Speaker 1: Hey, before we start, I wanted to let you know
Speaker 1: that this interview was recorded a while ago. Since then,
Speaker 1: some of the projects our guess we'll talk about have
Speaker 1: evolved a bit. And also, we cut down four billion,
Speaker 1: three hundred and eighty seven million trees. Yeah, I know
Speaker 1: that's an insane number, but it's true. Also, over one
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty people died from wildfires, we hit record
Speaker 1: global temperatures, and a fuck ton of other terrible things
Speaker 1: have happened. Check the show notes if you want to
Speaker 1: see updates on anything we talk about in today's episode.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.
Speaker 2: I had the moment where I'm like, holy crap, where
Speaker 2: no one's paying attention. We're in real trouble here.
Speaker 3: What do I do? I make movies.
Speaker 2: So I wrote five six different ideas for movies, and
Speaker 2: I just kept coming back to the idea that if
Speaker 2: a good portion of the movie could be funny, nothing
Speaker 2: is better at, you know, bringing people together then laughter.
Speaker 3: It's kind of the ultimate truth detector.
Speaker 2: Hi.
Speaker 1: I'm Chris Turney, and this is Unfucking the Future, a
Speaker 1: show about the climate crisis and what we can do
Speaker 1: about it. It's easy to get depressed about the climate.
Speaker 1: According to a host of recent scientific studies, this past
Speaker 1: year was the hottest ever recorded in human history. But
Speaker 1: now is not the time to despair. It's for time
Speaker 1: to get activated. And that's what this show is all about. Together,
Speaker 1: we really can on fuck this. Let's dig in.
Speaker 4: We're fucking the future.
Speaker 1: Let's play a game, all right. On the counter of three,
Speaker 1: name your favorite dinosaur. Don't even think about it, just
Speaker 1: name it ready one two three glass.
Speaker 5: Raptor favorite non pornographic magazine to masturbate two Good housekeeping.
Speaker 5: If you were a chick, who's the one guy you
Speaker 5: would sleep with?
Speaker 1: John Samos? What did we just become best friends?
Speaker 3: Yep?
Speaker 1: That's a scene from the two thousand and eight film
Speaker 1: Step Brothers. It stars John c Riley and Will Farrell
Speaker 1: and was directed by our guest today, Adam McKay. He's
Speaker 1: since written, directed, or produced projects like Succession, The Big Short,
Speaker 1: and Anchorman. The Man is a Hollywood legend, but he's
Speaker 1: not just a filmmaker. Adam McKay is also an activist,
Speaker 1: and he's tackling the climate crisis in his own particular
Speaker 1: way his storytelling. His most recent film, Don't Look On
Speaker 1: is an environmental allegory he's used for success of that
Speaker 1: film to create Yellow Dot, a production studio that's fighting
Speaker 1: back against all that climate disinformation we.
Speaker 3: See every day.
Speaker 1: So how did this comedy genius become a climate activist.
Speaker 1: It started back in two thousand and eight when he
Speaker 1: was making a film about another global crisis, the mortgage bubble.
Speaker 3: We were making this movie, The Big Short.
Speaker 2: And you know, because I have a job where I
Speaker 2: write scripts, I direct, it's not a regular nine to
Speaker 2: five job. Part of my job is to kind of
Speaker 2: just follow whatever interests me or I'm curious about. So
Speaker 2: I started reading some stuff that was really alarming, and
Speaker 2: I went from concerned giving money to holy crap, we
Speaker 2: are in trouble. I thought I have to be wrong,
Speaker 2: like it can't be this, you know, dire. And so
Speaker 2: I started just talking to scientists and calling them and
Speaker 2: I just kept double triple checking the science, and every
Speaker 2: answer I got was worse than one.
Speaker 1: But before Adam was digging himself deeper and deeper into
Speaker 1: a hole of climate anxiety, and suddenly just giving money
Speaker 1: didn't seem like enough. He felt like he had to
Speaker 1: do something, and so he started writing.
Speaker 6: I heard there's an asteroid or a comment or something
Speaker 6: that you don't like the looks of.
Speaker 3: Tell me about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, twenty minutes, twenty minutes go. That's a clip from
Speaker 1: Don't Look Up, Adam's record breaking twenty twenty one film.
