Why conservative white men are more likely to deny climate change

[Javaman]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/the-hot-button/why-conservative-white-men-are-more-likely-to-deny-climate-change/article2192459/?utm_medium=Feeds%3A%20RSS%2FAtom&utm_source=Home&utm_content=2192459

snip

A study of climate-change denial suggests it’s so: 48 per cent of “confident” conservative white men believe the effects of global warming will never happen, versus 9 per cent of other adults, Scientific American reports.

snip

White men fear all kinds of risks less than women and minorities do, according to Riley Dunlap, who co-authored the study, printed in the October 2011 issue of Global Environmental Change.

For conservative white men – who tend to benefit most from the current socio-economic system – recognizing climate change would be against the status quo, Mr. Dunlap explained to the Huffington Post.

[joeybee12]

1. I've got a simpler answer...conservative men are just plain stupid...nt

[jwirr]

2. That makes sense. They have been showing signs of insecurity since

Nat led a slave rebellion. And today they are no longer a big majority so they cannot take any kind of "disaster" seriously since it only adds to their insecurity. Poor babies.

[TalkingDog]

3. I've got a more accurate answer: The Dunning-Kruger Effect

http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/05/11/the-dunning-kruger-effect/

Relevant passage:
It breaks down like this:

The more skilled you are, the more practice you’ve put in, the more experience you have, the better you can compare yourself to others. As you strive to improve, you begin to better understand where you need work. You start to see the complexity and nuance; you discover masters of your craft and compare yourself to them and see where you are lacking. On the other hand, the less skilled you are, the less practice you’ve put in and the fewer experiences you have, the worse you are at comparing yourself to others on certain tasks. Your peers don’t call you out because they know as much as you do, or they don’t want to hurt your feelings. Your narrow advantage over novices leads you to think you are the shit.



They don't know that they don't know and they are unwilling to admit it because they seem smarter than all the doofi (doofus plural) they hang around with.

[RufusTFirefly]

4. It's no surprise: Acknowledging climate change is a major threat to their worldview

Naomi Klein has been addressing this (bullet points are my distillation of Klein's arguments)

Why is climate change seen as such a threat? I don’t believe it’s an unreasonable fear. I think it’s unreasonable to believe that scientists are making up the science. They’re not. It’s not a hoax. But actually, climate change really is a profound threat to a great many things that right-wing ideologues believe in. So, in fact, if you really wrestle with the implications of the science and what real climate action would mean, here’s just a few examples what it would mean.

• It would mean upending the whole free trade agenda.
  
• You would have to deal with wealth inequality.
  
• You would have to regulate corporations.
  
• You would have to have a really strong United Nations.
  

So when you go through this, you see, it challenges everything that they believe in. So they’re choosing to disbelieve it, because it’s easier to deny the science than to say, "OK, I accept that my whole worldview is going to fall apart," that we have to have massive investments in public infrastructure, that we have to reverse free trade deals, that we have to have huge transfers of wealth from the North to the South. Imagine actually contending with that. It’s a lot easier to deny it.

From Why Climate Change Is So Threatening to Right-Wing Ideologues.

[TheKentuckian]

7. This is a part of it that works in conjunction with other factors.

Another piece is just how information is processed. Conservatives tend to view things in a vacuum, holistic thinking seems greatly impaired. They just can't follow connections or grasp interconnectedness and rather than even try they set up simple constructs to operate in and react against and shut down on anything that threatens their worldview.

They are stuck in straight line logic and are blinded to all but the most obvious cause and effect nor can they easily see effects over time. If it isn't an immediate and obvious impact then the waters instantly become too muddied for any interpretation other than falling back into what ever one is dictated by an accepted authority or what their internal construct dictates.

[Viking12]

5. Organized Propoganda is certainly an influence....

http://books.google.com/books?id=JihhbdpO-yoC&pg=PA144&lpg=PA144&dq=%22Organized+Climate-Change+Denial%22+mccright+dunlap+oxford&source=bl&ots=mTaCbrS_9e&sig=6AvQabli6J_t68Csb7CCGiWffT8&hl=en&ei=OK6ITqn9HYPk0QGKo53EDw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false">Organized Climate-Change Denial

[moondust]

6. The good ol' boys are heavily invested in fossil fuels.

And addicted to windfall profits.

[Shagbark Hickory]

8. HUWHAT?! Conservative white men are the most fearful group that I know of.

They're scared of everything.
Scared their guns are going to get taken away.
Scared their freedom is getting taken away.
Scared of Obama
Scared of Socialism
Scared of Furriners
Scared of teh Gay
Scared of women's rights
Scared of going to hell


Oh the list can go on and on and on and on and on.