'Eco-Mindful Media' Is Now a Reality
Time for independence from old ways of thinking.
There is definitely a global shift toward “Eco-mindful media.” Seems to be popping out like digital gophers all along the media landscape. And now would be a really good time to understand and communicate about how to save ourselves from extinction.
Newspapers: Last month L.A. Times environmental reporter Margot Roosevelt wrote a wonderful article “Forests are as good as carbon in the bank.” The content about how forests can play a starring role in our struggle to deal with climate change is enough to warm a dirt blogger’s heart.
But more than that, Margot’s article showed up in prime time -- page one -- usually such articles are buried in the back pages. That climate change solutions are moving to the front of newspapers is a small but hopeful sign… finally something worth the trees they’re printed on? Paper media may be heading into the past as many have predicted which would be a shame if we were to lose such articles as these just when we need them on page one.
Television: A similar shift in focus to foreground has been happening in television, starting with cable. In January of last year the History Channel offered up a television special "Life After People" that took audiences through a post-apocalyptic 10,000 year time lapse of the crumbling of our urban industrial civilization after the sudden disappearance of humans.
The CGI depictions of the world without us (humans that is -- the rest of our biological brothers and sisters did just fine without us) were startling and challenging.
The audience was the largest the History Channel ever had. Nat Geo channel weighed in 3 months later with "Aftermath: Population Zero," based on a similar concept. After human population drops from 6 billion to zero you get to “explore a world you will never see." Taking it an interactive step further you can go to the website to “Experience the Aftermath … advance time to see buildings fall and nature rise.”
April 2009 The History Channel spun off "Life After People: The Series," based on the original broadcast. These cable shows and related websites are definitely attention grabbers… but they didn’t really deal with what happened to us humans.
Then, last month -- June 2, 2009 -- the what-if wonderings moved to prime time with ABC’s "Earth 2100," a two hour thought provoking special that gives humans the close up we’ve been ready for. And it ain’t a pretty picture.
Overpopulation, our depletion of natural resources, and actions contributing to climate change bring an end to life as we know it. This worst-case scenario is a challenge to our complacency.
Going beyond the standard TV doc format the program uses Lucy, a graphic novel fictional character to take us through the next very scary hundred years in order to personalize predictions that can boggle the intellect.
I think there are a couple of real interesting developments here: Primetime is the right time for Eco-Mindful Media; and, "Earth 2100’s" creative team is reaching out to audiences with imaginative story telling techniques.
The enormity of the problems we face demand that we use every bit of media imagination as well as solid science and probing journalism to reach solutions. Graphic novel animation in a primetime TV doc? Absofriggenlutely.
Movies: In a world of dread maybe some things are looking "Up." In the latest Pixar animation director Pete Docter, writer Bob Peterson and the whole creative team take audiences on an adventure infused with values that go to the heart of Eco-Mindfulness.
Not that the film is some environmental tract or message film. Not at all. Rather, there’s an emotional and ethical current that flows through the film that is evidence of the uplifting power of imagination to reveal the reality of what truly matters.
The film pulls you in with one of the best love stories you’ll ever feel in film with Carl and Ellie and then challenges you with a profound sense of loss when Ellie dies before the couple can realize their shared childhood dreams of adventure.
Setting the story on its way "Up" acknowledges the human realities of urban overdevelopment, when Carl faces eviction and removal to an old age home; and, offers grit and adventure as the only credible uplifting responses. He floats his house away on balloons heading for Paradise Falls to fulfill his promise to Ellie.
An 8-year-old boy Russell stows away, and our characters find Paradise Falls a fallen paradise that demands of them more action and commitment from them than they ever thought possible.
In an era when some have suggested that we don’t have to worry about what we’re doing to the planet because we can colonize space, the movie punctures the myth that we can somehow float away from our troubles and true feelings.
Down here on planet Earth the only happy ending we can have will come from taking responsibility for each other. Russell refuses to abandon the wonderful and nearly extinct chocolate loving bird he names Kevin, and grumpy old Carl winds up giving Russell the paternal attention and support he’s never had. I walked out of the theater with family, friends and the audience all feeling "Up."
Eco-Mindful Media? Maybe we are starting to pay attention in a way that will prepare a necessary shift in consciousness ...
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JGd Says
Yo fools..MyRun --- DogdoRunRun. Obama's numbers are not dropping..related to green movement, to climate change or anything else! . only your bullshit is dropping. And you're steppin in it. When science moves to the front pages as well as some thought about what it means we can see that you CroMag creeps will have to crawl in their cages/caves until the next batch of right wing puppet masters send you out with hot air balloons -- sent up by baboons -- crying climate change is a hoax. Just like their health care hooliganism. Monkey Myron's right about one thing tho -- watch out for corporate greenwashing which does turn people off....
And total props to MissTiggity who stepped on anonymous K's scrawny pimply fascist neck... u go grl... no wonder K is the name used for Kafka's nightmare scenarios... wimp to the end...
