ADL Condemns Spencer’s Nazi Analogy

February 26, 2014
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The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today denounced remarks by University of Alabama – Huntsville professor Roy Spencer who wrote on his blog that those who refer to him as a climate change “denier” should be called “global warming Nazis” and that they “are supporting policies that will kill far more people than the Nazis ever did — all in the name of what they consider to be a righteous cause.”

He also claims those who advocate for policies to slow global warming are “like the Nazis” in that they are fascist and anti-capitalist. The post is also accompanied by an image of a swastika.

Shelley Rose, ADL Southeast Interim Regional Director issued the following statement:

University of Alabama-Huntsville Professor Roy Spencer’s analogy of proponents of global warming to Nazis is outrageous and deeply offensive.  This analogy is just the latest example of a troubling epidemic of comparisons to Hitler and the Holocaust.

It has become too common to use comparisons to the Holocaust and Nazi imagery to attack people with opposing views, whether the issue is global warming, immigration or stem-cell research.

The six million Jewish victims and millions of other victims of Hitler deserve better.  Their deaths should not be used for political points or sloganeering.  This type of comparison diminishes and trivializes the Holocaust. There is no place for it in civil discussions.

  • Ben D

    So let me get this right……the ADL condones AGW bullies calling AGL scientific skeptics ‘deniers’ with clear undertones of association with the Holocaust, and then condemns the tit for tat response!

    Isn’t this a little one sided…why don’t you call out the other side of this scientific debate, particularly when much of the propaganda against skeptics is much more extreme and fascist minded?

    Do a little research puleeeze?

  • ricwerme

    Where was the ADL when skeptics started to be called “climate change deniers”? Where was the ADL when James Hansen, when he was the director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Science, referred freight trains carrying coal as “death trains”? Before launching into a knee jerk criticism of someone who has been unfairly hounded and denigrated for much of his professional career for working with data that shows climate change is less significant and less due to CO2 than those in power think, please do a little research.

    Please do come to the climate change debate and help get it back to healthy discourse instead of name calling it has fallen to today.

  • http://wermenh.com/index.html ricwerme

    BTW, while we’re on Nazi links, you might want to thank the WUWT blog for exposing how the Skeptical Science blog’s principals photoshopped themselves on images of Nazi leaders. I don’t know if the public shaming has changed any attitudes, but at least it will make them more careful in the future. See http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/06/skeptcial-science-takes-creepy-to-a-whole-new-level/

  • Michael Goad

    Dr. Spencer’s post is in response to the over-the top

  • OssQss

    I believe it would be in the best interest of this publication to do more background research, and perhaps publish an update to this article.

    Start at the rebuttal to this exact article from the shoes of the accused, and go from there.

    http://www.drroyspencer.com/2014/02/hypocrisy-at-the-anti-defamation-league/

  • Max Hugoson

    Am I to understand that the ADL is going to start documenting and vigorously defending the handicapped, the mentally retarded and handicapped, the Romanian Gypsies with the ferver they do the Jewish victums of the “Holocast”. I think not! Nazi behavior was NOT limited to violence, per see. It involved intimidation, verbal…and through threats on position, pay, power…whatever. NO opposition party was allowed. THIS IS QUITE SIMILAR to the behavior of the GREEN/LEFT with regard anyone who opposes them. Frankly, I don’t think the surviving Jewish populations of the world have learned much at all about the elements of equitable behavior, and “I may disagree with my opponent’s position, but I’ll defend to the DEATH his RIGHT to say it.” THOUGHT POLICE YOU ARE. Fair, just, and with enough character to handle “sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me”. HA, you are children.

  • tomdesabla1

    Hi, I don’t think it was particularly helpful for Dr. Spencer to say what he did, but to condemn his comments without considering the context is unfair. The context is an organized campaign of denigration and yes – defamation – of those who are skeptical on the issue of catastrophic man-made global warming. It is a fact that we still cannot predict the weather for 10 days with great accuracy, so it is not unreasonable at all to be skeptical of the accuracy of some of the predictions provided by climate scientists about the next decades, or the next hundred years, especially since nearly all of their predictions are generated by computer models only.

    Deniers, denialists, shills, anti-science – these are examples of how skeptics are routinely characterized. It doesn’t seem right at all that the ADL would remain silent while these derogatory and dehumanizing terms are used, but suddenly take action when someone like Dr. Spencer, who has been repeatedly called such names, fights back. He is a human being, and has a right to defend himself.

    It’s also worth mentioning that dehumanizing terms WERE used by the Nazis to pave the way for their horrible abuses, so although as I said, Dr. Spencer’s comments were unhelpful, they were not completely off the mark either.

