An Inconvenient Truth

I was finally able to watch Al Gore's documentary on global warming called "An Inconvenient Truth" last night. It is probably one of the most important documentaries of our times to hit the big screen, but I fear most people will never see it.

The theatre we watched it at is the Bookshelf, a bookstore with a small ~150-seat theatre. The crowd was clearly in agreement with the documentary the whole way through, leading to the depressing realisation that it is accomplishing nothing more than preaching to the converted.

The structure of the film was primarily a glorified version of a well-practised presentation former US Vice President Al Gore regularly gives on global warming. It cut occasionally to scenes outside of lecture halls and theatres, but it avoided getting into fluffy sensationalism. Gore kept it to a simple hour and a half long discussion of real, hard evidence of the existence of and problems created by global warming, offering a few minutes of solutions at the end.

In the movie, he compared the world's ability and willingness to react to problems with a frog. A frog, he showed with the help of an animation, jumps into a pot of boiling water, and immediately jumps out, sensing the danger. But if it gets in warm water, and then it is brought to a boil, it will just stay there... and stay there... A hand then entered the water and removed the frog in the animation, and Gore said "until it is rescued." It's kind of powerful, but I suspect that people who watch the documentary without really understanding it will interpret the scene as: "oh good, we'll be rescued."

I am concerned that An Inconvenient Truth is not playing in mainstream theatres, and that its mass market appeal is effectively zero. It does what it is meant to do, but the majority of the people who need to see it never will, namely the voting public. The people who are going to see it are doing so because they already understand that global warming is a significant problem.

As the documentary drew to a close, I expected Gore to look into the camera and say "... and this is why I am running for president in 2008". He didn't, though the consensus outside the theatre after was that he should. I do hope he throws his hat in for another crack at the presidency in the post-Bush era. A strong, well-funded presidential campaign around the environment in the US could, at the very least, force all candidates to address the issue.

I'll even provide Gore with his catchy slogan for his 2008 bid: "It's the ecology, stupid."

Imagine, for a moment, a world where Stéphane Dion is Prime Minister of Canada, and Al Gore is President of the United States... we could be rescued like that frog, after all!

Go watch this film. Especially if you believe global warming is a myth.

Posted at 06:59 on August 24, 2006

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Social Lib writes at Thu Aug 24 09:33:56 2006...

"Go watch this film. Especially if you believe global warming is a myth."

I'd say, "Go watch this film. Especially if you believe that you're apart of this world." :)

Great write up!

David Suzuki once gave a great analogy: He described a dividing cell in a test tube. One cell become two, two becomes four, four becomes eight...eight becomes sixteen. suppose these cells realize when the test tube is 26% full that in two more cycles they'll overflow the test tube. The cells come up with policies and regulations to cutback division by 50%. It seems quite impressive, however the test tube will still overflow somewhere between the third and fourth cycle. Moral: We need to tackle the root of the problem!

EX-NDIP writes at Thu Aug 24 15:59:50 2006...

David Suzuki is a Zoologist . . . living off donations and the govt.

Al Gore makes a passionate documentary . . . only one problem . . . his facts are not all facts.

There is no consensus that GW causes or contributes to hurricanes.

There is no consenses that increased CO2 levels is an serious problem.

Yes the world has warmed up, 1 degree Farenheit in the last 100 years. But, it has been much warmer and much colder in the past.

Fact . . . the polar bears are not disappearing, the last census found that in 3 of the 4 areas populations increased.

Fact . . . Greenland is not melting, the actual depth of the glaciers is increasing . . . hence, more calving at the outside edges. Ditto for Antartica.

Al Gore president . . . now that would be a disaster. He's the guy who, in 1998, said Iraq was an imminent threat! Although he would not remember that today, but its on the record.