Climate Change arguments in a GIF

Written By: - Date published: 6:30 pm, December 22nd, 2009 - 65 comments
Categories: climate change - Tags:

Information is Beautiful recently produced the image below summarizing the various arguments between about climate change. Click on the image to see the full version. hat-tip: Open Parachute

65 comments on “Climate Change arguments in a GIF ”

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  1. toad 1
    22 December 2009 at 6:48 pm

    Pity I can’t read it with my screen resolution.

    Sure it is good (almost everything at The Standard is) but no readable evidence to evaluate.

    Ah, click on it once, it then appears on the LHS, and click on it again.

    Then you get a ful-screen mage hat you can read.

    And it makes sense. Just a bit of a mission to get there.

  2. BLiP 2
    22 December 2009 at 6:56 pm

    Doesn’t matter how simple you make it for the denialists, they will still deny, deny deny.

    • toad 2.1
      22 December 2009 at 7:11 pm

      Because the science doesn’t count, BLiP. The ideology is all that matters.

      So just ignore the evidence, coz they have Jesus and/or Hayek on their side.

      • BLiP 2.1.1
        22 December 2009 at 7:46 pm

        Ironic that if Jesus was alive today it would be the denialists most likely to crucify him.

        • Andrei 2.1.1.1
          22 December 2009 at 7:51 pm

          3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?

          4 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.

          5 For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.

          6 And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.

          7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.

          8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.

          9 Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake.

          10 And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.

          11 And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.

          12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.

          13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

          14 And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

          • quenchino 2.1.1.1.1
            22 December 2009 at 8:34 pm

            Religion without reason becomes mere superstition.

            Science without faith becomes mere materialism.

            Science is how we discover the nature of this world, faith is how we are informed of the nature of the next… and while each is a different domain, there is but One Creator and One Reality… therefore in their innermost core, science and religion must be in harmony with each other.

            • Ron 2.1.1.1.1.1
              23 December 2009 at 7:25 am

              Religion without Reason is superstition? Religion IS without reason. By definition. Religion relies on faith. A “belief”. There’s no reason involved.

          • lprent 2.1.1.1.2
            23 December 2009 at 8:44 am

            Yep, you can find something in the bible or koran or any of the books of religion to fit any occasion.

            Those particular verses have been used extensively from Constantines time since for a variety of purposes.

            You should read about their use when the black death was crossing Europe… Not only did they have a ongoing natural disaster happening. They also had people of faith spending more time clustering together providing a perfect focus for disease transmission listening to those exact verses.

            They often then went down the road to help make verse 9 become true by way of pogrom. Jews were notorious for washing too often, so didn’t get the death quite as often. There is some really nasty history associated with those verses.

      • Gooner 2.1.2
        22 December 2009 at 8:59 pm

        Science isn’t about evidence Toad.

        You fail.

  3. Johnty Rhodes 3
    22 December 2009 at 7:33 pm

    you warming idiots are the deniers. Still run around as if CRU emails did not get released. GW is the new religion, so you dorks are the luddites.

    [lprent: Yeah right. I guess you don’t know much science. ]

  4. Andrei 4
    22 December 2009 at 7:43 pm

    Denialists?

    The only people in denial are those that still go along with this fraud.

    I’m afraid the so called ” scientific consensus” has been manufactured and the whole of science not only “climate science” is in for a big shake-up and re-think.

    Nobody will call themselves a “climate scientist” in the future because the very term will have become synonymous with “charlatan”.

    If it wasn’t for the fact that vested interests – an unholy alliance between left-wing politicians, quick buck con artists and bankers these fraudsters would have been nailed already.

    Its one of the most disgraceful episodes in the history of science my friends.

    • quenchino 4.1
      22 December 2009 at 8:00 pm

      Which is more likely Andrei? The documented unholy alliance between wealthy coal and energy companies and proven fraudsters like Fred Singer (he who ran the same FUD campaign defending tobacco company interests for decades)… or a conspiracy between thousands of independently tenured scientists in hundreds of institutions all over the world?

