Will climate extremism depress human civilization?
By Duggan Flanakin |June 3rd, 2023|58 Comments
Journalist Evelyn Pelczar writes that “fear has the power to sway, distort, and rupture the conventions of the human psyche.”
But just as importantly, as Psychology Today contends, “If people didn’t feel fear, they wouldn’t be able to protect themselves from legitimate threats.”
Franklin Roosevelt, in his first inaugural address, told a nation shaken by the Great Depression that “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
But fear is a driving force in today’s environmental journalism. The use of fear as a motivator is much older than the musings of the late Stephen Schneider, who once urged his green colleagues to “offer up scary scenarios, make simplified dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we may have” to gin up fear and anger over climate change.
https://www.cfact.org/2023/06/03/will-climate-extremism-depress-human-civilization/