{"id":57870,"date":"2021-05-15T15:05:12","date_gmt":"2021-05-15T20:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=57870"},"modified":"2021-05-15T15:05:12","modified_gmt":"2021-05-15T20:05:12","slug":"exxonmobil-wants-you-to-feel-responsible-for-climate-change-so-it-doesnt-have-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=57870","title":{"rendered":"ExxonMobil wants you to feel responsible for climate change so it doesn\u2019t have to"},"content":{"rendered":"
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ExxonMobil wants you to feel responsible for climate change so it doesn\u2019t have to<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n

A new study reveals how the oil company used \u201ccutting-edge propaganda\u201d to focus on fossil fuel consumption.<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"An<\/picture><\/span><\/span>Andrii Zorii<\/cite><\/span><\/figure>\n
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To understand why ExxonMobil has been so effective at shaping the US narrative about climate change in the US for some 40 years, look no further than the words of one of the company\u2019s communications strategists, Mobil Vice President of Public Affairs Herbert Schmertz: \u201dYour objective is to wrap yourself in the good phrases while sticking your opponents with the bad ones,\u201d he wrote in 1986.<\/p>\n

From the 1970s through the 1990s, most of the company\u2019s PR efforts focused on\u00a0casting doubt<\/a>\u00a0on the scientific consensus that burning fossil fuels was warming the planet. But by the mid-2000s, it was taking a more sophisticated, nuanced approach.<\/p>\n

\u201cEnergy-saving consumers can make a real difference,\u201d it said in 2007, listing ways consumers can \u201cBe smart about electricity use,\u201d \u201cHeat and cool your home efficiently,\u201d and \u201cImprove your gas mileage\u201d to address climate change. Another ad in 2008 looks to the auto industry: \u201cIt is important we reduce greenhouse gas emissions, too. Improving the efficiency of the vehicles people drive is one way to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are many examples in ExxonMobil\u2019s advertising materials and other documents right up to 2019, all doing the same thing: Deflecting attention away from the oil company\u2019s role in fueling climate change by supplying fossil fuels and turning attention toward consumer demand for, and dependency on, its products.<\/p>\n

We now have a comprehensive view of this strategy, thanks to a new peer-reviewed study by Harvard research associate Geoffrey Supran and Harvard science historian Naomi Oreskes in the\u00a0journal<\/a>\u00a0One Earth<\/em>. In a painstaking analysis, they show how hard the oil giant has worked to keep the conversation about climate solutions focused on the consumer, effectively individualizing responsibility for the problem.<\/p>\n

\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ExxonMobil wants you to feel responsible for climate change so it doesn\u2019t have to A new study reveals how the oil company used \u201ccutting-edge propaganda\u201d to focus on fossil fuel consumption. Andrii Zorii To understand why ExxonMobil has been so effective at shaping the US narrative about climate change in the US for some 40 […]<\/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":[3,4,6],"tags":[2688,141,1041,1729,31234,31233,19375],"class_list":["post-57870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","category-liberty","tag-big-oil","tag-climate-change","tag-exxonmobil","tag-oil-and-gas-industry","tag-propagnada","tag-rebecca-leber","tag-vox"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57870","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=57870"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57870\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57871,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57870\/revisions\/57871"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}