      Yet even when your side unethically hacks into thosuands of private emails going back a decade or so, the best you can do is quote mine a small handful of misleading phrases… all of which have rational explanations totally different to the lying spin that has been put on them. The CRU hack is in fact a huge dissapointment to you… for all the insane hyperbole that has been spewed over the media and net… there really was nothing useful to you at all. Was there?

      All the drivel we read from you is just non-stop unsupported assertions. At every science point you have been proven wrong and wrong again. Yet it means nothing to you… because you are not interested in science, or even the truth. All you are here for is to spread uncertainty, doubt and lies.

      Why the hell should The Standard continue to provide a platform for such a lying, febrile moron as yourself?

      • grumpy 4.1.1
        22 December 2009 at 8:17 pm

        quenchino, you are very vocal in always calling for those who outdebate you to be banned, the last gasp of someone who’s point of view can no longer be sustained.

        Don’t you realise that if The Standard took your advice it would become even more irrelevant, descending even further from the exchange of views it provides at present?

        [lprent: Exactly, it’d wind up like the sewer with mass bullying by an in-group and bugger all info from debate. As it is, people mainly have to worry about Irish and I and our wee mildly inconsistent banning quirks. Most people figure out how not to attract our immoderate moderation attentions eventually. ]

        • quenchino 4.1.1.1
          22 December 2009 at 8:26 pm

          First of all you neither you nor Andrei are debating. Not even close, all you are doing is trolling with unsupported drivel.

          Secondly, it is you guys who come here to The Standard and make these stupid, wrong headed statements. If you want to say that sort of mindless dreck, there are plenty of little denier dens where you can go and giggle and chortle among yourselves. If you go back there I promise to leave you alone.

          If on the other hand you show the slightest sign of engaging some intelligence, bring some actual information to the debate, or ask some honest questions… you’ll get a civil response from me. If you post trash I’ll go for you.

      • Andrei 4.1.2
        22 December 2009 at 9:02 pm

        I don’t have a “side” quenchino.

        I believe in scientific rigor.

        For example when I see a least squares regression fitted to stochastic time series (as in the notorious NIWA graphic) I ask myself – how was the start point chosen because I know that by careful choice of end points a line of almost any desired slope can be produced – convincing to the naive but a sure sign pseudo science to the informed.

        And when I read a scientific paper one of the most important elements is the error estimates because these give you the bounds of any estimated quantity e,g. the estimated average temperature rise over the past 100 years in New Zealand. And if the error calculations are missing or fuzzy, (what we call in the trade hand waving as opposed to rigorous analysis) again alarm bells ring.

        Now you may rail about the demands for scientific rigor but if you have an hypothesis in science that you wish to prove it is up to you to make the case not up to the skeptics (and science at its very heart is supposed to be skeptical) to disprove it.

        Sorry ’bout that

        • quenchino 4.1.2.1
          22 December 2009 at 9:15 pm

          I don’t have a “side’ quenchino.

          Blatant lie. You are a denier.

          I believe in scientific rigor.

          Another blatant lie. I’ve never seen the slightest hint of ‘scientific rigour’ from you. You are a total stranger to science, and the only rigor about you is your fixed thinking.

          I ask myself how was the start point chosen because I know that by careful choice of end points a line of almost any desired slope can be produced

          Psuedo science flim-flam meant to sound impressive to non-statisticians. What you are saying is perfectly well understood by anyone analysing time series.

          Hilarious enough of course in a more basic form this is exactly the same howler made by all those nitwits who cherry pick 1998 as a starting point to try and claim that it’s been cooling since then.

          And when I read a scientific paper one of the most important elements is the error estimates because these give you the bounds of any estimated quantity

          Error estimates seem to present in many of the papers I’ve read… more misdirection.

          Now you may rail about the demands for scientific rigor

          What you mean by this is that you feel free to play games shuffling the goal-posts about. Seen that from you before.

          • Andrei 4.1.2.1.1
            22 December 2009 at 9:44 pm

            Tell you what quenchino

            Why don’t you show me the error analysis for the famous NIWA chart and the regression line that is on it.