Speaker 1: You can find it on Netflix. The movies about two
Speaker 1: scientists who tried to warn the media and mankind. But
Speaker 1: there's an approaching comment that's going to destroy our planet.
Speaker 1: Now you're never going to believe this, but no one listens.
Speaker 6: And then doctor Mindy and miss Debosky, you'll come on
Speaker 6: and talk about that planet you discovered.
Speaker 1: We filmed a comment.
Speaker 7: They know what we're here to talk about.
Speaker 6: Right of course, Jack and Bree love doing science segments.
Speaker 6: Just remember, keep it light fine, Jack and Bree love
Speaker 6: having a good time.
Speaker 1: That's my Partnessy V is frighteningly close to how the
Speaker 1: world has dealt with global heating, or hasn't. Despite the
Speaker 1: decades of warnings from the scientific community, the reaction from
Speaker 1: world leaders has been more like tumbleweeds. Adam recognized, but
Speaker 1: the climate crisis isn't just a scientific problem. It's actually
Speaker 1: a hearts and minds problem. It's making people care about
Speaker 1: this problem, and how's he doing it through storytelling.
Speaker 3: So the story of that movie is obviously.
Speaker 2: I had the moment where I'm like, holy crap, where
Speaker 2: no one's paying attention, We're in real trouble here.
Speaker 3: What do I do?
Speaker 2: I make movies? And I just kept coming back to
Speaker 2: the that if a good portion in the movie could
Speaker 2: be funny, nothing is better at you know, bringing people
Speaker 2: together then laughter. It's kind of the ultimate truth detector.
Speaker 2: So I sort of settled on the comedy, and then
Speaker 2: obviously we got into making it done.
Speaker 1: Look Up was such a big moment for climate scientists.
Speaker 1: I think we will owe you a huge fanks from
Speaker 1: the scientific community. I went embarrassed myself for you to
Speaker 1: ask if you saw my picture before you cast in,
Speaker 1: you just told me for a project, why did you
Speaker 1: choose a comment?
Speaker 2: My friend David Sirota, who's a journalist, had made an
Speaker 2: offhanded comment to me about how it's like a meteorite's
Speaker 2: going to hit the planet and no one cares yes,
Speaker 2: And I remember saying to him and he was talking
Speaker 2: about climate and I said, David, that's the movie and
Speaker 2: he's like, what do you mean. I go, that's the
Speaker 2: movie and he's like, how is that a movie?
Speaker 3: I go, well, let me figure that out.
Speaker 1: What Adam wanted to get across was the urgency of
Speaker 1: a climate crisis. It's something that's happening right now. There's
Speaker 1: nothing more urgent than a comet about to blast us
Speaker 1: all to oblivion.
Speaker 2: What would really surprise us would be a comet, because
Speaker 2: that could come from outside our solar system, and that
Speaker 2: would kind of blindside us.
Speaker 3: And what we liked.
Speaker 2: About it was it was a familiar movie trope that
Speaker 2: a lot of us know. We've seen versions of disaster movies,
Speaker 2: whether it's an earthquake or Godzilla's going to attack a city.
Speaker 2: We're very comfortable with that as something that we know
Speaker 2: how that story plays out.
Speaker 1: Normally in a disaster flick, humanity comes together to save
Speaker 1: a day, but of course in Don't Look Up, the
Speaker 1: opposite happens.
Speaker 2: So disrupting that story would feel weird to an audience
Speaker 2: and hopefully funny and maybe a little uncomfortable, And so
Speaker 2: that that was really how I came upon it.
Speaker 8: It's headed directly at Earth and it really likely will hit.
Speaker 1: This sounds very very exciting.
Speaker 6: Exploding stars like stars actually explode, So how big is
Speaker 6: this thing going to like destroy someone's house.
Speaker 1: Is that possible?
Speaker 2: Well, comment bed asking, which is what it will officially
Speaker 2: be named, is somewhere ye right, congratulations, it's somewhere between
Speaker 2: six and nine kilometers across.
Speaker 3: So it's bad.
Speaker 2: It would damage the entire planet, not just a house.
Speaker 3: The entire planet.
Speaker 6: Okay, Well, as it's damaging, will it hit this one
Speaker 6: house in particular, that's right on the coast of New Jersey.
