Making Climate Denialism Mainstream

Efforts by libertarian conspiracy theorists and climate change deniers to block climate initiatives in the Kootenay region of B.C. are threatening to engulf the province as the loose coalition plots ways to expand its ideology.

Threats from people associated with the group BC Rising led the Regional District of Central Kootenay (RDCK) to postpone a suite of public meetings about its climate plan this spring. Since the meetings finally started in late August, they have been swarmed by people aligned with the group's beliefs trying to stop the regional district's climate efforts.

Believers say that the United Nations is led by a shadowy group of elites who are trying to create an authoritarian global government, using the World Economic Forum as a cover for their plans. They claim this group is coercing national, regional and local governments to implement climate initiatives and digital technologies as a ploy to eliminate people's human rights and freedoms. They claim climate change is not occurring or, if it is, is not caused by humans burning fossil fuels.

The B.C. group is part of a broader, Canada-wide organization that proselytizes similar conspiracies.

Scientists agree climate change is caused by human activity, primarily the burning of fossil fuels. The United Nations is a democratic coalition of nations; it has no global governing authority and cannot force countries to adopt specific policies. The World Economic Forum is an international organization that aims to promote collaboration between businesses and governments, best known for hosting the annual Davos summit in Switzerland.

"These people were insulting (city staff) and being abusive," said Kootenay resident, lawyer and progressive activist Allan Early, who attended some of the meetings. The group was "invective" in its efforts to force its "false misinformation and abusive anti-government nonsense" into the gatherings, he said.

It appears the coalition — which claims about 2,000 members on its website — is now trying to expand its reach throughout B.C. At a Zoom meeting earlier this month, roughly 45 people from across the province gathered to share strategies on how best to lobby local politicians and disrupt public meetings.

"We basically provide a space where groups can receive support, resources and educational material, which can help groups to lobby their local city councils and regional districts," said one organizer from the Kootenays.

While climate denial has existed for decades, the idea that climate policies are part of a secret government ploy to restrict people's freedom has only really emerged since the pandemic, explained Carleton University professor Chris Russill in a May interview with Canada's National Observer. This "climate authoritarianism" feeds off the fears that many people developed in response to pandemic lockdowns and other public health measures, channelling them into far-right, anti-government beliefs.

Nonetheless, said Russill, it is the “wider set of conspiratorial musings that are animating this and drawing people in," he said. Those fears were on display during one of the group's fortnightly online Zoom meetings earlier this month.

Starting at around 7 p.m. on a Tuesday, the Zoom call had the feel of a local community group meeting. About half the attendees joined with cameras off, represented instead by black squares with their names. The remainder streamed in from kitchen tables, living rooms and offices. One woman's head floated in against a star-flecked, New Agey background. People made small talk, some referencing books and articles by known climate deniers like former American official Steven Koonin.

The meeting was loosely chaired by Geoff Snicer, a Kamloops man who drove across North America in a brightly emblazoned truck to convince Americans that Canada needed to be "saved" from the "tyranny" of "global governance."

Delivering the keynote address was Farrell Segall, a former councillor in the Kootenay town of Salmo. Speaking from a darkened room, he made a roughly 40-minute, fear-filled presentation about the 15-minute city conspiracy theory rife with fake and misleading information. This conspiracy posits the UN and the federal government are trying to force people into urban centres and prevent them from leaving, using climate change policies as a foil to cover their tracks.

In fact, the term "15-minute cities" is an urban planning concept to describe efforts by planners to build neighbourhoods where residents can get basic necessities within a 15-minute walk or bike ride. Over 60 per cent of Canadians support the concept, according to a March survey, and property values typically are higher when they are in a more walkable neighbourhood.

Conspiracy theories about the concept only emerged last year after a handful of fringe right-wing bloggers promoted them on social media, according to research by the group Climate Action Against Disinformation.

The meeting started in earnest after Segall’s presentation.

With Snicer moderating, Segall and other activists from the Kootenay region outlined how they were trying to gain followers and block the local government's climate efforts. They stated the most effective technique was to talk at Freedom Convoy rallies or conduct town hall-style meetings to "raise awareness" and gain more public support. Once they had a large enough group, they could plan actions that targeted regional climate policies, like swarming public meetings or lobbying local officials.

People from other parts of the province chimed in with advice or updates about local initiatives. A man in Kamloops claimed he had lobbied the city's mayor to push back on efforts to reduce emissions and promote electric vehicles.

Some attendees from the Okanagan asked others for help organizing their local efforts. A woman in Victoria called on fellow conspiracists to travel to the city in mid-September to lobby B.C. mayors, who are expected to be in the capital for an annual gathering.

A woman in Burnaby who claimed she works in the oil and gas sector emphasized that "this whole climate hoax is underpinning everything that we're fighting" and that "we need to keep fighting" using the same tactics as the group in the Kootenays. That includes pushing back against the "narrative" of climate change, which she claimed has even forced the oil and gas sector to develop carbon capture and storage technology to "appease" the federal government and "people on the left."

Scientists agree that climate change is caused by humans warming the atmosphere by burning greenhouse gases. Carbon capture and storage is a suite of technologies oil companies say will reduce their emissions while allowing them to continue producing, but the approach is criticized by environmentalists for being an ineffective solution to rapidly reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

In an email, Kootenay-based group organizer Corrine Mori told Canada's National Observer the group doesn't receive any funding and "every single person involved in this province is working on this for no money."

But Russill pointed out that many of the conspiracy theories and climate denialism the group is promoting have been pushed for years by cash-flush conservative media organizations, fossil fuel lobbyists and influencers in Canada and the U.S. While it is nearly impossible to draw a "direct line" between the B.C. group's efforts and fossil fuel companies or right-wing lobbyists, these companies' political and economic influence and ability to push their agenda through social media platforms is fuelling these groups.

"It's what keeps them together," he said.