  • goldminor

    Your byline is stated as ” Imagine a World Without Hate”. Yet you do not seem to recognize what has been happening in dialogues taking place at different media site blogs around the globe in discussions that are related to climate change. There has been an escalating scale of attack against anyone who voices an opinion that goes against the catastrophic global warming agenda. Recently the level of attack has escalated to some calling for imprisonment or worse for those who disagree with their belief system of CAGW. Does the ADL stand with those people and what they would like to see done to those who disagree with their beliefs? There is no question in my mind that the hard core inner group of acolytes, who spend their days spewing hate speech continually at sceptics, have the impetus in their heart to inflict harm on the perceived enemy, which are those who are sceptical of their beliefs regarding causes of changes in the climate. Actually the term ‘Climate Change Gestapo’ would be more fitting for those types, as they are the hard core adherents to this belief system. Many of them do not have the ability to understand the science under discussion as it is. However they have chosen sides, and absent the ability to debate they resort to hateful or denigrating comments against sceptics. It is in this light that I see no problem with Dr Spencer’s article and the views that he has expressed. I am thus surprised to hear of your reaction to this issue.

    My great grandfather had the foresight to leave Poland with his family prior to the rise of Hitler. He tried to talk his cousins and relatives to join him, but they did not believe his words. There were only several survivors from those who did not heed his words that survived that which came to pass.

  • Craig

    Dr Spencer is quite probably at his wit’s end and figures he has nothiing to lose. Being labelled a ‘denier’ and likened to holocaust deniers for over a decade might do that to a man. He’s not doing himself any favours here, but he is standing up to put an end to the besmirching of scientists who won’t accept dogma and rhetoric as the norm. I wish him good luck/.

    And shame on the ADL, you are far too late in this game for those of us taking the hate speech and death threats from the alarmist camps.

  • Shrub

    Shelley Rose, ADL Southeast Interim Regional Director issued the following statement:

    “University of Alabama-Huntsville Professor Roy Spencer’s analogy of proponents of global warming to Nazis is outrageous and deeply offensive.”

    Response: The ADL’s silence to a decade and a half’s demonization of folks who have raised honest questions about the extent to which humans contribute to “global warming”, or how serious it might be, is both outrageous and deeply offensive, in much the same sense as those who remain silent now, when good people of honest conviction and with scientific evidence supporting them, are demonized.

    “This analogy is just the latest example of a troubling epidemic of comparisons to Hitler and the Holocaust. It has become too common to use comparisons to the Holocaust and Nazi imagery to attack people with opposing views, whether the issue is global warming, immigration or stem-cell research.”

    Response: And yet, there has been a constant attempt to demonize those of us who have taken the time to learn about GW and its surrounding issues using exactly the same kind of language as was used by Hitler and those who supported him against the Jews. Where is your outrage at them, Ms Rose?

    “The six million Jewish victims and millions of other victims of Hitler deserve better.”

    Response: We who question the importance of human-generated CO2 to GW, or question the dogma that such GW will be “catastrophic” deserve better. But if you don’t care about us, do you care nothing for the millions and millions of people who will die if and when you get your wish, and energy prices go sky high? Will you feel complicit in their murder through your silence on those who use Nazi techniques against those of who would save them, and then by your affirmative attacks on us? Surely, they deserve better.

    “Their deaths should not be used for political points or sloganeering. This type of comparison diminishes and trivializes the Holocaust. There is no place for it in civil discussions.”

    Response: By averting your eyes, and conscience, from those who will suffer and die with the meteoric rise of energy prices and folks who you yourself would demonize for attempting to save their lives, you have forfeitted any right to sermonize about “civil discourse.”

    I say all this as a retired and reasonably successful (biomedical) scientist . . . one who was highly skeptical of the work of other scientists, and as one who fully expected, and welcomed, the most pointed scrutiny of his own work.

    Sleep well, Ms Rose.

  • http://motls.blogspot.com/ Luboš Motl

    ADL harasses Dr Spencer just like if ADL were Gestapo. You are trying to intimidate him and make him stop pointing out that just like the Nazis, the global warming alarmists are a threat to the civilization, to the very basic freedom of human beings on the whole Earth.

    Your organization has exhibited a stunning degree of hypocrisy, after a decade when you were silent while the global warming Nazis were trying to organize Nuremberg trials for compare the climate skeptics – the only professional as well as hobbyist climate scientists who are being honest – and compare them to holocaust deniers, death trains, anti-abolitionists, racists, homophobes, alcoholic fathers, and so on, e.g.:

    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/21/al-gore-compares-climate-skeptics-to-anti-abolitionists-racists-homophobes-and-alcoholic-families/

    You are a part of the problem. You’re another Gestapo-like organization that tries to impose the will of an organized group of Nazi-like aggressive mob on the innocent individuals who have enjoyed the freedom of speech in the U.S. for centuries – but you clearly don’t want this self-control of the individuals over their lives and over their speech to continue.

