The VRT, around 3 hours ago at time of writing:
Cloudy at the start of the week, but improvement is on the horizon: "We are getting summer 2.0"
What the fuck are you talking about, VRT? What improvement? Normal weather for us during this time of year is some intermittent showers, some sun, like 22C. Like the last few days (with the rest of July being abnormally wet lately, as someone rightfully pointed out. You can see on meteo.be that both precipitation and sun hours have increased over the years). You know, the kinda weather why our little corner of the world is lush, green and very fertile. Why this is an ideal place for humans to live and thrive, and the kind of weather that fits perfect with the way we generally build our houses.
Buuut nooo, that's not 'summer' according to the VRT. No no, what we apparently 'should' have, as is implied with braindead headlines like this, is 28C and the sun blazing away with not a cloud in sight. That's 'real' summer apparently!
Seriously this pisses me off so much, and I know it sounds like an overreaction but I genuinely think that having some of our premier news outlets write about the weather like that in between articles about heatwaves in Scandinavia and Portugal is poisoning public discourse about climate change. Forget that we're not a Mediterranean country, forget that the rapid increase of summer weather like that is wreaking havoc on our farmers, our fresh water management and our infrastructure. What apparently matter is that we're finally getting 'summer 2.0'!
Seriously I ain't even annoyed about this because whether I like or dislike that kind of hot, dry weather. I'm not talking from a viewpoint of personal comfort. And don't get me wrong; I am not any individual for enjoying that kind of hot weather. The world can be shitty, so I don't blame you for getting some enjoyment where you can get it. Go 'do a terrasje' and have a cold beer, of which we have so many in our beautiful country, more power to ya.
No I'm talking about how we look at and talk about our shared living space. How motivated we are to help stop the climate disaster we're rushing towards. Can we please acknowledge that this shit isn't normal? That this shit is fucked and that we, quite honestly, shouldn't enjoy this because it's really going to hurt us in the medium-to-long run? Because that's the reality of things, and your stupid framing of this mess like it's so nice is not helping!
Anyway, sorry if I'm raining on anyone's summer parade here. I really don't want to. I'm just worried it's getting normalised with such ease and speed. I even see very climate-conscious co-workers be much more focused on how happy they are they can get a nice tan in such weather rather than the impact it's having on our society.
by C0wabungaaa
23 comments
Are you just too young to remember that it’s been like this… forever? People think of summer, and they exclusively think of sun, and therefore the media has pretty much always referred exclusively to hot sunny weather as “summer weather”. When we have a “normal” Belgian summer, they call it a bad summer, because anything that’s not suitable to cart half the population off to the terraces is “bad” because it doesn’t contribute economically.
I fully agree. last 2 weeks felt like a normal Belgian summer. I don’t need or want a summer 2.0. Hoping for an all Belgian summer all the way trough to September.
Don’t mention the sunshine or people are going to start to like climate change.
Because we -like- sunny days? Preferably during weekends, where we can spend time sitting outside, socializing. VRT doesn’t have a hidden climate change denial agenda, they are just reporting on what people want to hear.
Have we really become this bitter that we get angry over people prefering the sun over gray, rainy days?
> Anyway, sorry if I’m raining on anyone’s summer parade here.
So it was you that was responsible for the last 2 weeks.
[https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c80dl731pk1o](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c80dl731pk1o)
[https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y74nv1zqpo](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y74nv1zqpo)
[https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj4w9ggzxv4o](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj4w9ggzxv4o)
“Wildfires have already struck some parts of Europe, including Greece, where coastal towns near the capital Athens [erupted in flames that destroyed homes – forcing people to evacuate](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1k8jxdyj0go).”
“Heatwaves are becoming more common due to human-caused climate change, according to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Extreme hot weather will happen more often – and become even more intense – as the planet continues to warm, it has said. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO), which is the UN’s weather and climate agency, said on Tuesday that human-induced climate change meant “extreme heat is becoming more frequent and intense”.
[https://www.bbc.com/news/topics/c1y3r184ywpt](https://www.bbc.com/news/topics/c1y3r184ywpt)
It’s depressing really. Climate change is being buried or sanewashed by the media. The billionaires and the rightwing are now united in attacking net zero. And this conspiracy of silence.
That is a pet peeve of mine: presenters (usually on the radio) referring to 27+ degree weather as “goed weer” This is fine on holiday, but in general: that’s too hot.
I kinda agree with you that the “asterix” should always be mentioned. Yes it’s going to be warmer next week, but it’s not natural and the reasons are easily found. The fact that the weater is going beserk everywhere (more rain, more fires, more storms, hotter…) is clearly a result of climat change. And I tend to agree that we should be informed as much as we can.
