Polar bears and ice: cultural connotations of Arctic environments that contradict the science of climate change

Media, the Arctic, and American thought

Journalistic accounts – in daily press or through magazines such as National Geographic – were one of the wider public’s few sources of information concerning the Arctic in the early history of Western society’s interaction with the region (Riffenbaugh, 1993; Robinson, 2006). Notably, tales of Arctic exploration captivated readerships and began to influence the way in which the region was perceived by Westerners. The reason behind this captivation stems from the simple fact that

adventure stories sell newspapers; when the attainment of the North Pole became a competitive event, newspapers took notice as never before, reported each expedition in the minutest detail, and also sponsored expeditions seeking the pole to ensure the race was run to the last. (Holland, 1994: 107)

Additionally, the advent of cold weather photographic techniques allowed people to see the landscape of this far-off region (Fiala, 1907: 141). Thus, the media, for better or worse, accelerated depictions of the Arctic as a frontier to be conquered, and has since remained a primary determinant in how information pertaining to the Arctic is conveyed to the public (see also Christensen et al., 2013).

While much of what the general public knows about the Arctic and climate change has been learned from the media, there is a distinct disconnect between scientific findings and how they are portrayed in the American media, which thereby indicates that public views of the scientific validity of climate change may be influenced by competing cultural connotations and images. It is a truism to state that for the general public, ‘mass media, particularly television and daily newspapers, constitute major sources of information about scientific issues including climate-related questions’, however, what is significant is that while the news media may be the public’s primary scientific information source,

media coverage of scientific issues is not a direct reflection of scientific debates and discourse but rather part and parcel of a complex web of power geometries (inter- and intra-institutional); professional/social interactions between policymakers, scientists and media actors; and journalistic norms and routines. (Christensen, 2013: 28)

To further compound this disconnect between science and the public, studies confirm that ‘a significant number of Americans do not use science to inform their views. Instead, they use political orientation and ideology, which are reflected in their level of education, to decide whether humans are driving planetary warming’ (Vaidyanathan, 2015). And while an optimistic person would hope that policy makers do not fall prey to such shortcomings in the conveyance of scientific knowledge, media portrayal of scientific findings has been shown to influence ‘individual to community- and international-level perceptions of climate science and policy decision making’ (Boykoff and Yulsman, 2013: 368). Effectively, what the American public, as well as its policy makers, learn about scientific findings of climate change is largely a function of the mass media portrayal of these findings, as well as the way in which their own ideological and political beliefs receive such information. It has been suggested that the increased polarity of modern American political ideologies and subsequent ‘inter-party animus lies in the rhetoric of political campaigns … [Furthermore] the tendency of the media to recycle candidates’ negative messages only confirms partisans’ suspicions of those on the other side’ (Iyengar et al., 2012: 427). The increased polarization and animosity between the two parties can only contribute to the development of public views that are not so much rationally grounded as they are politically motivated. In a sense, political ideology serves as a lens that alters the public’s perception of information and media. As the public knowledge and cultural perceptions of the Arctic are similarly dependent upon their media portrayal, and the image of the Arctic is inextricably tied to the American concept of climate change, one can easily make the supposition that cultural connotations of the Arctic influence both the broadcast and reception of information concerning scientific findings of climate change.

Connotations of the Arctic as hostile and climate change discourse

Arctic exploration of the 19th century laid the intellectual framework for modern perceptions of the Arctic as a harsh, foreboding, and inhospitable environment. The age of heroic, masculine, and nationalistic polar exploration served as the foundation for modern public connotations of the Arctic and as an extension of Pax Americana and Manifest Destiny. The stories of exploration were generally characterized by depictions of the Arctic as a fierce natural environment that was a life-threatening challenge to all Westerners who attempted to endure it. In a period of relative peace, ‘the Arctic began to be touted as a training ground for seaman and officers that would be required for future wars’, which thereby contributed to the image of this region as a foreboding environment, as the few men who attempted to explore it were part of the military, and thus especially hardy (McGhee, 2006: 218). Furthermore, at the time, the Arctic was one of the few regions on Earth that remained uncharted by Westerners, thereby serving as a frontier in which explorers were motivated by ‘patriotic fervor, the desire to expand human knowledge, and most prominently the quest for personal advancement and personal celebrity’ (McGhee, 2006: 217). Inherently intrinsic to the narrative of Arctic exploration is a certain quality of machoism, which at the time, only compounded this, as women were implied to be unsuited to attempt to explore it. Overall, Arctic exploration and the establishment of the Arctic as a frontier had important social implications, including