    Be ashamed, be very ashamed. I live in a country that has spent a decade under the oppression of the Nazi regime and I won’t allow someone else who doesn’t have a clue about these matters to teach me who is analogous to the Nazis and who is not. It is unquestionable the climate alarmists who are.

    If there is at least someone who cherishes basic freedoms and basic moral values, I urge you: work hard to disband the despicable organization called ADL.

  • Jim Clarke

    In sports, it is often the player who responds aggressively to a flagrant foul that gets penalized for their aggressiveness. This happens because the referees miss the original infraction that happened quickly when they were not looking. Unfortunately, this isn’t a good analogy for the ADL in this case, as the original infraction has been going on for over 10 years!

    Climate change crisis skeptics have been called many names over the last 25 years, but the one that has the most traction is ‘denier’; a direct comparison to irrational Holocaust deniers. Holocaust deniers are usually Nazis or Nazi sympathizers. So for over a decade, climate change crisis skeptics have been routinely compared to crazy Nazis in countless venues, without so much as a finger wag from the ADL.

    Chastise Roy Spencer if you wish, but also chastise the many advocates, reporters and scientists who have instigated this type of hatred and have been trivializing the great tragedy of the Holocaust for a long time now. Your press release will need to be a whole lot longer to include all of those names.

  • Jack Brown

    Why hasn’t the ADL been going after those who have been referring to climate skeptics as deniers or flat Earthers? This has been happening for at least the last 15 years.

    Is it because Al Gore so openly uses the term deniers that the ADL finds it acceptable? Is it because Al Gore thinks climate skeptics should be ostracized that the ADL finds the term deniers acceptable? Shelley Rose please tell us why is it acceptable to insult climate skeptics on a daily basis?

  • http://www.sealevel.info/ Dave Burton

    Roy Spencer did not call them “Nazis.” He called them “Climate Nazis,” which is a very different thing. It’s a literary reference to the famous Seinfeld “Soup Nazi,” as explained at Language Log:

    http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2090

    OTOH, the people who Dr. Spencer called “Climate Nazis” have, for years, been calling Dr. Spencer and anyone else who disagrees with them “Deniers,” which is a despicable reference to Holocaust Deniers — but which the ADL apparently is okay with.

  • NikFromNYC

    It was NAZIs and neonazis who denied the Holocaust, as their detractors presented photographic evidence of their lies. Today artificial energy rationing has become genocidal public policy. When climate supercomputer model skeptics (who do not in the main deny the mild classic greenhouse effect) have been called deniers in direct Holicaust denial analogy exactly because your organization allowed it and now encourages it. The brazenness of pure scientific fraud appeared in 2013 as yet a new temperature hockey stick, and far from denying it, skeptics merely had to plot the input data and suddenly anybody with eyes will become slandered as a denier, as you will too, if you dare take a single glance at it:

    http://s6.postimg.org/jb6qe15rl/Marcott_2013_Eye_Candy.jpg

    -=NikFromNYC=-, Ph.D. in carbon chemistry (Columbia/Harvard)

  • http://www.facebook.com/russell.cook.7334 Russell Cook

    The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has a page addressing the topic of “crimes against humanity” ( http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007102 ). Is the ADL unaware of the hateful application of the phrase “crimes against humanity” to skeptic climate scientists, when those scientists have only sought to offer a second opinion about claims by the IPCC and others that the idea of man-caused global warming is beyond debate? Wouldn’t the marginalization of those scientists via a comparison to genocidal killers be something the ADL finds extremely troubling and worthy of calling attention to as hate speech that should be stopped?

  • chadke

    The remarks by Roy Spencer were in direct response to catastrophic anthropogenic global warming alarmists labeling people opposing their ridiculous beliefs as “deniers”, a poor attempt to link them with holocaust deniers. The ADL has never, to this date denounced this.

  • Mogumbo Gono

    .

    This is truly despicable! The ADL is kicking the victim, instead of reprimanding the offenders.

    What an upside-down, George Orwell world we live in…

    .

  • EWorrall

    Alarmists have urged the use of the RICO act against “deniers” like Anthony Watts, to detain them for having the wrong beliefs http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/02/24/the-merchants-of-smear/ , have urged that politicians who are skeptical of climate change be jailed http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=290513 , and even thought it was funny to make a film fantasising about violence against school children who held “denier” beliefs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-Mw5_EBk0g .

    From these and many similar outrages, it should not be difficult to see why people who are skeptical about the link between CO2 and global warming have legitimate concerns about public advocacy of state sanctioned violence against those who share their skepticism.

    Like a certain historical political movement, climate alarmists believe the world is at the brink of disaster, and that only urgent, drastic action will prevent imminent calamity. Their catastrophist worldview is used to sanction all manner of public hate speech against those whose views differ from their own.

    You might not see a connection with the beliefs and behaviour of belief systems and political movements in the past, but I assure you a lot of people like myself can.

  • Phillip2

    It is several years since I was first publicly called a climate change denier, with a clear insinuation that I was as evil as holocaust deniers. Why has ADL not condemned those who use the term ‘climate change denier’? It has been going on for years, with no sign of any condemnation whatsoever.

  • MangoChutney

    Dear Ms. Rose,

    Could I humbly suggest you state loudly and clearly that you don’t accept man made CO2 is the driver of catastrophic anthropogenic global warming, then sit back and wait for the verbal and often threatened physical abuse that comes your way?

    http://joannenova.com.au/2010/04/greenpeace-are-coming-we-know-where-you-live/

    Who can forget the Nuremberg style trials for sceptics

    http://www.epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=264568

    I myself have been called all sorts of nasty things with the obvious holocaust connotations thrown in for good measure. “Skeptical” Science have all but admitted they followed my comments on the BBC and WUWT blogs http://www.skepticalscience.com/tropospheric-hot-spot.htm#67837 (as well as deleting inconvenient comments – see numbering on link above)

    Go ahead Ms Rose, I challenge you to state loudly and clearly that the science is not settled or re-think your misguided statement

  • Joe Horner

    Given the longstanding campaign of hate and calls for everything from imprisonment, stabbing, and even explosion for those sceptical of AGW, this release appears to be disturbingly akin to denouncing those who raised their voices AGAINST what was happening in the lead-up to the Holocaust.

    Hate is revolting and should be condemned, regardless of what direction it takes. But it should be condemned fairly and AT ITS SOURCE, which in this case is certain factions of the AGW orthodoxy.

  • Jon Jermey

    So it’s OK to use defamatory language if you’re referring to AGW sceptics, just not when you’re talking about alarmists? OK, got it.

    “By curtailing frivolous and “fighting” words, the Party seeks to narrow the range of thought altogether, such that eventually, thoughtcrime will be literally impossible.”

    George Orwell — 1984.

  • Bruce

    Perhaps you might extend your commendable “world without hate” policy to your treatment of Palestinians?

  • TinyCO2

    If you listen to just one argument from us global warming
    sceptics I recommend you watch this video from a well respected UK CO2
    reduction campaign called 10:10.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skW6krOLL20

    This wasn’t a spoof video by climate sceptics trying to
    paint the consensus as Nazis. It wasn’t a student video or one from some rabid
    environmental organisation. It was a well funded, much planned effort by some
    leading UK and US figures including a well known person in prime time comedy
    writing. As you will see, a lot of intelligent and prominent figures got
    involved. It was intended for release in cinemas and perhaps later on TV if it
    proved effective. Well it was effective, just not the way they intended.

    That vile video and much more is aimed at me and I’m just an
    unassuming member of the public with no incentive other than genuine questions
    about the quality and accuracy of climate science and its catastrophic
    predictions. Unlike Dr Roy Spencer I’m invisible. My career and finances or
    family are not threatened by those who dream of blowing me up. Where has your
    defence of him been?

    I don’t remember a press statement from you on any of the
    occasions where threats have been made against global warming sceptics. Like
    when Dr Pachauri, head of the IPCC said he wished we’d put asbestos on our
    faces like talcum powder. Or the warning from Greenpeace that read:

    “The proper channels have failed. It’s time for mass civil
    disobedience to cut off the financial oxygen from denial and scepticism. If
    you’re one of those who believe that this is not just necessary but also
    possible, speak to us. Let’s talk about what that mass civil disobedience is
    going to look like. If you’re one of those who have spent their lives
    undermining progressive climate legislation, bankrolling junk science, fuelling
    spurious debates around false solutions and cattle-prodding
    democratically-elected governments into submission, then hear this: We know who
    you are. We know where you live. We know where you work. And we be many, but
    you be few.”

    Did you know that if you search for denier on Google you get
    twice as many references for climate change denier as Holocaust denier?

    We are under fierce attack for asking questions and you have
    utterly failed to defend that most reasonable activity. You only spring to life
    when one of our numbers snaps. Go back and watch the 10:10 video and ask
    yourself if you’re on the right sight of defamation or worse – persecution.

  • BarryWoods

    YES, the victims of the holocaust deserve better, which is why, the equating of climate sceptics to being the moral equivalent of holocaust deniers, is so distasteful and it has been going on for over a decade.

