Climate change should not be a politicized issue, but a discussion that engages the scientific and educational communities.
According to Pew, 67 percent of U.S. adults think that climate scientists should have a major role in policy decisions. Along the political line, less than half of conservative Republicans feel this way while 80 percent of liberal democrats do.
Climate change and the research behind it should not be a political issue that is a pro for one party and a con for the other party. This issue affects all citizens, not just liberals or conservatives.
Why has climate change become politicized when, according to NASA, 97 percent of scientists agree that humans are causing the climate to change?
An international science academies’ joint statement reads, “Climate change is real. There will always be uncertainty in understanding a system as complex as the world’s climate. However there is now strong evidence that significant global warming is occurring.”
However, politicians have expressed doubt over whether climate change scientists’ information is accurate or not. This fails to make sense because scientists know more about the earth’s climate than politicians do.
Furthermore, politicians usually have agendas behind the causes they support. Fossil fuel corporations such as Exxon drive many politicians’ reasoning behind climate change. Scientists’ only agenda is the search for the unequivocal truth.
President-elect Donald Trump tweeted in November 2012, “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.”
According to PBS, Republican Ben Carson called the climate change debate “irrelevant” and said “there’s always going to be either cooling or warming going on.”
Climate change should not be a dividing force between the two major political parties in the U.S. because politicians on either side may have important ideas surrounding climate change policy.
Some Republicans, including John Kasich, have said climate change is real. However, it is too late for our planet for the argument to only be about whether climate change is happening. Politicians on both sides should be figuring out what to do about it with the help of the science community.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change came to the conclusion: “Scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal.”
However, climate change continues to be a politicized issue because of the interests of fossil fuel corporations and resistance to change.
If politicians do not listen to the science community, they are ignoring the truth and the opportunity to get help from scientists to understand the right way to solve the damaging effects of climate change.
