Gaslighting Stoves

Gas stoves are the latest Fact Attack victim in the Environmentalists are Coming For Our Rights! campaign.

You’ve seen the memes.

We live in an era where it’s acceptable for people to deny facts and distort truths. Don’t like what the scientists and journalists are reporting? Wage a three-pronged Fact Attack: first, claim it’s not true. Second, throw in a claim about your rights being trampled upon by the woke liberals. Third, finish with a slippery slope: if they come for your gas stoves today, what will they come for next? Your life, your liberty, your right to pursue happiness, oh, my!

How about this slippery slope? If we keep polluting at current rates, our planet will experience species extinctions, water shortages, erosion, floods—wait, no, sorry, those are actual facts...

Speaking of facts—as in information that can be collected, studied, verified—studies show that gas stoves create tremendous indoor pollution, spewing methane, carbon monoxide and formaldehyde into our homes and polluting the very air we breathe. These chemicals cause asthma and contribute to greenhouse gasses, among other things. Armed with this information, I have three choices: 1) Attack the Facts and those wanting me to believe that the actual facts are lies generated by some left wing conspiracy, 2) Believe the facts but do nothing, or 3) Believe the facts and take some common sense actions which might include using other devices when possible (air fryer, Instant Pot, etc.), getting a portable induction cooktop burner (prices start at $79), and running the exhaust fan when using the stove. When my gas stove is cooked, I can replace it with an electric one. Not a single right has been trampled in the taking of common sense actions! Amazing.

History is rich with examples of Fact Attacks successfully postponing meaningful action on products and substances that have killed and harmed millions.

Asbestos is a great place to start. It insulated well and was an effective fire retardant. But then word got out that it also causes cancer. Not just any cancer but an awful cancer that made every breath feel like you were breathing with shards of glass in your lungs. (I should know—my dad died of asbestos-related lung cancer when he was 42 years old). The EPA placed limits on the use of asbestos under the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 but—fun fact—it is still imported into the U.S. Efforts to pass legislation to ban asbestos have failed several times thanks to successful lobbying activities by the asbestos industry.

Big tobacco wields a massive legal and lobbying machine. In countries where robust, effective legislation has been passed, smoking rates have plummeted. Smoking rates in the US were steadily declining until … vaping. Since electronic cigarettes use “synthetic nicotine,” they initially weren’t regulated as tobacco. Also, the tobacco lobby cleverly claimed the nicotine-delivery devices were “smoking cessation tools” despite having any actual data proving e-cigarettes successfully helped people quit. (Spoiler alert: data now exists which proves e-cigs do not help people quit.) The accusation that flavors like cotton candy and tutti fruity were designed and marketed to children were brushed aside as unfounded conjecture. It would almost be funny if we weren’t killing kids.

The lead industry has employed some heavyweight Fact Attackers. Lead’s toxicity was discovered in the late 19th century, but it took almost a century to make meaningful progress. When lead toxicity became impossible to ignore, the lead industry successfully convinced people that lead only affected poor people of color living in slums, thereby making it a low priority problem, buying them years to continue poisoning children and adults without regard to race or socioeconomic status.

Let’s not even go there with guns.

So why are we gaslighting legislators who are trying to improve air quality by proposing common sense measures encouraging or requiring new homes to have electric stoves? Where is the logic that says it’s okay to ban books which enrich our hearts and minds, but it’s not okay to ban appliances that pollute, sicken and contribute to climate change?

Slowly phasing out gas stoves doesn’t trample rights; it simply reduces indoor and outdoor pollution, improves health, and reduces carbon released into the atmosphere. That’s it.

It’s so easy to make this complex which puts the problem out of the reach of the general public and left to the "experts." But climate change isn’t an “us” and “them” problem. It’s really quite simple: we must each decide whether we want to be a part of the problem or the solution. We all must make that choice every single day. It would be a whole lot easier if we could look at simple facts without all the memes Fact Attacks.