            It must exist it is good science after all – so lets see it

            • quenchino 4.1.2.1.1.1
              22 December 2009 at 10:29 pm

              Of course you pose a question you already know the answer to. Instead I’ll point you at a more useful, generalised answer. Try this thread for an introduction to dealing with errors in noisy data and the problems involved with curve fitting.

              • Andrei …
                23 December 2009 at 7:11 am

                That is NOT the error estimates for the NIWA graphic!

                That is a pitiful attempt to divert into a discussion of the perils of curve fitting.

                Try again

        • prism 4.1.2.2
          23 December 2009 at 10:15 am

          Hey Andrei you “believe in scientific rigor’ then what can we do if its really important to ameliorate the results of conditions revealed by science?

    • Pascal's bookie 4.2
      22 December 2009 at 8:05 pm

      Yeah, it’s just like evolution.

      • grumpy 4.2.1
        22 December 2009 at 8:13 pm

        Face it, AGW is dead – killed off by the exposure of the very people responsible for the scaremongering.

        It has joined swine flu, Y2K, SARS etc. etc. ….. and saved us from the ENRON carbon trading market.

        • quenchino 4.2.1.1
          22 December 2009 at 8:15 pm

          Face it grumpy, you are a fool.

          • grumpy 4.2.1.1.1
            22 December 2009 at 8:19 pm

            and you, quenchino have already lost both the argument and your relevance.

          • quenchino 4.2.1.1.2
            22 December 2009 at 8:28 pm

            And you are a moron who hasn’t said anything worthwhile ever.

            “Lost the argument”… ha.. there never was one.

            (I can keep this up all night …see how far it gets you. )

            • grumpy 4.2.1.1.2.1
              22 December 2009 at 9:39 pm

              WE shall see. If, as Al Gore says, the polar ice cap has vanished in 5 years, I will be more than happy to say that you were a visionary, ahead of your time. If, on the other hand……….

              • quenchino …
                22 December 2009 at 9:57 pm

                What do you mean by ‘vanished’?

                There will always be Arctic ice in the winter for the foreseeable future, so if we take you statement at literal face value.. no-one is going to take your bet on.

                In order to make a valid threshold you need to specify some lower limit, like multi-season ice reduced to 15% coverage at the end of the summer season.. by a certain date.

                Alternately you might want to rummage through this post from Tamino which gives a reasoned , statistically based method for determining how many years of noisy data is needed to before we can be confident about the underlying trend.

              • grumpy …
                23 December 2009 at 10:24 am

                Really, quenchino, then someone had better tell Al,

      • toad 4.2.2
        22 December 2009 at 8:16 pm

        Don’t you mean Creation Sciene?

  5. BC 5
    22 December 2009 at 9:07 pm

    Grumpy, it is in fact you who have lost relevance. You troll around these forums espousing your descredited and unsubstaniated views whilst attacking sensible contributers. Your actions are childish and obviously the product of a weak mind.

    You also say that quenchino has lost the argument. It certainly doesn’t appear that way from my persepective. Andrei has been utterly refuted in every respect.

    I suggest you take a walk along to Kiwiblog where your ignorance will be welcomed and celebrated.

  6. mickysavage 6
    22 December 2009 at 9:31 pm

    Wow

    Really good summary and the Trolls have not addressed one matter raised in the summary. So which part is lies, which part is conspiracy, and why is the consensus of so many scientific brains wrong?

    Quoting “the email” will not do it.

    • grumpy 6.1
      22 December 2009 at 9:43 pm

      What idiot organised the Copenhagen conference to coincide with the worst cold snap in years?

      How come the worlds greatest climatologists didn’t see this coming and organised it elsewhere – such as Alice Springs. The outcome may have been better for them.

      • mickysavage 6.1.1
        22 December 2009 at 10:04 pm

        Grumpy

        Classic denialist tripe.

        It is really hot in city X therefore the globe as a whole is not warming.

        Are you being serious?

        When talking about localised effects why do you not talk about the North Pole which is disappearing, the South Pole that is turning itself into icebergs or Greenland that is melting?

