It's ironic how lacking in irony deniers are

Anthony Watts probably doesn't have a sense of humour.  He probably sits through the famous four candles Two Ronnies sketch and barely breaks into a smile.  He probably has a stone face all the way through Basil Fawlty failing to fail to mention the war.  He possibly doesn't even get the Parrot Sketch.  Oh, he might pretend to, just to fit into polite society, but in private he will turn it over, just in case he can find Glenn Beck making a donkey of himself in a Gish gallop for the finishing line.

Tonight he has posted (arcvhived) something that shows he hasn't really got a clue what his baying hounds of fellow deniers write.  You see, he got a bit antsy about something that Lord Deben, the former John Selwyn Gummer, tweeted:

Why are climate naysayers so personally unpleasant? In no other issue do dissenters turn so quickly from argument to abuse and innuendo.

Lord Deben, clearly one of those eco-socialists, except he was one of Margaret Thatcher's ministers and quite keen on free enterprise

In order to ram the point home he post a picture of some environmentalists with flaming torches and a challenge:

I challenge Lord Deben to find examples of climate skeptics doing anything remotely close to this sort of ugliness that is much like of the tactics of the Klu Klux Klan – showing up at somebody’s house with mask covered faces, torches, and a threat.

"That is much like" suggests a man on the edge of providing another example of Godwin's law in action.  But not quite.  I must admit, if I did not have the KKK rammed down my throat here, it is not what I would have thought of.  Most of the world sees the white robes, the pointy hats and the Christian tolerance message of the vile racism of KKK members.  Perhaps Antony needs a reminder:

Anyway, what the commenters on WUWT can be relied upon is to give evidence that anyone who suggests climate deniers are unpleasant is correct:

Kaboom says:

February 9, 2014 at 11:08 am

Can’t really fully comment until I understand what a “climate naysayer” is. Probably another figment of imagination for warmers to push over, strawman-style.

 Well, Kaboom, look it up.  You know, do what skeptics really do and find out for yourself.  Wait, I'll help you:

To oppose, deny, or take a pessimistic or negative view

 Anyway, having demonstrated wilful ignorance, very few debates on WUWT get any better.

onlyme says:

February 9, 2014 at 11:38 am

The remark that started ‘Lord’ Deben off is found at https://twitter.com/lorddeben/status/432571803425587201 in which he calls #Anthropogenic #GlobalWarming sceptics ‘deniers/dismissers’ the holocaust referencing Godwins’ law invoking term used by so many alarm spreading followers of #IPCC dogma. This was followed by the remark Antony responded to at https://twitter.com/lorddeben/status/432575875666968577 in which he now labels #CAGW sceptics dissenters.

The use of the epithet #Denier has been habitual and continual with Deben, and to me is not the kind of behavior that is fitting on part of someone who is supposed to be part of the nobility. There is nothing whatever noble about such speech, and when he is called out on this practice of his, his response is as detailed above, to blame sceptics for attacking, even though he is the first to hurl the slurs.

I also take exception to his classification of sceptics on the matter of anthropogenic global warming as dismissers, we do not dismiss the evidence but the interpretations and question the models which to date show limited skill at prediction beyond 5 to 10 days.

 See what I mean.  and as for the behaviour fitting the nobility, the tame peer at WUWT, his lordship Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, barely leaves the playground in his level of disputation.  So much for nobility.

mosomoso says:

February 9, 2014 at 12:19 pm

I haven’t met a person who is in a postition to naysay climate, so I can only assume “naysayer” is a pejorative directed at the likes of me. It’s odd that Lord Deben can’t refrain from a term of abuse even in this context. Cloaking his insult in prissiness and whining does not make it less of an insult.

 Once again a pretty good description of Monckton's modus operandi.

ferdberple says:

February 9, 2014 at 12:51 pm

Lord Deben’s hypocritical remarks are no different than racism. He lumps “the climate naysayers” together and calls them “so personally unpleasant”.

Lord Deben has not met all the climate naysayers. At most he has met a small sample, so his remarks show prejudice. He is judging all members of the group to be the same, having never met the majority of the group. This is racism.

Then, to top it all off, he labels the group and with derogatory labels. Which clearly establishes that he is personally unpleasant. So we have a case of the pot calling the kettle black. A hypocrite dressed in Lord clothing.

 As we know, Antony Watts is not a stranger to hypocrisy himself.  But are Deben's remarks no different than racism?  Really?  Of course they are different.  Tainting people for the colour of their skin, an unavoidable event, is not the same as suggesting that some people who have some views could be personally more pleasant, more polite, more intellectually honest.  It isn't difficult.  And it isn't prejudice but more likely to be the result of personal experience.  Anyone who has posted a comment suggesting that something is wrong on WUWT can expect the sort of behaviour that Lord Deben comments on. 

I know I have.  From having my sexuality questioned, to having crude jokes about my profession, these tiresome and childish insults and innuendoes come only from the climate science denier side and not the so called "warmist" side. 

I had been thinking of writing a post about the inability of climate science deniers to look at the scientific evidence with anything like an open mind and why they seem so keen to resort to ad hominem arguments.  When I saw Antony Watts's post, I didn't need to.  He had, in his customary way, given the answer himself.  It's a surprise he didn't ask the Nuremburg trials.  Oh, wait, Dellingpole already did that.