Eyes Wide Open: List 2

The psychology pioneer Sigmund Freud was the first to describe how we use defense mechanisms to ward off uncomfortable feelings.

The deluding voices don’t always come from inside us. They can be supplied from outside—the form of denial that’s prominent in the debate over climate change.

Sowing doubt. The vast majority of climate scientists believe global warming is real, a serious threat, and caused by humans, but fossil-fuel interests have painted the issue as undecided and hotly debated.

They have the clout to demand that their viewpoint be heard on TV, in newspapers, on radio, and in school textbooks.

A new wrinkle in concealment is the creation of Astroturf groups to give the appearance of grassroots support.

Political polarization has played a role as well.

The United States is divided into liberal (Democratic) and conservative (Republican) camps, with a bundle of positions that go with membership in either.

The United States is divided into liberal (Democratic) and conservative (Republican) camps, with a bundle of positions that go with membership in either.

Accepting criticism is hard, the reason it’s considered a mark of maturity. Individuals like to see themselves as flawless. The defense mechanism projection helps maintain that illusion. With one swift move it turns the tables on critics, dismissing their claims by projecting the negative behavior onto them.

You can see this in action when environmentalists are described in ways that incite fear about them rather than about the dangers we’re courting.

A few environmental groups, like the Earth Liberation Front, have indeed earned fear-stoking terms by using arson and sabotage against development, SUV dealerships, and other targets.

The several investigations into the affair acquitted the scientists, but that was months after they’d been tarred in the media.

We’ve reached this stage in the United States, where TV meteorologists who connect weather events to global warming risk alienating viewers and losing their jobs.

With the daunting issues facing us, it’s easy to see the appeal of retreating to a childlike stage without responsibility.

People under the spell of regression, by contrast, lean toward fantasy and avoidance. They don’t climb back into cribs but often into artificial realms—TV, video games, sports fandom, shopping, social media.

Speaking unwelcome news can bring defeat. President Carter found this out in 1979, when worry over oil supplies led him to urge Americans to drive less and lower thermostats. The public was stunned by his gloomy frankness, a factor in his defeat the next year.

If enough voters demand hard truths, swift action, and long-term thinking, leaders are motivated to comply.

China’s 1979 one-child policy for urban couples was decreed, not publicly debated for decades.

American election campaigns are long and waged mainly with TV ads, which are very expensive. This requires candidates to raise millions, which leads them to the corporations that can afford the big donations needed to buy those ads. In return, business interests gain unprecedented influence on policies.

The ability to vote and participate in politics encourages initiative and innovation in democratic societies.

With companies vying for your dollars, the ones whose products fill the most need, have an edge in performance, and cost less than the competition will thrive.

Does your lipstick contain lead, a neurotoxin? Are there carcinogens in your shampoo?

European laws ban hundreds of chemicals considered dangerous; the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), hobbled by business interests, has banned only a handful.

A tropical forest keeps CO₂ out of the atmosphere, gives us oxygen to breathe, reduces soil erosion, and fosters the diversity that makes an ecosystem resilient.

Profits and the market aren’t infallible guides.

They’ve also driven extinctions, the uprooting of half the world’s tropical and temperate forests, and the filling of land, sea, and air with pollutants because there was no immediate financial price.

Conventionally grown produce using synthetic fertilizers and pesticides would outprice organic after paying to clean up polluted water.

Another is transparency—full disclosure of practices that would reward responsible businesses.

In 1987, nations band together against the threat and sign the Montreal Protocol, agreeing to phase out CFCs.

Action was taken based on prudence, without a seeing-is-believing epidemic.