valuable opportunities for enhancing national prestige, training naval personnel, carrying out scientific recording and investigation, and testing technological developments … a focus for patriotism, even jingoism on occasions, and the resulting national heroes, with their stories of hardship, triumph and occasional disaster, [which] were especially appealing to a Protestant popular imagination. (David, 2000: 2)

During the Cold War, connotations and attitudes of the Arctic as a hostile environment were perpetuated. Depictions of the Arctic during the Cold War were very much in the same vein as the Arctic explorer narratives of the 19th century. Ironically, while in the age of Arctic exploration, the region served as a military training ground of sorts in the absence of real engagements, during the Cold War, this same absence of combat resulted in similar use of the region as a patriotic and military playing field. Such iconography is evident in both high-budget action films such as Ice Station Zebra (1968) and in news programs like the widely broadcast US Army Signal Corps Pictorial Service documentary television (TV) series The Big Picture (1954–1961), which featured a number of episodes focusing on engineering feats on the ice. The Big Picture’s City Under the Ice: Camp Century (1961), for example, depicts the construction of Camp Century, a military outpost built north of Thule on the Greenland ice sheet at the height of the Cold War. Throughout the film, the environment is described as foreboding and harsh, with numerous elaborations upon the difficulty of conditions and how the Army had to overcome obstacles posed by this environment in order to build the base. Effectively, The Big Picture’s City Under the Ice: Camp Century portrays to the public that without the ingenuity and resources of one of the most powerful armies in the world, surviving in the Arctic would be impossible, thereby perpetuating the public image of the Arctic created by exploration. The Italian–Soviet coproduction, The Red Tent (1969), portrays the continuation of these attitudes and depicts the crash and subsequent rescue of the dirigible of the early 20th century Arctic explorer, Umberto Nobile. The subject of the film itself indicates that Arctic exploration was still a salient topic in the era of the Cold War and that audiences were still comfortable with such notions of the region. In effect, these Cold War films illustrate that connotations of the Arctic as a hostile frontier and force to be reckoned with were still prevalent in the modern age, and thus throughout its socio-cultural history, connotations of the region as powerful and foreboding are well-established and recognized. The establishment of these connotations thus undoubtedly influences the way in which climate change is perceived if images of the Arctic are linked to this climatological phenomenon in the public mindset. Interestingly, during the Cold War, political actions illustrated this connotation. Throughout the Cold War, ‘ecological concerns were conspicuous by their total absence or relative neglect in the national priorities and calculations of Arctic states … The most dramatic, indeed shocking, example during this period is the disposal of radioactive waste in Arctic seas’ (Chaturvedi, 2000: 448). The dumping of radioactive waste indicates an understanding of the Arctic as a powerful environment which humanity, and its waste, could not affect.

