Harmless? Think again
Unpacking a delivery from Amazon this morning, I was faced with an attractive and well-presented children’s pop-up book entitled “How the World Works – A hands-on guide to our amazing planet” (see cover illustration right).
As usual, before passing it on to my children, I gave it a quick scan for any possible subliminal (or blatant) global warming propaganda, and suffice it to say, it’s going straight back to Amazon in tomorrow’s post.
Just for background, this book was the winner of the Royal Society’s Young People’s Book Prize in 2011 – and that just about tells you all you need to know. The Royal Society isn’t about impartial and rigorous science any more, its about environmental brainwashing and political activism, hence this book would have scored very highly. It was also shortlisted for the Blue Peter Book Awards 2011 (“best book with facts” – no irony intended).
Driving your car kills the planet. Click to enlarge
The first three double spreads, about the formation of the planet were interesting and informative. By the fourth, however, on the water cycle, the usual hectoring tone of the environmentalists began to show through. The principle is that the planet is pure and undefiled and everything humanity does merely damages that purity. So we begin:
“How do we interfere [their emphasis] with the water cycle? Fertilisers and pesticides can seep into rivers and lakes, polluting the water [no mention of the fact that those chemicals allow us to feed the worlds population more effectively than any time in history]. Our vehicles release harmful gases into the air. This makes the rain acidic and affects wildlife [no mention of the fact that the global population’s standard of living has, in part due to the availability of global transportation, never been higher]”
And from there it just gets worse:
“Extreme weather. Weather can be dangerous! Winds and rain help move heat and water around the earth. But extreme weather can cause huge damage to homes, buildings and roads, and can even kill people. Scientists believe that human activities are changing our atmosphere and making the earth warm up. This might mean more extreme weather in the future.”
Gulf Stream - click to enlarge
And now for the Day After Tomorrow moment:
“What if the Gulf Stream stops? Scientists fear that global warming could affect the Gulf Stream. Melting polar ice caps will make the water at the poles less salty, preventing it from sinking and gradually slowing down the Gulf Stream. This would make Europe and North America much colder!”
Yet more global warming alarmism:
“The world has changed fast over the last hundred years. With an increasing number of people, factories, power stations and cards. We are constantly adding large amounts of carbon [sic] to the air, but the planet cannot absorb it any longer. We are meddling with the world’s natural carbon cycle, with worrying results (see ‘The Greenhouse effect,’ on the right.
Because there are more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, more of the Sun’s heat is trapped and the earth’s surface is warming up.”
And then, more lecturing on “green” living:
“How can we reduce our carbon footprint? The best way is to use less energy. We can start at home by turning down thermostats, hanging out the washing rather than tumble drying it, and switching off lights, televisions and computers when not needed. Transport is another big carbon producer. So walking, cycling or using public transport really helps.”
Environmental propaganda - click to enlarge
And as you can see from the images, it’s all dressed up in cheerful, kid-friendly artwork, with plenty of pull tabs and pop-ups so the message is cleverly concealed. Apart from the global warming propaganda, almost every page admonishes the reader and humanity in general for the evil it has done to the planet.
Because it’s a kids book, and the message must be straightforward, there’s no room for subtlety or shades of grey – it’s a blunt assessment that humanity is damaging the planet and we must change our ways, or else.
Gone are the days when children could grow up enjoying the wonders of the planet and the universe for their own sakes without being badgered or berated. Now even pop-up books designed for the very youngest in our society are packed with enviro-propaganda to make them feel guilty about the way in which humanity (and by inference the young readers of the book) have defiled Gaia. Tragic.
A link to the book on Amazon is here.
The publisher is Templar (link).
Christiane Dorion, the author, spent several years as co-ordinator of primary education for, wait for it, WWF. So here we have a committed environmental activist brainwashing children into Gaia-guilt when they are barely out of diapers…
UPDATE: Apologies for the typos – quick copy typing unfortunately. Hopefully all corrected now.