    Sceptics have been equated to holocaust deniers for years. Spencer is pushing back and is not referencing Jew, but the conduct of the NAzi’s who suppressed(killed)all political opposition and freedom of thought (book burning, remember)

    The Guardian explained 4 years ago:

    “We have been discussing such terminology, and some of my colleagues have suggested that Guardian style might be amended to stop referring to “climate change deniers” in favour of, perhaps, “climate sceptics”.

    The editor of our environment website explains: “The former has nasty connotations with Holocaust denial and tends to polarise debate.” – Guardian

    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/mar/01/climate-change-scepticism-style-guide

    Here are some very high profile examples, in the international media, by journalists and activists and politicians calling sceptics names (equating them to somebody as low as a holocaust denier)

    Hari 2005:
    “The climate-change deniers are rapidly ending up with as much intellectual credibility as creationists and Flat Earthers. Indeed, given that 25,000 people died in Europe in the 2003 heatwave caused by anthropogenic climate change, given that the genocide unfolding in Darfur has been exacerbated by the stresses of climate change, given that Bangladesh may disappear beneath the rising seas in the next century, they are nudging close to having the moral credibility of Holocaust deniers. They are denying the reality of a force that – unless we change the way we live pretty fast – will kill millions.”

    http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/the-shame-of-the-climatechange-deniers-6147534.html

    2006: monbiot “Almost everywhere, climate change denial now looks as stupid and as unacceptable as Holocaust denial.”
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/sep/21/comment.georgemonbiot

    2006: Lynas “I wonder what sentences judges might hand down at future international criminal tribunals on those who will be partially but directly responsible for millions of deaths from starvation, famine and disease in decades ahead. I put this in a similar moral category to Holocaust denial – except that this time the Holocaust is yet to come, and we still have time to avoid it”.
    http://web.archive.org/web/20080512154243/http://www.marklynas.org/2006/5/19/climate-denial-ads-to-air-on-us-national-television

    2007: fed Ellen Goodman : “Let’s just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers, though one denies the past and the other denies the present and future.”
    http://web.archive.org/web/20070214041353/http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/02/09/no_change_in_political_climate/

    then there are others saying ‘climate treason’, and others saying ‘Nuremburg trial’ for climate – and I’m sure very many other USA, examples could be found (in the main stream media (Hari, Independent, Monbiot – Guardian) very politicized and a huge deterrent to speak up at all.

    2008 – Grist Climate Nuremburg (quoting monbiot)
    http://grist.org/article/the-denial-industry/

    2008: Hansen -Crime Against humanity:
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jun/23/fossilfuels.climatechange

    2009: Krugman – Guilty of treason
    http://www.alternet.org/story/141204/are_climate-change_deniers_guilty_of_treason

    20011- Chris Huhne – UK Minsiter Enrrgy & Climate Change– “Defying climate deal like appeasing Hitler-
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/21/enivronment-britain-huhne-idAFL6E7IL0MF20110721?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=0

    The Guardian Newspaper wrote 4 years ago, about the linkage of ‘climate deniers’ with ‘holocaust deniers’..

    shame nobody spoke out against all the above at the ADL

  • Steven Hoffer

    One can only express disappointment at the commentary of Miss Rose. She is, unfortunately, completely unaware at how offensive this statement from the ADL is to those of us who make the climate change debate a hobby. Anyone who spends twenty minutes searching through news articles and blog posts can find the use of the term “denier” in literally hundreds of locations. In fact, a Google search of “Climate Change Denier” returns over 15 million hits.
    It is completely possible that the ADL has been unaware that ordinary people talking about the weather are being labeled this way. It is completely possible that they are unaware that prominent figures in this debate have referred to trains carrying coal to power stations in the United States as “Death Trains.” It is possible that the ADL has missed the commentary calling for re-education camps for those who disagree that the world is ending from CO2. It is plausible that the ADL was unaware of commercials exploding school children who do not wish to participate in environmentalism. It may even be that the ADL missed the recent cartoon suggesting that those skeptical of Global Warming be stabbed through the heart like vampires by icicles from the polar vortex.
    What I find difficult to believe is that the ADL never saw ANY of this. For anyone having a familial connection to the events of the second world war, Dr. Spencer’s words were a poor choice, though no less appropriate was any of the language he has been peppered with for not agreeing about how the weather is going to look next week.
    Once again. I express disappointment.

  • http://climatefraudwatcher.wordpress.com/ CFI

    Stunning hipocrisy.

    The skeptics simply wish to register doubts and concerns with some aspects of climate science.

    The eco-zealots want skeptics totally out of the picture, without jobs, without a voice, without a presence, in other words they wish to close down any opportunity to debate. They want to run climate science as a totalitarian discipline.

