On Having My Integrity Attacked in the Climate Change Debate
Don’t worry, I’m not crying about being criticized.
When I decided to publish my writing on Medium, I knew that it would invite criticism, critique, and even attacks. That’s okay. I enjoy the intellectual banter, and I enjoy having my ideas challenged by others. It’s all part of participating in the great conversation of human history, even if one’s level of involvement seems small. The discussions are especially good when one or both sides see something they didn’t see before or shift their insight, their understanding, or their stance. In many ways, I live for those shifts.
I write mostly about climate change, and my views tend to be unconventional. While I was an idealist many decades ago, a long business career taught me that on a large scale, people rarely change their behavior based on insistence or cajoling. Rather, they change when they choose to change. This has given me a pragmatic view and it has affected my perspective on climate change. I’ve tried to bring that perspective to my writing.
This perspective is why I argue that consumption reduction is a flawed strategy. It is also why I have argued that renewable energy production is far more important and effective at reducing GHG emissions. It is far easier to convince people to eliminate emissions by driving emission-free cars than it is to convince them to reduce driving by 50% or even, as some argue, to stop driving at all.
Although I have been misinterpreted as “defending consumerism” and even accused of being on the payroll of fossil fuel and nuclear companies, none of these misinterpretations are true. I’ve been an independent entrepreneur all my life (except for three years in the solar industry), an environmentalist since long before it was cool, and I live in a 520-square-foot cabin in the woods of northern Wisconsin. I have always kept a garden, though the size has fluctuated, I cook nearly everything from scratch, and I generally try to leave a minimal impact on the earth from my lifestyle. I last flew in an airplane in 2020. I’m sure I am not the lowest-level consumer on the planet, but I also don’t feel my lifestyle is consumption extravagant. Perhaps some readers will set me straight on that perspective, but that’s how I see it.
Wendell Berry once wrote that it is impossible to defend private practices in public, and I agree. So, it is with some hesitation that I reveal these aspects of my lifestyle. Yet I do so to illustrate a point. I actually agree with everyone who promotes a lower consumption lifestyle, and in many ways, I have lived that. Not perfectly. Not as completely as some. But on the other hand, I’m certainly not a mega-consumer or, worse, a defender of extravagant consumption.
This gets me to my point. The pain of being accused of being a lackey for fossil fuel companies or the nuclear industry doesn’t come from the implied accusation of hypocrisy; it comes from the loss of intellectual clarity. I hate being misunderstood. I hate having the conversation distracted into something so irrelevant as non-existent allegiances. I mean, gheeez! The Earth is burning, flooding, and slowly becoming uninhabitable; pragmatic, realistic action is urgent. We need a foolproof strategy — one that people will nearly universally comply with. I believe we are all trying our best to contribute to that strategy. Certainly, that is my goal. We just don’t have time for distractions.
Motivations can and should be questioned, especially if a challenge is coming that seems off-kilter. I am guessing that many of my critics experience my writing as being just so off-kilter. Hence, the questions arise. But I would also challenge all of us to try to understand the real motivations before jumping to conclusions. Our assumptions about what others are saying often distract us from hearing the real questions they are asking, the points they are making, and the challenges they are issuing.
Perhaps we should start not by questioning others, but by questioning ourselves.
I have found this to be true for myself. At times, I write off the ideas of others in the same way. But I have come to realize that when I do that, it is usually because their ideas are challenging my ideologies. Indeed, my strongest reactions tend to be reserved for the ideas most challenging to those ideologies. On good days, I try to see them for what they are and welcome the challenge. On bad days, I just react, project, and accuse.
The problem, of course, is that when I react, project, and accuse, I contribute absolutely nothing to the debate. Rather, I harden my ideological position, while the attack usually puts the other person on the defensive and hardens them into their position. Conversation stops. Listening stops. Insights evaporate. Most importantly, nothing gets solved. It is like drifting sideways in an emergency. We all get stuck.
Political discourse has often been hampered by ad hominem attacks — attacks on the person rather than the idea. Such attacks purposely change the focus to who is landing punches rather than solving the issues. For the most part, it is a political strategy for those with ideas that cannot persuade. Since engagement of the idea is a losing strategy, they turn to attack the messenger. It is often an effective strategy, even though tragic for civil society.
We cannot afford to have the climate discourse fall into the same trap. We cannot afford to be stuck. There is a lot to do, and we need to do it quickly. We need to focus on strategies that will work, that people will adopt, and that will stem the tide of the climate change disaster. We need new technologies, policies, programs, and commitments. The attacks on my integrity — indeed, attacks on any climate writer’s integrity — are sad to me because they indicate we have moved away from discourse on solutions and into an angry dialog similar to our political discourse. We really can’t afford that.
So, my invitation to all of us writing on climate is this: Let’s watch ourselves on this level. Let’s engage in robust debate and discussion about the solutions, and let’s realize that when we are tempted to go after the person rather than the idea, we are engaging in a political strategy to stop communication. Let’s ask ourselves if we really want that. Perhaps we have all done it more than once. And perhaps we can restrain ourselves for the bigger win in the future.
Anthony Signorelli
Ideas, insights, and imagination to help you live better in a worsening world. Topics include Men, #MeToo, and Masculinity; Postcapitalism; Climate Change; Digitalization and Cryptocurrency; Green Energy; Retirement and financial planning… basically everything that addresses making life better in this challenging time of history.