6 ms·

The audacious PR plot that seeded doubt about climate change

72 points by sirteno 4y ago

hunglee2 4y ago
it is high time we called 'PR' what it is - corporate propaganda - in order to strip the discipline of the legitimacy it somehow retains. It's basically paid for BS, and when it comes to climate change, everyone is going to be paying the price
- aurora72 4y ago
  So you believe whatever story appears on BBC?
  - phtrivier 4y ago
    "So you believe BBC exists ? Do your own research !". Yes, though, I'm inclined to believe a sourced article from a major publicly founded outlet including quotes from the "accused" admiting to what they have done, over most corporate PR. But maybe I should not, what do we care anyway ?
    - aurora72 4y ago
      They'll of course add the "sources". They are not stupid. Addendum: Yep I believe BBC exists.
  - hunglee2 4y ago
    No - the claim that PR agencies were involved in climate change denial is pretty solid. It's basically their work. My point is that we should resist the renaming BS
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- headsoup 4y ago
  Do you at least appreciate the irony of the BBC here saying we shouldn't give contrary opinions a stage as a way of ensuring integrity?
  - hunglee2 4y ago
    yes indeed I do, BBC itself started for PR purposes, I believe BBC Worldwide retains it as its core purpose
    - Angostura 4y ago
      The BBC was started with the core mission to 'Inform, educate, entertain.' The BBC World Service - funded by the Foreign Office, rather than from the core BBC license fee funding, did indeed have soft-power as part of its remit.
  - Barrin92 4y ago
    The BBC as a public broadcaster isn't in the business of hosting contrarians for profit but to broadcast factful news, so.. not really. The opinion of scientists qualified to speak on the question of CC matters, letting literal oil lobbyists speak is like asking the fox if we should keep the door to the henhouse open.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - jamessb 4y ago
      > The BBC as a public broadcaster isn't in the business of hosting contrarians In the past, the BBC certainly has been in the business of "hosting contrarians", though perhaps with the misguided intention of providing balance rather than attracting viewers. For example, OFCOM found them to have broken broadcasting standards by allowing Lord Lawson (a well-known climate change denialist) to make false statements on the Today Program [1, 2] without being challenged or corrected. This happened despite a complaint being upheld about a previous appearance of the same guest on the same program [3]. [1]: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-43699607 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-43699607 [2]: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0012/112701/issue-351-broadcast-on-demand-bulletin.pdf https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0012/112701/... [3]: https://web.archive.org/web/20140901181614/https://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/comp-reports/ecu/today13022014 https://web.archive.org/web/20140901181614/https://www.bbc.c...
- kaushikc 4y ago
  Proper terminology needs to be crafted for corporate tactics and their incessant attempts towards undermining public good.
  - tiborsaas 4y ago
    No word-crafting is needed, it's called a conspiracy.
- Comevius 4y ago
  It's crimes against humanity, it's what it is. Sabotaging the human race for personal gain is the ultimate crime, it makes Hitler look like a saint. Any sentient species in the Universe wishing to prevail must, absolutely must be able to effectively discourage such behavior.
  - silverpepsi 4y ago
    ...Sentence two, and y'all folks keep wondering who is fueling the lack of trust & emergence of conspiracy theories. When you're fueling the emotional aspect with your words that unabashedly, you are making people who are on the fence or unsure certain something is really wrong with the mainstream claims. I can tell you this just from the reaction you gave me in the pit of my stomach.
    - Comevius 4y ago
      I have strong sense of justice, but this is how countries are built to last. Rest assured that I wouldn't let some libertarian think tank and their corporate sponsors get away with such manipulation of public opinion for personal gain. On the other hand if you are on the fence about climate change please call me ASAP, I have some property to sell.
    - superchroma 4y ago
      No, it's an emergency. We've screwed the planet, big time. When they're cutting open whales to reveal heaps of plastic, find it on Everest's peak and also in our meat at the supermarket, and when 3M is still, to this very day, trying to weasel out of being forbidden from making PFAS (a pointless, stupid chemical group that we basically didn't need as a race), we can't afford to sit idly by and entertain the feelings of people who never really had an interest in anything outside of their yard.
  - celdon25 4y ago
    > it makes Hitler look like a saint. You clearly don't understand what you are talking about, based on this.
flooow 4y ago
> "My role was to identify the voices that were not in the mainstream and to give those voices a stage," Rheem says. [...] > He says the media was hungry for these perspectives. > "Journalists were actually actively looking for the contrarians. It was really feeding an appetite that was already there." A rare example of the BBC breaking the media omertà on itself here. You thought journalism was supposed to help you understand the world? Nope, reading our slop will actually make you *less* able to make informed decisions. There was a good paper written about this all the way back in 2007 [1]. Makes for some eyebrow-raising reading in the year-of-our-lord 2022. [1] https://www.eci.ox.ac.uk/publications/downloads/boykoff07-geoforum.pdf https://www.eci.ox.ac.uk/publications/downloads/boykoff07-ge...
- truculent 4y ago
  In the UK, you need a substantial amount of meta-knowledge about the media outlets and political landscape in order to use news reporting to become more, not less or dis-, informed. It’s a shame that the idea of learning media studies and related subjects at school or university were so maligned in the 00s, but probably not a coincidence either.
  - flooow 4y ago
    > In the UK, you need a substantial amount of meta-knowledge about the media outlets and political landscape in order to use news reporting to become more, not less or dis-, informed. This is most-certainly true, and an interesting corrollary is that journalists themselves very likely underestimate the impact their work can have. Being on the inside, they of course know (because 'everybody knows') that this Daily Mail article about Jeremy Corbyn being a soviet spy (yes, it is real [1]) is utter dreck, basically just popcorn nonsense for bored retirees to flick past on the way to the sports pages. Journalists might have a hard time believing/understanding that people actually trust and respect them, and may even take what they say at face value, with actual consequences. Of course, their proprieters understand this full-well, which is why e.g. Murdoch is willing to plough endless cash into loss-making endeavours like The Times. Not that I intend to absolve journalists whatsoever. Their actions have literally destroyed everything (we just haven't realised it yet). [1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5401097/Jeremy-Corbyn-paid-Czech-secret-police-spy-claims.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5401097/Jeremy-Corb...
everyone 4y ago
This is a good book about that sort of business. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt
kubb 4y ago
People will help make Earth unlivable for half a million dollars :( To me, this is a more grave crime than murder, and yet our socioeconomic system rewards it.
sammalloy 4y ago
> On an early autumn day in 1992, E Bruce Harrison, a man widely acknowledged as the father of environmental PR, stood up in a room full of business leaders and delivered a pitch like no other. Sadly, the article makes no mention of his wife Patricia, who has run the Corporation for Public Broadcasting since 2005.
manuelabeledo 4y ago
> He maintains that climate science was too uncertain in the 1990s to warrant "drastic actions", and that developing countries - particularly China and Russia - have ultimately been responsible for the decades of climate inaction, rather than American industry. This is such a classic at this point. "Look, even if we are partly responsible, and way ahead in per capita terms, look at how others are doing overall". I feel that this kind of hypocrisy has permeated down from geopolitical excuses, to the common people, who are now blamed, very publicly so, when it comes to essentially any kind of pollution, from air travel to plastic use.
h2odragon 4y ago
There were grass roots activists already talking about these issues, several years before these people got together. The GCC was professional lobbyists and advocates jumping on a market they just discovered existed.

