The hate mail campaign against climate scientists, part 2

I wrote earlier about the hate mail campaign against Australian climate scientists. Leo Hickman reports on the hate mail campaign against US climate scientists:

The scientists revealed they have been told to “go gargle razor blades” and have been described as “Nazi climate murderers”. Some emails have been sent to them without any attempt by the sender to disguise their identity. Even though the scientists have received advice from the FBI, the local police say they are not able to act due to the near-total tolerance of “freedom of speech” in the US.

Marc Morano regularly posts the email addresses of climate scientists to be targetted with such emails over at Climate Depot. (And please do not email him — it will only encourage him.)

Comments

#1 Carl C
July 6, 2010

it’s “freedom of speech” when it’s a right-wing hack or hacker at UEA releasing emails; or sending death threats to climate scientists thru Obama. But when you mildly criticized Bush, Cheney, or easily hacked Sarah Palin’s Yahoo email account (from which she idiotically used for gov’t purposes) — then it’s “nefarious treason and/or terrorism!”
#2 Mike
July 6, 2010

All very sad really. Threats of violence on either side are totally unacceptable.

I have no doubt at all that there is a literal plague of mental illness infecting the people who send these hate emails. Arguably worse is the fact that very few sceptics seem to want to spend much time exhorting their followers not to do it.

Given that the hate campaign probably won’t stop, the only thing I can think of is to send messages of support to the scientists and emphasise that there are many more people out there who just want them to continue their efforts to understand climate and what impacts we may be having on it.
#3 EKo
July 6, 2010

All rhetoric of ideologues aside, in the United States freedom of speech does not protect the making of threats. If done through the mail it is a federal offense.
#4 JennieL
July 6, 2010

Mike @2:

Given that the hate campaign probably won’t stop, the only thing I can think of is to send messages of support to the scientists and emphasise that there are many more people out there who just want them to continue their efforts to understand climate and what impacts we may be having on it.

Seconded (and I’d add: buy their books!). You can know you’re sane, but if the only thing you see around you is batshit crazy, it can start to make you wonder.

Speaking of which – “Nazi climate murderers”?! This the kind of insult which could only be created by a mind whose sole mode of operation is kneejerk reaction to the emotive impact of words.
#5 Boris
July 6, 2010

The emails were basically Watts Up With That comments if they were directed by Scorsese.
#6 dhogaza
July 6, 2010

“All rhetoric of ideologues aside, in the United States freedom of speech does not protect the making of threats. If done through the mail it is a federal offense”

Not e-mail, though. Our political machine has routinely refused to apply the old legal standards that apply to traditional communication to more modern electronic communication.

We know why …
#7 Squeaky Woo Woo
July 7, 2010

Is that Denial Depot blog a spoof or does the guy running it actually believe the easily disproved rubbish he posts on there? If it’s the latter then I seriously worry about him and his complete lack of intellectual honesty.
#8 Paul H
July 7, 2010

“Not e-mail, though. Our political machine has routinely refused to apply the old legal standards that apply to traditional communication to more modern electronic communication.”

Indeed, perhaps apropos, I remember reading an Anthony Watt’s piece over a year ago whinging about the fact that California was thinking about updating its laws on cyber-bullying. The key phrases are “electronic means” and “emotional distress”. Apparently Watts is unfamiliar with the meaning of the word “intent”.
#9 Donald Oats
July 7, 2010

Yikes! The various twisted nazi ones are reminiscent of the hate (snail) mail sent to pro-abortion rights campaigners, by the anti-abortion psychos (who are a minority of the abortion protesters, just so we’re clear on this). Some people just latch onto an issue, a cause, and go to eleven on it. Occasionally one of them goes gun-happy and thinks they are going to “save the world” by popping the enemy of freedom, of life, etc.

The current cause is a libertarian one (actually exploited by a rightwing movement, ironically against some of the constitutional amendments which make the bill of rights) of resisting large government and government intrusion into a citizen’s rights. Unfortunately the unrelenting Murdochisation of modern media (large Media, anyone) has seen the rise and rise of the Right Opinion Makers, aka Bill O’Reilly, Glenn Beck, etc. Short of ceasing all newspaper and TV (free or pay), it is nigh impossible to avoid the ROMs of the Murdochary. The ROMs ensure that the IPCC is painted as the rise of World Government (they’ll take our guns from us, they’ll have control of us), and even of Communism in order to remind older viewers of the old USSR (and McCarthyism, but in a “good” way).
#10 Derecho64
July 7, 2010

Having been swiftboated by Morano myself (courtesy Watts and McIntyre) the entire lot can go bugger themselves.
#11 DaveMcRae
July 7, 2010

Squeaky Woo Woo @7 asks if DenialDepot is serious.

It isn’t – although it goes a long way to prove Poe’s Law that states that parody and crazy can be difficult to differentiate
#12 pointer
July 7, 2010

@ Squeaky Woo Woo: yup, Denial Depot is definitely a spoof, as is FoGT (Friends of Gina and Tonic) in DD’s blogroll. Both among my favourite sites.
#13 Stu
July 7, 2010

Squeaky Woo Woo (congrats on the most ludicrous pseudonym I’ve ever come across, by the way!)