But a lot of people do enjoy it, so IMO nothing wrong with calling it that way. A lot of folks want to enjoy the sun, want to sit outside, kids wanna play when it’s sunny. So to not enjoy it is silly. By all means, you do you, but that’s a reaction on “we, quite honestly, shouldn’t enjoy this ”
Two things can happen simultaneous. VRT can call it a summer 2.0, because a lot of people are waiting on it. But they should also add why this is happening.
Summers used to be a lot warmer than what we´ve had the last couple of years.
Totally with you there.
Ons gematigd zeeklikmaat is moderate. It’s in the name. Having a summer like this without heatwave after heatwave is an extremely good thing.
Want blistering sun and sweltering heat? Go to Spain or Portugal. That’s what they’re there for. Don’t forget to stay indoors during the hottest parts of the day! En smeren smeren smeren!
Could not agree more. The juxtaposition is interesting, isn’t it? *Here are all the forest fires and heatwave related deads in other countries, there it has been 35 degrees heatwave and unbearable nights for the past two weeks and no end in sight… anyway our liveable, breatheable, normal summer sucks and you should hate this kind of weather*.
I take medications that make me more sensitive towards heat and dehydration. 28 degrees is simply too much for me, I get really uncomfortable. I am already dreading “Summer 2.0”. And personally, I know literally no one who prefers hot weather to what we are having now. I wish the media wouldn’t present something that is clearly a preference as a fact but would adopt neutral language instead.
Hypernormalisatie is het sleutelwoord van al onze hedendaagse problemen en de aanhoudende negatieve evolutie ervan.
It’s supposed to be both. Two weeks of blazing sun, then two weeks of rain. Alternate with some variation, making June more dry and August more wet. One last shine in September and then proper Autumn.
Glad it’s been more like this than the 2 months of blaze we had in the previous years. But it’s true some plants are getting swamped now.
30° is not abnormal.
“20-22C with intermittent showers.”
Intermittent showers? What are you talking about? My 10000l rainwater tank was almost empty in the first half of July and it was overflowing last weekend. That’s a bit more than some intermittent showers.
People don’t want heatwaves per se but enough with the rainy summer days already, plenty of those in autumn, winter and spring (well except this year).
Niet zeveren alstublieft. 20° is absoluut niet de normale zomerse temperatuur van België.
https://i.imgur.com/CybGUtP.png
Gemiddeld halen we zo’n 30 à 40 dagen temperaturen boven de 25°, terug een week of 2 aan 27° is dus volstrekt normaal Belgisch zomers weer.
Een hittegolf waar we de 35° aanraken, dat is abnormaal. Dat hadden we vroeger ook al, maar nu dus iets vaker.
I absolutely agree with you. The narrative normalizing extreme weather , at least for our normal climate, (so 30+ degrees) is just plain wrong in face of overwhelming scientific evidence of the disaster that is climate change.
Celebrating weather like this by showing kiddies happily playing on the beach is involuntary extremely cynical, if you realize those kids will be hit with the brunt of climate change. This is nothing to celebrate, but should be horrifying.
If we really want to tackle climate change, the first thing to do is change public awareness, and change the narrative.
Absolutely agree. The fact that this weather is considered ‘bad’, is bonkers to me. This weather is so much more enjoyable and my plants/trees aren’t dying from it since it rains at night.
Seriously, we couldn’t ask for more perfect weather than these last 3 days lol
I’m not sure if I agree with you here (and you can check my post history to see that I am definitley annoyed with how our country and media handle climate change).
Climate change is very real and the media downplays it a lot, but in this case it’s one week of warmer weather, after we had some nice amount of rain and fairly normal temperatures. People can enjoy this if they want to.
What we saw in the first half of the year and especially end of june/beginning of july is a lot more worrisome than a warmer week in August.
We had a heatwave and very little rain during the months before. Which can be disasterous for local wildlife, crops and even our own drinking water.
It’s a lot worse to downplay that than to say a few days of almost 30°C is “a nice 2nd summer”.
Yeah, it´s pretty irritating how normal summer weather is labelled as ´bad´ or ´not good´ and long periods of to warm and especially dry weather are ´good´.
Lol imagine complaining about the VRT because they mention that the weather will improve. How pathetic is your life in that case?
Don’t bother to respond on this question, it’s rhetorical.
Passive voice.
“We are getting”.
Passive voice indoctrinates people into believing things just happen and they have no power to change it.
For weather, this might seem normal at first glance.
But it’s used for everything.
VRT is ruled by NVA boomers. This is what your average Flemish wants to hear
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