By Rocky Wood

Have you ever wondered if celebrities have a conscience? Whether they consider their impact of their words and deeds in much the way as the common man? Let’s investigate that matter in the context of the raging debate over climate change.

Did you tune into the Live Earth concerts promoted by Al Gore on the catchy date of 7/7/07? No? Well, you certainly heard of them, thanks to the free time given by the media. Concerts on seven continents, headlined by Madonna, Genesis and the Black Eyed Peas. Concerts designed to arouse awareness of the apparent threats of climate change and global warming.

Concerts watched by fewer people, even in the United States, than the Princess Diana Tribute Concert a week or so earlier. Concerts attended by disappointing crowds but lauded by Al Gore, his promoters and the usual suspects in the Hollywood and music industry.

Indeed, not everyone saw value in another headline-grabbing event of this type – Bob Geldof, who organised concerts against poverty and starvation in Africa in earlier times sniffed, ‘We are all f***ing conscious of global warming. It’s just an enormous pop concert or the umpteenth time that, say, Madonna or Coldplay get on stage’. Right on, Sir Bob. In fact, even the youth who were targeted Gore’s media machine were unconvinced of the motives, with many downright cynical.

The issue promoted may or may not be bigger than world poverty, starvation in Africa, or many other issues facing our planet – although I doubt if a starving family in Darfur gives a single thought for Tim Flannery’s worries about the sea rising to swamp multi-million dollar mansions on the coastlines of Florida or Queensland. But, when the hypocrisy of opposing greenhouse gas emissions by consuming large amounts of electricity on stage, and flying to and from events in private jets, is the subject of greater debate than the so-called problem, then the promoters have an issue.

Let’s take Madonna, a serial and successful publicity grabber if ever there was one. Her charity, The Ray of Light Foundation, happened to own millions of dollars of stock in aluminium giant Alcoa, one of the single largest corporate users of electricity in the world; the Ford Motor Company; and Weyerhaeuser, a forestry giant. All these companies are on the radical environmental hit list. When this information came to light, Live Earth founder Kevin Wall’s defence was this: ‘I didn’t see the Fox News Report but Madonna is here today, which shows her commitment.’ So just turning up absolves one’s eco-sins, does it? ‘Today, we’re not focussing on what she or other artists may have done in the past; it is about the future. Whatever is being said, I know that her commitment to this cause runs deep. She is performing for free and has written a new song for us, which I think goes to show that.’

Apparently celebrities can write off their greenhouse gas emissions by giving their services for free, and of course, by writing a nice new, catchy tune.

You and I of course don’t, or soon won’t have it that easy. A breed of radical environmentalists, fronted by Gore, Flannery and others, is beginning to demand we give up many of life’s luxuries and even economic necessities, while they individually continue to consume enough energy to power small villages. Al Gore’s house has been revealed to use 20 times the energy of the average home; who knows what Madonna’s houses chew through in electricity; or the cars and jets she and her entourage use go through in gas and aviation fuel?

Another celebrity eco-warrior is Sting, who reunited with his band Police for the 7/7/07 gig. The same Sting who advertises, according to the leftist British newspaper, The Guardian, ‘the biggest gas-guzzling Jaguar of them all’.

Let’s take a little tour of the wacky world of global warming and climate change publicity… and see what we can discover – a little of the truth for ourselves, perhaps?

Remember, these are demands put forth by celebrities – many of them wealthy beyond the wildest dreams of workers in the suburbs of Los Angeles or Melbourne, let alone those struggling to make better lives in Brazil, Burma, South Africa, Cuba or the Ivory Coast. Remember, any amount of taxes or restrictions implemented at their behest cannot truly affect their own lifestyles, while they most certainly will damage yours or mine.

Here are some interesting proposals put forward by celebrities who feel sure climate change is largely driven by human intervention – factories, cars, aircraft, energy consumption and the like.

