Denial: Not just a river in Egypt

Steven W. Running

This morning the New York Times has published an article entitled "Climate Talk’s Cancellation Splits a Town": Here's part of what it says:

CHOTEAU, Mont. — School authorities’ cancellation of a talk that a Nobel laureate climate researcher was to have given to high school students has deeply divided this small farming and ranching town at the base of the east side of the Rocky Mountains.

The scholar, Steven W. Running, a professor of ecology at the University of Montana, was scheduled to speak to about 130 students here last Thursday about his career and the global changes occurring because of the earth’s warming.
...
Choteau is home to a deep-seated mistrust of environmentalism, which many here see as a threat to their agricultural way of life. The town has also been largely on the pro-development side of a long and sometimes bitter battle over whether to exploit oil and gas reserves along the wild Rocky Mountain front or to preserve it primarily for wilderness and wildlife.
...
Dr. Running did not mention the cancellation or the resulting controversy in his presentation, “The Five Stages of Climate Grief,” which was sponsored by the Sonoran Institute, an environmental group.
The first two of the five stages are denial and anger, Dr. Running said in the phone interview, so he understands the opposition to his addressing the students.

Ah, denial. I know of women who just refuse to get a lump in their breast checked out too. Doesn't make the cancer go away, now does it?