  • MangoChutney

    Dear Ms. Rose

    I assume you won’t be accepting donations from us deniers:

    Imagine a World Without Hate®. We do. Join us.

    It’s really a shame, because up till this moment, the vast majority of us would have been more than happy to show our support

  • MangoChutney

    The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry in the U.S. and abroad through information, education, legislation, and advocacy. ADL serves as a resource for government, media, law enforcement, educators and the public.

    MISSION STATEMENT

    “The immediate object of the League is to stop, by appeals to reason and conscience and, if necessary, by appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people. Its ultimate purpose is to secure justice and fair treatment to all citizens alike and to put an end forever to unjust and unfair discrimination against and ridicule of any sect or body of citizens.”

    Failed

  • John B

    ADL are due Dr Roy Spencer a full and unreserved apology for your criticism of his comments.
    Perhaps it’s time the ADL disbanded if you now support defamation of one of the few honest and respected climate scientists.

  • BarryWoods

    If you don’t know about the Seinfeld “Soup Nazi,” this is for you:

    It is a very common Internet meme. For instance, a google search for “grammar nazi” yields over 600,000 hits:
    http://www.google.com/search?q=%22grammar+nazi%22

    Here’s what KnowYourMeme says about Grammar Nazis:
    http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/grammar-nazi

    …and Soup Nazis:
    http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/no-soup-for-you-soup-nazi

    …and here’s an article about Smoking Nazis:
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/blogs/over-the-rainbow/3968013/Are-you-a-Smoking-Nazi

    When is the ADL going to denounce all these people? All these examples preceded Dr. Spencer’s use of the meme. Why was he, and he alone, singled out for ADL denouncement?

    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/02/26/bizzare-anti-defamation-league-apparently-gives-a-green-light-to-defamation-of-climate-skeptics-by-comparing-them-to-holocaust-deniers/#comment-1577773

    ‘climate nazi’ is not a phrase I would use… how about ‘climate thought police’

    • Carbonicus

      I prefer climate parasites.

  • See – owe to Rich

    It looks like there is a consensus emerging in the comments. It is that Dr. Spencer has been called a “climate change denier”, and the “denier” word is commonly associated with the awful Holocaust of the Jews. So Dr. Spencer has been defamed, many times, without the ADL lending him their support.

    In return, Dr. Spencer has defamed his accusers as “Nazis”. This is actually a pretty good description of what the global warming alarmists are doing, or threatening to do, to quash free speech on this subject. Nevertheless I could agree with ADL were they to say “Dr. Spencer should assert that some of the behaviours of his opponents are Nazi-like rather than that they are Nazis”. Two wrongs don’t make a right, but please do not ignore the original wrong.

    Thanks,
    Rich.

  • http://climatefraudwatcher.wordpress.com/ CFI
  • http://itsaboutliberty.com/index.php MNHawk

    Will extreme increases in costs associated with things like heating and cooling homes cause deaths? It’s a valid question and comparison. Meanwhile, the real thing (Antisemitism) continues to rear it’s head all over the world.

    Maybe the ADL should equate themselves with the episode of Happy Days entitled, Hollywood. This appears to be your moment of such.

    • John Crutchley

      Perhaps the ADL can be regarded as ‘Denialist Nazis’

  • HeaterGuy

    I suspect that the people who drafted the ADL press release were unaware of the background history of the use of the word “deniers” against sceptics as well as the direct comparisons with the holocaust presented by various commenters. Maybe next time they should not jump the shark.

    Shelley Rose needs to get to the roots of the problem ASAP. This is no
    analogy, it’s the real thing, whether Shelley likes it or not.

    http://www.spunk.org/texts/places/germany/sp001630/peter.html

  • Carbonicus

    Shelley, you have this 180 degrees backward, having sat by silently while the side to which Dr. Spencer was responding has been using the Holocaust denier reference and Nazi imagery for almost a decade.

    As a Jew and a professional in the environmental industry, I cannot let this go unanswered. You’ll be hearing from me directly. It would be in ADL’s interest to hear what I have to say and show you.

  • Mister Lackey

    It’s now official: The Anti-Defamation League should officially change its name to Speech Nazis, Incorporated, a genuine hate group.

    Where in the hell is the ADL to condemn so-called “academics” and “intellectuals” and “scientists” when they defame skeptics, real scientists and good citizens as “Nazi’s”?!

    The ADL is obviously caught up in its own belligerent hubris. I got news for your ADL — you ain’t all that. In fact, you’re not even a tenth of all that.