72 points by sirteno 4y ago

it is high time we called 'PR' what it is - corporate propaganda - in order to strip the discipline of the legitimacy it somehow retains. It's basically paid for BS, and when it comes to climate change, everyone is going to be paying the price

aurora72 4y ago
So you believe whatever story appears on BBC?
- phtrivier 4y ago
  "So you believe BBC exists ? Do your own research !". Yes, though, I'm inclined to believe a sourced article from a major publicly founded outlet including quotes from the "accused" admiting to what they have done, over most corporate PR. But maybe I should not, what do we care anyway ?
  - aurora72 4y ago
    They'll of course add the "sources". They are not stupid. Addendum: Yep I believe BBC exists.
- hunglee2 4y ago
  No - the claim that PR agencies were involved in climate change denial is pretty solid. It's basically their work. My point is that we should resist the renaming BS
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
headsoup 4y ago
Do you at least appreciate the irony of the BBC here saying we shouldn't give contrary opinions a stage as a way of ensuring integrity?
- hunglee2 4y ago
  yes indeed I do, BBC itself started for PR purposes, I believe BBC Worldwide retains it as its core purpose
  - Angostura 4y ago
    The BBC was started with the core mission to 'Inform, educate, entertain.' The BBC World Service - funded by the Foreign Office, rather than from the core BBC license fee funding, did indeed have soft-power as part of its remit.
- Barrin92 4y ago
  The BBC as a public broadcaster isn't in the business of hosting contrarians for profit but to broadcast factful news, so.. not really. The opinion of scientists qualified to speak on the question of CC matters, letting literal oil lobbyists speak is like asking the fox if we should keep the door to the henhouse open.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - jamessb 4y ago
    > The BBC as a public broadcaster isn't in the business of hosting contrarians In the past, the BBC certainly has been in the business of "hosting contrarians", though perhaps with the misguided intention of providing balance rather than attracting viewers. For example, OFCOM found them to have broken broadcasting standards by allowing Lord Lawson (a well-known climate change denialist) to make false statements on the Today Program [1, 2] without being challenged or corrected. This happened despite a complaint being upheld about a previous appearance of the same guest on the same program [3]. [1]: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-43699607 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-43699607 [2]: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0012/112701/issue-351-broadcast-on-demand-bulletin.pdf https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0012/112701/... [3]: https://web.archive.org/web/20140901181614/https://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/comp-reports/ecu/today13022014 https://web.archive.org/web/20140901181614/https://www.bbc.c...
kaushikc 4y ago
Proper terminology needs to be crafted for corporate tactics and their incessant attempts towards undermining public good.
- tiborsaas 4y ago
  No word-crafting is needed, it's called a conspiracy.
Comevius 4y ago
It's crimes against humanity, it's what it is. Sabotaging the human race for personal gain is the ultimate crime, it makes Hitler look like a saint. Any sentient species in the Universe wishing to prevail must, absolutely must be able to effectively discourage such behavior.
- silverpepsi 4y ago
  ...Sentence two, and y'all folks keep wondering who is fueling the lack of trust & emergence of conspiracy theories. When you're fueling the emotional aspect with your words that unabashedly, you are making people who are on the fence or unsure certain something is really wrong with the mainstream claims. I can tell you this just from the reaction you gave me in the pit of my stomach.
  - Comevius 4y ago
    I have strong sense of justice, but this is how countries are built to last. Rest assured that I wouldn't let some libertarian think tank and their corporate sponsors get away with such manipulation of public opinion for personal gain. On the other hand if you are on the fence about climate change please call me ASAP, I have some property to sell.
  - superchroma 4y ago
    No, it's an emergency. We've screwed the planet, big time. When they're cutting open whales to reveal heaps of plastic, find it on Everest's peak and also in our meat at the supermarket, and when 3M is still, to this very day, trying to weasel out of being forbidden from making PFAS (a pointless, stupid chemical group that we basically didn't need as a race), we can't afford to sit idly by and entertain the feelings of people who never really had an interest in anything outside of their yard.
- celdon25 4y ago
  > it makes Hitler look like a saint. You clearly don't understand what you are talking about, based on this.