      • quenchino 6.1.2
        22 December 2009 at 10:09 pm

        Grumpy,

        Heavy snow is not synonymous with cold temperatures. In fact snow occurs when especially saturated moist air is lifted very rapidly over the top of a cooler air stream.

        The cooler stream needs not be especially cold, just sufficiently dense and well organised enough to lift the warmer moist air high enough so that the adiabatic cooling is rapid enough to supercool the water, so that it freezes rather than liquifies. Well I simplify a lot… but the essential point is that snowfall is not a sign of low temperatures as such… rather the sudden meeting of warm wet and cold denser airstreams.

    • Ag 6.2
      22 December 2009 at 11:32 pm

      You don’t get it, MS.

      They don’t have to address any matter in the summary or anything else that climate scientists come up with. To assume so is to assume that they are playing the same game as the AGW side, which is the game of reasoned arguments backed up with evidence.

      The deniers are not playing that game. They do not care about the evidence, but only in preventing any form of enforced action to reduce carbon emissions. That means nothing you say matters to them. Nothing at all.

      The pro-AGW people are essentially stupid in thinking that this is a debate they can “win” in the normal way that debates are “won”.

      It is not a debate. It is a political struggle over whether carbon emissions are to be subject to international regulation. You cannot win on “the facts”. The issue will only be won when the deniers are cast out of the political process.

      Remember why the Americans lost in Vietnam? It was because they assumed that they were fighting the war the way that wars were supposed to be fought. But the North Vietnamese weren’t fighting that war. They were fighting to win.

      By attempting to win on the science alone, the pro AGW side are making exactly the same mistake as the Americans did in Vietnam. How stupid do you have to be not to understand that?

      If you want to beat the deniers, you have to show them that there will be consequences for their actions. If you don’t, they’ll just keep denying.

      Do you have the guts to do that?

  7. Gooner 7
    22 December 2009 at 10:03 pm

    Really good summary and the Trolls have not addressed one matter raised in the summary. So which part is lies, which part is conspiracy, and why is the consensus of so many scientific brains wrong?

    Mickey, how can one argue an image that is headed “scientific consensus”?

    There is no consensus. There is no such thing as “settled science”. And Science is not about evidence, as claimed by Toad.

    There are three reasons why it is impossible to even start to debate.

    • quenchino 7.1
      22 December 2009 at 10:14 pm

      There is no consensus.

      Keep telling yourself this nonsense if it comforts you, but the IPCC process is probably the most formally exhaustive and detailed consensus process in the whole of human history.

      • mickysavage 7.1.1
        22 December 2009 at 10:18 pm

        Apart from the time scientists decided that the world was not flat and that the sun did not rotate around the earth. I bet there were trolls back then too!

        • BLiP 7.1.1.1
          22 December 2009 at 10:49 pm

          Mostly religious, too.

        • QoT 7.1.1.2
          22 December 2009 at 10:59 pm

          They probably found inscriptions on urns saying “I’ve just repeated Erastothenes’ trick of estimating the distance to Alexandria” and told anyone who might listen about how this PROVED the earth was flat and it was all just the deceptions of a cadre of round-earthers funded by the secretive summer solstice celebration conglomerates.

  8. mickysavage 8
    22 December 2009 at 10:06 pm

    How about a poll of climatologists. What percentage of them do not believe in human induced climate change?

    • Roger 8.1
      22 December 2009 at 11:57 pm

      According to a 22nd Jan 2009 poll, 97% of climatologists believe in human induced climate change. Apparently that leaves 3% that the skeptics here obviously believes is a significant percentage. The same poll showed that petroleum geologists were the most skeptical at 47% believing in human induced climate change followed by 64% for meteorologists. The analysis by poll conducter Peter Doran, University of Illinois at Chicago associate professor of earth and environmental sciences includes this about meteorologists;

      “Most members of the public think meteorologists know climate, but most of them actually study very short-term phenomenon.”

      and this about the result among climatologists;
      “They’re the ones who study and publish on climate science. So I guess the take-home message is, the more you know about the field of climate science, the more you’re likely to believe in global warming and humankind’s contribution to it.”

      and the following conclusion;
      “the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely nonexistent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes.”

