Episode 96: Laughing through the climate crisis with Stuart Goldsmith
Our summer of storytelling goes on, with jokes about business class and ocean acidification -- no, really!
Hey everyone —
You all know how I love a theme, a story arc, a miniseries. Sometimes you do like four episodes in a row and then realize you’ve got a theme going, which is what happened to me with this week’s interview. I realized I’ve been doing Storyteller Summer!
Let me start with this week’s episode and work backwards through the collection. My guest in episode 96 is Stuart Goldsmith, a UK-based stand-up comedian who, after 20 years of professional comedy, decided to do something almost no other snow leopard (aka: stand-up comic) does…
He made his whole act about the climate crisis.
And it works.
🎧 In This Episode:
Stuart’s journey from street performer to climate comic
Why jokes about methane and wish-cycling actually land
The emotional weight of eco-dread — and how comedy diffuses it
Why hypocrisy and self-deprecation are comedy’s secret weapons
What Seinfeld’s crisper drawer joke has to do with climate behavior change
▶️ Listen to the episode here: Everybody in the Pool – Stuart Goldsmith
🛠️ What Comedy Can Do That Data Can’t
The climate space is full of terrifying charts, acronyms, and confusing targets. But Stuart argues that if we can laugh about tariffs, business class guilt, or the illusion of perfect eco-purity, we create space to act.
Because fear without agency paralyzes us.
But laughter? Laughter opens the door.
And when Stuart hears people repeating his jokes at airports, or gets emails from CSOs saying they shared his bit in a boardroom? That’s real impact.
It’s the bear hug theory: surround people with the story, again and again, until it becomes culture.
🎟️ Links & Stuart’s Work
Thanks for listening, reading, and laughing through the weirdness.
We need storytellers just as much as we need scientists and engineers.
And in case you missed the previous storyteller episodes this summer, here’s the whole bundle!
Episode 92: Sharing the love with Supercool
I chat with Josh Dorfman, the co-founder and CEO of Supercool, a media company dedicated to highlighting climate solutions that cut carbon, boost business, and enhance modern life. Yep, we’re doing kind of the same thing. Because EVERYBODY IN THE POOL, PEOPLE!
Bonus: Processing climate change through fiction
Feed drop! I co-host another podcast called Futureverse, where I interview authors of climate fiction about their work and points of view. In this episode, renowned researcher Naomi Oreskes talks about her work of fiction, “The Collapse of Western Civilization.”
Episode 94: Rev Yearwood on telling climate stories for everyone
Rev Yearwood is the president of the nonprofit Hip Hop Caucus, which works to engage young people around voting and community service, and he also advises the Bloomberg Foundation on climate storytelling projects. We talked about communicating climate in a way everyone can understand (and why aren’t there any hip-hop songs about this yet?)
Episode 95: Convening for Climate with Aimée Christensen
Aimée is a a longtime climate champion and consultant who is the founder of the Sun Valley Forum and the Sun Valley Institute for Resilience. We talked about how convening people to appreciate nature, each other, and the work we’re all doing has incredible power — especially now.
Next week, we’ll take a break from Storytelling Summer and dive deep into ocean tech — see you then!
— Molly
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