Earth Day Hysteria

I find it interesting that supposed supporters of “science” are more upset with warming skeptics than hysterics.  The hysterics are the ones who act like Chicken Little—predicting increasingly catastrophic DOOM!!!! unless we act IMMEDIATELY!!! to SAVE THE PLANET!!!!  They are like the proverbial religious crank carrying a sign, stating, “The End of the World is Nigh!,” except the crank is harmless while the hysterics have potential to cause real harm.

Here’s an example from Newsweek—which really has become a disgrace on many levels—pitching hyper hysteria by identifying 100 of the earth’s most beautiful  places that will soon be destroyed by global warming.  From “100 Places to Remember Before They Disappear”:

What follows is a list—arbitrary, to be sure, and far from inclusive—of some of the places that could disappear, or be radically changed, if climatologists are right in their predictions of global warming.

Some of the doomed places include, Kauai:

The fourth largest of the Hawaiian Islands, Kauai is one of the wettest spots on earth. Large parts of the mountainous island are swathed in cloud. These lush and mossy forests are home to the colorful Hawaiian honeycreeper, an endangered bird species. Even small shifts in rainfall patterns could cause major local changes, putting the islands’ distinct ecosystem under severe stress.

And the penguins are more doomed than the polar bears!!!

Antarctica has no permanent human settlements.  The vast continent, however, is inhabited by a two-legged creature: the penguin. There are millions of them. Studies suggest that temperatures in the Antarctic Peninsula are rising at one of the fastest rates anywhere on earth, and if the sea ice disappears, so too would the penguins.

Then there’s PARIS!!!!!!

Paris’s grand avenues and iconic monuments attract 45 million tourists each year. Almost 12 million people live in the metropolitan area, making the city one of the most heavily populated places in Europe. France was hit particularly hard in a 2003 heat wave, an event that’s likely to become more common in the coming decades.

The human toll was caused by lack of air conditioners, but I digress.

Of course, it’s all a desperate and rather crass attempt to sell books and products:

100 Places to Remember Before they Disappear features 100 photographs from one hundred different places around the world in risk of disappearing or seriously threatened by climate change. The pictures are taken by some of the world´s best photographers and all the places are based on reports from UN´s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). On this website you can see the photographs and find further information and news about climate change and our project. “100 Places to Remember…” is also available as books, exhibitions, posters, postcards, calendars and TV-spots.

Every beautiful photo—and they are remarkable—has a link stating:

ORDER “100 PLACES” SPECIAL ISSUE NOW

Here’s the point: Fear of global warming is ebbing among the population precisely because people now understand that they’ve been played by the hysteria.  Perhaps that is why we see increasing levels of stridency and hyperbole. But if you want people who have grown doubtful that there is a CRISIS! (as opposed to a potential problem), screaming louder isn’t going to change minds.

This kind of thing should really concern those who worry about climate change because it—not skeptics—truly undermine trust and faith of the public who are being asked to sacrifice their own prosperity on the altar of what is fast becoming a religion.