'The threat is from those who accept climate change, not those who deny it'

If the biosphere is ruined it will be done by people who know that emissions must be cut - but refuse to alter the way they live

George Monbiot
Thursday September 21, 2006
The Guardian
<http://www.guardian.co.uk>

You have to pinch yourself. Until now the Sun has denouncedenvironmentalists as "loonies" and "eco beards". Last week it published"photographic proof that climate change is real". In a page that could have come straight from a Greenpeace pamphlet, it laid down 10 "rules" forits readers to follow: "Use public transport when possible; use energy-saving lightbulbs; turn off electric gadgets at the wall; do notuse a tumble dryer ... "

Two weeks ago the Economist also recanted. In the past it has assertedthat "Mr Bush was right to reject the prohibitively expensive Kyoto pact". It co-published the Copenhagen Consensus papers, which put climate change at the bottom of the list of global priorities. Now, in a special issue devoted to scaring the living daylights out of its readers, it maintainsthat "the slice of global output that would have to be spent to controlemissions is probably ... below 1%". It calls for carbon taxes and anambitious programme of government spending.

Almost everywhere, climate change denial now looks as stupid and as unacceptable as Holocaust denial. But I'm not celebrating yet. The danger is not that we will stop talking about climate change, or recognising thatit presents an existential threat to humankind. The danger is that we will talk ourselves to kingdom come.

If the biosphere is wrecked, it will not be done by those who couldn't give a damn about it, as they now belong to a diminishing minority. Itwill be destroyed by nice, well-meaning, cosmopolitan people who accept the case for cutting emissions, but who won't change by one iota the way they live. I know people who profess to care deeply about global warming,but who would sooner drink Toilet Duck than get rid of their Agas, patioheaters and plasma TVs, all of which are staggeringly wasteful....

Environmentalism has always been characterised as a middle-class concern; while this has often been unfair, there is now an undeniable nexus of class politics and morally superior consumerism. People allow themselves to believe that their impact on the planet is lower than that of the great unwashed because they shop at Waitrose rather than Asda, buy Tomme de Savoie instead of processed cheese slices and take eco-safaris in the Serengeti instead of package holidays in Torremolinos.

In reality, carbon emissions are closely related to income: the richer you are, the more likely you are to be wrecking the planet, however much stripped wood andhand-thrown crockery there is in your kitchen....

So the question which now confronts everyone - politicians, campaign groups, scientists, readers of the Guardian as well as the Economist and the Sun - is this: how much reality can you take? Do you really want tostop climate chaos, or do you just want to feel better about yourself?

George Monbiot's book Heat: How to Stop the Planet Burning is published by Allen Lane next week. He has also launched a website -turnuptheheat.org - exposing false environmental claims made bycorporations and celebrities

www.monbiot.com