“Climate Collusion—Is the Anemic News Coverage of the Crisis
Ignorance or Intentional?”
Tune in to KSQD 90.7FM “Be Bold America!”
Earth Day Show
Sunday, April 26, 2020 at 5:00pm
Mainstream news media outlets have been slow to recognize and report on the climate and other ecological systems collapse. Is it out of ignorance, arrogance or both? In the vacuum, disinformation campaigns have filled the void, “fueled” by right wing media and oil industry money. More than 90% of radio hosts are conservative. This is a big part of the denialism in our country.
Has the news media abandoned the climate and other environmental threats while doing the opposite with the coronavirus? The common denominators in both crises are: 1) Deadly global threat, no one is exempt, 2) Information and action can thwart or slow spread, 3) Personal actions have a public impact, 4) Requires national and international cooperation to reduce threat, 5) Requires some individual and societal sacrifice but benefit outweighs risk (suffering and death).
What corporate news organizations choose to focus on determines what the public is focused upon and this narrow-vision contributes to ignorance, avoidance, and lack of response. This failure has been key in the lack of national response thus worsening the climate crisis during critical years. Media managers don’t see it as their duty to provide solutions. So, whose responsibility IS it? What could possibly go wrong?
Interview Guests:
Betsy Rosenberg’s broadcast career in television began working for ABC Sports for the Olympics and then working, for two decades, in radio as a reporter and anchor with CBS News. Later, she created, hosted, and produced “EcoTalk” heard on the Air America radio network attracting an audience of 50,000 and becoming the first daily green show in broadcast history. During its ten-year run, Betsy interviewed hundreds of eco-leaders in science, politics, culture, business, tech, arts and activism – from Al Gore and Bernie Sanders to Drs. Jim Hansen and Katherine Hayhoe to CEO’s from all the pioneering green companies. Betsy blazed a trail in the field of environmental and climate journalism. She has written for Huffington Post and Medium.com, often about the media’s failure to cover climate change, and is a contributing chapter author in Climate Abandoned: We’re on the Endangered Species List, a #1 Amazon bestseller.
Dr. Richard Nolthenius is Astronomy Program Chair at Cabrillo College in Santa Cruz, CA. Dr. Nolthenius specializes in Mathematics, Aerospace Thermodynamics, Applied Physics, and Astronomy. In the past 10 years, Richard added climate science to his expertise, teaching a comprehensive course – Astro 7 – in Climate Science and its civilization context. By examining the climate science problem and searching for solutions, he has found it connected fundamentally to everything – from physics and evolutionary biology, to psychology, to economics and politics, to the thermodynamics of complex dynamical systems, and even the “strange attractors” of Chaos Theory. Solutions are not going to come from techno-wizardry, nor from politicians on the horizon today, nor from anyone mired in our current paradigms. Richard is a contributing chapter author in Climate Abandoned: We’re on the Endangered Species List, a #1 Amazon bestseller.