Speaker 1: It's my ex wife's house.
Speaker 3: I needed to be it. Can we make that happen?
Speaker 1: Once he had figured out his idea for the movie,
Speaker 1: Adam says, the script just poured out of him.
Speaker 3: He was so inspired and it was the craziest experience.
Speaker 2: I had an outline, but then I went to this
Speaker 2: house we have lake in Ireland, and I wrote the
Speaker 2: whole script in like four weeks.
Speaker 3: It was incredible.
Speaker 1: Wow, just did he really poured out of me.
Speaker 2: I've had that experience maybe one or two other times,
Speaker 2: but never like this. It was like a fever dream.
Speaker 2: So it was the fastest thing ever where. We sent
Speaker 2: it to Leo. We sent it to Jen Lawrence. I
Speaker 2: think Jen Lawrence was first in and then Leo and
Speaker 2: Tyler Perry and all these great people and then the
Speaker 2: release of it was its own crazy story, like nothing.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, it was insane.
Speaker 1: In the movie, the media and the government all turn
Speaker 1: a blind eye to this comic that's about to wipe
Speaker 1: out a planet, and meanwhile they're frightening the people who
Speaker 1: are trying to warn the public about the impending disaster.
Speaker 1: It's depressingly similar to what happened when the movie was
Speaker 1: actually released.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, it was insane.
Speaker 2: When we did the theatrical release, we got it was
Speaker 2: like I've gotten bad reviews before, Like I don't care.
Speaker 3: When you do this as a job, you're used to it.
Speaker 9: But these were the nastiest reviews, Like they were so
Speaker 9: angry and personal and welcome to my world.
Speaker 3: I remember joking, this must be what it's like.
Speaker 2: This must be what it's like to be a climate
Speaker 2: science is for the pat sort of hears.
Speaker 1: Can I share with you, just for a moment, what
Speaker 1: bad reviews have looked like for climate scientists, for search
Speaker 1: fundings being blocked, individuals have been publicly vilified, and of
Speaker 1: course there's some good old gas lighting going on out there.
Speaker 10: President Trump just tweeted about the extreme cold slamming more
Speaker 10: than seventeen million Americans tonight. His tweet also mocked the
Speaker 10: science of climate change. From President writes in the East,
Speaker 10: it could be the coldest New Year's Eve on record.
Speaker 10: Perhaps could use a little bit of that good old
Speaker 10: global warming that our country, but not other countries, was
Speaker 10: going to pay trillions of dollars to protect against. Bundle up.
Speaker 1: There's an insane amount of misinformation out there, and there's
Speaker 1: a lot of companies and politicians who are making money
Speaker 1: with a status quo we now have. It's created a
Speaker 1: pretty toxic environment for those of us talking about climate
Speaker 1: and apparently also for those making movies about climate any.
Speaker 1: Reviews were quite mixed, with some critics describing it as
Speaker 1: too negative and even smug.
Speaker 2: Meryl Streep I remember, was like, I don't understand. She's
Speaker 2: like she was confused, like I saw the movie. This
Speaker 2: is not the movie I saw it. But then a
Speaker 2: wonderful thing that happened.
Speaker 4: We're un fucking the future. We're un fucking the future.
Speaker 2: We released it on Netflix worldwide and it was the
Speaker 2: most incredible thing I've ever seen. People in dozens of
Speaker 2: languages immediately identified with it, and it went on to
Speaker 2: become the number one movie in like ninety two countries,
Speaker 2: which that doesn't happen with a comedy.
Speaker 3: It's very rare. Comedy is very cultural.
Speaker 2: And then I started hearing stories that there were huge
Speaker 2: protests in France.
Speaker 11: The French process is obviously so hyped up. Everyone's frying
Speaker 11: banana skins, Mario cart style. There's no police there, and
Speaker 11: they started and banas I just got hit in the
Speaker 11: head banana skins. How politicians, police and the public around
Speaker 11: the world reacts has yet to be seen, but the
Speaker 11: past week has shown that climate protest is now made
Speaker 11: up of a whole ecosystem of tactics.
Speaker 2: And then climate scientists were like criticizing movie critics, like
Speaker 2: there were these fights online, like George Mambiad wrote this
Speaker 2: beautiful piece how the movie made him cry because it
Speaker 2: had been in his life for the previous twenty years.
