Meet the Money Behind The Climate Denial Movement

It is deeply important that we seek to understand this and learn how to follow the money. There is a reason why there is an imperative to get the money of powerful special interests ― including from the fossil fuel industry, the military industrial complex, the pharmaceutical and insurance industries, and other huge financial corporate interests ― out of our political system and mainstream media. Once I came to understand that we Americans are an incredibly propagandized people, that awareness propelled me to become profoundly committed to the truth and to the ongoing process of courageously and humbly and fiercely peeling back the layers of my illusions, ignorance, and indoctrination. May courage be contagious! There is an urgent need that we fight the epidemic of disempowerment with the empowerment that comes with the truth! Let us unite in the struggle of our lives, which is to birth a conscious and compassionate society and world which cares for and protects life rather than destroys it. ― Molly

  

 Nearly a billion dollars a year is flowing into the

organized climate change counter-movement

By Colin Schultz

The overwhelming majority of climate scientists, international governmental bodies, relevant research institutes and scientific societies are in unison in saying that climate change is real, that it's a problem, and that we should probably do something about it now, not later. And yet, for some reason, the idea persists in some peoples' minds that climate change is up for debate, or that climate change is no big deal. 

Actually, it's not “for some reason” that people are confused. There's a very obvious reason. There is a very well-funded, well-orchestrated climate change-denial movement, one funded by powerful people with very deep pockets. In a new and incredibly thorough study, Drexel University sociologist Robert Brulle took a deep dive into the financial structure of the climate deniers, to see who is holding the purse strings.

According to Brulle's research, the 91 think tanks and advocacy organizations and trade associations that make up the American climate denial industry pull down just shy of a billion dollars each year, money used to lobby or sway public opinion on climate change and other issues.

“The anti-climate effort has been largely underwritten by conservative billionaires,” says the Guardian, “often working through secretive funding networks. They have displaced corporations as the prime supporters of 91 think tanks, advocacy groups and industry associations which have worked to block action on climate change.”

“This is how wealthy individuals or corporations translate their economic power into political and cultural power,” he said. “They have their profits and they hire people to write books that say climate change is not real. They hire people to go on TV and say climate change is not real. It ends up that people without economic power don't have the same size voice as the people who have economic power, and so it ends up distorting democracy.

Last year, PBS talked to Brulle about his investigation into the climate change countermovement. The project, says Brulle, is the first part of three: in the future he'll turn a similar eye to the climate movement and to the environmental movement. But for now, the focus is on the deniers.

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