• ‘I propose a limitation on the number of squares of toilet paper to be used in a sitting…’ – singer and celebrity environmentalist Sheryl Crow
• A ban on cremations, replaced with upright burials in cardboard tubes!
• A congestion tax on trucks in New York City (with no viable alternative to move goods such as food in or out) – Mayor Michael Bloomberg
• The leading celebrity environmentalist who suggested those who oppose the man-made climate change theory might one-day face ‘a prosecutor in some yet-to-be-formed international court’. You know, a court like Nuremberg (he didn’t need to say). And, by the way, this is no fringe nutcase – it is a direct quote from Tim Flannery, author of a leading text on man-made climate change, The Weather Makers

Okay, let’s agree most of those ideas are just plain silly. The power needed to pump water to your home so you can wash your hands thoroughly after using one or two squares of toilet paper proves that.

With little solid evidence, other than a series of climate models, which vary widely and are subject to massive manipulation to prove a particular point, the world is being railroaded into making a series of changes that may have huge consequences for our economy, and our lifestyles.

Claims are thrown about like confetti – a leading aid agency recently said, with an apparent straight face, ‘between now and 2050 climate change will push the number of displaced people globally to at least 1 billion.’ Note the will, not may; climate change will create 1 billion refugees! Apparently we are expected to simply accept the claim at face value and then… well, what? Turn off our air-conditioning?

How about the demand from a British charity that the US must pay $22 billion a year to help deal with the ‘ravages’ of global warming. How much do you think they propose should be China’s share? Remember, China is now the biggest greenhouse gas emitter in the world. Do we hear zero? Correct!

Why would China not be asked to pay? The answer seems quite simple – they are not a democracy, environmental campaigners have no real levers over their government, media or the thinking of their masses. But those same campaigners do have influence over those in America and Europe, so it’s they who must be badgered into what could well turn out to be very bad policy indeed.

The same Tim Flannery mentioned earlier, and who was mystifyingly made Australian of the Year in 2007, has made this claim: ‘I think there is a fair chance that Perth will be the 21st century’s ghost metropolis’ (Perth in Western Australia is a city of over 1.5 million people and is in the middle of an economic boom). Flannery also said that ‘some time in the next 30 years, we face… rapidly rising sea levels, maybe up to 6 metres and hundreds of millions of refugees, because there are whole cities going under.’ Now, 6 metres is 236 inches, nearly 20 feet of increased worldwide sea levels. It sounds and is scary. One suspects it was meant to sound scary. But, wait, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the touchstone of faith for the world’s leading climate change promoters, projects only 59cm (23 inches, not even two feet) of increased sea levels. What gives here? Deliberate sensationalism by Mr Flannery, or just poor science on his part? Either answer is damning.

Why does the hard-core environmentalist movement seek out hypocrites and the ill-informed to front their views (seriously as they take them)? And why do celebrities seek out opportunities to flash their ‘green’ views at every opportunity. Clearly there is a Faustian bargain here.

But a bargain with the Devil has payback. In this case the environmental movement and the celebrity musos, actors and soft scientists are already beginning to find that payback has come early.

When the green movement allows those compromised by their behaviour (Gore, Madonna, Sting et al) to display their hypocrisy the message itself is damaged, possibly irreparably. When the celebrities make claims that are wrong, irresponsible or just plain hypocritical and are exposed their credibility suffers, possibly irreparably. In fact whether they care, or even know, is a moot point and it is hard to imagine them lying awake at night worrying about that, or much else other than the source of their next dose of that most addictive of drugs – fame.

And for those who wonder if climate change is natural, who wonder if nothing man does to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will alter that, and who wonder if the real reason behind proposed carbon taxes and the like is being left unsaid, the exposure of a few compromised celebrities may be comforting. But it is cold comfort.

Do these celebrities actually have a conscience? Or did they trade that to the Devil as well?

© Rocky Wood, 2007
Rocky Wood has been a freelance journalist for 30 years, and is based in Melbourne, Australia. He is the author of four books and has published hundreds of articles in the US, Canada, the UK, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.