Antinuclear

The power of WORDS about nuclear power, climate change – theme for February 2014

The nuclear power lobby and the fossil fuel lobby spend $billions in publicising their industries and in combatting established information on nuclear dangers and on global warming. This is done through “front groups” such as (for pro nuclear) the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition., (for climate denial) American Enterprise Institute.

It’s getting more difficult to spot these propagandists, because increasingly, they are using sophisticated Internet techniques. These have been beautifully explained in How to spot an astroturfer or an online fake -some of the organisations and techniques are summarised in the sidebar at right.

However, the words alone can help you to spot a fake.  Look out for these two types of language:

BIG WORDS – in long complicated sentences – guaranteed to confuse the ordinary reader. The aim is to make you think that the writer is much smarter than you, and his opinion must be right.  Amongst the big words, some quack science ones – like hormesis, adaptive radiation, andradiophobia Also,you are referred, by links, to obscure articles in even more complicated language.

SMALL WORDS and CLICHES – short positive ones, with no backup information, e.g. “clean -green-safe-cheap nuclear power”. Or negative cliches e.g. “hysterical- paranoid- emotional – irrational – delusional – extremists –alarmist – scare mongerer” applied to anti nuclear people, or those who want action on climate change.

February 8, 2014 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Christina themes