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Guerrilla science journalism among the public broadcasters: The lonely climate fight of the weather forecasters

2021-10-10T14:49:29.130Z


A Nobel laureate in physics praises young climate activists, TV meteorologists are talking more and more clearly about extreme weather disasters. Both have to do with the failure of public broadcasters.


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»Tagesthemen« meteorologist Karsten Schwanke uses a graphic to illustrate how extreme weather events have been causing billions in damage for decades

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For a long time, a simple, immovable rule applied to television news: At the end of the day, »soft« topics come first, such as cultural issues, then sport - and then the weather.

The weather report has always been considered the most apolitical thing a news broadcast has to offer.

That’s all over.

In fact, the weather forecast in many news programs is now more political - or rather: more relevant than much of the rest of the reporting.

This is due to the fact that the once so apolitical weathermen are obviously fed up with the fact that the most important topic of the present is often still treated like a marginal note in public law.

Always the same wrong question

There are quite a number of these rebellious meteorologists who have significantly expanded their area of ​​responsibility - probably also because nobody else does it.

In the week before the general election, “Anne Will” asked “What is the climate worth to us?”, A question that was clearly wrongly posed in 2021 and which also made an inglorious appearance in each of the three TV trials.

The meteorologist Karsten Schwanke then showed a graphic this week during the »Tagesthemen« weather report that takes this question to absurdity: It shows that extreme weather events that cause billions in damages have been increasing in frequency since the 1980s, and the distances between them getting smaller and smaller.

The correct question has long been: "What will the climate crisis cost us if we don't finally act?" The current occasion this time was the rain catastrophe in Liguria, where as much water fell from the sky in one day as in Hamburg in a whole year.

One of many weather-related disasters this year.

Umbrella or sunscreen - that was a thing of the past

Conventional weather reports often seem a bit strange at the moment.

When someone in front of the camera has to try, for example, from devastating fires in the entire Mediterranean region to elegantly cast an arc to the question of whether "summer is coming back in southern Germany".

The weather itself is now political because it is always an indication of an existential threat.

But television often tries to continue to ignore this fact.

One could call what various TV meteorologists are now doing, guerrilla science journalism: The weather report, which used to only be about the question of whether you need an umbrella or sunscreen tomorrow, is now the climate report.

Not least because the most important of all topics, the future of mankind, is still not receiving the appropriate attention, time and depth elsewhere in the program.

Attacks on the messengers of the message

Karsten Schwanke is not the only one who practices guerrilla climate journalism.

Another striking representative of the genre is his ZDF colleague Özden Terli.

For some time now, Terli has been making "Adult Education Center" a climate crisis in its weather reports, as the "Tagesspiegel" once put it.

He is hostile and defamed for it.

Climate change deniers like to write angry letters to real or supposed superiors of people who do not suit them.

That is certainly not always pleasant in a public service apparatus.

more on the subject

  • Climate and Money: How the Rich Can Improve the WorldA column by Christian Stöcker

  • German Nobel Laureate in Physics: Are we currently experiencing climate change or a climate catastrophe, Mr. Hasselmann? An interview by Johann Grolle

Similar attacks hit anyone who dared to publicly announce simple scientific facts on the topic of the climate crisis.

Sven Plöger (ARD), another person who repeatedly uses his weather reports for climate education, has also been defamed for years.

There are YouTube videos in which he is shown with a pinocchio nose attached and accused of "climate lie".

Aggressive, anti-science warriors of faith

Plöger has written a book about the climate crisis, Schwanke, too, as an author, talk show guest and protagonist of explanatory videos, repeatedly points out the impending catastrophe, Terli is involved with the Scientists for Future.

That makes people like her - there are various others, the three of whom are only substitutes here - a target.

There are still many who still want to believe the old propaganda lies of the oil and coal industry.

Aggressive, anti-science warriors of faith who believe they are in the right and the rest of the world in the wrong.

You will find them again in the forum for this column.

They are often remarkably coordinated, distort the image of public discourse, abuse and lie.

And some of their drivers are simply unscrupulous but enterprising conspiracy entrepreneurs.

In Germany there are blogs such as the »Axis of the Good«, where those stuck on the old lies gather, their own climate denier book market with titles such as »Green and Dumb«, publishers such as Kopp-Verlag, who constantly deny conspiracy ideologues and climate change deniers deliver new fodder, although their assertions sound even more absurd with each new extreme weather event.

In truth, hardly anyone listens to these people anymore, but they are very loud and very aggressive.

And then there is the supposed "research institute" EIKE, which allegedly makes scientific considerations, but in truth has no specialist publications to show, but has excellent relationships with disinformation organizations financed by the oil industry, such as the so-called Heartland Institute.

And to the AfD and the "Berlin Circle" of the Union.

The swamp from which the trolls crawl

The aggressive letter writers and YouTubers, with whom the Schwankes, Plögers and Terlis of German television have to grapple when they report simple facts about the connection between climate and weather, come from this swamp.

Perhaps an even bigger problem, however, is that they have to do that in the first place.

The fact that climate change on premium-funded television appears in the weather report when in doubt and not in every single news broadcast, every foreign report and every second or third talk show, that is the real failure of the public broadcasters.

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As is well known, the ARD has rejected the initiative to replace the »Börse vor eight«, which is only relevant for a very small part of the audience, with a program called »Klima vor Acht«, which is really relevant for everyone.

ZDF director Thomas Bellut said on the same question: “Climate is important, but then comes the next topic.

Topics change all the time. "

The mother of all topics

This last sentence reflects the problem that the guerrilla meteorologists are trying to tackle: It is sheer nonsense that the topic of climate will soon be superseded by the "next topic".

On the contrary: with each passing year in this world that is getting hotter and hotter, the extreme weather catastrophes will continue to increase, quick action will become even more urgent, the political debate about the right path will become more heated, and economic changes will become more obvious.

This is what distinguishes the "issue" of climate from all others, perhaps apart from the similarly threatening extinction of species.

It is the mother of all subjects.

And it will stay that way until we arrive at real, global zero emissions.

At least there are initial approaches: The MDR, for example, has declared October, the month before the global climate conference in Glasgow, to be a “climate month” and is running an extensive special program. It is high time for such actions, but they too are not enough: The constant balancing, adjournment and distraction - out of supposed "neutrality" - must be over.

When the physicist Klaus Hasselmann received the Nobel Prize this week for developing a central climate model, it was once again seen as a “political message” from the committee in Stockholm.

Hasselmann himself has publicly and clearly recognized himself as a supporter and partner of the Fridays for Future movement, because, according to the Nobel Prize laureate, »the youth« are now finally making the issue public.

What Hasselmann only said through the flower: Nobody else does it, although there are people whose job that would be.

Most people who, like him, have been dealing professionally with the topic of climate and weather for a long time are increasingly stunned by the continued inaction of politics, but also by the media representation of the most important topic of all.

It would be nice if climate guerrilla journalism was no longer needed soon, because the mother of all topics finally gets the airtime it deserves.

Source: spiegel

All tech articles on 2021-10-10

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