As the Arctic, one of the two coldest parts of the Earth, has become the central image of climate change and global warming, it presents a logical contradiction for the scientifically uninclined. The association of Arctic images with the concept of anthropogenic climate change and global warming has been received with resistance as a result of the cultural connotations of the Arctic as a life-threateningly cold region originating in Cold War and explorer narratives, which on a superficial level contradict the concept of global warming. For example, ‘not so long ago, polar bears were a symbol of cold, but these days they are a symbol of warmth’ (Garfield, 2007). Interestingly, and from a science education perspective, disappointingly, American connotations of the Arctic as cold do seem to influence global warming discourse. For example, a prominent representative in the US Congress, Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, addressed his constituents in a statement, ‘Unilateral economic restraint in the name of fighting global warming has been a tough sell in our communities, where much of the state is buried under snow’ (Ryan, 2011). In effect, Ryan’s statement illustrates how even winter snowfall in a temperate state appears contradictory to claims of global warming in these American communities. While Ryan’s statement may not necessarily reflect his own beliefs, it nonetheless captures the ideological lean of his party and constituency. If one season’s heavy snowfall can serve as a basis for resistance to the acceptance of anthropogenic climate change, images of ice in the Arctic can understandably do the same if these are the representations of global warming in the public consciousness. Perhaps then the visual links made between climate change and the Arctic, while scientifically the most rigorous and evident, may not be the most effective means of debate for not-so-scientifically inclined audiences.

In light of our understanding of the way in which the Arctic is perceived by the American public, a possible link can be found between this perception and the common view of climate change skeptics that the climate cannot be influenced by humans. Notably, in a recent, quite comprehensive study of opinions toward climate change, it was found that ‘37% of Americans think that global warming is due mostly to natural changes in the environment’, or in other words, that humankind is not causing climate change (Leiserowitz et al., 2010: 11). Furthermore, these attitudes are echoed by the statements of several politicians who have expressed skepticism toward anthropogenic global warming. For example, Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe expressed his views that the ‘Climate is changing and climate has always changed and always will. The hoax is that there are some people who are so arrogant to think they are so powerful they can change climate. Man can’t change climate’ (Goldenberg, 2015). A congressional representative of Indiana, Todd Rokita, has been quoted in saying, ‘I think it’s arrogant that we think as people that we can somehow change the climate of the whole earth when science is telling us that there’s a cycle to all this’ (MacNeal, 2013). In each of these politicians’ statements, the view that humanity is inconsequential in affecting the environment is clearly exhibited. In effect, there is clearly a common worldview shared by many Americans and politicians suggesting that human impacts upon the environment are insignificant. Notably, senior Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, known as a ‘war hawk’ and by all means a bastion of the right, has stated that ‘climate change is not a religious problem for [him]. It’s an economic, it is an environmental problem’ (Knowles, 2015). Graham’s stance on climate change stands in contrast to most Republican politicians, but sheds light upon the intrinsically religious nature of climate change skepticism.

While many right wing politicians oppose the limitation of greenhouse gas emissions for religious reasons, an even greater number would feasibly oppose it for economic reasons. In effect, measures to constrain greenhouse gas emissions contradict both right wing religious and economic ideologies, which interplay to construct the worldview of an environment that is hierarchically higher than humanity and can thus be utilized without restraint. In light of the common link between images of the Arctic and the concept of climate change as well as long-established attitudes toward the Arctic as hostile and powerful that originate from exploration to the Cold War, a common association of attitudes is easily elucidated. In a society that otherwise constantly works to alter its environment, the Arctic stands as one of the few places in the cultural mindset that cannot be tamed, and these attitudes, through the images of polar bears and ice, are attributed to the concept of climate change, thereby contradicting the scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change and generating cultural resistance to its legitimacy.

The findings of Mann et al. (1998) and the subsequent ‘Climategate’ scandal, as well as the reception of other important scientific studies, shed light upon the contentious aspect of climate change: anthropogenic forcing. One of the first scientific publications to identify the occurrence of anthropogenic climate change was written by Hansen and Lebedeff in 1987. Dr Hansen later testified before Congress, clearly stating to politicians that human production of greenhouse gases was causing widespread warming (Shabecoff, 1988). The work of Hansen and Lebedeff started the ball rolling in terms of widespread recognition of climate change by scientists. Nearly 10 years later, Mann et al. (1998) published their now famous Nature article that included the ‘hockey stick curve’ illustrating the significant rise in global surface temperatures tied to industrialization and the anthropogenic production of greenhouse gases. The findings of Mann et al. drew considerable media attention, especially during the ‘Climategate’ scandal that followed the hacking of a server at the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia (Pearce, 2010).

