Messaging guru offers list of words to use and avoid to build support for climate solutions

f you’ve heard of Frank Luntz, you may know him as the evil-genius messaging expert who advised Republicans how to twist words to support their policy priorities. But Luntz seems to have gotten religion on climate. He has stopped minimizing the problem of global heating and has instead decided to do the opposite — to try to help activists raise the alarm.

Cecil the lion: understanding the secret of a supermeme (and its relevance to climate change communication)

"Cecil the lion" is having so much success because it has the three basic characteristics that make a meme a supermeme. These are 1) Be simple, 2) Have a villain, 3) Be reassuring. From these considerations, we can probably understand why it is so difficult to create effective climate memes that carry the right message: climate science is not simple, the villain is us, and the story is disquieting, rather than reassuring.