Not the most persuasive approach

Kristof's op-ed on how the effects of climate change reach beyond immediate geological consequences like rising sea levels is hampered, I think, by the sorts of examples he chooses. First he talks about how droughts are correlated with an increase of witch-burnings in rural Tanzania--and later he talks about how drought might have helped trigger the civil war and genocide in Sudan.*

While I think it's right to focus on the geopolitical consequences of climate change, where entire regions are threatened by changing agricultural conditions and waning supplies of water, I don't think it makes sense to highlight examples in which most of the harm is caused by the unrelated ignorance or brutality of people. I mean, climate change isn't causing people to believe in witches in Tanzania or causing soldiers in Darfur to rape and kill. People not already on board with the arguments about climate change will see this article as one more example of liberal hysteria over global warming--and they will also see a healthy dose of the liberal penchant for facile attributions of the world's problems to objective phenomena rather than human choice.

*Kristof weasels back out of the Sudan claim after making it, but it's a rhetorical bell that can't be unrung. Judge for youself: "Ethnic conflict in Darfur was exacerbated by drought and competition for water, and some experts see it as the first war caused by climate change. That’s too simplistic, for the crucial factor was simply the ruthlessness of the Sudanese government, but climate change may well have been a contributing factor." Why even put this paragraph in there in the first place?