Dubbed ‘climategate’ by climate skeptics and some in the media, the scandal generated considerable press attention across the United States and around the world, with articles and editorials published in major newspapers and scientific journals and stories broadcast on major television and radio networks. (Leiserowitz et al., 2013: 819)

Many emails between prominent climate scientists were released, and when taken out of context, were easily manipulated to make these scientists appear to be charlatans manipulating data. The ‘Climategate’ scandal serves as an illustration of how the media has influenced the reception of scientific findings of climate change in the past. However, within the resistive reception to these findings, one can deduce links between cultural attitudes toward the Arctic and climate change. For example, a prominent conservative blogger and climate denier, Rand Simberg, claimed that Mann ‘had been engaging in data manipulation in order to keep the blade on his famous hockey-stick graph, which had become an icon for those determined to reduce carbon emissions by any means necessary’ (Simberg, 2012). Effectively, in Simberg’s statement, one can see that the real issue at the heart of the climate change debate is the validity of anthropogenic warming and whether or not humanity can truly affect the climate in noticeable ways. In light of the distinct image of the Arctic as a hostile environment that dwarfs humanity, Simberg’s train of thought bears a striking resemblance to this point of view. The mentality behind the backlash of denial and criticism toward climate scientists during ‘Climategate’ is thus likely linked to views of the Arctic that would contradict the logic of the findings of these climate scientists.

Dissociation of the Arctic and climate change: indigenous peoples and Cold War worries

The Cold War introduced a new psychological paradigm of warfare to the American public that further distanced the Arctic in the American mindset. Proxy wars in far-away places such as Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan, combined with the lack of the traditional ‘home front’ war effort of the World Wars resulted in the general dissociation of the public with the conflict. The McCarthy era exhibited domestic unrest toward the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and its ideologies, and the involvement of American forces in proxy wars undoubtedly impacted the American public; the period was characterized by themes of fear, uncertainty, and distance from the enemy. Most contact that the ‘war’ had with people was as a result of media coverage. Cinematic imaginaries of the Arctic during the Cold War present a geopolitical game in which environmental aspects are managed in much the same manner that the conditions of space are dealt with by astronauts, namely, as self-sustainable encampments and vehicles upon whose integrity the crew is completely dependent for survival. In effect, much in the same way that Cold War conflict in the Arctic was contained and separated from the American public, canonical Arctic Cold War films, from The Thing (1952) to Ice Station Zebra (1968) and The Red Tent (1969) portrayed characters that were likewise contained and distant from palpable influence upon the public. As MacKenzie and Stenport (2013) argue,

like the concerns about global warming today, these films and the ideologies behind them lived in fear of the thaw, and what a change in the frozen, hermetically sealed ideology of the two worlds would mean for their inhabitants and the political worlds that the ideology of these films upheld. (p. 174)

In effect, Cold War politics and its portrayal in the media and popular films were characterized by a defensive dissociation.

Similar assumptions guide public perception of global warming in the 21st century. A recent study of imagery and visual representations of climate change established that ‘fearful messages can enhance feelings that climate change is a distant issue in both time and space … studies indicate that meaningful engagement approaches must involve some degree of connection with “the everyday,” in both spatial and temporal terms’ (O’Neill and Nicholson-Cole, 2009: 369). Therefore, similar to the views of the Arctic as an otherworldly, desolate, remote, and sealed-off region during the Cold War, modern images of climate change and the Arctic foreground evoke fear, which arguably results in dissociative distancing in the mindset of the American public. This dissociation is evident in general attitudes toward climate change. One survey found that ‘over six in 10 people … said they don’t think that global warming will seriously threaten them during their lifetimes’ (Clement, 2013). The results of this survey illustrate the dissociation of Americans with the issue of climate change, much like Cold War connotations of the Arctic as an otherworldly region.