flooow 4y ago

> "My role was to identify the voices that were not in the mainstream and to give those voices a stage," Rheem says. [...] > He says the media was hungry for these perspectives. > "Journalists were actually actively looking for the contrarians. It was really feeding an appetite that was already there." A rare example of the BBC breaking the media omertà on itself here. You thought journalism was supposed to help you understand the world? Nope, reading our slop will actually make you *less* able to make informed decisions. There was a good paper written about this all the way back in 2007 [1]. Makes for some eyebrow-raising reading in the year-of-our-lord 2022. [1] https://www.eci.ox.ac.uk/publications/downloads/boykoff07-geoforum.pdf https://www.eci.ox.ac.uk/publications/downloads/boykoff07-ge...

truculent 4y ago
In the UK, you need a substantial amount of meta-knowledge about the media outlets and political landscape in order to use news reporting to become more, not less or dis-, informed. It’s a shame that the idea of learning media studies and related subjects at school or university were so maligned in the 00s, but probably not a coincidence either.
- flooow 4y ago
  > In the UK, you need a substantial amount of meta-knowledge about the media outlets and political landscape in order to use news reporting to become more, not less or dis-, informed. This is most-certainly true, and an interesting corrollary is that journalists themselves very likely underestimate the impact their work can have. Being on the inside, they of course know (because 'everybody knows') that this Daily Mail article about Jeremy Corbyn being a soviet spy (yes, it is real [1]) is utter dreck, basically just popcorn nonsense for bored retirees to flick past on the way to the sports pages. Journalists might have a hard time believing/understanding that people actually trust and respect them, and may even take what they say at face value, with actual consequences. Of course, their proprieters understand this full-well, which is why e.g. Murdoch is willing to plough endless cash into loss-making endeavours like The Times. Not that I intend to absolve journalists whatsoever. Their actions have literally destroyed everything (we just haven't realised it yet). [1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5401097/Jeremy-Corbyn-paid-Czech-secret-police-spy-claims.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5401097/Jeremy-Corb...

everyone 4y ago

This is a good book about that sort of business. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt

kubb 4y ago

People will help make Earth unlivable for half a million dollars :( To me, this is a more grave crime than murder, and yet our socioeconomic system rewards it.

sammalloy 4y ago

> On an early autumn day in 1992, E Bruce Harrison, a man widely acknowledged as the father of environmental PR, stood up in a room full of business leaders and delivered a pitch like no other. Sadly, the article makes no mention of his wife Patricia, who has run the Corporation for Public Broadcasting since 2005.

manuelabeledo 4y ago

> He maintains that climate science was too uncertain in the 1990s to warrant "drastic actions", and that developing countries - particularly China and Russia - have ultimately been responsible for the decades of climate inaction, rather than American industry. This is such a classic at this point. "Look, even if we are partly responsible, and way ahead in per capita terms, look at how others are doing overall". I feel that this kind of hypocrisy has permeated down from geopolitical excuses, to the common people, who are now blamed, very publicly so, when it comes to essentially any kind of pollution, from air travel to plastic use.

h2odragon 4y ago

There were grass roots activists already talking about these issues, several years before these people got together. The GCC was professional lobbyists and advocates jumping on a market they just discovered existed.