  • Sorrow

    Sorrowlocaust should never be trivialised nor forgotten yet it’s terminology has already been hijacked by those who seek to stifle debate. Those who don’t support claims of man made global warming are called “Denialists” as if they are gulty of denying an obvious horrific genocidal truth. At the same time some of those who defame their opponents call for their extermination. A quick Google nets some interesting results! Ironically some such as Richard Parncutt support Amnesty International’s opposition to the death penalty even while they call for the execution of their opponents. Apparently “Denialists” like the Third Reich’s Jews don’t rate as human but perhaps the ADL see things differently?

  • AGW_Skeptic

    Time for a retraction and apology to Dr. Spencer. The longer you delay, the more damage done to your fundraising efforts.

  • Denier

    ADL is a joke. You’ve always worked under selectivity narrative and so you do today. Objectivity is something you don’t practice nor understand. You’ve been a watch dog for jewish interests in US, that was your main objective. Your push for banning religious celebration in open (christmas tree outside the white house gone) and at the same time you have no issues with hannuka celeb on the same spot. Don’t you think people see this and begin to wonder???

  • Ben Vincent

    Persons and organizations that believe in the theory of man made climate change have on more than one occasion associated man made climate change skeptics with Nazis. Why did the ADL not issue any sort of statement after those remarks were made?

  • 17 Year Pause

    Imagine a World Without Hate™ – Unless you’re a CAGW (man-made global warming) skeptic!
    This press release should be removed immediately with an apology to Dr. Spencer.
    Hello ADL New York? Are you paying any attention to this?

  • Justin Boston

    It was written by Shelly Rose, a climate activist. What did you expect? Fairness? Why doesn’t the ADL condemn the use of global-warming denier? This is hypocrisy of the highest order. The term originated with a reporter at the Boston Globe where she specifically links deniers as being “on par” with Holocaust deniers.

  • BigFurHat

    There is nothing “fair” about a rabid AGW activist being put into the position of ADL arbiter, especially when she makes such a lunk-headed decision fueled by bias, something the ADL should decry.
    I’m making no argument for or against AGW.
    This argument is purely about the hypocrisy of selective outrage over terminology.
    Denier epithet = good
    Nazi epithet = bad

    I’ve put it in a nutshell for you, ADL. Follow my lead and put your nut back in its shell.

  • http://cumulativemodel.blogspot.com/ aaron

    You do realize that this apt anaology is an ironic response to truly defamotory term popular in media and politics, right?

  • Simon Fraser

    The two faces of ADL hypocrisy have a name . . . “Shelley Rose”

    Why have you said nothing, year after year, when excellent scientists like Dr. Spencer were slimed with the Nazi invoking, Holocaust related label of “Denier”

    Nothing, nada, rien, zero comment from Shelly Rose.

    So why now, why go after Dr. Spencer?

  • PhilJourdan

    Did Shelley Rose even READ Dr. Spencer’s criticism? Apparently not! For she completely missed his point! She is damning him and agreeing with him at the same time!

    Perhaps it is time for the ADL to take back their organization and disconnect it from their wedded ideological spouses. It matters not WHO denigrates the Holocaust or why. Because once “your side” is allowed to do it, you have lost control of the high ground.

    The ADL has lost control of the moral high ground here.

  • http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/ Ferdinand Engelbeen

    Having had my father emprisoned 4 years in Germany and an uncle who helped pilots and crew of shot allied planes escape to England, I deeply regret the use of “denier” and “Nazi” by both climate camps.

    But I wonder why your reaction now is only to condemn the “climate Nazi’s” words, while the other side of the fence uses “climate change deniers” already many years.

    I am a climate sceptic myself, which includes that I know that the CO2 increase is man-made and that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. But in my opinion, based on real-world observations, that doesn’t imply a pending catastrophe, it is possibly far more beneficial by helping plant growth than that it may have negative consequences, for which is not the slightest evidence, except from failing climate models, which don’t reflect the real world temperature and precipitation.

    I hope you will amend your press release to show that you object to both the words “denier” and “Nazi” as that doesn’t contribute anything to a scientific debate and both do harm to the history of what happened in WWII.

  • edzuiderwijk

    After years of being abused by labels like “denier”, “enemy of humanity”, “shill for big energy” etc. without any reaction or condamnation from the ADL whatsover, it is quite revealing to see ADL come out almost immediately when a respected scientist decides that he has had enough and call the mud slingers by their appropriate name.

  • realheadline

    This was clearly an attempt by Dr. Spencer to counter the despicable ‘denier’ references and show the climate extremists for the irrational, unscientific, flame-throwing zealots they have become. To ignore the term “deniers” but denounce the response after years of abuse is duplicitous at best and dishonest at worst.