Western cultural representations of the indigenous peoples of the Arctic are characterized by a lack of understanding of their history, cultural paradigms, and relationships to the environment. In the American cultural consciousness, the Arctic has been alienated and dissociated as a hostile and inhospitable environment, though there are multiple prosperous and culturally rich indigenous populations that call this region home. For example, views of the Arctic in this regard characterize the region as a blank space ‘where human action seemed to cease in cold and ice there could be no history … a non-history of no events and the silence that preceded action’ (Jørgensen and Sörlin, 2014: 1). While the existence of indigenous peoples would seemingly contradict this view of the Arctic, their non-conformity to Western standards and paradigms of what constitutes a civilized society actually reinforces this view. For example, ‘the Inuit’s own past was recorded through their oral tradition’ (David, 2000: 3). However, as is the custom of the Western society, rather than attempt to understand a culture that does not conform to Western paradigms, Inuit cultures were written off as primitive and marginalized, thereby alienating and suppressing these peoples in the public consciousness. Furthermore, in stark contrast to the Western exploitative view of the land, ‘for indigenous peoples, land is not only a source of livelihood but also of philosophy; fundamental cultural values and worldviews are derived from the land’ (Kuokkanen, 2000: 1; 2007). This fundamental difference in the way that the natural environment is perceived by Arctic indigenous cultures thus further alienates and dissociates them from Western culture. In this context, the Arctic comes to serve as an exception for typical Western views of the natural environment. These connotations of the Arctic relate to public opinion about climate change. In a recent study, it was found that only about ‘half of [all] Americans (47%) believe global warming – if it is happening – is caused mostly by human activities’, thereby illustrating that this dissociation of the Arctic, and subsequently climate change, has resulted in a mindset that inherently resists scientific findings and agreement concerning anthropogenic climate change (Leiserowitz et al., 2010: 11).

American exceptionalism: the intermingling of religious and political belief

In the United States, political, scientific, and religious discourses and ideologies are closely linked on the right, which likely explains at least part of the disconnect between scientific knowledge and political action concerning climate change. In a nation that guarantees freedom of religion, it is particularly ironic how contradictions with religious beliefs and doctrines have resulted in some of the greatest political debates (evolution, stem cell research, abortion and same-sex marriages to name a few), which also tend to fall between party lines. Similarly, in the case of anthropogenic climate change, party lines appear to dictate acceptance of the scientific evidence. Research indicates that ‘liberals and Democrats are more likely to hold beliefs about global warming consistent with the scientific consensus and to express concern about this environmental problem than are conservatives and Republicans’ (McCright and Dunlap, 2011: 178). Additionally, research has found that, generally speaking, in the United States, scientific literacy is relatively low when compared to other developed nations, and ‘that religious factors play a substantial role in creating these deficits’ (Sherkat, 2011: 1145). Furthermore, ‘sectarian Protestants, Catholics, and people with fundamentalist beliefs in the inerrancy of the Bible have significantly lower levels of scientific literacy when compared with secular Americans’ (Sherkat, 2011: 1134). Effectively, religion, science, and politics all compound to influence policy and legislation to a high degree in the United States. Political beliefs are not necessarily separate from religious ideologies, which may not coalesce with scientific findings, thereby rendering the American political atmosphere especially convoluted. As religious and scientific beliefs compete with one another on the political stage, the question of how religion may counteract scientific assertions of anthropogenic climate change thus begs to be answered.

