Sponge Bob in Hot Water over Global Warming

According to Fox News, perhaps the popular cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants should be renamed SpongeBob GlobalWarmingPants.

Six years after it was released, the cartoon short SpongeBob SquarePants in The Endless Summer went under the microscope at Fox & Friends on August 3. The pundits took issue with what they called “Nickelodeon’s global warming agenda.” The educational short which was a collaboration among Nickelodeon, StopGlobalWarming.org and Frededor Studios focuses on the effects of putting excess carbon dioxide and other pollutants into the atmosphere.

The Fox & Friends panel took the opportunity to attack the Department of Education for wasting time and tax dollars on this educational piece, calling the science unproven and the storyline one-sided.

Watch the full Fox & Friends segment, including the intro by Gretchen Carlson, who says the cartoon, “blamed man for global warming, but they did not tell kids that is actually a disputed fact — oops!”

Fox’s Dave Briggs calls global warming an “unproven science.” He says, “This is a public education system that we all pay our tax dollars for and the SpongeBob book says that it’s a man-made problem that requires human intervention.”

He fails to see the irony of his own statement in talking about the Washington D.C. school district, where he says the cartoon in question was recently played.

He says, “The schools there — I mean, we’re talking about 14th in the world in reading, 17th in the world in science, 25th in math. So we’re forcing an issue that is not yet proven — we can’t even teach our kids the adequate math, reading and science at this point.”

Part of that “adequate math, reading and science” includes a critical look at climate change. That includes accepting the preponderance of scientific evidence showing that man-made activities are largely contributing to the rising global mean temperature.

Notion That Humans Are Changing Climate Is Not Controversial Among Mainstream Scientists

National Research Council: “Preponderance Of Scientific Evidence” Indicates That Humans Are Changing The Climate. In a recent report, the National Research Council stated: “[T]he preponderance of scientific evidence points to human activities — especially the release of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere — as the most likely cause for most of the global warming that has occurred over the last several decades.” [National Research Council, 5/12/11]

American Chemical Society: Climate Change Is “Largely Attributable To Emissions From Human Activities.” According to the American Chemical Society: “[C]omprehensive scientific assessments of our current and potential future climates clearly indicate that climate change is real, largely attributable to emissions from human activities, and potentially a very serious problem.” [American Chemical Society, accessed 8/3/11]

AAAS: “Global Climate Change Is Real” And “Is Caused Largely By Human Activities.” The American Association for the Advancement of Science said in a 2009 statement: “The vast preponderance of evidence, based on years of research conducted by a wide array of different investigators at many institutions, clearly indicates that global climate change is real, it is caused largely by human activities, and the need to take action is urgent.” [American Association For The Advancement of Science, 12/4/09]

American Meteorological Society: “Humans Have Significantly Contributed” To Climate Change. In a February 2007 statement, the American Meteorological Society said “there is adequate evidence” to conclude “that humans have significantly contributed” to climate change and that “further climate change will continue to have important impacts on human societies, on economies, on ecosystems, and on wildlife through the 21st century and beyond.” [American Meteorological Society, 2/1/07]

Geological Society Of America: “Human Activities … Account For Most Of The Warming Since The Middle 1900s.” From an April 2010 position statement of the Geological Society of America:

The Geological Society of America (GSA) concurs with assessments by the National Academies of Science (2005), the National Research Council (2006), and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2007) that global climate has warmed and that human activities (mainly greenhouse gas emissions) account for most of the warming since the middle 1900s. If current trends continue, the projected increase in global temperature by the end of the twentyfirst century will result in large impacts on humans and other species. [Geological Society of America, April 2010]
– Compiled by Media Matters

 
Tim Tuten of the Department of Education Told Media Matters that the SpongeBob video was not shown at the reading event Fox & Friends mentioned. He says, “We’ve never shown any videos ever, so I have no idea where that is coming from.” He says that student participants were given one book to take home and that each student could choose from “dozens of diverse books” and the SpongeBob book was one of those options.

But here’s the offending cartoon.

A leaked memo from a Fox executive has called for Fox staffers to keep the climate debate going by following any statements about the planet warming with a statement saying those theories are based on data critics have called into question.

In December 2010, Fox News Washington managing editor Bill Sammon sent an e-mail to all staff within 15 minutes of a Fox News on-air report by correspondent Wendell Goler. Goler accurately reported that the United Nations’ World Meteorological Organization announced that 2000-2009 was “on track to be the warmest [decade] on record.”

Sammon sent the following email to the staffs of Special Report, Fox News Sunday,and FoxNews.com, as well as to other reporters, producers, and network executives, instructing them to “IMMEDIATELY” include objections of “critics” when reporting on climate data:

From: Sammon, Bill
To: 169 -SPECIAL REPORT; 036 -FOX.WHU; 054 -FNSunday; 030 -Root (FoxNews.Com); 050 -Senior Producers; 051 -Producers; 069 -Politics; 005 -Washington
Cc: Clemente, Michael; Stack, John; Wallace, Jay; Smith, Sean
Sent: Tue Dec 08 12:49:51 2009
Subject: Given the controversy over the veracity of climate change data…

…we should refrain from asserting that the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period without IMMEDIATELY pointing out that such theories are based upon data that critics have called into question. It is not our place as journalists to assert such notions as facts, especially as this debate intensifies.

Perhaps this little SpongeBob SquarePants flare up has nothing to do with science or even politics. It may just be sour grapes by Fox, which on August 2 found it that its entertainment show The Family Guy was the most social show on TV, meaning it attracted the most viewers who engaged with it through comments and other interactions on TV and online. But coming in a close second? SpongeBob SquarePants.