DenialDepot is most assuredly a parody. You’re just falling victim to Poe’s law – that no-one can make a parody of fundamentalism (in this case, fundamentalist denial of climate science) extreme enough that someone wont mistake it for the real thing.
#14 Lars Karlsson
July 7, 2010

I believe Tim provided the wrong URL for Climate Depot. Although Climate Depot (real) and Denial Depot (spoof) are nearly indistinguishable.
#15 Tim Lambert
July 7, 2010

Ah yes, Poe’s law. [Check this one out](http://www.independent.org/blog/?p=6107)

> Steve McIntyre … early exposer of Michael Mann’s fraudulent [“hockey stick” graph](http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/parody/tcs/)

Look at where that ‘”hockey stick” graph’ link goes.
#16 Squeaky Woo Woo
July 7, 2010

> I believe Tim provided the wrong URL for Climate Depot.

Thank goodness for that! No wonder I was so confused.
#17 truth machine, OM
July 7, 2010

Is that Denial Depot blog a spoof

I guess there’s always going to be someone who can’t tell, no matter how blatantly obvious the author makes it. The problem is that people like Morano (and McIntyre and Spencer and Monckton and Milloy etc.) are propagandists who are trying to make their BS look like real science, and thus Poe’s Law isn’t really applicable to them.
#18 bill
July 7, 2010

Boy, if you can’t spot ‘The Hockey Stick has Collapsed into a Singularity and then Exploded into a Cloud of Sub-atomic Particles Expanding at Light Speed’ as a Poe you’re either as crazy as those being parodied or not reading properly! Or both! Even the URL explicitly states ‘/parody/’…
#19 truth machine, OM
July 7, 2010

Even the URL explicitly states ‘/parody/’…

And the blog entry Tim gave that links to it is tagged “humor”, and following a link to Tim’s parody is claim that McIntyre is a “continuing exposer of the numerous additional “hockey sticks“”, with a link to pictures of hockey sticks. While the author is apparently deadly serious about her (erroneous) content, she or someone else at the site was clearly playing around, and it is you who is “not reading properly”.
#20 Wrinkled Retainer
July 7, 2010

7 Squeaky,

Everything at Denial Depot is absolutely true. It is based on the best available evidence and the very latest principles of Blog Science. Anyone who can’t see that is obviously a warmofascist environazi who’s not capable of thinking for themselves. Do you not realise that the IPCC is a prototype for a communist world government that will TAKE AWAY ALL OUR FREEDOMS AND TAX US BACK TO THE STONE AGE?!!
#21 truth machine, OM
July 7, 2010

following a link to Tim’s parody is claim that McIntyre is a “continuing exposer of the numerous additional “hockey sticks“”, with a link to pictures of hockey sticks

Oops; the link to pictures was from Tim’s parody; the “continuing exposer” link was to ClimateAudit. So I guess the people at The Beacon are just idiots after all.
#22 Rick Bradford
July 7, 2010

Nothing much new here – Dr Tim Ball was getting death threats back in 2007.
#23 JMurphy
July 7, 2010

Now that yet another enquiry (The Independent Climate Change E-mails Review under Muir Russell) has exonerated the scientists and the science, we can expect Phil Jones to receive much more hate mail for the foreseeable future.

Russell himself will probably now be added to that list of inconvenient and rational persons who don’t bow down before the skeptical guru McIntyre, and will no doubt soon be receiving his own share of cowardly messages of hate.
#24 frank
July 7, 2010

JMurphy:

I expect a renewed spate of attacks on Michael Mann, because, well, because climate inactivists are just obsessed with Michael Mann. (Or maybe attacking Al Gore just doesn’t cut it anymore.)

Also, Benny Peiser’s climate septic tank wants to (!) conduct their own kangaroo inquiry into the inquiries…
#25 Squeaky Woo Woo
July 7, 2010

OK, I get it now! I was just confused why a blog that screamed of parody in every possible way could be sending hate mail to scientists as Tim said – this was until it was pointed out we were given the wrong url

What I’m wondering is how many actually quote the blog approvingly in support of their pseudoscience. I really wouldn’t put it past some people!
#26 sod
July 7, 2010

CRU has been cleared. again. and again. and again.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10538198.stm

perhaps the most funny part:

We find that CRU was not in a position to withhold access to such data or tamper with it,” it says.

“We demonstrated that any independent researcher can download station data directly from primary sources and undertake their own temperature trend analysis”.

Writing computer code to process the data “took less than two days and produced results similar to other independent analyses. No information from CRU was needed to do this”.

Sir Muir commented: “So we conclude that the argument that CRU has something to hide does not stand up”.

Asked whether it would be reasonable to conclude that anyone claiming instrumental records were unavailable or vital code missing was incompetent, another panel member, Professor Peter Clarke from Edinburgh University, said: “It’s very clear that anyone who’d be competent enough to analyse the data would know where to find it.

the denialists are incompetent. that is, why they are writing death threats, instead of climate code…
#27 TrueSceptic
July 7, 2010

25 Squeaky,

Tim was having a little joke by deliberately using the “wrong” URL to show how deranged Climate Depot is. Get it now?
#28 Jeremy C
July 7, 2010

Its afternoon here in London and I’ve been reading the Guardian’s live coverage of the release of the Muir report into UEA/CRU. Evryone is cleared (third report to say so!) the only criticism the Guardian can find is that the scientists could’ve been more open….yeah so could my local council and my local newsagent about where he hides my weekly copy of Private Eye (I just know he reads it before I do).

Phil Jones has had admin moved from him…… everyone is saying its a demotion but more likely UEA has realised its mistakes in how it handled the affair and having learnt about the viciousness of the denialsphere has moved to shield its scientists – about time too! This is part of moving the CRU into the dept of Environmental Science at UEA (that will upset the FOI foo fighters no end as now they will have to deal with university bueracrats each time they make an application).

And has this stopped the deniality going on about a whitewash, well as you expected, no if the inital posts on the Guardian siteare any guide. Someone has posted that Lawson’s thunk tank is launching an investigation into the three investigations. If this is true then I am going to start listening to old Goon show recordings just to keep a hold on reality.
#29 TrueSceptic
July 7, 2010

28 Jeremy,

[Full Muir Russell Review](http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jul/07/findings-muir-russell-review).

The denidiots will never stop. Anything that they don’t like is a “cover-up” or a “whitewash”.

I wonder though: surely it can’t be OK for the filth merchants to keep harassing and falsely accusing scientists for ever? Isn’t there a law about this?

Michael Mann has been in a similar situation, of course.

BTW I see that McIntyre and one of his fellow harassers, David Holland, are holding a “presser” (ever seen that word before?) in London [next week](http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/06/mcintyre-presser-in-london/)
#30 Jeremy C
July 7, 2010

TrueSceptic,

Thanks for the heads up about the McIntyre presser. If I’m not doing anything that evening I might cycle around to it, its only down the road from Tony’s pub. I find it hard to imagine its a presser (I had to go to hundreds of those in a previous life) as most of them are held during working hours for good reason unless its breaking news (e.g. Kev being monstered by Julia). Its start time is 7.00 pm just as Ch 4 news goes to air and I doubt Ch 4 will put a live cross into their running order so unless they are aiming for Newsnight on BBC 2 at 10.30 pm you have to ask what media are they aiming for? As to specialist publications well journos on those work office hours, thats the advantage of working for specilaist publications. So whats Benny playing at?
#31 MapleLeaf
July 7, 2010

@29 and 30,

Anyone in London have a cream pie for next week? Sorry, couldn’t resist. Play nice everyone….even if the other side does not.
#32 MapleLeaf
July 7, 2010

@28,

“Phil Jones has had admin moved from him…… everyone is saying its a demotion …”

Well, of course the deniers are, got to spin even the worst news. IMO, it seems that UEA/CRU are now going to give Jones more resources, and free up more of his time to do research, rather than waste his time dealing with vexatious requests from the likes of Mosh-pit and Nigel Persaud.
#33 chek
July 7, 2010

[Rick Bradford said:](http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/07/the_hate_mail_campaign_against_1.php#comment-2636999) “Nothing much new here – Dr Tim Ball was getting death threats back in 2007.”

Although we don’t know if that was career related, nor indeed do we have any documentation for them at all beyond the good geography professor’s unreliable word. Maybe he’s even been getting them since he was 15, just for being a hateful, mendacious little pr*ck. We just don’t know.

Not that it’s condoned in any way whatsoever, should it be true.
#34 TrueSceptic
July 7, 2010

33 chek,

“unreliable”? Surely not?

Someone who claims to have been a Professor of Climatology at a university that has never had such a department, where he was in fact a Professor of Geography who now seems not to know in which province the university is.
#35 Brent
July 7, 2010

*[Please post only in your thread]*
#36 Brent
July 7, 2010

*[Please post only in your thread]*
#37 Wow
July 7, 2010

Yah, a good way to hide the decline in the reading age of Brent is to have him avoid saying “Hide the decline”.

So Brent would prefer not to use thermometers for temperature readings.

Can anyone tell me if this is about the norm for brent?

PS If Brent wants to say “It shows that proxy data is unreliable”, can he please tell everyone who proclaims a MWP but hasn’t used thermometer recordings to show it that proxies are not reliable.

kthxby
#38 chek
July 7, 2010

Wow, “slogans not comprehension” is Brent’s whole gig.
There are at least two tortuous recent threads (including his own monickered hall of shame) attesting to that observation.

File under the moronology casefiles.
#39 Brent
July 7, 2010

*[Please post in your own thread only]*
#40 frank
July 7, 2010

Brent can’t actually defend the hate attacks against climate scientists.

So he just keeps throwing out random talking points.
#41 TrueSceptic
July 7, 2010

39 Brent,

Just what are the “myth” and the “fallacy”? Perhaps you could explain in clear enough language that everyone, including, say, John Christy, Bjorn Lomborg, and Nigel Lawson, could understand?
#42 John
July 7, 2010

Brent, you have a threat all to yourself to stop you derailing others. This is a great honour and shows what a special person you are.

Now go there.
#43 John
July 7, 2010

*thread