Resistance to the acceptance of anthropogenic climate change may be the result of differing religious and spiritual worldviews of scientists and generally the more religious population of climate change deniers. Scientists are generally regarded as non-believers, and rightly so,

about 34 percent of scientists at elite universities ‘do not believe in God’ and about 30 percent more answer ‘I do not know if there is a God and there is no way to find out’ … meaning that over 60 percent of this population describes themselves as either atheist or agnostic. (Ecklund and Long, 2011: 264)

Plausibly, empirical findings of anthropogenic climate change ought to evoke little resistance in this community. However, for more religious Americans who have a very different worldview than these scientists, such claims may seem contradictory. For example, research indicates that a majority of Evangelicals ‘readily evince environmental apathy … In particular, [they] find a belief in a rigid hierarchy of God, humans, and then the environment; a belief in the sovereignty of God; and eschatological beliefs help generate narratives of environmental apathy’ (Peifer et al., 2014: 373). Furthermore, research indicates that ‘a belief in Christian end-times theology significantly predicts resistance to government action aimed at curbing global warming’ (Barker and Bearce, 2013: 271). It thus appears as though there is a fundamental difference in the way that scientists and those most likely to deny the legitimacy of anthropogenic climate change view the hierarchy of the universe. More religiously inclined persons intrinsically view the environment as something that is not under the control of humanity but of a higher being. Interestingly, this has not always been the case. While modern religious people view the environment

as completely beyond their control, the early Enlightenment’s theology of climate change did not regard humans as passive victims. Far from precluding human agency, the invisible hand of God at work in these accounts only served to underscore humanity’s role in bringing disaster upon themselves. (Barnett, 2015: 232)

Unfortunately for future Americans who will have to brave the consequences of modern policy’s delayed response to climate change, this religious worldview did not last. Nonetheless, Senator’s Inhofe’s words, ‘there are some people who are so arrogant to think they are so powerful they can change climate. Man can’t change climate’, are particularly pertinent in light of this religious worldview (Goldenberg, 2015). Furthermore, the often anthropomorphized image of the polar bear may be perceived as a projection of humanity by climate deniers, thereby reinforcing the doubt in anthropogenic climate change.

Conclusion

While scientists widely agree that anthropogenic climate change is currently occurring, many Americans continue to deny its validity. This disconnect is likely the result of information distortion that has been shown to occur in the media’s portrayal of scientific findings, especially in the context of the climate change debate. As many Americans rely upon the visual representations of television and newspapers as their sources of information of scientific findings, these portrayals have an important influence upon the way in which people view this climatological phenomenon. Interestingly, a visual imagery of the Arctic, a region with a rich history of cultural connotations, has become intrinsically associated with the concept of climate change, which has likely resulted in the association of cultural attitudes toward the Arctic being attributed to the concept of climate change. Upon examination, deniers of anthropogenic climate change stand in general contrast to general Western connotations of the natural world. While typically speaking, Western culture views the natural environment as something to be utilized and exploited for gain, the Arctic stands in stark contrast to this notion. In Western thought, ‘as the self-proclaimed soliloquist of the world, “Man” is obliged to be known about nature’ as opposed to being a symbiotic part of it as most indigenous cultures perceive themselves (Manes, 1992: 22). This contrasting view of the Arctic illustrates how attitudes toward the region originating from exploration and Cold War narratives have differentiated it in public thought, and how in a society wrought by exploitative attitudes toward the natural world, one region holds a special status of invincibility that has become intrinsic to the public skepticism of anthropogenic climate change as a result of its association with the Arctic. Additionally, views of Arctic indigenous peoples have reinforced denial of anthropogenic climate change on grounds of the limited influence of humanity upon the natural world, which may stem from distinct differences in worldview originating from religion. The marginalization of indigenous peoples of the Arctic and the characterization of the region as otherworldly has effectively dissociated the Arctic region and the climate change associated with it from the sphere of the Western society. Thus, cultural connotations of and attitudes toward the Arctic have been projected upon anthropogenic climate change, thereby reinforcing skepticism and possibly explaining the rupture of consensus between the scientific community and the general public consciousness. In this way, the reliance of scientists upon records of the Arctic climate to illustrate the amplified effects of climate change in a climatologically sensitive region may be misguided in light of the likely cultural connotations and resistance that may impede these efforts. If preventative actions against the exacerbation of anthropogenic climate change are to be taken, then it would appear as though cultural connotations of climate change ought to be considered and addressed in order to ensure the efficacy of educational and informational efforts in the future.