Last week, an anthropology PhD student in New Zealand wrote a summary and response to a paper I gave at the Association for Journalism Education annual conference, in September this year. I though her commentary was a thoughtful piece with a fair set of conclusions: that bloggers self-select their networks based on beliefs. And that my beliefs were as rigid as any “climate sceptic”.
One thing Picking Up Sticks noted in the piece was the lack of engagement across the networks; “deniers” and “believers” rarely talk. This is a currently recognised theme online, and not just around climate change: take the U.S. election, for example. The TV producer Adam Curtis described blogging self-selection in an interview with The Register last year: More »
This was unsettling to watch, for a few reasons. One, it is well made, put together by a Portuguese environmental organization named Quercus. The PSA was created by McCann Erickson Portugal.
The tag line at the end of the video reads “Global Warming - If you give up, they give up.”
However, the anthropomorphism is unsettling and perhaps a problem. The manipulation of images of polar bears has already given denialists plenty of ammunition against effective action on climate change (not least Sarah Palin, of course, who sued the Federal Government in the US on its decision to list Polar Bears as under threat).
I’m not wholly comfortable with the attribution of such human decision-making to animals. Not least because animals are smarter than we’ve been - they look after their own habitats much better than we do.
The question is, what gathering of meaning does this message contribute to? If this is one singular event of a particular form of message, what message pool does it contribute to at the semiotic level? What ‘regime of truth’ does it help supplement? That if animals are sentient enough to ‘give up’, does that justify their own extinction? Did the Javan Tiger (extinct) really ‘give up’ because we gave up on its habitat or right to life?
As appreciative as I am of the efforts of this Portuguese group, the fact that an ad agency (ultimate goal and mindset is one of capital and money making; I worked in advertising, and I know that people in that industry are not in general aware of the need to be semiotically and psychologically aware of the content of their messages) came up with this advert says a lot of the type of ad that it is. Think for example of the Coca-Cola Polar Bear, and you see the same anthropomorphic intent.
In no way should any message cloud the understanding, at a conscious, semiotic or unconscious level, that animals are without choice in a world so comprehensively dominated by one species. Yes, if we give up on tackling global warming, they are doomed, but not because of any choice on their part. I’d prefer an ad that apportioned all responsibility for extinction of animals, where linked to global warming, to those actually responsible: us.
Paul Bradshaw at City has ‘produced’ (and that word is carefully chosen) another inspired blog post, pulling together the views of a number of journalists and academics to answer this question:
Should journalism degrees still prepare students for a news industry that doesn’t want them?
Go read it, it’s excellent. I’ve only a little to add, which I’ve posted there, but will reproduce here. Then I’m having a three day break from the blog. I’ve just read about a quarter of a million words, in journal articles, book chapters and blogs, for a book chapter I’m working on (on media and climate change), and my mind is frying!. So will be back next week. And here’s my comment on Paul’s blog: More »
