Comment by ohthehugemanate | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ohthehugemanate | Hacker News Reader

ohthehugemanate

Drives me crazy to see how we report this stuff. Doom and gloom sells more papers than hope, of course.

Yes, we are still net deforesting the Amazon rainforest... At the slowest rate since we began measuring. In 2016 we deforested about 6000km2. TFA says that in 2018 we deforested about 3700km2. This is down from the 1995 peak of 28,000 km2/yr. Remember all those programs to save the rainforest? Turns out they're working really well, and TFA proves it.

BBC opted not to print the headline "Amazon deforestation still improving, now at lowest rate ever!" And opted for the scary/outrageous version we see above. Both are true, but one tells you that our anti-deforestation efforts work, and have been improving the situation for decades. The other says everything is hopeless. Which one do you think is better for encouraging further action?

We're not done yet, there's still a terrible amount of deforestation going on, but we are definitely getting there!

(Fancy chart: https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/11/annual-rate-of-le... )

> Which one do you think is better for encouraging further action?

I can fairly easily imagine that the doom and gloom spin does better. The message that anti-deforestation efforts work and have been for decades likely does less to make the average person feel they should continue to do anything about it in their daily lives, since the current trend indicates everything will be fine. Instead, if you believe that the situation is dire, a person that otherwise would not care deeply about the problem might be more likely to take action.

I would argue that a combination of the two is most effective, if the primary goal is to encourage further action. A little doom and gloom by framing the current situation as an image people can understand ("a football pitch every minute") convinces people that there is still a significant problem, and then the hopeful aspect (that the trend actually shows a positive outlook) convinces them that any action they take will be useful.

Indeed, I went from a genuine "what can I personally do about this" when hearing about this on the radio this morning to "OK, I guess I don't need to get involved after all" when reading GP's comment. Just because outrage promotes clicks doesn't mean that it doesn't also encourage action.

Ah yes, much better! Thanks, now I'm seeing the cheery upside of deforestation!

Indeed. There's also the scale to consider.

I remember flying over the Amazon, watching this endless sea of empty green drifting past for hours on end. Thinking about these "football pitch per minute" logging numbers and thinking to myself "they're really going to need to step things up if they want to make a dent in this thing".

Sure, it's ugly near big habitations. But even those are few and far between. Still, it's nice to hear that the logging rate is dropping that sharply.

I agree with your sentiment. I guess "Things Aren't All That Bad After All" doesn't get as many clicks.

I'm sorry, I want to be respectful to most people, but the tone-deafness of this comment was really upsetting. I read your comment and I'm really struggling to find words to help you grasp how flippant, disrespectful, and frivolous it is. You fly over in a jetplane and have a thought about how it's all fine. You utter a dig that they aren't eating nature quite fast enough for you to care. You treat the extermination of vast quantities of species and habitat as nothing--it's all fine, because it's so big. Or something. But you are murky about how big it all is. Hours of flying, it costs you no effort to zip across. Out the window it's just another screen, just another selection in the menu of movies to watch on your shiftless, bored existence.

"Things Aren't All That Bad After All"--indeed. Just like carbon emissions weren't all that bad 40 years ago (compared to today!). And little by little, while people look the other way, gobble gobble. There's no undoing the destruction of pristine rainforest. It's really important that we stop it now; not when it gets down to 20% or 10%--now.

Please don't cross into personal attack no matter how wrong or provocative another comment is or feels.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

What I would love, and think needs to be the standard for reporting, is directing readers to the solutions of the doom and gloom. Directing them to recognized movements or foundations that take action, what general type of ingredients or products make use of the rain forests etc. so consumers can make informed decisions.

It's not about singling any company out (even though many rightly should), it's about informing people. We wouldn't appreciate someone coming up to us and giving us bad news every day or week and think of it as mentally healthy, but the media has always done it regardless.

People may be ambivalent to this type of progressive talk, but if they are truly ambivalent then they shouldn't actually care.

That's very much picking a side though, and a lot of people hate that and demand dispassionate media.

I understand the point you're making but according to the fancy chart you posted it did reach a peak in '95 but your statement implies that it's been in decline since then. According to the fancy chart it then steadily rose to almost the same level in '04. It fell again to it's lowest level in '12 and has consistently been above that level in the following years. Also the article makes it clear that the current rise is a result of local government policy and reduction in regulations which has been one of the primary obstacles in preventing mass deforestation. If we repeat the causes, we'll just inevitably repeat the results.

From the article:

The rate of losses has accelerated as Brazil's new right-wing president favours development over conservation.

It’s the BBC, not much can be expected. I believe it’s simply a matter of looking at the source to know what quality of reporting you should expect and whether the headline might be clickbait or not.

Thank you for this comment, very educational.

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