The anti-Greta: A conservative think tank takes on the global phenomenon
The
Washington Post
February
24, 2020
The
anti-Greta: A conservative think tank takes on the global phenomenon
For climate skeptics,
it’s hard to compete with the youthful appeal of global phenomenon Greta
Thunberg. But one U.S. think tank hopes it’s found an answer: the anti-Greta.
Naomi Seibt is a
19-year-old German who, like Greta, is blond, eloquent and European. But Naomi
denounces “climate alarmism,” calls climate consciousness “a despicably
anti-human ideology,” and has even deployed Greta’s now famous “How dare you?”
line to take on the mainstream German media.
“She’s a fantastic
voice for free markets and for climate realism,” said James Taylor, director of
the Arthur B. Robinson Center for Climate and Environmental Policy at the
Heartland Institute, an influential libertarian think tank in suburban Chicago
that has the ear of the Trump administration.
In December,
Heartland headlined Naomi at its forum at the UN climate conference in Madrid,
where Taylor described her as “the star” of the show. Last month, Heartland
hired Naomi as the young face of its campaign to question the scientific
consensus that human activity is causing dangerous global warming.
“Naomi Seibt vs.
Greta Thunberg: whom should we trust?” asked Heartland in a digital video.
Later this week, Naomi is set to make her American debut at the Conservative Political
Action Conference, or CPAC, a high-profile annual gathering just outside
Washington of right-leaning activists.
Activist Greta
Thunberg on how to make sure the world does not 'give up' the climate fight.
After taking a
solar-powered boat from England to New York to attend the United Nations
Climate Action Summit, Thunberg discussed what activists need to do. (Jhaan
Elker/The Washington Post)
If imitation is the
highest form of flattery, Heartland’s tactics amount to an acknowledgment that
Greta has touched a nerve, especially among teens and young adults. Since
launching her protest two years ago outside the Swedish parliament at age 15,
Greta has sparked youth protests across the globe and in 2019 was named Time
magazine’s “Person of the Year,” the youngest to ever win the honor.
The teenager has
called on the nations of the world to cut their total carbon output by at least
half over the next decade, saying that if they don’t, “then there will be
horrible consequences.”
“I want you to
panic,” she told attendees at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland,
last year. “I want you to feel the fear I feel every day. And then I want you
to act.”
Naomi, for her part,
argues that these predictions of dire consequences are exaggerated. In a video
posted on Heartland’s website, she gazes into the camera and says, “I don’t
want you to panic. I want you to think.”
Graham Brookie
directs the Digital Forensic Research Lab, an arm of the nonprofit Atlantic
Council that works to identify and expose disinformation. While the campaign
“is not outright disinformation,” Brookie said in an email, it “does bear
resemblance to a model we use called the 4d’s — dismiss the message, distort
the facts, distract the audience, and express dismay at the whole thing.”
Brookie added: “The
tactic is intended to create an equivalency in spokespeople and message. In
this case, it is a false equivalency between a message based in climate science
that went viral organically and a message based in climate skepticism trying to
catch up using paid promotion.”
Naomi said her
political activism was sparked a few years ago when she began asking questions
in school about Germany’s liberal immigration policies. She said the backlash
from teachers and other students hardened her skepticism about mainstream
German thinking. More recently, she said that watching young people joining
weekly “Fridays For Future” protests inspired by Greta helped spur her
opposition to climate change activism.
“I get chills when I
see those young people, especially at Fridays for Future. They are screaming
and shouting and they’re generally terrified,” she said in an interview. “They
don’t want the world to end.”
Naomi said she does
not dispute that greenhouse gas emissions are warming the planet, but she
argues that many scientists and activists have overstated their impact.
“I don’t want to get
people to stop believing in man-made climate change, not at all,” she said.
“Are manmade CO2 emissions having that much impact on the climate? I think
that’s ridiculous to believe.”
Naomi argues that
other factors, such as solar energy, play a role — though the amount of solar
energy reaching the Earth has actually declined since the 1970s, according to
federal measurements. A slew of peer-reviewed reports, from scientific bodies
in the U.S. and elsewhere, have concluded that greenhouse gas emissions are the
dominant cause of warming since the mid-20th century, producing a range of
devastating effects from massive marine die-offs in South America to severe
wildfires in Australia and sinking ground in the Arctic.
