Will Hackman, a climate advocate and political operative, has a simple diagnosis for why the climate movement has struggled to win over the majority of Americans: it's been talking to the wrong people in the wrong language.
In his new book, "Radically Reframing Climate Change: A Guide to Saving Ourselves," Hackman argues that climate communicators have spent decades speaking in the language of those who already agree with them—polar bears, melting glaciers, "no planet B"—while failing entirely to reach the cautious, doubtful, and disconnected. This matters because the science is no longer the obstacle. Despite two Trump administrations pulling the United States out of the Paris Agreement and dismissing climate science, federal agencies like NASA continue to maintain that human activities are definitively driving climate change. The problem is political, cultural, and communicative.
According to research from Yale's Program on Climate Change Communication, only about 10 percent of Americans actively dismiss climate change as part of their identity. That means roughly 90 percent of people remain reachable—if the climate movement asks them the right questions and speaks in their language. Yet the polling data shows why that hasn't happened: climate change remains deeply polarized, with Republicans significantly less likely than Democrats to view it as an urgent threat. Rather than adapt their messaging to this reality, many climate advocates have simply repeated the same alarming language louder, hoping people would magically believe them.
Hackman's central argument is both practical and humanistic: reframe the conversation away from planetary salvation and toward human survival. Stop talking about saving the planet. Start talking about protecting people's health, safety, costs, and communities. The distinction might seem semantic, but it represents a fundamental shift in how the climate movement approaches persuasion. A message about clean air and healthy children speaks to people's immediate experience. A message about abstract planetary crisis speaks primarily to those already motivated by environmental identity.
The Yale research identified six distinct audiences that respond differently to climate messaging depending on where they sit on the spectrum of concern. For the "alarmed" and "concerned" categories—those who already believe urgent action is needed—the doom narratives may work. But for the cautious and doubtful, different tactics are required. Hackman emphasizes that successful campaigns must answer two basic questions: who are we trying to reach, and how do we want to say it? Many climate communicators, he suggests, skip the first question entirely. They focus on what they want to say rather than how their audience will receive it.
This reframing becomes especially urgent given the political moment. Climate gains are being rolled back, and the broader coalition needed to sustain climate policy simply does not exist. The ceiling has been hit. Without expanding beyond "true believers," the movement cannot build the political power necessary for meaningful action. That expansion requires meeting people where they are—not where climate advocates wish they were—and speaking to the self-interested concern that unites most humans: protecting ourselves, our families, and our communities from harm.