Climate Change and Jeremy Clarkson.

[jobob_80]

I cheated a bit today. I went to Waterstones, and bought a number of books. Then I sat in the cafe and read a book I hadn't in fact bought. Nor do I intend to. It was the third book of Jeremy Clarkson's volume of columns, For Crying Out LoudNow Jeremy Clarkson is very much an Everyman. He's clearly not the most intelligent man in the country. He's

Comments

[hubcap_reloaded]

I think there are two general-issue flaws in your starting argument for me.

(1) "JC is a fantastic barometer for the way people -- non-expert people -- tend to think about climate change." I don't think this is a good rule to run by. Jeremy Clarkson is, ultimately, a sort of pantomime villain character who talks "sense" in the same way someone who suggests that old ladies who slow you down on the stairs should be shot talks sense. People enjoy listening to him and would probably say "He's got the right idea" but do not mistake this as meaning people would actually follow his advice on anything. (Including on cars, actually.) He's entertainment, not informative.

(2) "It's because the media coverage -- not the science, you understand, but the interpretation through the medium of journalists -- has planted a doubt that doesn't exist in any scientific sense." I don't think this is a reasonable interpretation of the media's coverage, certainly in the UK where every news report I've seen has stressed that the majority opinion is

[jobob_80]

I think I remain unconvinced by your first argument. I don't mean that people listen to JC, I just mean that if he's got a particular idea about climate change, chances are a lot of other people have that idea too -- not because they listen to him, but because that's the message that's getting through from a number of sometimes quite authoritative places. I think that if you look back you'll see that this is what I was saying in the article, and I stand by that opinion

[hubcap_reloaded]

...not because they listen to him, but because that's the message that's getting through from a number of sometimes quite authoritative places

This is still something I don't think is really accurate, though. Although without context of the exact Clarkson-ism I can't really say either way, it seems to me that there's no real debate on climate change in the sense of It's There.

Then along comes some new policy which will reduce climate change, and suddenly all that matters is that Mr Bloggs from Essex doesn't like it. Of course, I'm exaggerating, but I still feel that global warming is covered more as an abstract than as either a fact or an enemy to be fought with every resource at our disposal.Certainly, some specific attempts at fighting climate change have been difficult to implement when the general public have found they couldn't just carry one as before. I still think fortnightly bin collections is a poor idea, for example, and one which is always going to be a hard sell even if there's serious data that it helps with waste

[lazystorm]

I really enjoyed reading this post. And I agree with you.

A while ago I watched a documentary about the one really good electric car that was made. It got recalled, in fact I don't think it was ever sold, it was rented to people in America. It was really good for people living in the city and you could charge it up at home. But the car and oil industry didn't want them to be popular. So they pretended there wasn't enough interest and recalled them. People didn't want to give them back.

And I can't remember what they were called.

Anyway, I'd love to do more for the enviroment. But there are barriers in place and they are starting to annoy me. I shouldn't have to walk half a mile to drop off my glass recycling. Not in the city centre. I want to grow my own food, I shouldn't have to wait ten years for an allotment. Grr.

It seems to me that councils and companies are going to slowly with this.

[jobob_80]

I definitely agree. Facilities are few and far between (we drive to Glasgow to do our recycling, which isn't as bad as it sounds as we pass the recycling point on our way to my parents every Sunday), and the means of actually getting to these facilities basically relies on a car. Who wants to get two buses, both of which turn up nominally twice an hour, while carrying four bags of glass jars and bottles and six bags of mixed plastics?

[lazystorm]

Exactly. We could be doing more.

[lazystorm]

Just to let you know there is now a glass recycling bit really near our house. It's a block over. Hurrah! Result!

[rose_kolodny]

I agree about the transport in Glasgow. I've been nostalgic for London transport ever since I visited in December. I could get from Regents Park to Blackhealth to Wembley with Oyster that covers at least two different methods of transport. Glasgow really needs something akin to Oyster PAYG if it doesn't want to tell people how much stuff will cost. It also needs to start cleaning things properly: buses full of litter and traintracks covered in human excrement are big put-offs.

Ditto recycling; although Glasgow seems to have improved a lot lately.