In addition to
climate change, Naomi echoes far-right skepticism about feminism and
immigration. The German media have described her as sympathetic to the
nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD), the biggest opposition party in
parliament, whose leaders have spoken of fighting “an invasion of foreigners.”
Naomi says she is not a member of AfD — she describes herself as libertarian —
but acknowledges speaking at a recent AfD event.
Her path to Heartland
began in November with a speech at EIKE, a Munich think tank whose vice
president is a prominent AfD politician. By then, Naomi was already active on
YouTube, producing videos on topics ranging from migration to feminism to
climate change. In the audience was Heartland’s Taylor. He said he immediately
recognized her potential and approached her about working with Heartland.
Founded in 1984 and
funded largely by anonymous donors, Heartland has increasingly focused on
climate change over the past decade. Its staff and researchers enjoy ready
access to the Trump administration, and one of its senior fellows, William
Happer, served as a senior director on the White House National Security
Council between September 2018 and 2019.
An emeritus professor
of physics at Princeton University, Happer has repeatedly argued that carbon
emissions should be viewed as beneficial to society — not a pollutant that
drives global warming. During his time with the Trump administration, he sought
to enlist Heartland’s help in promoting his ideas and objected to a U.S.
intelligence official’s finding that climate impacts could be “possibly
catastrophic,” according to documents obtained by The Washington Post.
Why would an American
think tank want to get involved in German politics? Because it worries that
Berlin’s strong stance on reducing greenhouse-gas emissions could be
contagious, according to a recent investigation aired on German television.
For two decades,
Germany has been a leader in pressing other nations to curb carbon output and
shift to renewable energy. Though it is falling short of its ambitious goals,
Germany has pledged to cut its greenhouse gas emissions this year by 40 percent
compared to 1990 — and by up to 95 percent by mid-century.
In December, during
the Madrid climate conference, two undercover staffers from the nonprofit
investigative newsroom CORRECTIV approached Taylor and claimed to work for a
wealthy donor from the auto industry who wanted to give Heartland a
half-million euros. Taylor took the bait, and followed up with a three-page
proposal outlining a campaign to push back against German efforts to regulate
emissions.
“These restrictive
environmental programs are largely unnecessary,” says the document, a copy of
which was obtained by The Post. “Worse, other nations — including the United
States and European Union nations — are increasingly being influenced by unwise
German policy.”
The proposal
described Naomi as “the star” of a “Climate Reality Forum” organized by Heartland
during the Madrid talks. With “over 100,000 people viewing her talk on climate
realism,” the proposal said, Naomi was well-positioned to fight German climate
policies.
“Funding for our
Germany Environmental Issues project will enable Heartland to provide Naomi
with the equipment and the sources she needs to present a series of effective
videos calling attention to the negative impacts of overreaching environmental
regulations,” the proposal says.
CORRECTIV aired its
report on Heartland earlier this month on German TV. Taylor dismissed the
report, saying, “Heck, I would have spoken with them if they told us who they
were, and the answers would have been pretty much the same.”
The investigators
filmed Naomi at a public event, posing as would-be donors. She struck back with
her own video response. Invoking Greta, she said, “To the media, I have a few
last words: How dare you?"
Greta Thunberg
confronts world leaders at the U.N. climatre summit: 'How dare you?'
Despite echoes of
Greta’s style, Naomi has objected to the comparison.
“The reason I don’t
like the term anti-Greta is that it suggests I myself am an indoctrinated
puppet, I guess, for the other side,” she says in one video. Asked if she meant
that as a criticism of Greta, Naomi says: “That sounds kind of mean, actually.”
She added: “I don’t want to shame her in any way.”
Taylor said the
tendency to associate Naomi with Greta is “kind of natural” — and benefits
Heartland’s message.
“To the extent that Naomi
is pretty much the same, just with a different perspective, yeah, I think that
it’s good that people will look at the two as similar in many ways,” he said.
Still, Naomi has a
long climb to reach the level of global attention lavished on Greta. While
Greta measures her social media following in the millions, Naomi counts
slightly under 50,000 YouTube subscribers.
Through her
spokespeople, Greta declined to comment.
Comments
Post a Comment