Guardian ixnays fossil fuel ads

The British newspaper company says it will no longer accept ads from fossil fuel companies. However, as of this time, it will still accept ads for products that are major fossil fuel users, ie, CARS!

From the newspaper side, I understand still taking car ads, or travel ones. They're big sellers. Now, the idea that this will entice other advertisers? I doubt it. The Guardian is not the British equivalent of The Nation or something.

Nieman Lab comments more on both the policy and the paper's move to revamp its news language about climate issues. And on how the NYT (and presumably many other papers) talk "firewall" when called out for still running these ads. As an editor, I know that Amy Westervelt is right — readers don't see a "firewall."

And, as long as the NYT has people like John Schwartz on the editorial side, even if ads are a declining percentage of revenue, eXXXon will be OK with running those ads.

Beyond THAT, Schwartz is no idiot, even though he's currently playing one on Twitter. He knows that papers have either killed outright or modified stories before under pressure from advertisers. Big Oil doesn't have the chops to pull that off any more, but it has in the past. Other industries, either national, or local and of concentration in a city's newspaper, have successfully pressured newspapers to kill, or at least modify, stories.

(And, although not an advertiser, let's not forget that a President of the United States successfully pressured the Times itself to hold a story on domestic spying until after the 2004 election.)

Update, Feb. 12: Beyond THAT? NYT's own in-house T Brand Studio created an oily ad for Chevron, as Westervelt discusses in detail at The Nation.

Will the Guardian's call to other newspapers to follow it, either on the no ads, or even more forceful framing in news stories, have any effect? Not as long as papers like the NYT still have reporters like John Schwartz, as I see it.

Let's remember that this crosses into the news side.

Look at the ExxonMobil Foundation and the big bucks it pours into the National Math and Science Initiative, and the publicity it gets in small-town papers, and sometimes bigger ones, for the awards it makes. Well, somehow, I doubt the initiative is training high school students to know climate science enough to refute Exxon.

So, John, want a desk editor giving you a new assignment, since you're an environment reporter? Write about that.