Did the EPA borrow its latest PR strategy from my teenage self?

In 11th grade, I had an inane habit of staying up very late IMing my stoner boyfriend and/or stalking boys who were cuter than him on Myspace. As a result, I essentially never woke up on time for school — which, in my defense, started at 7:45 a.m. — but I REFUSED to acknowledge my role in that in any way.

“I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHY THIS KEEPS HAPPENING,” I would moan at every tardiness slip. I understood extremely well why this kept happening.

According to a Huffington Post report by Alexander Kaufman, the EPA is taking a very similar approach to its communications on climate change. On Tuesday evening, the agency’s Office of Public Affairs sent around an internal set of talking points.

To sum up: The EPA is dealin’ with climate change! But it sure doesn’t know why it’s happenin’!

Consider some of the OPA-provided points:

• Human activity impacts our changing climate in some manner. The ability to measure with precision the degree and extent of that impact, and what to do about it, are subject to continuing debate and dialogue.
• While there has been extensive research and a host of published reports on climate change, clear gaps remain including our understanding of the role of human activity and what we can do about it.

Replace “human activity” with “staying up until 1 a.m. on the internet” and “changing climate” or “climate change” with “always being late to school,” and you will see my point.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Did the EPA borrow its latest PR strategy from my teenage self? on Mar 28, 2018.

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