Posted on 06/28/2007 7:12:43 AM PDT by GMMAC
Ontario to distribute Gore's film to schools
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH
Mike De Souza And Melissa Leong, CanWest News Service; National Post
Published: Thursday, June 28, 2007
OTTAWA - Ontario will be distributing hundreds of donated copies of Al Gore's controversial documentary on climate change to public schools across the province.
But Kathleen Wynne, Ontario's Minister of Education, said the government's actions are not an endorsement of the film, An Inconvenient Truth.
"It's just a resource that will be available. The teachers can choose to use it or not," she said of the gift from the Tides Canada Foundation.
A spokeswoman for the ministry added: "We're not saying that Al Gore's got it right; what we're saying is climate change is an important thing to be talking about."
CREDIT: Samantha Sin, AFP, Getty Images
Former U.S. vice-president Al Gore attends a press conference to
promote An Inconvenient Truth in Hong Kong last September.
Some skeptics have charged that the movie is one-sided and is often presented in classrooms across Canada without a discussion of competing theories. One renowned geologist yesterday called it "political propaganda."
"The [school] boards should see to it that the schools are instructed to offset the Gore movie with alternative interpretations," said Albert Jacobs, the founder of Friends of Science, a Calgary-based group that promotes alternative theories to climate change.
Critical analysis should accompany the film, said Rick Johnson, president of the Ontario Public School Boards Association.
"We have to make sure that what we're teaching is factual and it is balanced. I'm sure that teachers will use that as part of a curriculum and not as the gospel," he said. "But as a piece, it causes people to think and look at things. The most important thing we can teach a child is to read and ask questions."
Vancouver-based businessman Michael Chernoff says his charitable foundation will provide to Canadian high schools DVD copies of the new British documentary, The Great Global Warming Swindle, featuring interviews with scientists who dissent from Mr. Gore's claims.
"The students deserve the other side," said Mr. Chernoff, who has served as the director of oil, gas and renewable energy companies.
Tim Draimin, executive director of the Tides Canada Foundation, says he chuckles when he hears people complain that Mr. Gore, the former U.S. vice-president, exaggerated some of the immediate dangers of global warming.
"If people want to generate a bit of a debate about this, I think that's fine, because I'm totally confident that science and the human knowledge to date is on the side of the fact that we are going through climate change," he said. "But I think that having that debate allows other people to become engaged around the issue and learn more about it."
The foundation distributed copies of the DVDs throughout British Columbia in April.
"We have to really make sure that everybody in society begins to understand how important this is because our personal lifestyles are going to be a huge part of making changes and reducing emissions of carbon in the environment."
The film highlights some of the warnings from an overwhelming majority of climate experts around the world. These experts have said that if humans don't start to change the actions that cause climate change, there will be massive species extinctions, increased spread of disease, floods, droughts and other extreme weather events before the end of the century.
Mr. Gore's documentary also proposes a number of conservation measures that people could implement at home to reduce their energy use and the resulting consumption of fossil fuels, which produce the gases that trap heat in the atmosphere.
"Today's announcement is moving Ontario forward in the battle against climate change by inspiring students to reduce their environment[al]impact," Ontario Environment Minister Laurel Broten said in a statement.
"We are growing a new generation of environmental leaders in our schools who will help us build a strong Ontario for many generations to come."
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INCONVENIENT INACCURACIES?
Some of Mr. Gore's allies have acknowledged glaring inaccuracies in the film. Though Mr. Gore was right for "getting the message out," University of Colorado climatologist Kevin Vranes told The New York Times he worried about the film "overselling our certainty about knowing the future." James E. Hansen, a NASA scientist and one of Mr. Gore's advisors, agreed the movie has "imperfections" and "technical flaws." Among other things, since the film's release last year, scientists have rejected Mr. Gore's claims that 2005 was the warmest year on record (temperatures have been receding since 1998) and that polar bears are heading for extinction (their numbers are growing).
Kevin Libin, National Post
© National Post 2007
"I'm sure that teachers will use that as part of a curriculum and not as the gospel"
Hey, given the McGuinty Liberal government's record, what's one more pack of lies?
Reality check: Climate change: The Deniers (link to on-going now 27 (!) part series)
I cant see any bullets down there? does anyone know if this thing is loaded?
It's the sun, STUPID!
First evolution, now this. Public schools are useless.
“It’s just a resource that will be available.”...for what?..a toilet paper shortage?
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