martin durkin's 'the great global warming swindle' made waves when screened last week. a feature length film presenting scientists who dispute the received wisdom about climate change, 'swindle' is a technically brilliant piece of dramatic documentary, made by someone who also has the courage to stand in the face of mainstream opinion. (whatever it else it is, courage is definitely part of it.)
and yet.
and yet, the response to the film has raised uncomfortable questions about journalistic ethics - the director has been previously found to have misled interviewees, and distorted or ignored facts. at least one of the contributors to 'swindle' has already stated that he feels let down by the programme-makers.
what is saddest about this is that the question of the potential validity of any of the arguments made by the contributors is likely to be subsumed under media sniping about the possibility that we have been misled about some of them. i'm left not sure what to do about this - who do i believe? can anyone help me?
am i left with only the option of splitting the difference between watching 'swindle' followed by 'an inconvenient truth' and a visit to george monbiot's blog?
4 comments:
Hm... I'd like to see this film, is it on in QFT? I wont be in Ireland until the 29th probably, any chance it'll still be on?
it's a channel 4 film for TV - may be repeated on more4 again; probably also available on youtube or elsewhere.
Good rebuttal from The Independent in yesterday's edition here.
Monbiot's response was good, I thought. Also see what Media Lens had to say.
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