While their proximity may have been completely unintentional, the pairing of two headlines on January 17 carried a heady jolt of irony: “Disasters displaced 3 million Americans last year” was the lead energy and environment story for Rachel Franzin and Zack Budryk at The Hill. The story notes that an estimated 3.3 million Americans were forced from their homes at least temporarily by natural disasters in 2022. By far the highest number were residents of Florida, where nearly one million people, about 7 percent of the state’s population, were displaced by major disasters such as Hurricane Ian and Hurricane Nicole. According to data compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau, these two hurricanes killed 157 people and caused $114 billion in damage. 

Louisiana followed, with 410,000 residents (about 15 percent of the state’s population) displaced by weather events. NOAA noted that 2022 tied with 2021 and 2017 for the third-highest number of billion-dollar disasters, and was the third highest in total costs, with 18 major natural disasters, including hurricanes, tornadoes, derechos, hailstorms, heat waves, droughts and wildfires, responsible for 472 deaths and $165.1 billion in damage.

Just a little way down the page, the same authors reported on a decision by Gov. Ron DeSantis to prohibit the investment of Florida’s state pension funds with companies that consider environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors in their investment decisions. Part of a larger effort led by the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which has drafted numerous corporate-friendly model laws, at least 18 states have proposed or adopted similar legislation boycotting companies that enact policies for sound environmental and social behavior. The result of such laws is to shield polluting industries like fossil fuels from informed scrutiny that considers long-term climate consequences—like those afflicting Florida—in investment decisions.

ESG policies are designed to help individual investors, brokerages and mutual funds evaluate the level of environmental responsibility exercised by the companies they choose to invest in, their commitment to treating their employees fairly and being good corporate citizens of the communities in which they operate, and the effectiveness of internal controls that ensure transparency and accountability to the stockholders. ESG policies are largely shareholder-driven, and have grown in popularity among individual and institutional investors, especially among younger investors, as they exercise consumer choice in the marketplace. 

Proponents are quick to point out that, as idealistic as the policies might sound, they also have the practical effect of protecting investors from costly environmental and health disasters that result from risky or unethical corporate behavior. 

A recent analysis of the results of anti-ESG legislation in Texas concluded that in the first eight months since its enactment, the boycott caused five of the major municipal underwriters to withdraw from the state, resulting in reduced competition and hundreds of millions of dollars in higher interest costs that will eventually be borne by the taxpayers.

Six years ago, I wrote about “woke” in this column; it was a contender that year for the Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the year. It was a runner-up to “post-truth,” which was defined as “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” As with so many things he doesn’t like, Florida’s governor has branded ESG policies as “woke,” which seems to have become a culture-wars code word, “post-truth” shorthand for all the inconvenient historical, scientific and economic realities that get in the way of unconstrained power and profit. 

In December, I was charmed to learn that the Oxford English Dictionary had selected “goblin mode” as the 2022 word of the year. It describes “behavior that is unapologetic, lazy, self-indulgent, or greedy,” especially referencing the struggle to return to normal social behavior after the isolation experienced during the COVID pandemic. The Merriam-Webster dictionary chose “gaslighting”—“the act or practice of grossly misleading someone especially for one’s own advantage”—in recognition of the newly potent electronic tools available for the dissemination of deception. “Gaslighting goblins” will now be my go-to term for all of those working to roll back the clock on history, democracy, education, the environment and all of the social norms that allow us to focus on the common good.