Not Evil Just Wrong (2009) User Reviews

Most environmentalism is "extreme" to profligate polluters

[AJ4F · 2/10 · 31 August 2013]

The title of this pseudo-documentary is ironic, since it implies that people who want to prevent human overpopulation and greed from suffocating our only life support system might be "evil." Anti environmentalists who see pollution as excusable are the truly evil ones. The right-wing, religious, Cornucopian view of the world forgets that agencies like the EPA were created because industries would not voluntarily stop polluting. A film like this would have gotten no traction in the late 60s and early 70s, and deserves none today.

Modern conservatives bask in a fantasy world where they assume environmental regulations are unnecessary to mitigate human overpopulation and the cannibalization of nature to support a single species at the expense of others. They "forget" all the earlier battles fought to protect nature from their own denier ilk, and they simply ignore climate science and worst-case warming scenarios.

You won't find any accurate coverage in this film of CO2's huge impacts on "radiative forcing," the key factor in trapping heat over time. CO2 controls about 80% of radiative forcing, per NASA and other sources. Conservatives throw around the term "trace gas" without the context of CO2's potency. They harp on water vapor as the most powerful greenhouse gas, but water vapor is in constant flux while CO2 lingers far longer in the atmosphere and modulates the net warming effect. Without CO2, most of the world would be frozen. How can anyone think it's an insignificant gas if they really understand what it does?

The film is full of appeals to "ordinary people vs. the elites" but the former often have no understanding of the science. The message is politicized, not truly investigated on its scientific merit. The main tactic is to create doubt about the climate consensus without ever proving that doubts are valid. It's the same old denialism repackaged with a not so clever title.

I find it especially ironic that these filmmakers claim to be concerned about the poor, downtrodden masses who are already suffering from climate change in low-lying areas and marginal farming regions. They will be the worst hit, so stop playing them as "victims of environmentalism." The real good guys are not science-denying capitalist zealots.

The plot thickens

[rndiadem · 10/10 · 10 October 2018]

When was Florida supposed to be under water according to Al Gore's 1990's prediction???

Terrible film that does not help to add to the climate debate

[avoux · 2/10 · 7 June 2017]

Not Evil Just Wrong, created by Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer, is a documentary created as a response to Al Gore's Oscar winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth. In An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore claims that the temperature is rising, humans are the cause of it because of the CO2 we are emitting, and that we should do something about it. The documentary Not Evil Just Wrong is intended to represent the other side of the climate change debate, and discredit Al Gore's claims in his documentary. While the film succeeds at muddying the debate, it does not make any convincing arguments based in science and fails to actually inform its audience, which is why I give it a 1 ½ out of 5 stars.