      • SHG 8.1.1
        23 December 2009 at 2:27 am

        Since when has consensus been a part of the scientific method?

        • lprent 8.1.1.1
          23 December 2009 at 7:36 am

          consensus is always part of science.

          Elimination of the impossible laves the possible visible. You get broad agreement about what is conclusively disproved. A few people stay to chip around the edges of the impossible looking for flaws. Most move on to look at the possible.

          The difference with the climate change debate is that we’ve had a whole pile of quacks pile in with their equivalent of perpetual motion machines.

          There are a few climatologists, earth scientists, and geologists amongst the skeptics side – a very few of whom are doing science rather than just reviewing other peoples work.

          The vast majority of skeptical ‘scientists’ are people who are simply untrained to look at the relevant science and the vagaries of deep time. Physicists, chemists, meteorologists, etc generally contribute very little because they simply have too short-term focus or expect to get reasonably accurate results from a very chaotic system.

          Of course there are loony lords, scientific mercenaries like Singer, and various ‘institution’ fronts for the polluters.

          Trying to make sense of all of this are the CCDs and skeptics. Their biggest hassle is the conflict between what they want to believe (being able to burn without consequence), and the hard facts of climate being a delicate balance between different forces. Around the anglo world, they usually take the easier option of denying that they have to change their lifestyle (curiously it is a lot less noisy outside of the anglo states).

          So they listen to quacks rather than studying the science.

    • Roger 8.2
      22 December 2009 at 11:57 pm

      According to a 22nd Jan 2009 poll, 97% of climatologists believe in human induced climate change. Apparently that leaves 3% that the skeptics here obviously believes is a significant percentage. The same poll showed that petroleum geologists were the most skeptical at 47% believing in human induced climate change followed by 64% for meteorologists. The analysis by poll conducter Peter Doran, University of Illinois at Chicago associate professor of earth and environmental sciences includes this about meteorologists;

      “Most members of the public think meteorologists know climate, but most of them actually study very short-term phenomenon.”

      and this about the result among climatologists;
      “They’re the ones who study and publish on climate science. So I guess the take-home message is, the more you know about the field of climate science, the more you’re likely to believe in global warming and humankind’s contribution to it.”

      and the following conclusion;
      “the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely nonexistent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes.”

  9. Bill 9
    22 December 2009 at 11:33 pm

    The corporatists and deniers and servants? Kill them. Kill them all and come back alone.

    With apologies to you know who.

    • gitmo 9.1
      23 December 2009 at 6:50 am

      On the -3rd day of XMAS the Standard gave to me the commenter known as Bill showing his true colours quite terriyingly.

      • Bill 9.1.1
        23 December 2009 at 7:50 am

        You never listened to Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry then? His lyrics.

        Don’t know why you’d find him terriying (sic)

        • gitmo 9.1.1.1
          23 December 2009 at 7:56 am

          Well at least we have a clearer idea of your position on how to get rid of capitalism……. you really would have been in your element back in 1917.

          • Bill 9.1.1.1.1
            23 December 2009 at 8:12 am

            As I have said previously, abandon it Gitmo. That’s how it’s gotten rid of.

            As I guess you are referring to events in Russia when you speak of 1917, I’ve always reckoned the Bolshevics would have shipped me off to Siberia if I hadn’t escaped abroad by 1921.

            Anyway.

  10. tsmithfield 10
    23 December 2009 at 6:15 am

    The arguments for the skeptics shown above are really strawman arguments. This is because most serious skeptics actually accept that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and that human induced CO2 is affecting the environment.

    The main debate now is about how sensitive the climate is to these changes.

    I would be more interested in seeing the arguments for both sides for climate sensitivity addressed instead of some old debunked arguments that have been dredged up and summarily disposed of.

    • lprent 10.1
      23 December 2009 at 7:38 am

      That was why I put this post up. Best summary of most of the known arguments in a short format that I’ve seen.

      The sensitivity is a quite a different issue simply because the science hasn’t been developed to look into the future, and we’ve never seen or measured what happens during large climate shifts.