Myron Says
By lifting their here-to-fore non science from back page darkness, the greenies are exposing it the disinfecting light of truth. That's always bad for people who are pushing lies. There's nothing better to get voters against you than allowing/making them think about what you're selling, if you're selling dreck.
Look what happened to Al Gore's story about global warming. It was savaged by scientists who knew the score, and the video was dropped - or at least greatly de-emphasized - as a teaching aide in many schools across America.
Since the '08 elections, progressives think they've got enough support from the masses to roll out and their program full force. Good. Their green ads and the like have caused people to start turning away. They think that because the have controlling numbers in Congress today, that they can FORCE permanent laws and regulations on the country. That has been proven false over and over. (Prohibition chief among them, but there are many, many others.)
Obama's polling numbers are dropping, and he is inextricably linked to the green movement.
stop2think Says
History Channel's, "Life Without People" had NOTHING to do with climate change or the environment or that man is evil does evil things to the environment. It just noted how the world would change if people simply vanished (and no people did not die from some man made catastrophy, i.e., global warming). All it showed was how buildings would fall by the way side and animals would come back to the city....so? The Green concept has indeed crept its way into everyday life because the press, like its coverage of the president, buys ANYTHING, the nuts in the green world spew forth. Remember the scares of ALAR? Acid Rain? Global Cooling? DDT? And how is it that the writings of Paul Erhlich, with his asinine book "Population Bomb" which was so widely inaccurate (and laughable) in its prediction, are still touted by the press? The other whacko the press love is Rachel Carson. Uh huh. when you consider how many people die from malaria each year because of DDT's banning, it makes you realize how irresponsible these folks were...but in the press they still hold hero status. I purposely AVOID buying from companies who even mention "green". It's a joke. A fad. And a dangerous slippery slope to controlling our lives. WAKE UP.
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misstiggity Says
in regards to comments by "K":
hey k-hole: way to throw around terms like "apocalyptic" and "anti-human" while simultaneously sending someone to "report to the incinerator." check your meds, and maybe do some research on some of this wannabe SAT-word terminology you're throwing around (see "rationalist humanist," "anti-human postmodern," and/or "apocalyptic pseudo religious"). oh, and i'd get busy taking responsibility for your own toxic Co2 - you don't seem like you're exactly qualified to be taking care of others.
Tina Smyth Says
I have been a recycle, reuse, water conserving, tree hugging kind of gal since my formative years in the early 70's. But... I must say I took a bit of guilty pleasure throwing away a plastic bottle the other day. It seems to me eco-mindful media could cause an awful lot of push back from the ignorant (and not so ignorant) masses. Just an observation.
Alex Says
That 'AFter people' show is weak. Where did all the people go? Did they up and vanish. Plus, you have to have mutant monsters or zombie bikers or something. DOn't they ever watch any post-apocalyptic B-movies?
When I was a kid I actually cared about saving the dolphins by cutting up the plastic rings from the six packs of soda. I care less now, because I have to listen to this stuff. How long before books are banned because they are made out of paper or they don't want us to be able to read.
frankie Says
Yawn. When Hollywood has picked up on a "trend", you can be sure it's almost over. This latest "green" fad surely is, and the marketers and politicians who profit from it have realize the rag has been pretty much wrung dry....they'll be on to the next horror they want our money and votes to save us from in no time.
Jim Says
I find it so funny when newspapers talk about tree conservation.
Think about it.
Ranba Ral Says
I've noticed this increasing trend as well; however it is not a new phenomenon. As a child of the 80's, I got to live through such things as Captain Planet, among others. I would say the trend has just shifted from the 'kiddy cartoons', mandatory 'pep rallies' at school, and from back pages to the front pages. Frankly, its lockstep message has gotten annoying (seriously, nothing is EVER good enough, and we're doomed DOOOMED DOOOOOOOMEEEEED no matter what. Heaven/Elysium/Valhalla/Gaia/whatever help you if you dare even ask a clarifying question).
Life After People was interesting at first, but so many of their scenarios are increasingly unrealistic. I stopped taking it as anything other than a joke when they did the one where the atomic weapons in our subs detonate; like they destabilize and start sweating like TNT. To butcher a Futurama reference: "ATOMIC WEAPONS DO NOT WORK THAT WAY". They're specifically designed to not go off unless intentionally set off, just in case things like an unrecoverable sub crash happen. Radiation leak from deteriorating casings: perfectly within reasonable bounds. Detonation: So remote a chance as to make me facepalm at just the previews for that episode.
K Says
Down here on planet Earth the only happy ending we can have will come from taking responsibility for each other.
Right you are. I'll be taking responsibility for you Gene. Report to the incinerator immediately as I have determined that you are personally sucking up too much air and expelling both Co2 and apocalyptic pseudo religious booshwa at an alarming rate. Thereby forcing an intellectual climate change from a rationalist humanist one to an anti-human postmodern one.
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