Oxford Dictionaries has declared the phrase “climate emergency” as its Word of the Year, after a 10,000 percent spike in usage.
Oxford defines “climate emergency” as “a situation in which urgent action is required to reduce or halt climate change and avoid potentially irreversible environmental damage resulting from it.”
In 2019, usage of the term skyrocketed to the top of public discourse. According to a statement published by their panel:
In 2018, climate did not feature in the top words typically used to modify emergency, instead the top types of emergencies people wrote about were health, hospital, and family emergencies.
…
But with climate emergency, we see something new, an extension of emergency to the global level.
This existential threat surpassed all other “emergencies” in writing by a “huge margin” despite not even making the list in 2018.
Even other variations of the same concept, exhorting attention to the health of our native planet, were eclipsed by the relative urgency of the phrase. According to Oxford Dictionaries:
This data is significant because it indicates a growing shift in people’s language choice in 2019, a conscious intensification that challenges accepted language use to reframe discussion of ‘the defining issue of our time’ with a new gravity and greater immediacy.
Media outlets like the Guardian have altered their language to “more accurately describe the environmental crises facing the world,” asserting that “the urgency of climate crisis needed a robust new language to describe it.” The New York Times, among others, soon took a similar stance.
Oxford Dictionaries did, however, note that the term is contentious, saying some people still “harbor concerns over the language choice” and “some in the scientific community question the validity of climate emergency as an appropriate term at all.”
In fact, it may very well be the divisive nature of the argument that has helped to fuel its proliferation.
The 2018 Word of the Year selection was “toxic,” and 2017 saw the dominance of “youthquake.” It is presently unclear where language will trend during 2020, but as an election year, there will be plenty of choices.
Read more at Breitbart
Perhaps some accompanying references to the word of the year could also include “Unsettled Science,” “Unproven Hypothesis,” “Corrupt Analysis,”, “Hyperbole,” “Climategate,” & “Politically Motivated”…
Why didn’t the Oxford dictionary consider “Climate Hoax” or “Climate Scam”. It appears to me like they are pretty much in bed with the scammers.
I call BS. This is another PR stunt.
climate emergency, n., a fictional situation which exists in the minds of uneducated people causing them to believe that urgent action is required to reduce or halt climate change and avoid potentially irreversible environmental damage resulting from it. The actions such people demand would lead instead to extensive and possible irriversible damage to civilization, just as it has already severely eroded public trust in science.
Climate Emergency should be on the same page as Nonsense,Rediculous,Poppycock and Stupid
The only thing that makes “climate emergency” a word is that politicians and news media use it more often. Neither my family nor I have heard a single person use it. This reflects what the climate change movement is. It is a dogma of the politicians and the mainstream media, but not true science or the general public.