{"id":20603,"date":"2016-05-14T10:29:55","date_gmt":"2016-05-14T15:29:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=20603"},"modified":"2016-05-14T10:29:55","modified_gmt":"2016-05-14T15:29:55","slug":"how-the-fort-mcmurray-climate-conversation-went-down-in-flames","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=20603","title":{"rendered":"How the Fort McMurray Climate Conversation Went Down in Flames"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"page__title title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.desmog.ca\/2016\/05\/10\/how-fort-mcmurray-climate-conversation-went-down-flames\">How the Fort McMurray Climate Conversation Went Down in Flames<\/a><\/h3>\n<article class=\"node-10594 node node-blog node-promoted view-mode-full clearfix\">\n<header>\n<p class=\"submitted desktop-only\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.desmog.ca\/sites\/beta.desmogblog.com\/files\/styles\/full_width_blog_image\/public\/blogimages\/Fort%20McMurray%20fire.jpg?itok=RpNGJ82t\" alt=\"\" width=\"826\" height=\"551\" \/><\/p>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"horizontal-social-bar horizontal-social-bar-top clearfix\">Connecting extreme weather events with climate change isn\u2019t exactly a new\u00a0thing.<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<p>After Hurricane Sandy devastated parts of New York and New Jersey in 2012, Bloomberg published a front page spread proclaiming, \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2012-11-01\/its-global-warming-stupid\" target=\"_blank\">It\u2019s Global Warming, Stupid<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For years,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.worldbank.org\/en\/news\/press-release\/2014\/05\/23\/climate-change-a-fundamental-threat-to-development-world-bank\" target=\"_blank\">major storms<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2015\/08\/21\/science\/climate-change-intensifies-california-drought-scientists-say.html?_r=0\" target=\"_blank\">droughts<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.macleans.ca\/news\/canada\/alberta-flooding-sets-records-prompts-calls-for-action-on-climate-change\/\" target=\"_blank\">floods<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ucsusa.org\/global_warming\/science_and_impacts\/impacts\/global-warming-and-wildfire.html\" target=\"_blank\">fires<\/a>\u00a0have been connected to climate change. The climate angle was even\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/opinion\/a-wildfire-wake-up-call-for-canada\/article25903467\/\" target=\"_blank\">fair game<\/a>\u00a0during last summer\u2019s wildfires in western\u00a0Canada.<\/p>\n<p>So how did the climate conversation around the still-raging Fort McMurray wildfire that destroyed thousands of homes become so befuddling-ly messed\u00a0up?<\/p>\n<p>Conversations about climate change as a factor in the wildfires has garnered about as much attention as the wildfires themselves. For a recap of the \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.calgarysun.com\/2016\/05\/04\/middle-finger-salute-to-fort-mac-climate-tweeters\" target=\"_blank\">middle-finger salutes<\/a>,\u201d\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mavisgrizzltits\/status\/728154769957642240\" target=\"_blank\">schadenfreude<\/a>\u00a0and #tinyviolins mock-sympathy for the people of Fort McMurray, check out this article on\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.slate.com\/articles\/health_and_science\/science\/2016\/05\/the_mcmurray_fire_is_worse_because_of_climate_change_and_we_need_to_talk.html\" target=\"_blank\">Slate<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>(Add in, May 12: It&#8217;s worthwhile to point out that while there were a lot of unfortunate aspects of the public conversation about the fire, many environmental\u00a0<span class=\"caps\">NGO<\/span>s rallied their organizational capacity to raise money and basic support for evacuees. The executive directors of Canada&#8217;s most prominent environmental groups including the David Suzuki Foundation, Ecojustice, Ecology Ottawa, Environmental Defence, Equiterre, Greenpeace, LeadNow, Sierra Club, Stand and West Coast Environmental Law urged support for evacuees in a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/blog\/Blogentry\/executive-directors-at-environmental-groups-u\/blog\/56393\/\" target=\"_blank\">joint press release\u00a0<\/a>published Friday, May\u00a06.)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.climateaccess.org\/team\" target=\"_blank\">Cara Pike<\/a>, climate communications expert with Climate Access, says the urge to link what\u2019s happening in Fort McMurray to climate change should be tempered by a keen sensitivity to the very real human suffering on the\u00a0ground.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"dquo\">\u201c<\/span>We need to lead with our humanity,\u201d Pike told DeSmog Canada. \u201cThis is a good time to listen very, very hard to what people are dealing with, what they care about, what they want for their futures and try to find those common\u00a0places.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How the Fort McMurray Climate Conversation Went Down in Flames Connecting extreme weather events with climate change isn\u2019t exactly a new\u00a0thing. After Hurricane Sandy devastated parts of New York and New Jersey in 2012, Bloomberg published a front page spread proclaiming, \u201cIt\u2019s Global Warming, Stupid.\u201d For years,\u00a0major storms,\u00a0droughts,\u00a0floods\u00a0and\u00a0fires\u00a0have been connected to climate change. The climate [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[12861,141,5317,7214,7953],"class_list":["post-20603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","tag-carol-linnitt","tag-climate-change","tag-desmog-blog","tag-desmog-canada","tag-fort-mcmurray"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20603"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20603\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20604,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20603\/revisions\/20604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}