Avatar director James Cameron recently said that the tar sands are a black eye to Canada. The response was predictably hostile. The defenders of power circled the wagons in response to Cameron’s comments. 

The Calgary Sun’s Dave Breakenridge said Cameron was “blowing a lot of his own hot air.” He later blabbed on that Cameron wasn’t looking at the facts. Quite the statements considering that they were coming from the Calgary Sun.

Calgary Herald columnist Don Braid was also up in arms. According to Braid, Albertans should pay no heed to what people like Cameron say because “there’s a new Armageddon scenario every day.” He goes on to say that success gives Cameron the “confidence to think he's right about everything.” And media pundits don’t?

Darren Krause, editor of Calgary Metro, went berserk on Twitter. In a rage Krause said, Cameron “should shut his damn mouth until HE actually gets the facts - and stop abusing his influence.” Krause then said, “As the saying goes - you take two extremes and the truth likely lies somewhere in the middle.” If only life were as simple as an article in Metro.

The Alberta government, in its role as the dutiful servant of corporations, shrugged off Cameron’s comments. They then cordially invited Cameron to come see the tar sands in person. Yeah, after seeing the rape of the boreal forest in person Cameron should see the light.

What the media is trying to convey is that you need to be an expert to speak out about issues. Yet these are the same journalists who virtually write tar sand press releases verbatim. They aren’t experts, they just write what their sugar daddies want them to. If they didn’t they wouldn’t be getting any sugar from daddy. As Upton Sinclair said, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”  

Only the CBC reported what Cameron said without any comment. Cameron admitted he was not an expert on the tar sands. He asked though “why Canada is spending billions on extracting crude oil when it could spend those funds on wind turbines?” Good question. Unfortunately the media didn’t bother to even attempt to answer that question.

The narrow spectrum of opinion only ranged from neutral to hostile. The CBC has been turned into a limp dick. There were no opinion pieces, editorials, or media pundits defending Cameron. None. As part of its public service, shouldn’t the CBC have at least one of its radio or TV personalities in this role, and if not the CBC than whom?    

The facts are that the tar sands produce 144% more emissions than conventional crude. Two tar sand producers, Syncrude and Suncor, each produce more emissions than even Cyprus. With activity in the tar sands expected to triple by 2020, the greenhouse emissions will be greater than that produced in all of Belgium.

Canada emits 24 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per person. When compared to Sweden ( 7 tonnes), which has a similar climate, it is really atrocious. Since 1990 Canada’s emissions have increased 55%, compared to the US (14%), France (-9%), UK (-16%), Germany (-19%), and Norway (-29%). Houston, we have a problem.

Speaking of Houston, Dr. James Hansen works for NASA, which is definitely not a ‘biased eco think tank’. He is considered by many to be the world’s leading authority on global warming. In 2007 he said, “The geological record suggests that ice at the poles does not melt in a gradual and linear fashion, but flips suddenly from one state to another. When temperatures increased to 2–3°C above today’s level 3.5 million years ago, sea levels rose not by 59 centimetres but by 25 metres. The ice responded immediately to changes in temperature.” Temperatures are expected to increase in this century by at least this much, but Hansen’s report was virtually ignored.

The world pays more attention to what celebrities say than scientists. I don’t understand why the world works this way, but it does. With this in mind, we should be encouraging those with pedestals to keep speaking up on global warming (using scientific reports as their basis). We should also keep in mind that you don’t have to be an expert. You also don’t need to be a Hollywood star. We all need to find our voice and start shouting.

In the spirit of Earth Day, the time has come to take back our earth (and our media) to start living a more diverse, meaningful and sustainable life.