I always feel somewhat conflicted by the sentiment here. Like it’s true that a lot of liberal and leftist condescension towards climate change denial is framed in gross, classist ways. But simultaneously, that doesn’t excuse people capable of reason and thought from denying reality no matter how much Koch brothers’ nonsense they’ve been fed and how biased their textbooks were.
I have a lot of family subjected to more egregious propaganda with significantly less formal education; they still think and learn and are able to acknowledge what’s been long established as factual. Calling out and recognizing the origins of denial in these coordinated indoctrination campaigns is important, and Shure clearly means well.
But it comes off as “don’t be mean to the poor yokels, they were just brainwashed.” A lot of us yokels (and yokel-adjacent people lol) know better despite that and all of us can despite that.
yeah and imo a lot of these attitudes can come off as patronising; don’t blame poor racists for supporting and voting for racist politicians they’re just worried about the economy, don’t be mean to climate change deniers they’re too stupid to know any better – sometimes these are well-meaning statements, but most of the time they come off as extremely condescending, with an air of smugness and presumptions about poor people’s intelligence and ability to understand basic concepts.
i essentially left school at 14 and have no formal education beyond that, but i didn’t let that stop me from educating myself and staying informed about the world around me. most of the people the previous statements are aimed at have TVs and internet access, so they have the ability to inform themselves, but some of them just don’t want to. stop making excuses for them and insulting poor people that actually make an effort to educate themselves.
queerlybeloveds 