This film fails to achieve its goal of giving an alternative solution to the climate crisis but it does succeed in clouding the discussion and confusing its intended audience about the issue. I can tell the film does not aim to inform the audience because it purposely contains contradictory statements and vague assumptions without evidence. They usually bring up Al Gore's arguments then either use unrelated or untrue political arguments instead of scientific arguments, or pull a bait and switch and attack something else, trying to tie it to the argument. All three main points have issues with consistency and accuracy as well, which helps muddying the waters. The discussion on climate data accuracy contradicts itself multiple times. Some experts claim that the icecaps are retreating because of natural temperature oscillation, then others claim that the icecaps are actually growing. Patrick Moore discuss how the temperature is not at its hottest currently and the temperature is not warming, then claims that there is warming happening and it is good for us. The experts also uses red herring, ad hominem and strawman arguments in their discussion in this section, such as claiming that the data from 1932 that was incorrectly calculated completely discredits the whole argument. They couple these arguments with scenes of children repeating environmentalist talking points in an effort to make the arguments sound naive. The creators of the film claim to have the goal of providing an alternative look and set of solutions relative to Al Gore's film, but this technique they are using fails to do that. The children are not giving any alternatives or solutions, the experts discussing the issues brought up by the children are misleading the audience with false alternatives, and are also not providing any solutions. The goal I believe the film had, muddying the debate so people would not know what to believe and lose interest, does benefit from this technique since it confuses the audience. During the malaria discussion the film the film plays to people's emotions by attacking environmentalists' character. They claimed that environmentalists overwhelmingly were anti-human juxtaposed with the scenes of struggling families from third world countries in an attempt to blame the environmentalists for their misfortunes. This is very misleading on many fronts. One is the assertion of environmentalists being anti human. They do this without any data to back it up, just anecdotes about experts who disagree with them. Another misleading aspect is that the actions of the environmentalists did not cause the issues they are pointing to. When they claim that Rachel Carson is responsible for millions of African deaths, they fail to mention that DDT was never banned for malaria control and that countries that stopped using DDT for malaria control did so because it was no longer effective in controlling malaria. They also claim that Rachel Carson is a discredited scientist which is blatantly false. The one and only valid point I believe that the film brought up well is the discussion on a baseline for energy needs. With the technology of the time and the expected advancement of technology projected in the ten years that Al Gore called for, the energy output of 100 percent renewable energy would not consistently meet the energy baseline required. The film quickly went back on track to getting things wrong when they claimed that because of this we cannot have any change or reduction. One major example where it could work is increasing the efficiency of new cars that are bought. Transportation creates a significant about of greenhouse gasses and if the cars on the road were much more efficient than air quality will be greatly benefited and the economy will not implode. The final sin this movie made was present in all three points, pitting normal Americans against the elites. They ridiculed Al Gore for using a private jet to get around, portrayed him and many other environmentalists as out of touch and uncaring, and they falsely claimed that the average American was the victim of environmental extremism. This is done quite well by the film and allows them to replace an actual argument against Al Gore with a political sentiment of us versus them. It is unfortunately effective politically and at muddying the debate, but is very poor at actually informing people about an issue. This film is considered a documentary but at its best it is propaganda. The film is contradictory, fails at informing the audience, and obscures the debate and science in a hope that people will lose interest and not engage. I believe that the film has a near perfect title, but with a few edits I believe that title could be used to describe itself rather than Al Gore. Just evil and wrong.

Worth a look

[daragh27 · 7/10 · 19 March 2010]

As someone who is neither pro nor anti-climate change, I feel I can listen to the arguments for and against the case of man-made climate change with an open mind but, as Richard Dawkins says, not so open minded that my brain falls out.

When it comes to controversial subject matters such as man-made climate change, I, personally, prefer to listen to a debate, with both sides represented, than a, more or less, one sided documentary.

However, I'd heard many good things about this documentary and, as it's made by two Irish journalists and fellow citizens of mine, I was that bit more intrigued.

The Good: There are some excellent scientific counter arguments presented and there are numerous 'big claims' made by pro-climate change heavy weights, most notably Al Gore, that are either discredited or exposed as sensationalist non-truths or, at the very least, exaggerations of the facts.

There seems to be a, somewhat, credible line-up of contributors on hand to lend their views, scientific know how or experience in this field.

I'm sure that, if there were a direct answer to this documentary from the 'pro' side, there would probably be an equal amount of statements and 'facts' discredited in the, sometimes, mud-slinging arena, that is climate change..

The bad: I'm not a scientist, so I'm not in a position to discredit or, indeed, endorse the 'facts' in this documentary, so I won't go there.

While the impact on the 'average' family and, of course, those who are already impoverished, is certainly something that needs to be emphasized, as cheap fossil fuels may be replaced with more expensive "greener" forms, along with carbon taxes being introduced by many governments, I felt that the time dedicated to 'the average middle American family' was far too long.

This movie clocks in at just under 90 minutes with approximately 25-30 minutes taken up by an overweight women and her malnourished husband who are both, by the own admission, not very well educated.

Not being very well educated is certainly not a crime but, in a documentary supposedly exposing the bad science of the Al Gore led pro-climate change group, a family employed in the industrial sector explaining that they "couldn't pay for their new wooden floors" and "entertainment systems" if it weren't for their industrial jobs and how they're "living their American dream", isn't science.. or even a valid argument, in the grand scheme of things. Of course, the impact on family's standard of living is a very important topic that should not be swept under the carpet but 10 minutes would have been sufficient in this particular documentary.

In my opinion, I feel it takes away a little creditability from what is, otherwise, a very fine piece of work.

So, if you're like me and still not completely sold on either side, this is well worth a look.