Doublespeak vs Doublespeak: An Inconvenient Truth and Policy Peril (Final)

No matter which direction you approach the topic of global warming from, you will always be met with strong feelings and heated arguments. And why wouldn't you, such a universal and troubling issue is bound to generate opposition and controversy. But when examining the issue in a documentary, one would hope that a producer would strive to emphasize the facts above their own agenda. But as the liberal "Inconvenient Truth" and conservative "Policy Peril" demonstrate, facts can be easily manipulated to match the opinions of their intended audiences. They achieve this maneuver through the cunning use of doublespeak, a form of language or imagery intended to misinform or mislead someone into believing a specific opinion or idea. They both claim to be the absolute truth, but both are riddled with distorted facts, deceiving figures, and misrepresented data. Nowhere is this more evident than in their blatant use of visual manipulation.

     Visual manipulation has been around since the 1960 presidential debate. It the first in history to be broadcast on both television and radio. Those who listened on the radio thought Nixon clearly won the debate, but those watching on television believed the handsome and charismatic Kennedy had.  It was the first time our nation ever witnessed the power images have in controlling the psyche. Despite the fact that people might have believed what Nixon was saying more, his disheveled and nervous appearance led them to put their faith in his more attractive opponent. Marketers jumped on the phenomenon, and the age of image driven propaganda was born. The producers of "An Inconvenient Truth" and "Policy Peril" understood this, and harnessed the power of misleading images to win minds for their respective causes. 

     In "An Inconvenient Truth", Al Gore explains that glaciers are receding at an alarming rate. To demonstrate, he shows two pictures of the glacier on Mount Kilimanjaro. One photo is from decades ago and the other is a more recent photo that shows a greatly reduced mass of ice. It convincingly proves his point that the ice is melting at a faster rate than ever before. Or does it? What the former Vice President fails to mention is what time of year the pictures were taken. It is a normal planetary cycle for glaciers to recede during warmer months, but Mr. Gore intentionally leaves the dates out to make the audience believe the ice was receding faster than it really was. 

       In "Policy Peril", the little known minority enunciates its legitimacy by showing a number of expert witnesses they have in their court. But in the rapid succession of flashing pictures, the audience doesn't notice that many witnesses' images are shown more than one time, making the number of experts appear greater than it actually is. In one instance, their key expert, who speaks for about 75% of the film, actually changes location and costume to make him look like he is another witness entirely. The average audience member might miss the likeness and mistake him for another expert, making them believe that the global warming opposition has one more expert on their side than they really do. 

      But in both films, the most unapologetic form of visual manipulation comes in confusing and poorly labeled data. In "An Inconvenient Truth" I counted six times that graphs were shown with unlabeled axes. In some cases, the graphs didn't even have axes at all. In "Policy Peril", I counted another four instances where graphs were either mislabeled or not labeled at all.  By not providing values for their axes, they are able to misrepresent the data as much as they want. A simple change in units can make a set of numbers go from looking like they increase gradually to appearing as though they increase exponentially in a very short time frame. They intentionally left out labels to  misinform, so that people would only notice the dramatic slopes of the lines and not the values they represent. If that information were present, it might bring one to a different conclusion. You can imagine how this would be dangerous when discussing an event with such global impact. 

     Regardless of the way they go about presenting them, what their arguments ultimately come down to are a set of values that differ between the two sides. The central theme of "An Inconvenient Truth" lies around nature, and how it should be valued above almost everything else. Their message is "we must save the planet in order to save ourselves." All of their information centers around nature as the most important thing in the world, and how the health of nature is directly linked to the future of mankind. The makers of "Policy Peril" feel that mankind itself is more important than anything else. Their message lies in the future of mankind's prosperity, valuing human life and economic progress over planetary conditions. Sort of the "as long as we can adapt to a warming world, we shouldn't worry about fixing it" argument. They are two equally valid points that both parties justifiably believe to be the absolute truth. 

         This difference in value structure is a vital part of human nature. It lies at the core of the essence of what makes us individuals. And it is necessary in a world governed by half-truths and misconceptions. So despite the inherent fallacies  and doublespeak in their arguments, no matter how much we personally disagree with them, we must respect their point of view. What we can criticize is the convoluted way they dupe their audiences and present their opinions as facts.