The dramatics of global warming

John Kerry, secretary of state, likened global climate change to weapons of mass destruction, poverty, outbreaks of disease and terrorism just before the start of this week in Jakarta, Indonesia. You would assume that our leading diplomat would have a little more common sense. No such luck.

I should probably mention in the spirit of full disclosure, I don’t buy into the whole climate change argument, at least not the part about how we are fiendishly causing it. Look up how many harmful emissions a spewing volcano releases into the atmosphere and you’ll see why.

Earth is not this perfectly harmonized system of ecological utopia. It is rather a sphere of chaos.

That means things change. That means temperatures, sea levels and ice flows all fluctuate. And when they do, a better approach would be to gaze in amazement, in my opinion, than screaming Armageddon.

Regardless of your stance on the argument, I think we can all agree it’s not exactly in the same category as suicide bombers, Jihadists or the epidemics of AIDS and malaria — not to mention nuclear weapons. The comparison is almost insulting to those who have lost loved ones to terrorism, disease, poverty and, if not nuclear weapons themselves, the hunt for them.

My suspicion is that Kerry was only trying to bring seriousness and urgency to the national and international discussion about how to handle greenhouse gas emissions and the like. Which is the sad part.

Since, in reality, what he has done is curtailed the dialogue by making it comical, especially to his environmental opponents. Ironically enough, it is these people he needs to sell the legitimacy of the issue to the most.

That’s how discussions work. We need contribution from both sides.

If his comments only grow the divide between the two camps, no solution will likely be reached. And that puts all of us in a worse position.

The great irony is that ambassadors should be taking picks to break the brick wall, not adding bricks to it.

We have become a nation of dramatics and theatrical antics. Every problem is the largest of the century, the generation, the political term. It goes on and on.

A greater problem may be figuring out where the simple concept of an honest dialogue went. It has vanished, and my instinct is to blame the politicians. But maybe that would be incorrect.

The use of dramatics may have more to say about the audience than the messenger. If we, the voters, could learn to care about the issues without politicians putting a rhetorical gun to our heads before we want to solve them, maybe our secretary of state wouldn’t need to make ridiculous comparisons.

— cgerst@indiana.edu
Follow columnist Cameron Gerst on Twitter @CameronGerst.