Speaker 1: The response amongst my fellow scientists was quite amazing, and
Speaker 1: it takes a lot to get them excited. It was
Speaker 1: a special moment for many of us. Someone else understood
Speaker 1: and showed just how mad the last few decades have been.
Speaker 2: So it ended up being an experience like nothing I
Speaker 2: have ever had in making films and TV shows. You know,
Speaker 2: we're dealing with just a gargantuan force, you know, changing
Speaker 2: the livable climate, and it's amazing how much it just
Speaker 2: bats you around emotionally, how it plays with people's perceptions,
Speaker 2: how some people you don't want to deny it. So yeah,
Speaker 2: it's a wild, wild experience, there's no question. And the
Speaker 2: number one thing I've been trying to do through the
Speaker 2: whole thing is just keep my sense of humor.
Speaker 1: It's not surprising Adam would prioritize his sense of humor
Speaker 1: considering his background, but he's also onto something in regards
Speaker 1: to how we humans are wired to communicate. If there's
Speaker 1: one failing we scientists have is that we think that
Speaker 1: the only way to communicate the urgency of global heating
Speaker 1: is via facts and data. But research increasingly shows that
Speaker 1: these facts don't often change people's minds. If we really
Speaker 1: want people's attention, we need new strategies. We need empathy,
Speaker 1: we need common ground, We need to tell them stories.
Speaker 1: All this points back to a big lesson Adam learned,
Speaker 1: and we can take away too.
Speaker 2: What I learned is there is no one way to
Speaker 2: do it. Yes, this is a story that's got to
Speaker 2: be told in a thousand and a million different ways,
Speaker 2: because you know, seven billion people, the world is vast,
Speaker 2: there's so many different emotional experiences.
Speaker 3: So what I learned we don't look.
Speaker 2: Up is the way we told the story worked really
Speaker 2: well for the people it worked for, and.
Speaker 3: That's great.
Speaker 2: So yeah, the big lesson as well, there are a
Speaker 2: lot of different ways to tell this story for a
Speaker 2: lot of different people. One example is, you know, we
Speaker 2: do this prayer in the end of the movie where
Speaker 2: Timothy Chalomay's character says a very sincere prayer to God
Speaker 2: in this moment of collapse.
Speaker 12: Dearest Father, an almighty Creator, we ask for your grace tonight,
Speaker 12: despite our pride, their forgiveness, despite our.
Speaker 2: Down And there's nothing funny or cynical about it. I mean,
Speaker 2: I wrote that as sincere as possible, but it never
Speaker 2: occurred to me that they were of course a duh.
Speaker 2: There would be tons of people of faith that would
Speaker 2: really connect with that moment. So I read some beautiful
Speaker 2: pieces in outlets that normally I don't think would even
Speaker 2: watch anything I make, like you know, Christian News Monthly
Speaker 2: or whatever making that up. And then I saw some
Speaker 2: responses to the movie from Believe It or Not, right
Speaker 2: wing corners of the World, and I saw like one
Speaker 2: guy who I'm sure his boss yelled at him afterwards,
Speaker 2: but he wrote this piece that was like the movie
Speaker 2: is ultimately calling for true accountability. And I was like, wow,
Speaker 2: this guy is writing for a magazine I find reprehensible,
Speaker 2: but he really got the movie.
Speaker 1: The end is so moving, Adam, the prayer is beautiful
Speaker 1: and Leonardo DiCaprio a wonderful moment at the tay Bluff.
Speaker 1: I think it's something like we really did have everything,
Speaker 1: didn't we? And oh my god, it was so beautiful.
Speaker 1: I actually brought me to tears and it was just
Speaker 1: an incredible emotional moment. It was just so real.
Speaker 12: The thing of it is is we really.
Speaker 4: We really did have everything, didn't we?
Speaker 1: I mean, when you think about it.
Speaker 3: So I got to tell you this story of that line.
Speaker 2: So for me, the line in the end when I
Speaker 2: wrote it was Jen Lawrence saying, at least we tried,
Speaker 2: And that was the line when I was a little
Speaker 2: great line, but no, no, no, I totally agree with you.
Speaker 2: So I when I wrote that line at this lake
Speaker 2: house in Ireland, I had tears in my aunt. So
Speaker 2: then we're shooting the scene and DiCaprio comes up to
Speaker 2: me and he goes, you know, I love Jen's line,
Speaker 2: but is there a line that can really drive the
Speaker 2: loss home? And of course I'm the writer of the script.
Speaker 2: I'm delighted with the line I've written and it's so.
Speaker 3: I tell him.
Speaker 2: I go like, look, I think it works great, but
Speaker 2: if you want to try something, which is the way
Speaker 2: I work, I always let actors improvise. I go, if
Speaker 2: you've got something, let's film it. So he leaves. Then
Speaker 2: he comes back and I'm next to my script supervisor,
Speaker 2: Kate Hardman, who's hilarious from Texas and no BS calls
Speaker 2: everything like she sees it, and DiCaprio's like, you.
Speaker 3: Know, I came up with this line. What do you
Speaker 3: think of this?
Speaker 2: And he takes a beat and he says, you know,
Speaker 2: right at the very end, I just say, wow, we
Speaker 2: really did have it all, didn't we? And he said,
Speaker 2: and Kate Hartman and I both of us tears in
Speaker 2: our eyes, and I'm like, uh yeah, Leo, let's do that.
Speaker 1: It's all right, It's all right.
Speaker 2: Like e what after they saw the movie was like
Speaker 2: that was the line? And I go, you know, I
Speaker 2: cannot tell a lie. I did not script that. That
Speaker 2: was all Leo and I go, well, the.
Speaker 3: Only credit I'll give myself is I filmed it.
Speaker 2: I was smart enough to go you inspired, you inspired,
Speaker 2: Thank you. I like the Twister, but but it's so
Speaker 2: funny because it might be the single line from anything
Speaker 2: I've ever worked on that moves me the most. It
Speaker 2: hit me every single time I watched the movie when
Speaker 2: we were editing or screening it.
Speaker 1: Adam was encouraged by the success he saw We don't
Speaker 1: look up, and this inspired him to start another big project.
Speaker 1: He founded Yellow Dots Studios. It's a nonprofit production studio
Speaker 1: fighting against climate disinformation and inaction.
Speaker 2: One goal is educate on climate. There's still a remarkable
Speaker 2: amount of people once again because no functioning news media
Speaker 2: on it. They don't under stand the basics on how
Speaker 2: the climate is warming.
Speaker 3: So that's a big thing. Communicate the science.
Speaker 2: The other thing is to point to the cause aka
Speaker 2: the villains, big oil and the banks that fund them.
Speaker 2: They directly did this. They knew back in the seventies
Speaker 2: that it was happening. They chose to lie about it
Speaker 2: and keep making money.
Speaker 1: Okay, I need to interrupt for a second and underscore
Speaker 1: Adam's last point. The big ore companies have known about
Speaker 1: global heating for decades, and instead of trying to help,
Speaker 1: they covered it up, which brings us to a segment
Speaker 1: we call what the fuck are you talking about? What
Speaker 1: the fuck are you talking about? You might assume that
Speaker 1: we've only known about global heating for a few decades,
Speaker 1: but actually as far back as the eighteen eighties, scientists
Speaker 1: knew but if we added carbon to the hemosphere it
Speaker 1: could change our climate. Now fast forward to the nineteen seventies.
Speaker 1: By that time there was some amazing research being done
Speaker 1: to figure out what impact burning fossil fuels was having
Speaker 1: on the climate. Who was doing at research? X on Mobile, Yes,
Speaker 1: that big oil company, and they confirmed by nineteen seventy
Speaker 1: seven that global heating was real and was actually happening.
Speaker 1: So what did they do with this information? They spent
Speaker 1: millions and millions of dollars spreading lies and confusion about
Speaker 1: their own excellent research. The public started to hear about
Speaker 1: the changing climate in the nineteen eighties. I was a
Speaker 1: nerdy teenager growing up in England and I remember Margaret
Speaker 1: Thatcher of a British prime minister, giving several famous speeches
Speaker 1: about it. She spoke about the responsibility we had to
Speaker 1: balance economic growth with protection for the environment. But it
Speaker 1: must be gross, but it doesn't plunder the planet today
Speaker 1: and leave our children to deal with the consequences tomorrow.
