Climate change has been in the news a lot in recent years. Whether the news stations were urging people to care or denying its existence, climate change has quickly become one of the biggest political issues in the nation. I do, however, find this rather odd. Why is climate change a partisan issue? Scientists have proven time after time that climate change is real, yet it remains one of the most highly debated topics. This seems silly, and downright dangerous. Climate change threatens the entire planet if steps aren’t taken to prevent it, so why aren’t politicians working together? What sense is there in engaging in partisan politics?
The answer in this case, as it is in most cases, is control. By taking sides on an issue like climate change, even though it isn’t innately political, politicians make it a taboo subject. I don’t know about all my readers, but I can personally say that I was never once taught about climate change. It seems like something I should have learned about, but it was simply glossed over in all of my science classes. When asked why, all of my teachers gave me the same response – “It’s too political”. As soon as politicians took sides, people were unable to have open conversations about the issue. In making climate change a political issue, the two major political parties are able to control how people think and talk about it. Rather than getting the bipartisan action we need, partisan politics has made it such that if you identify as a Democrat, you believe one thing and if you identify as a Republican, you believe the exact opposite. This may seem a bit dramatic, but it is the truth with most issues in America, and climate change is no exception.
As I stated previously, the two major political parties created two very different sides of the climate change issue. So, what’s the Democratic side? In general, the Democratic Party seems to treat climate change as a rather big deal. Many left-leaning news sources have put out articles like this one from The Nation where they urge people to care about climate change. The left constantly demands more change and progress. This may seem like a great thing because, after all, if one of our major political parties demands change then they should be compromising and doing whatever it takes to get that change, right? In theory, yes. However, as this article from Pew Research suggests, Democrats may be concerned about the climate, but their top priority seems to be Republicans. This misplaced focus stalls any progress that the Democratic Party is trying to make. Rather than doing everything in their power to get people to understand the dangers of climate change, Democrats tend to spend their time trying to make the Republican Party look bad. Democrats focus more on calling out the Republican Party for not facilitating change than they do on actually making change. This kind of finger pointing results in the extreme divide between the two parties. It’s not just that in general members of the Democratic party believe climate change requires action, but that has simply become the “Democrat side” of the issue. For instance, if a person advocates for progress when it comes to climate change, regardless of their political affiliation, other people will think they are spreading a left-leaning agenda.
Now that we know what the Democratic Party stands for, what about Republicans? I want to start off by saying that it’s not that Republicans (the party in general) don’t believe in climate change, it’s just that it’s not really something the party focuses on. This article from Deseret News even reports that Republicans promise to care about climate change if they took back the House in the midterms, but that really just seems like a ploy devised so the Republican Party to get more votes (again this goes back to the idea of control that I mentioned previously). But really, why would Republicans focus on climate change? Focusing on climate change is a “Democrat policy”. Rather than committing to the change that everyone knows is needed, Republicans keep a “partisan gap” when it comes to caring about climate change. When it comes to something like this, politicians vote along party lines. Republicans take the Republican stance, and Democrats take the Democrat stance. What this actually means, though, it that the two parties just work against one another. What’s so bad about that? Doesn’t it make sense that if the party believes one thing, individual members of that party would probably believe the same thing? While it does make sense, that doesn’t change the fact that partisan politics is dangerous, specifically for an issue like climate change. For inherently political topics partisan politics is bad, but it’s not the end of the world. For climate change, it quite possibly could be. The fact that climate change isn’t even political in nature means that partisan politics is really just controlling what people think and say about it and effectively halting all progress. This control is harmful with climate change because it has made the topic too political to teach about. This means that the average person isn’t really educated enough on the climate to have a fully formed opinion on policy, but due to the effects of partisan politics a person’s opinion is synonymous with their political affiliation. This isn’t how change is made. We need bipartisan action, but instead all we get is a further divided nation.
I liked your analysis, although I was sad there wasn’t at least a small mention of Big Oil. I completely agree with your perspective, to the point where I don’t say I believe in Climate Change, because whether or not I ‘believe’ in it, it exists. I don’t believe, I know, and I think we should all shift our perspective from believing to knowing, so this doesn’t remain a partisan issue.
I thought your arguments here were very compelling, in large part because of your external links. The Pew Research was particularly informative and gave me an opportunity to dive deeper into the trends you were describing. I look forward to the next post!
This topic is really interesting to me because I have never thought about this before. Politicians debate about climate change all the time, however, they should be spending more time coming up with a plan. I have also never learned about climate change in any of my classes. I’m assuming it’s too “new” of an issue to be discussed even generally, without making it “political”.
I think one of the biggest problems in our nation is that we fight against each other more than we fight for change. I believe climate change is a huge issue for our generation because we want a good place for ourselves to live for the next 60 years. Your blog is interesting because it uses an issue that we all know, climate change, to shed light on the much bigger issue of the distinct separation of parties, that can’t agree.
Climate change is so relevant in todays society, and it is up to our generation to fix this. If everyone could agree, the issue of climate change could be solved much more easily. Hopefully we can act now, even in small ways, so that we can have a cleaner environment in years to come.