From 30cd81e3761f9afe44841a76e217258315092ebb Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Joe Carstairs <me@joeac.net>
Date: Tue, 5 May 2026 14:38:36 +0100
Subject: add scratchbook

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+---
+bibliography: bibliography.bib
+title: Dissertation scratchbook
+author: Joe Carstairs
+---
+
+## Examples of green rhetoric in which the audience is blamed or assumed to have power over the problem
+
+- @{back-to-nature} is a particularly egregious example
+- @{inconvenient-truth} must be a go-to. See the credits especially.
+- @{forget-me-not}, especially the Epilogue
+- @{greenpeace-report} is a particularly egregious example of the magic 'we'
+
+@{no-one-is-too-small}, @{xr-declaration}, and @{xr-not-a-drill} are good
+contrasts: it emphasises that the audience is not, at least not entirely,
+responsible.
+
+## Examples of green rhetoric in which the catastrophe is final
+
+Like, all of them.
+
+Obvious examples include @{xr-declaration}, @{no-one-is-too-small},
+@{greenpeace-report}. If we don't stop emitting CO2, everyone will die and/or
+civilization will collapse.
+
+@{inconvenient-truth} didn't quite have that narrative, but it did use Earthshot
+and Pale Blue Dot very prominently, which I think was to communicate that what
+is at stake is global, cosmic, total.
+
+In @{cry-of-the-wild}, the catastrophe is final for the orca, Eeschin. While we
+don't see her die, we know that her whole clan has died off, and she will refuse
+til death to join another clan: the only way it can end is death, and thus the
+total extinction of her clan.
+
+### Examples of green rhetoric using core apocalyptic forms
+
+The goal here is to persuade the reader that green rhetoric often uses literary
+techniques which are distinctive of the genre, apocalypse.
+
+Examples of the doomsday cluster of symbols includes almost every example of
+green rhetoric I've read so far:
+
+- @{silent-spring}
+- @{heat}
+- @{inconvenient-truth}
+- @{xr-declaration}
+- @{xr-not-a-drill}
+- @{no-one-is-too-small}
+- @{greenpeace-report}
+- @{back-to-nature}
+- @{forget-me-not}
+- @{cry-of-the-wild}
+- @{greenhouse-effect}
+
+Green rhetoric almost always talks about the world system, so engages in cosmic
+speculation by default. Almost all green rhetoric also imagines alternative
+worlds, particularly alternative futures, whether utopic or dystopic. Pretty
+much anything in the above list would include those symbols.
+
+Examples of nesting contexts:
+
+- @{greenhouse-effect}
+- Chp 7, @{losing-eden}
+- @{inconvenient-truth}
+- @{xr-declaration}
+- @{wilding}
+- @{losing-eden}
+
+The best examples of moral dualism:
+
+- @{no-one-is-too-small}
+- @{silent-spring}
+- @{xr-declaration}
+- @{back-to-nature}
+
+The best examples of eschatological symbols:
+
+- @{cry-of-the-wild}
+- @{xr-not-a-drill}
+- @{back-to-nature}
+- @{inconvenient-truth}
+
+For fatalism, see: @{xr-not-a-drill}, @{american-apocalyptic}.
+
+For mythological symbolism, see: @{cry-of-the-wild}, @{xr-not-a-drill},
+@{inconvenient-truth} (Revelation itself used as a mythological symbol!).
+
+For exhortations to remain faithful, see: @{xr-not-a-drill}, @{cry-of-the-wild},
+@{back-to-nature}, @{xr-declaration}, @{forget-me-not}.
+
+For minority/revealed knowledge, see @{heat}, @{xr-not-a-drill},
+@{silent-spring}. But be aware that the vast majority of green rhetoric uses
+'majority' scientific knowledge as its rule, and often loudly celebrates this
+fact.
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