Speaker 1: We are not the lords.
Speaker 7: We are the lord's creatures, the trustees.
Speaker 8: Of this planet.
Speaker 1: That clip was from a speech Thatcher gave in nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty nine. But here's a crazy thing. Since she gave
Speaker 1: that speech, humans have pumped more carbon into the atmosphere
Speaker 1: than we did in the entirety of history before nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty nine. In other words, most of the damage from
Speaker 1: burning fossil fuels has been caused after these big corporations
Speaker 1: knew exactly how harmful it was. It's absolutely criminal. And
Speaker 1: that's what the fuck we're talking about. What the fuck
Speaker 1: a we're talking about? Okay, let us get back to Adam,
Speaker 1: who's actually trying to help us unfuck this. He's using
Speaker 1: his voice as a storyteller and an activist through his
Speaker 1: company Yellow Dots Studios.
Speaker 2: We're working on numerous different climates projects. I wrote a
Speaker 2: script called to see that's a specscript.
Speaker 1: To TC is that two degrees anegrad correct.
Speaker 2: Correct and it's a big sort of climate epic that's
Speaker 2: you know, dramatic, funny, thrilling that spans hundreds of years
Speaker 2: of climate change. And then I'm working on another script
Speaker 2: about the corruption that has stopped action on climate and
Speaker 2: it's a comedy. It's about a serial killer that hires
Speaker 2: a lobbyist to make it easier for him to kill.
Speaker 2: And we've got Rob Pattinson, Robert Downey, Junior uh for
Speaker 2: his twitterker, Amy Adams, Daniel Deadweiler. It's incredible cast has
Speaker 2: signed up. It's definitely one of the main thrusts of
Speaker 2: every single thing I'm doing, just because it feels ridiculous
Speaker 2: to be you're alive at this giant seismic moment and
Speaker 2: not to at least somewhat address it with anything we're doing.
Speaker 2: It feels like a lot of stuff that doesn't is
Speaker 2: going to feel awfully irrelevant in the next couple years.
Speaker 2: So we always at least try and have it next
Speaker 2: to a project we're doing, if not directly in the
Speaker 2: middle of it.
Speaker 1: One thing I really like here is that Adam's infusing
Speaker 1: the story of a climate crisis into almost every project
Speaker 1: that he's working on. He's also connecting people with resources
Speaker 1: for them to make positive changes in their communities. If
Speaker 1: you follow yellow dots on social media, you'll find lots
Speaker 1: of ways to get connected to activism work. And that's
Speaker 1: a lesson for all of us. It's keeping the story
Speaker 1: at the top of everyone's mind and doing it in
Speaker 1: a way that's useful, helpful, and most important of all, engaging.
Speaker 1: We can all do that, even if we aren't a
Speaker 1: famous director to hang out with movie stars. We can
Speaker 1: communicate the story and then collectively we can turn that
Speaker 1: awareness into action. I have good news for you on
Speaker 1: that front too, because it turns out and in order
Speaker 1: to change things, we don't need to convince everyone that
Speaker 1: global heating is a crisis. We might just need three
Speaker 1: and a half percent. What I'm talking about is a
Speaker 1: three and a half percent rule. It's an idea based
Speaker 1: on the search done at Harvard by Erika Chenoweth. She's
Speaker 1: looked at nonviolent protests over this last century and found
Speaker 1: that they almost always bring about regime change when at
Speaker 1: least three and a half percent of a population are
Speaker 1: taking part. We just need three and a half percent
Speaker 1: of us willing to stand up and tell our governments
Speaker 1: that we need action.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: So I guess my question is why aren't three and
Speaker 1: a half percent of us taking to the streets right
Speaker 1: now to fight for climate action In the US that
Speaker 1: looks like ten million people, which does feel like a lot.
Speaker 1: But if you think about your city, let's take Boston
Speaker 1: to get real change, it might only take twenty two
Speaker 1: thousand people there to ride up and demand stronger action
Speaker 1: on the climate crisis from the government. And honestly, to me,
Speaker 1: it really doesn't seem impossible.
Speaker 2: Well, in here's the good news, it's already happening. There
Speaker 2: have already been successes. There was an incredible protest of
Speaker 2: trying to remember the country was Norway or Sweden that
Speaker 2: they did against private planes that garnered worldwide attention, and
Speaker 2: afterwards there were laws passed restricting use of private jets.
Speaker 2: So I just tell everyone I go, look, just show
Speaker 2: up at the march. They're not violent. Doesn't mean that
Speaker 2: cops aren't going to show up and get really pissed,
Speaker 2: and they do arrest people. But you're going to make friends.
Speaker 2: You're going to meet people that feel like a lot
Speaker 2: like you. I have made so many incredible friends, taken
Speaker 2: so much comfort from it. So people ask what they
Speaker 2: can do. Show up for declare emergency, climate defiance, extinction rebellion,
Speaker 2: just stop oil all these incredible groups that are out there.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's something you can do that we know,
Speaker 2: like you said, according to actual studies of the data,
Speaker 2: really does work far better than signing an online petition
Speaker 2: or you know which not fine, do that too, but
Speaker 2: that's like a thousandth of the impact of showing up
Speaker 2: for these non violent disruptive marches.
Speaker 3: They're so powerful.
Speaker 1: Oh Adam, this is just so inspirational. Just before we
Speaker 1: sign off, could I just ask your advice as a
Speaker 1: master communicator, how do we reach people in our lives
Speaker 1: who don't yet care about the issue.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, yeah, you kind of read it and react.
Speaker 2: I love basketball, and basketball is a read and react game.
Speaker 2: When you catch the ball, how close is your defender,
Speaker 2: where's the defender behind them? Is anyone open? And so
Speaker 2: it's a read and react kind of thing. And yeah,
Speaker 2: you don't want to be going around putting people into
Speaker 2: tears if they're having a hard time, but always if
Speaker 2: you can do it with a little bit of like
Speaker 2: laughing at yourself or humor, that's fantastic. And then sometimes
Speaker 2: I'll just drop one piece of information on them, Like
Speaker 2: if I'm talking to someone who thinks, you know, Joe
Speaker 2: Biden's not a Republican so he's fixed everything, I'll say,
Speaker 2: you know, actually Joe Biden has approved more oil drilling
Speaker 2: leases than trumped it. And they'll go that's not true,
Speaker 2: and I'll go, yeah, it, actually he is, and that
Speaker 2: will hopefully kind of push them towards like you're not
Speaker 2: going to solve this through a one party versus the
Speaker 2: other lens. And then there are times I need the
Speaker 2: people around me to help me and tell me like, hey, McKay,
Speaker 2: calm down, No.
Speaker 1: It's so true. Is we need We do need each
Speaker 1: other because it's it's pre it's pre sobering what we're
Speaker 1: going for a moment. And I just love that reading
Speaker 1: a room, empathy, a little bit of human self irreverence
Speaker 1: is always really it helps cut for a lot of conversations.
Speaker 2: I always say, like, the most frustrating thing about all
Speaker 2: of this is we have the science. We've had it
Speaker 2: the whole time. We could have We could have switched
Speaker 2: from fossil vuels and gone to solar panels wind like hydro.
Speaker 2: We could have been developing new technologies like, you know,
Speaker 2: science is our ex caliber, man, it's our secret weapons.
Speaker 1: It's true, we just didn't use.
Speaker 2: It because those big oil companies pay to everyone off
Speaker 2: not to use it. So that both infuriates me and
Speaker 2: gives me a lot of hope.
Speaker 4: On fucking the future. We're on fucking the future.
Speaker 1: I have to say I've really enjoyed my conversation with
Speaker 1: Adam McKay. He's proving how powerful storytelling can be in
Speaker 1: the fight against global heating, and it's a reminder that
Speaker 1: our words matter, which brings us to our final segment,
Speaker 1: what the fuck can I do?
Speaker 3: What the fuck can I do?
Speaker 1: So this is a part of a show where we
Speaker 1: tell you one thing you can do to get involved
Speaker 1: and see she was so brilliant last episode. We've asked
Speaker 1: Maggie Bear to come back on the show each week
Speaker 1: to help us with a segment. Hey, Maggie Cray, how's
Speaker 1: it going great? It's great to have you back here, Maggie.
