE money tied up in Governmental ponzi-schemes associated with Global Warming, either regulatory, in advertising, or in "carbon market trading." It's a ponzi-scheme, that’s what Government’s do, they create open-ended self-perpetuating ponzi-schemes driven by tax monies. Just look at how "Social Security" works, or "Socialized Medicine."
Governments have the ability to tax entire national populations – a few billion here and a few billion there and pretty soon you’re talking real money - just ask George Soros - money in amounts far eclipsing anything the Oil Industry can come close to.
This is a very typical of the "shut up" tactics that are used to A: get one to shut up or B: get people to not listen. One is threatened, ostracized, mocked, whatever it takes to get you to "shut up" or be portrayed as some kind of intolerant baby-eating monster so people don't listen to you. If you remain outspoken, your name is used by various "information" outlets as a synonym for bad things.
If one refuses to "shut up", then they will be ignored by the various major communications outlets. Thankfully, the stranglehold on information flow by the communications oligopoly is quickly eroding.
Step one is really to publish the name of the offending professor.
Let the internet know that Professor So-and-so from the University of Wherever is a thuggish bastard who threatens to smear who say things he doesn't like.