TCC #55 — The glorification of anti-intellectualism
'Smart' people have a messaging problem
Remember when we re-elected a former president who would rather babble about shower pressure than acknowledge the climate crisis?
Anti-intellectualism isn’t new. But it sure is getting louder!
The glorification of ‘gut instinct’ over fact, ‘common sense’ over data, and ‘real Americans’ over academics has turned knowledge itself into a political red line. We see it everywhere:
A majority of Republicans believe universities have a negative impact on the U.S. (??)
Trump’s approach to foreign policy ignores experts entirely, reinforcing a broader trend of dismissing informed decision-making
The COVID-19 pandemic revealed just how deeply anti-intellectualism affects public health, with misinformation spreading far faster than scientific findings
It’s not just a right-wing phenomenon. The ‘educated elite,’ (my eyes are rolling all the way back in my head as I type that) dismiss perspectives outside their ideological bubble, too — effectively creating echo chambers that are just as rigid as the populist rejection of expertise.
This tension — between expertise and skepticism, between academia and the ‘real world’ — has consequences. It shapes our politics, our ability to solve global crises, and, most relevant here, our ability to communicate about sustainability (or anything else) in a world where trust in institutions is rapidly eroding.
What happens when nobody listens to the experts anymore?
Anti-intellectualism is deeply woven into the fabric of the U.S. and other Western nations. Just look at the language we lean on:
Its modern incarnation, though, is radicalized by social media and political polarization, which has made it more dangerous than ever.
‘Common sense solutions’ — a euphemism for gut instinct policies that ignore data
‘The real America’ — a way to discredit urban, diverse, and educated populations
‘The people versus the elites’ — a manufactured cultural divide that pits expertise against everyday experience
A brief history of distrust in expertise
The roots of anti-intellectualism in the U.S. stretch back centuries. Historian Richard Hofstadter traced it to the tension between democratic values and elitism — an ingrained suspicion of intellectuals as out-of-touch with ‘real’ American life. And the belief that expertise = elitism has only deepened over time.
Today, the forces driving this sentiment are stronger than ever:
Economic disenfranchisement + rural identity → Many working-class and rural Americans feel abandoned by political and economic systems that have failed to deliver on their promises. In this void, expertise is seen as a tool of control rather than one of empowerment. Kristin Lunz Trujillo argues that “a significant and overlooked factor contributing to anti-intellectualism is rural social identification — a psychological attachment to being from a rural area or small town — because rural identity, in particular, views experts and intellectuals as an out-group.” Scientists, policymakers, and academics fit that bill.
The growing influence of podcasters → When ‘influencers’ wield more power than trained journalists, misinformation spreads like wildfire. If professional historians, scientists, and academics don’t engage the public, someone else will. For many, podcasters fill an emotional need that isn’t being met elsewhere; one that, certainly, isn’t likely met by academia. This is a systemic problem that I believe is 1000% related to the loneliness epidemic. It’s another void — one that’s led to Holocaust deniers, climate change skeptics, and conspiracy theorists gaining traction.
Performative ignorance + the political weaponization of ‘common sense’ → The louder and prouder one is about rejecting expertise, the more credibility they seem to have. Figures like RFK Jr. and Donald Trump have perfected the art of turning intelligence into a liability by framing knowledge as ‘elitist’ and ignorance as ‘relatable.’ When universities, public health officials, and climate scientists became synonymous with liberal elites, rejecting them became a way to stick it to the man.
Anti-intellectualism is a direct threat to climate action and sustainability efforts. When science is politicized and expertise is dismissed, solutions that require collective effort and long-term planning become nearly impossible to implement.
Climate denial 2.0: from skepticism to open hostility
The days of casual climate skepticism have largely been replaced by something more aggressive. Today, outright hostility toward climate science is a defining feature of right-wing politics in the U.S. and beyond.
The belief that climate action is a form of government control has fueled opposition to everything from renewable energy to carbon pricing.
Republicans have shifted from debating climate policy to dismantling it altogether — Trump has openly vowed to bury ESG and is actively gutting any environmental protections he can get his hands on.
A significant portion of the population now sees climate concern as an elite, urban issue that’s out of touch with the economic realities of everyday people.
What’s alarming about this shift is that it moves beyond disbelief and dangerously close to territory in which climate scientists and activists are labeled as the enemy.
The glorification of 'gut instinct' over data
Climate science is complex. Sustainability disclosures are dense. And when people are told to trust the experts without clear, digestible explanations, it can feel condescending.
At the same time, many public figures have positioned intuition over expertise as the superior way of understanding the world. The idea that a politician's ‘common sense’ is more valuable than a scientist's decades of research is, somehow, gaining hold.
Take the Texas power grid failure of 2021. Experts warned for years that the state’s deregulated system was vulnerable to extreme weather. When the inevitable happened, conservative leaders blamed wind turbines instead.
If data isn’t enough to persuade, how do sustainability professionals move forward? If people trust personal stories over statistics, how do we build narratives that resonate?
Who gets to be ‘smart’? The left’s intellectual bubble
Anti-intellectualism is often framed as a right-wing problem, but let’s be honest — lefty intellectual elitism is real, and it is alienating. The idea that ‘if you can’t see how this is so, you must be uneducated’ (guilty!) fuels resentment and division. People don't want to be condescended to — they want to be heard.
The climate movement needs broad support. Right now we’re only speaking to people who are already on our side — largely academia and urban progressives. When sustainability becomes synonymous with elitism, it loses its ability to connect with anyone who perceives themselves to be outside of that group.
The bigger problem is, anti-intellectualism is also a political strategy.
For decades, politicians have capitalized on distrust of experts to advance agendas. If science, academia, and journalism are seen as untrustworthy, then fact-based policymaking becomes impossible — and that’s the point.
When voters are convinced that climate action is a ‘globalist hoax,’ it becomes easier to gut regulations, roll back commitments, and champion fossil fuel expansion.
Culture shifts don’t just happen. They’re manufactured through rhetoric, imagery, and the symbols people rally behind. Here’s one. The U.S. Press Secretary’s selfie wearing a ‘Make America Blonde Again’ t-shirt is a perfect example of how seemingly small cultural signals reinforce deeper ideological divides.
Anti-intellectualism thrives on distrust, disillusionment, and cultural divides. If the sustainability movement wants to cut through, it needs to rethink how it communicates. It needs to move beyond data dumps and moral imperatives toward something that feels real, relevant, and urgent.
If the republican administration continues to be successful in framing sustainability as an elitist, globalist concern, it will continue to be rejected — often by the very people it most affects. This is a communications crisis.
So what does it all mean for sustainability communicators? If anti-intellectualism has a chokehold on culture, what can we do?
Ditch the jargon. If your message is full of acronyms and technical language, you’re speaking to other experts — not the people who need to hear it.
Appeal to lived experience. If data doesn’t resonate, find the stories that do. What does climate change mean for someone’s home, paycheck, or family?
Acknowledge the complexity. Oversimplification breeds skepticism. People trust communicators who are honest about trade-offs, challenges, and uncertainties. (Though, you know, know your audience. These days, many shut down at the first hint of nuance.)
Meet people where they are. Most people aren’t thinking about climate change in their day to day. If sustainability isn’t tied to immediate concerns *ahem, the cost of living* — it won’t stick.
This is the challenge for climate communicators: How do we make science feel relevant, not ‘elite?’ We’re fighting for attention in a world where people are conditioned to reject complexity. It’s a hard go, but go we must.
Another brilliant post, thank you for articulating this!
Fascinating. something I've always felt but could never articulate