Speaker 1: What have you got for us this week?
Speaker 13: Okay, since Adam's interview was all about the power of
Speaker 13: words and storytelling, I want to recommend that we all
Speaker 13: do something super simple, and that is this, We need
Speaker 13: to stop saying climate change. Let's call it what it is,
Speaker 13: global heating, or for Fox's sake, a climate crisis.
Speaker 1: And why is that important?
Speaker 7: Well, let me ask you a question.
Speaker 13: Do you know why everybody says climate change? So back
Speaker 13: in the day, we used to say global warming or
Speaker 13: greenhouse effect. But then a Republican political strategist named Frank
Speaker 13: Lutz got involved, and in two thousand and two, Frank
Speaker 13: wrote a famous internal memo about how Republican candidates should
Speaker 13: speak about the environment. And I'm going to read this
Speaker 13: bombshell to you quote. While global warming has catastrophic communications
Speaker 13: attached to it, climate change sounds a more controllable and
Speaker 13: less emotional challenge end quote. So basically, he recommended that
Speaker 13: politicians downplay the climate crisis by changing what we call it.
Speaker 1: Lovely thought on this say wow wow.
Speaker 7: Yeah, So get this. President George W.
Speaker 13: Bush switched from saying global warming to saying climate change, and.
Speaker 7: Now we all say it. Everyone says it. It's crazy.
Speaker 14: The United States has committed to strengthening our energy security
Speaker 14: and confronting global climate change, and the best way to
Speaker 14: meet these goals is for America to continue leading the
Speaker 14: way toward the development of cleaner and more energy efficient technology.
Speaker 13: The term climate change is intentionally misleading. It's part of
Speaker 13: the disinformation campaigns that we are all subject to. So
Speaker 13: can we please call the problem what it is? It
Speaker 13: is a climate crisis caused by global heating. We need
Speaker 13: to put a label on the problem that sounds like
Speaker 13: the problem that it is the problem we need to
Speaker 13: solve urgently.
Speaker 3: Thanks Maggie.
Speaker 1: That is so important and that's such a great idea,
Speaker 1: And that's what the fuck you can do?
Speaker 6: What the fuck can I do?
Speaker 4: Oh fuck?
Speaker 1: That's all for this episode. Next time I'm Fucking the Future,
Speaker 1: I'll talk with you and Goodwill Ambassador Sabrina Elba about
Speaker 1: the impact of a climate crisis on Somalia, where her
Speaker 1: family is from, and we'll dig into why women and
Speaker 1: girls at the forefront of a fight against global heating.
Speaker 15: I'll never hear this image of this swamp land in
Speaker 15: sire Leone that was converted into rice farms and seeing
Speaker 15: them before and after, I could not believe that land
Speaker 15: that was so degradated and so turned into this massive
Speaker 15: community with women farming. And I always thought that was
Speaker 15: so amazing.
Speaker 8: And it just goes to show like even things like
Speaker 8: land degregation like we need rule people to restore the
Speaker 8: world through nature based solutions. Nature release solutions are such
Speaker 8: a big part of it, and who else is going
Speaker 8: to protect these areas the genuine custodians of our planet
Speaker 8: rule people.
Speaker 1: Until then? I'm Chris Turney signing off from Sydney, Australia.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining me in I'm Fucking the Future.
Speaker 4: Fucking the Future.
Speaker 1: I'm Fucking the Future is produced by Imagine Audio and
Speaker 1: Awfully Nice for iHeart Podcasts and hosted by me Chris Turney.
Speaker 1: The show is written by Meredith Bryan. I'm Fucking the
Speaker 1: Future is produced by Amber von Shassen and Rene Colvert.
Speaker 1: Ron Howard, Brian Grazer, Carl Welker and Nathan Chloke are
Speaker 1: the executive producers from Imagine Audio. Jesse Burton and Katie
Speaker 1: Hodges are the executive producers from Awfully Nice. Sound design
Speaker 1: and mixing by Evan Arnette, Original music by Lillly Hayden
Speaker 1: and producing services by Peter McGuigan, Sam Swinnerton to our
Speaker 1: theme and all those fun jingles. If you enjoyed this episode,
Speaker 1: be sure to rate and review Unfucking the Future on
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts or whether you get your podcasts