Debunking Michael Knowles

This article originated on the blog “what do I like this week” it can be found at https://whatdoilikethisweek.blogspot.com/

I should preface this by reflecting on the fact that the name of this blog relates to things I’m supposed to like. I do not like Michael Knowles. Instead he is someone I find myself interested in despite my dislike and thus I’m concerned this blog may form into an outlet for ranting about my annoyances. Let’s hope not.

week 1: Michael Knowles

Part 1 Background

I’ll start this exploration of one of my least favorite conservative pundits by exploring who he is and what he stands for. I want to make this part as non-biased as possible, before I present my reasons for disliking him.

First though, his background and other personal information. (Hopefully I don’t come across like too much of a stalker)

Of Italian descent Michael J. Knowles was born in Bedford Hills, New York, a sparsely populated area with a population of 3001 in 2010. He trained as an actor as a teen and later graduated from Yale university with a bachelors degree in history and Italian.

In 2016 Michael Knowles began to appear on the Andrew Klaven show, a podcast from the Daily Wire. The Daily wire is a conservative media company founded in part by the more well known conservative commentator Ben Shapiro. After around year appearing on the Andrew Klavan show Michael Knowles was given his own show by the Daily Wire.

Part 2 The Michael Knowles Show

In the first ever episode of Michael’s show he immediately begins dispensing his views on Al Gore, a former vice president of the United States, and by extension his views on climate change.

Michael plays the first seconds of the trailer for a then upcoming sequel to Al Gore’s documentary about climate change. In the trailer you hear a soundbite of then president Donald Trump making a comment on the cold weather and claiming that global warming would be beneficial because of how unbearable the cold apparently was. It cuts to a recording of Al Gore saying that the biggest controversy of the previous documentary was claiming that the 9/11 memorial would flood as a result of a weather event spurred on by global warming. The trailer then includes audio from a news report revealing that the 9/11 memorial really did flood sometime after the release of the original movie. There’s the context for the quote I’m now going to use.

The audio that was just described stops and here’s what Michael says:

“You have to hand it to Al Gore, this man has cahones of steel. He opens up his trailer with some of the most stunning hypocrisy in the entire movie. One thing we’re always told by the alarmists is that weather is not climate. So Donald Trump, you saw in that clip, said ‘we need a little bit more global warming, it’s a little chilly here’ and people say ‘well that’s just the weather, the weather is different than the climate’. Because the climate is alot of weather, or something like that. But then Al Gore immediately goes to one weather event that happened in New York”

He goes on to talk about how there have been many other hurricanes in New York, however the point of bringing up this quote isn’t related to the meteorological history of New York City but rather the way he dismisses the argument of those he tries to debunk.

Here’s the quote specifically: “Because the climate is alot of weather, or something like that.”

Michael doesn’t seem to understand a concept that is taught in very early grades in school. Weather is the temperature and other environmental happenings on any given day whereas climate is the temperature over a large period of time. Al Gore’s claim is that a warmer climate will create worse and more frequent weather events. Michael calls this hypocrisy because “weather isn’t climate” so why should anyone complain about weather events?

This is just ridiculous. It showcases either Michael’s inability to understand something that isn’t that hard to understand at a basic level or the fact that he’ll criticize anything he can reach for just to appease the audience who’s beliefs already align with the ones he’s selling.

Just to further disprove anything Michael claims in this area of climate denial I’d like to briefly explain why hurricanes do become more common if the temperature rises.
Hurricanes need warm winds and waters to form.
It’s pretty easy to understand.
An easy way to prove this is by realizing the fact that hurricanes occur reasonably close to the equator and never extremely far away from it in colder areas like Greenland.

and there’s lots of articles to back this stuff up:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/lauratenenbaum/2019/09/01/global-warming-causes-more-intense-hurricanes/?sh=69c6c25f55a1

https://www.nature.com/news/2006/060313/full/news060313-12.html

This last article points out that it could be due to changes in local Atlantic climate. I’d like to add on that if it’s not global warming yet then one day it will be if we continue on this path.

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/videos/does-warmer-world-make-hurricanes-stronger

Show any of these links to someone next time they deny the effects or future effects of global warming on the planet.

Let’s flash forward to one of his more recent episodes. Episode 775 “Your kids are under attack”
opens by telling the listener that it’s been 8 hours of pride month and kids are already being indoctrinated into believing the ideology of the LGBT community. He goes onto complain about the kids show blue’s clues. Michael reveals to us that blue’s clues is collaborating with a drag queen to create an episode centered around pride month. Michael plays some audio which features the drag queen in the show singing about a pride parade. The song is a variation of the ants go marching. They replace “the ants go marching one by one” with “families go marching one by one” and show how families can be made of two dads or two moms in an effort to normalize members of the LGBT community.

Michael, of course, calls this radical. Here’s a quote from the episode:

“This is going to be the key to understanding the radicalism here. It’s not ‘hey look at these lesbians, look at these gay guys, look at these transgender people, look at these various eccentric characters in the LGBT lmnop rainbow’ it’s ‘look at these families’. Because having succeeded in redefining marriage now the radical sexual revolutionary left is going to try and redefine the family.”

I think this quote shows a lot about what Michael is all about.

First, he calls in radicalism so you go into his explanation expecting evidence to back up such a bold claim. Of course the evidence isn’t there but he tries to make you believe that it is.

Secondly, he’s trying to skew the purpose of the blue’s clues episode. In reality the episode is just trying to get kids more used to members of the LGBT spectrum because they’re people too. Michael says that they should be called eccentric characters instead of what they are: people. People who identify with the LGBT community are just people. But Michael is actively claiming that they shouldn’t be called members of a normal family. He says that the radicals are trying to redefine what a family is when the obvious purpose of the episode is just to be inclusive.

Michael thinks that teaching kids about LGBT+ people is indoctrination because some people are homophobic and don’t like that. By that logic you shouldn’t teach kids that people of different races are equal because some people are racist and don’t like that.

Conclusion:

There are many more topics that Michael discusses and in the future I might try and debunk him on them too. He talks about foreign policies, other social issues and economic policy as well. In this first blog post I’ve talked about a relatively small chunk of what Michael believes, however I do hope this paints part of a picture about my beliefs and about the beliefs of Michael. Next week I hope to discuss something else I’m interested in but hopefully it’ll turn out to be something I’m positive on instead.

Thanks for reading whoever you are!

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