Australian Climate Madness 
I went to Dirk Brinkmann of Brinkmann and associates reforestation and asked if I could illustrate a book of the many ways how I had been restring environments there was no interest. I now want to do a book showing how humans can and coexist and do coexist with the earth rather then seeing ourselves as parasites. But there is no support for a person as me that had been planting trees for 25 years. later this year dirk is shacking hands with the queen, and now I realize why I am feeling so stressed is that the climate madness comes from also prince philip himself that has found a way to silence tree planters as me threw his puppets as Dirk Brinkmann.
dont even have to read it to know what bs it is saying???BUT because I did not read it ,is it telling the kids that goverments and green parties all around the world are doing nothing to stop CGS and letting them use as much CLEAN water for FREE and then return that TOXIC water back into the rivers and streams and underground aqua water tables.NO even the U.N will do nothing SO we need to take our kids back and educate ourselves is we have to and WAKE UP AND LOOK BACK AND SEE WE HAVE BEEN LIVING OUR LIVES …..ASLEEP..PEOPLE TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR OWN LIVES BECAUSE THE GLOBAL DICTATORS HAVE BEEN DOING IT FOR YEARS
this fits with the UK Courts terming the Al Gore ‘Invonvenient Truth’ as propoganda with so many inaccuracies and fallacies, that in order to show it in schools Gore needed to propvide a guidebook listing the inaccuracies and publiching the correct information. I notice the CSIRO also has a student climate change kit for schools funded by Bayer (who are into genetically engineered crops). Perhaps it IS time to start examining the K-12 curriculum
Review submitted.
Good catch. I remember when was young I could read books about how industry worked and be impressed by such things as power stations, powerful trains, factories, rockets etc.
We were actually allowed to watch the lunar landings and we were allowed to be impressed by what had been achieved. We were even encouraged to take pride in these human achievements.
I think mine must have been one of the last generations to be allowed to do that.
And this kind of instruction is predicated on the accepted notion of limits. This notion is what is at the core of the environmental movement. They point out that exponential growth is impossible forever. Which is quite obvious and no reasonable person disputes it but human economies seem to function a bit differently they respond to limits not by adaptation but by invention. These inventions “reset” economies on a new exponetial with its corresponding limits. And I am as sure as evil exists environmentalists reset to these new exponentials.
Because of the unpredictability of invention environmentalists latch on to opaqueness of eventual outcomes and predict a linear outcome that sounds reasonable but at its core it ignores invention. Without invention the scary scenarios are well just that, scary. But living on this planet requires a great deal of faith and if we’ve lost faith in ourselves to invent our way out of predicaments then the environmentalists have won.
The way environmentalists prey on impressionable children makes me ill.
comment submitted
The scaremongering of violent blood and gore advertisements in the 10-10 ‘no pressure’ campaign are sending a message to agree or we will kill you; promoting violence and even death to anyone who questions the warmist religion
What the kids could do with is an antidote. When I get the time, and for my grandchildren, I shall write a book with this title: “This book belongs to…: the children’s guide to property rights and being free”. In the book we will find answers to such questions as: What is a slave? Why are taxes a form of slavery? Why do governments lie to people? Why do some scientists accept money to lie? Why am I forced by society to go to school? What are property rights? Why is it wrong for force ever to be used except in self defence? How do I deal with bullies? Who is Roald Dahl? What are some of the exciting, dangerous and heroic things I can do when I grow up? What do I need to build a tree house? How do I make stink bombs? What is money? Can I start my own gold mine? Why does using gold for money keep people honest?
Comment submitted
Just the above examples show the mental age of all involved; my only savior is that I won’t be around too much longer to see the world of morons inhabiting the world. The world is doomed.
Congrats on that FOI ruling, another myth busted!
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/health-science/climate-scientists-claims-of-email-death-threats-go-up-in-smoke/story-e6frg8y6-1226345224816
Much more appropriate for the kids:
http://freemarketamerica.org/if-i-wanted-america-to-fail/
Brilliant! I took my daughter to reading time at a local library a week or so ago, and as my luck would have it, the theme was “the environment.” Not only were all the designated books brainwashing the kiddies, but they were also teaching them to chastise their parents for not turning the TV off at the wall.
http://t.co/uE4k7Ak1
But it was all worthwhile because – as the book concluded – “together we can save the world.”
http://instagr.am/p/JlMNX5nUx8/
There are quite a few such books around, poisoned by the WWF view of humanity. I have added a link to your review of this one into my Page on climate books aimed at children or teachers (http://climatelessons.blogspot.co.uk/p/climate-books-aimed-at-children-or.html).
I’d be glad to hear of reviews of any other such books in order to add them to my list.
Congrats on skewering this one!