The eyewash. A particularly persistent, extremely dangerous species, consisting mainly of influential, highly privileged white men. Eyewashers twist facts, present negative things in a positive light and turn everything to their advantage. He stands for those who use their position of power to make a personal profit from the climate catastrophe. He increases his wealth by burning fossil fuels. He exploits natural resources and people. Sustainability, responsible action towards the climate catastrophe or even a common global future stand in the way of his personal pleasure. Ignorance and denial are his constant companions, running in circles. The media and political reappraisal is influenced by the eyewash. Precarious warning signs of nature are downplayed and normalized with platitudes such as “it’s always been hot in summer” or “fear-mongering and scaremongering” and have a negative impact on the community’s sense of responsibility. “Augenwischer – Organized repression of the climate crisis” captures the current social situation worldwide and re-evaluates it. Selected by a jury, twelve international artists show individual approaches to the eyewash and the resulting collective climate repression in humorous, tense and moving works. The artists expose disinformation and anti-climate propaganda, play with conspiracy myths, accuse unscrupulous profiteers of fossil fuels and at the same time offer solutions. Accompanying the exhibition, an extensive program invites exchange and discourse.” (Katja Hock) Outside of the competition, we are showing Léonard Chemineau‘s graphic, which depicts the common narratives of climate change deniers with humor in six languages for download. One agent of doubt, for example, is the Springer press, whose publishing house is largely owned by fossil fuel investors, as well as AFD, so-called “lateral thinkers”. “It’s always been hot in summer”, “It’s a good thing!”, “Yes, it’s the weather”, “Fear-mongering and scaremongering”, “He who believes will be saved”, “Belief in man-made climate change as a substitute for religion?”

Cognitive scientists have developed a toolkit called PLURV to help identify disinformation and propaganda related to the climate crisis: Pseudo experts, logic errors, unfulfillableexpectations, cherry-picking, conspiracy mythsare detection features.

In Germany, the CDU and FDP parties are conducting a textbook delaying discourse: they have no proposals. It’s really not about political ideologies, it’s about defending fossil business models.

Displacement leads to aggression against, for example, meteorologists on TV who receive hate messages. You only believe what you want to believe. Researchers talk about dissonant information being devalued and consonant information being valorized. The fact that humanity is in the process of destroying the foundations of human life with its way of life generates unpleasant emotions: Feelings of guilt, fears, sadness about the squandered future, the inevitable suffering and death. Cognitive dissonance, that is. Pseudo-information that suggests everything is not so bad can be exonerating.

The book accompanying the exhibition: