Earth Day Fail.

I just wrote the following letter to www.climatecentral.org, a nonprofit billed as trying to bridge scientists and the public to provide clear up-to-date info and help educate ppl and help them make decisions.

Hi,

Yesterday, I attended Earth Fair in San Diego.  It is billed as the largest free earth day event in the world with over 70,000 visitors.  Among the music, food, and entertainment were what seemed like a million booths from corporations, individuals, and non-profits alike trying to sell products, educate people, obtain signatures, publicize, etc.  I searched through the official index beforehand and I searched the whole complex for one booth dedicated to (a) educating the public about the severity of climate change, (b) disseminating the truth of and science behind climate change (there are still a lot of climate denialists out there), or (c) empowering people to use said knowledge to influence public policy.

The closest I found was the Citizens Climate Lobby (www.citizensclimatelobby.org), a group dedicated to grassroots lobbying.  While I applaud their action, as well as the actions of all the groups out there helping people "green" their everyday lives via products, awareness, recycling, reduced emissions, etc., none of it seems adequate.

Am I wrong to think that there should have been a much greater "Climate Change Awareness" presence at such an event?  Am I wrong to think that there should be resources or information that press people to "Join here, Sign up, Sign here, Do this, Act now" to help prevent climate change.  

The lady at the Citizens Climate Lobby booth said that people want to put on blinders and ignore the fact that climate change is an extremely real and imminent danger.  Well, is the answer to stop trying to educate them since they'll ignore you anyways?  It can't be.

I can only come to two conclusions as to the cause of this startling lack.  Either the movement to mitigate climate change has not reached the maturity where they reach out at events like this, or it was tried and found to lack efficacy.  The latter rationale seems thin.  When groups promoting Atheism and Humanism are at the event, and every local watershed has multiple nonprofits trying to raise awareness, then why not raise awareness about climate change.   Especially with the recent spate of public attacks against climate change wouldn't an event like this be ideal for debunking those attacks and educating the public?

I would love your thoughts how or why this happened.

Thanks.