Essay by Eric Worrall
An AAP Factcheck, a few wild claims, and an Andrew Doyle interview with British environmentalist Jim Dale which appears to have taken on a life of its own.
Climate change deniers not at risk of WEF arrest
William Summers June 7, 2024
AAP FACTCHECK – A website with a history of spreading misinformation claims the World Economic Forum (WEF) has ordered governments to arrest all climate change deniers.
The claim is false. The man said to have issued the “order” is a British meteorology consultant who told AAP FactCheck he has no links with the WEF, a global economic forum and think tank.
He also didn’t make any order or call for the arrest of all climate change deniers.
What he did say is that it should be illegal to promote climate denial in the media.
The false claim appears in an article published by The People’s Voice, a prolific publisher of viral misinformation and fake clickbait news stories.
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The article in question is headlined: “WEF Orders Govt’s To Arrest Citizens Who Oppose Man-Made Climate Change Narrative.”
It describes how environmentalist Jim Dale said it should be illegal for people to “promote” climate change denialism during a TV segment aired on GB News on May 12.
Mr Dale tells AAP FactCheck that the claim he spoke on behalf of the WEF is “totally false”.
Read more: https://www.aap.com.au/factcheck/climate-change-deniers-not-at-risk-of-wef-arrest/
I tracked down the People’s Voice article. It appears to quote a WUWT article I wrote, though they added a few of their own interpretations.
WEF Orders Govt’s To Arrest Citizens Who Oppose Man-Made Climate Change Narrative
Fact checked by The People’s Voice Community
May 21, 2024 Sean Adl-Tabatabai
The World Economic Forum has ordered government’s to begin arresting citizens who oppose the man-made climate change narrative in a bid to persuade the masses that ‘global boiling‘ is a real danger.
Young Global Leader and British far-left environmentalist Jim Dale says all ‘climate deniers’ must be sent to jail in order to shut them up from convincing others that man-made global warming is fake.
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Dale did not specify what types of sanctions would apply to people who are still allowed to live outside of prison despite holding what he believes to be errant beliefs, but he did indicate that it would be up to politicians like Labour Party leader Keir Starmer.
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According to Watts Up With That, Earth is actually in a process of cooling right now, not warming. In fact, the climate is always changing up and down depending not only on the season but also the age.
If there were periods of extreme heat and extreme cold way back before there was even industrialization, then how can people like Dale claim that human activity is responsible for the temperature “extremes” that he claims are now taking place?
“Given the geological evidence is that we are living in a significant period of extreme cold, how can today’s temperatures possibly qualify as a global warming emergency?” Watts Up With That asked.
“Yet an opinion such as I just provided, a simple statement of fact, would likely be illegal under Jim Dale’s climate denial rules. Under Dale’s proposed rules, myself or anyone who retweets this article could go to jail or lose their house, merely for suggesting that people living in the middle of an ice age should be more concerned about glaciers than beach weather.”
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We are in the Quaternary Ice Age, and it is warmer than a few hundred years ago – though whether the world is cooling or warming very much depends on your choice of timescale and starting point.
I believe the referenced article was “Jail the Deniers? British Environmentalist Demands Criminal Sanctions”. As far as I can tell I didn’t mention the WEF in that article.
Environmentalist Jim Dale didn’t actually say “Jail the deniers” in the interview above, what he said is deniers should face criminal sanctions. But how can you have criminal sanctions without a threat of jail time? Jim Dale refused to be pinned down on exactly what criminal sanctions deniers should face, instead suggesting British opposition leader Keir Starmer should make that call.
Did the WEF order governments to begin arresting climate deniers?
I don’t believe the evidence People’s Voice presented in the article AAP Factchecked supports this claim, though if I missed anything I’m happy to add a correction.
I don’t recall Jim ever claiming to be a WEF spokesman, if he had I would have mentioned it. Frankly Jim seemed a little slow, he really struggled with simple questions, not the kind of person the WEF would normally pick as a representative.
We live in dangerous times. I accept People’s Voice’s suggestion that the disturbingly authoritarian hate speech laws which are being used to arrest people in Britain one day might be applied to climate denial. I also accept that the UN and WEF may be behind the push for international recognition of the crime of Ecocide, which could be used as a pretext to arrest climate skeptics. But these are all future possibilities. As far as I know, right now, today, nobody is being arrested for climate denial, and I have seen no evidence anyone has been ordered to arrest deniers.
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