      We’re peering back into deep time at past events beyond the the relatively stable last 10,000 years to when there have been significant climate shifts – that has been the art of paleo-climatology for the last couple of hundred years. Meteorology has been the study of modern weather patterns. But climatology has only been spanning the two for the last 30 years. But it is a big jump between paleo events and then looking for the precursor events in the modern world (which are largely wiped in the record for past events).

      The best known guesses are in the IPCC reports. They are very conservative because they focus on what is known in the modern world rather than what is inferred from paleo-climates. In other worlds they focus on the climate that we have now rather than the rapid shifts that are visible in the past.

      The problem is that we are causing a sustained rapid shift in the atmosphere that is faster than anything we’ve observed in the past. Slower changes of that type are associated with vast changes in paleo-climates. These are the type of changes that cause mass-extinctions, especially of top animal species in their eco-systems – like us. However the paleo-climate shift patterns cause and effect is too undeveloped to put into a IPCC report. There is a lot of effort going on to look at likely possibilities, but that takes time to extract – typically decades for observation.

      The real question you should be asking is – how much risk do you find acceptable?

    • Andrei 10.2
      23 December 2009 at 8:01 am

      You want to discuss sensitivity – Here is a good paper on it

      Enjoy

      • lprent 10.2.1
        23 December 2009 at 8:20 am

        Interesting. If that is corroborated then it will cause a small shift in the models for direct radiative cooling for the tropical seas.

        Now they have to get some good data outside of the tropics. That is where most of the effects of climate change manifest. And see if the same thing happens on land surfaces in the tropics and elsewhere

        As per normal most of the paper was about instrumentation biases and cleaning up the data. Perhaps the fools that thought ‘climategate’ was important should read some actual science papers.

    • NickS 10.3
      23 December 2009 at 10:19 am

      @tsmithfield
      Except they’re not, you’ve only got to hang around the climate blog comment threads, or forums, to see many of the arguments mentioned in the gif used. Or just go to micro-Watts blog and see the same old moronic arguments spun time and time again.

      Bit like evolutionary biology actually, where the “sceptics” make the same tired old claims again, and again and again, aka “P.A.R.T.T’s”…

  11. Daveosaurus 11
    23 December 2009 at 7:49 am

    Personally, I’ve always been skeptical of climate change, but the denialist camp are driving me away with their reliance on spin, sophistry, obfuscation, rhetoric, lies, conspiracy theories and even, in at least one case, blood libel, rather than finding any actual science to back up their case.

    • lprent 11.1
      23 December 2009 at 8:00 am

      I describe it as the ‘con’ pattern of smoke, mirrors and hidden objectives.

      I was also a skeptic – 30 years ago. That was when I was doing earth sciences and the theory was very raw and young with little backing evidence and tested explanations of causal effect. They managed to dig up enough evidence and support theories by the early 90’s to convince me there was an issue. By the late 90’s they dug up enough to scare me. This decades research is rapidly shifting me to terror.

  13. SJ Hawkins 13
    23 December 2009 at 10:29 am

    Well eventually one side or the other is going to be correct, and that should be the end of the matter.
    Personally I have no cause to worry, I live on a hill, I can afford higher costs for power, petrol and food etc, and frankly I like warmer weather.
    If anyone else is worried they should really do something about it. Al Gore clearly isn’t worried, look at his carbon footprint.
    Geez, there probably isn’t a problem, so stop worrying and enjoy your life!

  14. tc 14
    23 December 2009 at 10:45 am

    Yup, I can afford bigger power bills, live high up and have plenty of sunblock and water for the extended summers/droughts we’ll have.

    Being intelligent and independant I have all the excuses lined up for my grandkids when they ask…why have your generation left the planet like this knowing what you did.

    Job Done, sleep peacfully, not my problem. Blame the politicians……lunch on the company powerboat everyone.

  15. enny 15
    26 December 2009 at 12:47 am

    Information is Beautiful recently produced the image below summarizing the various arguments between about climate change. Click on the image to see the full version. hat-tip: Open ParachuteFinden Sie eine große Sammlung von animierten Gifs, Cliparts, grafiken, animationen in verschiedenen Kategorien zu Gifs.de