  • HeaterGuy

    “Congregations Caring for the Climate – Atlanta, GA”
    “… Shelley Rose (third from right,…”
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/stepitup2007/464126698/

    Shelley Rose Linkedin photo
    http://www.linkedin.com/pub/shelley-rose/3a/305/70a

  • DaBilk
  • jwalsh

    Don’t you know that “Skeptics” are called “Deniers” all the time!.”

  • Ron Turner

    Pathetic, but not surprising. An organization goes full moonbatty when it has nothing more to do with its original mission.

  • TR M

    If Dr Spencer’s comments offend you so much then why were you not
    offended over the last 6 years as the term “denier” was thrown at him
    and other scientists who have legitimate questions about the science of
    “global warming / climate change”?

    The term
    “denier” is used against him and others in an incredibly ignorant
    attempt to link them to those who deny the holocaust. You know that
    because you are involved in the climate debate and it is YOUR side that
    is using that term isn’t it?

    Your hypocrisy is only outdone by your lack of consistency.

  • earwig42

    To Shelly Rose-
    “I won’t insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.”

    ―
    William F. Buckley Jr.

  • Ron Turner

    You are by definition, a liar.

  • Craig

    Stunning leap of faith at the end there. And so well done on playing the man because we all know that ad hominem is the debate tactic of a genius. Dr Spense could believe in litle green men on Mars and it would have no bearing at all upon is views based upon sound science and observation. Shame on you.

  • Shrub

    Interesting . . . attack the messenger, while ignoring the thrust of Ms Rose’s rant and Dr. Spencer’s parry of it (that Ms Rose is decidedly hypocritical).

    Stephen, I’m not dazzled by your brilliance. I am bored by your conformity. Damning the messenger and avoiding the message is not a novel approach. It is commonly used when someone cannot refute a point that has been made.

    Let me put it to you this way: even if Dr. Spencer were as discredited an individual as you’d like the readership to believe he is, what on earth does that have to do with the truth or falsity of his charge of hypocrisy?

  • Henry Galt

    Yeah – a dumb one too

  • Paul Moulton

    That is simply quite wrong. Deniers are only labelled because they do not follow the accepted orthodoxy as defined by activists.

    Deniers believe that CO.2 is a GHG.

    Deniers believe the earth is warming.

    Deniers believe that man is partly responsible for the warming.

    That in fact makes them part of the consensus. Go to any denier website you wish and ask what they believe. I am absolutely certain that there are differences of opinion, but then skepticism and debate is encouraged there. Heck even I disagree with some opinions, but I won’t browbeat people because I think differently.

    The true difference of opinion lies in the level of attribution. Deniers are of the belief that the Climate Sensitivity is on the low range, while “Warmist” are on the higher side.

    Historic data can easily support the Deniers but models definitely support “Warmists” . Take your pick. I know that data trumps science and I know we do not know nearly enough about the climate to be sure either way.

    There is a host of peer reviewed literature that does support the Denier’s position and there are many experts that do as well. Just go look around yourself. Don’t just ignore people whose opinion is different than yours.

    Also, these are not made up statements, these are simple facts. Perhaps it is you that is the denier.

    Please open your eyes. Do a little footwork. Come to a conclusion, but do not denigrate those that believe something else. Heck, this is the ADL website for goodness sake.

    (I assume that I should not use the term that Spencer coined here so I won’t use it)

  • Craig

    What nonsense. You’d have to go a long way to find any climate ‘sceptic’ who denied anything that is established scientific fact. The real facts here are that there is little in co2 driven temperature theory that is actual fact. It exists in complicated computer models that all have consistently failed in modelling anything close to our chaotic climate. Any scientists will tell you that models and their predictions are not evidence of anything.

    The facts are observations. The facts are the actualities of what is happening now, not what a computer algorithm says may happen in 100 years. The facts are that the behaviour of current climate shows that co2 as a main driver of atmospheric temperature simply can not be proven and evidence shows it’s a failed theory.

    Ask the founder of Greenpeace what he thinks.

    http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/22514hearingwitnesstestimonymoore.pdf

    And as an addendum.You talk of empirical reality. That suggests you have not been studying the data of late. Show some empirical evidence that supports catastrophic anthropogenic global warming theory and I’ll eat my hat. The real facts are that none exists as observations simply can’t support it as a theory.

    The data do not lie. Well, not untl certain ‘scientists’ get their hands on them and make them tell the story they require. Altering the data to support the theory is not looking to see if the data support the theory and is certainly not science.

  • CB

    Well, no, actually! I have had Climate Deniers deny all of those facts you pretend they accept.

    If you also accept all those facts, explain to me how likely you think it is that polar ice caps will be able to withstand current levels of CO₂, given they have never done this before in Earth’s history.

    Give me a rough probability.