Could you be with a partner who doesn't believe in climate change?

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DH doesn't really think it's all that bad. He thinks we should be recyling more and caring for the planet as makes sense and is just the right thing to do - but that climate change as a disaster is an exaggeration and not based in science. And that people are utilising it for their own agenda, woke brigade & so on.

We have young kids.

AIBU to find this position increasingly problematic?

People are going to say people are allowed different opinions but he seems geniunely unconcerned about future of planet for our kids - and I find that hard to swallow.

You believe in the transference of your soul from one life to another and he's the idiot for believing that the rhetoric around climate change may be over-egged for effect?

@Ragwort "Why are you avoiding answering the question about why you had DC if you are so concerned about climate change?"

Maybe because it's a stupid question?

Why is that relevant ?

Apart from - obviously if you have children having agreement with DH is much more important as it's important to raise children to have low impact and it's hard in the UK to raise children that way because of society pressure

There are certainly a range of valid beliefs on matters of climate policy and individual responsibility but outright disbelief of anthropogenic climate change is approaching flat-earth levels of stupidity.

If you cared that much about climate change (and presumably our subsequent suffering), you'd wouldn't have had kids.

This is what I don’t get full stop. So people will be totally panicked about climate change…utterly consumed with stress. They refuse to have kids because the earth will be too buggered and we’re killing it for future generations. BUT if everyone stops having kids there won’t BE any future generations? Soooo…

there’s just a lot of confusion and contradiction and it seems like people just want to be revved up by the media and feel self righteous by looking down on others with different opinions but not actually doing anything to help the issue.

Oh Lord....
I don't know whether what you've just said is more offensive to victims of racism/ homophobia, or to those of us who reserve the right to doubt the current hysteria over perfectly natural variations in the climate...!

Agree with this too.

Being generous, I think it's also that the complexity and enormity of climate change are genuinely hard to process. It's much easier and less frightening to take the view that it's a conspiracy etc than actually engage with the subject, and I think in a lot of cases the decision to do so is take unconsciously- people simply don't have the cognitive resources to take it on board (and I don't mean being thick so much as having other problems in their life which take up their mental resources and which they can actually do something about). I think this is why people get so weirdly aggressive about the subject- it's not nice to have your mental defences challenged.

Damn... I must have got my two degrees, including Dentistry, on a fluke...

Well he's not wrong on some aspects people do use it for their own agenda.....

I think in a society where we are bombarded with headlines and the news trying to grab attention constantly it can be difficult to ascertain what is based in science and what is doomsday/headlines grabbing.

Climate change obviously exists and causes effects but we are also transitioning into a el nino year which does bring higher temperatures.

It wouldn't be make or break for me though given even the world's top scientist don't agree on all of the impacts etc

You can't be that scared of it or you wouldn't have had 2 kids and be using the internet.
Are you just more concerned he's not part of your 'clan' ?

In the day-to-day, how does his opinion manifest?

I mean, does he sit there in a tinfoil hat, swivel eyed and shouting through a megaphone that It's All Lies!! and insist on driving a gas-guzzler car that does one mile to the gallon? Or does he just shrug when it comes up in conversation? Where on the spectrum of opinion is he?

"AIBU to find this position increasingly problematic?"
What do you mean by problematic? What problem is he causing?

I wouldn't start a new relationship with a CC denier because I would struggle to respect him.

But if I already shared dcs with him, I'd try to live with it.

So you fully understand the science behind human impact on climate change?

If you do then great but I just don't think many on here do. I know I don't so it would be gullible of me to believe either way as I can't possibly assess the validity of either side.

The whole ‘aha, you have kids’ gotcha is so fucking stupid.

Most people who are concerned about climate change are concerned, at least in part, with the negative impacts on humanity. Birth rates are already crashing worldwide. There are few better ways to ensure the collapse of society than people stopping having kids.

And no, I don’t personally have kids.

@Shiftingparadigm The climate was warmer during the middle ages and medieval period - It wasn't. E.g. see here: https://skepticalscience.com/medieval-warm-period-intermediate.htm

All the predictions thus far have been wrong so I am with your DH on this. Now if the government wanted to fixate on the corporations causing pollution in this world I would be first in line but they don’t. They want you to pay more money and lower your standards of living to change the weather. The planet has been heating and cooling since time began. This time they have the media propaganda machine behind them for this agenda 2030.

Yes, my thoughts exactly.
I've noticed the news stories about the shocking heat, are suddenly giving the ground temperatures, rather than air temperatures as we have always used 🙄

When I was in school it was the Ozone layer, it's all we heard about. Aerosols would kill us all. We don't hear that much anymore.

It's OP that's moaning about the future for her young kids, obviously she should have thought about it before she had kids so she didn't have the worry, the same worry was there a few years ago.

The recovery of the ozone layer is because the world took action in the late 80s and eliminated 99% of ozone-depleting chemicals.

Why would you expect to continue to hear about it?

Unless you’re an ardent climate change enthusiast then yabu. What are you doing to save the planet? If it’s just differing opinions and you don’t actually do anything of significance then it’s irrelevant.

@ordellrobie It's not a question of 'both sides'. Climate science is a well established branch of science and the consensus position is very clear and strongly supported by evidence. Climate change denialism is not an intellectually defensible position.

Do you also struggle to decide who is right between people who think the Earth is a globe and people who think it is flat?

So what? I’m worried about climate change and the impact on future generations. That doesn’t mean I’m obligated to stop worrying about it if I decide to have kids, nor is concern about climate change likely to be anyone’s sole factor in deciding whether or not to have kids (and nor should it be).

The recovery of the ozone layer is because the world took action in the late 80s

In actual fact they say it wont fully recover until about 2066.

What predictions have been proven wrong ?

I mean I know things are happening harder / faster than the more conservative predictions but that's hardly a reason to therefore deny climate change !