This Changes Everything

Media coverage of climate change has diminished significantly over recent years, despite warnings from experts that severe weather conditions are clearly on the rise: in 2007, the three major American news network, CBS, NBC, and ABC, reported as many as 147 in-depth stories on climate change, but this figure fell to just fourteen in 2011. The denial strategy effectively covers up reliable evidence that has led 97% of environmental scientists to conclude that climate change, deriving purely from the life and habits of our global population, is really happening. This proof has been gathered over the past two decades from content analyses of peer-reviewed studies, as well as public statements made by virtually every expert organisation in the field and summarised in the 2014 American Association for the Advancement of Science Report.

In 2007, according to data from the Harris polling firm, 71% of Americans believed that the continued use of fossil fuels would cause the climate to change. By 2009, this number had dropped to 51%, and by June 2011, it had fallen further to 44%, less than half of the population. Similar trends have been recorded in the United Kingdom and Australia. Scott Keeter, director of the research survey at the Pew Research Center for People & the Press, described the statistics in the United States as being “among the largest shifts over a short period of time seen in recent public opinion history”. Recently, however, this trend appears to be reversing, which is most likely to be a result of the fact that more and more people are experiencing the direct consequences of extreme weather events.