Our class had never been more attentive up until that singular moment. Dangling eyes unable to muster up the courage to face a professor — admittedly monotonous in her presentation style — propagating a message most expected to have heard many times over.

But this was quite different.

As her voice slowed and she began pacing about the auditorium, heads ordinarily counting dust particles along the floor sat resolute. It was a reverberation one cannot unhear, one that penetrates even through the most intoxicated of students. Professor Edwin had advertised the services of the Student Health Center on the advent of our discussion of Stephen M. Gardiner’s article, detailing the “perfect moral storm” that is lending climate change to be unsolvable.

Her message, along with Gardiner’s article, helped me process the striking reality of human nature’s innate avoidance and endless inquiries towards climate change issues. If humans truly are the most intellectual species on the planet, why can’t we overcome our psychology in the same way we drive hunks of metal hurling at other hunks of metal at alarming speeds? While I would love to be able to answer this question however briefly, I instead wish to focus on the social aspect of this question: why can’t we overcome our psychology? We encompasses the nation, the arena of digital media and technology, the ability for our species to express across borders and peoples our concerns towards others. Our psychology references humans using, amongst other mechanisms, selective attention strategies and distractions that make a seemingly endless problem much smaller and further away.

To provide an example, I hope to retell and reimagine how media outlets and governments reacted to the floods in Henan Province (河南省), specifically in and around the capital city of Zhengzhou (郑州). Professor Edwin and Stephen Gardiner have both shown us that people are sensitive to the realities of climate change, but most importantly that all of us are human beings and thus require a state of mental health ready to tackle the issues at hand.

“China’s Drowned City”

“Devastating”

“Inadequate”

“Overwhelmed”

“Sheer volume”

“Terrifying”

“Wrecked” - James Palmer, Foreign Policy

“Infrastructural damage will hurt global supply chains for electronics and cars” - James Palmer, Foreign Policy(emphasis added)

“... journalists were surrounded by an ‘angry mob’ in the provincial capital of Zhengzhou on Saturday as they reported floods…” Baptista and Lau, South China Morning Post

(emphasis added)

We are all scared of what we don’t understand. The concerns of one person will always differ from the next, but what does that say about social interactions stretching from individuals to international organizations and governments? James Palmer (quoted above), like all other reportative journalists from big-name media companies, has a job to do. It would be unfair to criticize his remarks above as being angled “not domestic enough” or “not humanistic enough”; while the article’s voice is unique to Palmer the arguments must be reviewed by the publication before it is uploaded. However, this is no excuse to not remark on Palmer’s and others’ lens geared away from themes of humanity and emotion. An example could include a reference to the number of those who have passed away or are missing, but when the article’s argument points fingers at “who was at fault”, your attention is directed away from the catastrophe and instead focused towards the media’s inevitable bias.

What reading a few articles doesn’t tell you is the causes for concern in their arguments. Prior to the flooding events, Western media outlets started a conversation about climate change following the floods hitting Western Germany, forest fires affecting Greece; Russia; Turkey; and the US, along with heat-waves hitting North America. This has riled column reporters across all major newspapers about the impacts of climate change; foreign media outlets analyzing the Henan floods decided to instead argue against the Chinese government’s response, highlighting the failure of Chinese state media. Below is an excerpt from a CNN article detailing arguments about the Henan flooding:

“That stands in stark contrast to how climate scientists and the media have responded in the West. While full analysis is needed to confirm to what degree changes to the earth's climate have affected specific extreme weather events, many experts agree the trend is clear.” - Nectar Gan and Jessie Yeung, CNN

I do want to briefly acknowledge the lack of proper emergency response techniques in reaction to the floods; however, American media outlets in particular are translating the Western consensus that climate change must be argued into how Chinese media functions. The reasons for not mentioning climate change could include the lack of proper analysis at the time, the prioritization of emergency response measures over reporting causation, or having arguments including climate change not being the primary function of state media. CNN does include that climate change is officially acknowledged by President Xi Jinping and supports research efforts towards climate change research.

At the end of the day, we have to remember what CNN and other Western media companies represent: businesses. Firms function to gain a profit from their consumer base, and thus will produce articles and media buzz surrounding issues relatable and relevant to their readership. Discourse against the Chinese political climate and other regions of the world is not unheard of and arguably, almost quite normal. Editors came together in CNN, Foreign Policy, Newsweek, and the Guardian to not discuss what the world needs to focus on the most, but what will grab people’s attention the best. By using the floods as an angle against the Chinese government, the aforementioned Western media outlets realize what Gardiner argues in his article: hypocrisy and distraction are used as techniques to push the issue of climate change away and instead spark political discourse. Simply put, Western media isn't supporting climate change activism.

Issues were present in both Western and Chinese media when reacting to the floods. Western media confirmed Gardiner’s pessimism towards actors supporting climate change, while Chinese media lacked in emergency response preparedness. Taking a few steps back it seems quite cynical: media is selfishly using climate change as a means to benefit themselves, rather than helping eliminate or bring awareness to the real issue(s) at hand. We also have to remember that this technique by media has been successfully blinding us for decades; getting an A on mitigating climate change cannot withstand humans' everlasting procrastination.

The next time you find yourself reading any article, ask yourself: what is motivating this argument to be made? How does the author use techniques to imply that you already agree with their opinions/arguments? What are the author’s backgrounds? What attracted my interest into reading this article? Who supports the organization that I am reading from? Why don't articles with uncomfortable topics make me feel uneasy? What can I do next?

Perhaps it was worth staying awake for those final few lectures. Thanks Professor Edwin.