Everywhere I turned yesterday, I heard this: “The planet has a fever,” Gore said. “If your baby has a fever, you go to the doctor. If the doctor says you need to intervene here, you don’t say, ‘Well, I read a science fiction novel that told me it’s not a problem.’ If the crib’s on fire, you don’t speculate that the baby is flame retardant. You take action.”
Each time, I rolled my eyes and said (sometimes out loud), “No, you don’t. If your baby has a fever, you know that his or her little body is fighting off infection on its own. All you have to do is watch and wait.”
I’m guessing Al Gore never actually tended a baby with a fever.
The problem with using metaphors is that all too soon, the metaphor breaks down. In this case, the metaphor crumbled from the very start.
Then I heard that Al Gore consumes more energy than most of us (“last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359“) in addition to his frequent flying on private jets (I had to laugh when I heard on the news that he’s “jetting” around, spreading his message). I wonder if he actually believes his message of imminent catastrophe . . . and does he hang his own laundry on clotheslines to dry?
(I haven’t seen “An Inconvenient Truth.” The last time I saw a movie with an obvious political bias I was not persuaded by the movie’s bias . . . I was just annoyed and wondered how it could be that so many people believed the propaganda.)
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Speaking of topics in the news, did you all hear about the new study done that expunges the guilt of millions of American mothers by telling us that modern mothers actually spend more time with their kids than mothers in the past did?
A quote I found interesting was this:
There is primary time, when a child is the focus of a parent’s attention. There is secondary time — helping with homework, for example, while cooking dinner. Then there is a third category: just being with children.
Perhaps because I accessible to my children all day, most every day, I do not feel guilty over not spending enough time giving my children my sole focus. I wonder if our society is not too child-focused while at the same time, not taking into account a child’s true needs for security and protection. I, personally, would describe my parenting philosophy as “benign neglect.” I think I once saw Madeleine L’Engle use that phrase, but I have never been able to find it again. I like to believe that we share the same mothering philosophy.
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Well, this post started last night . . . and in the interval, I have been through five lessons of history with my children (I wonder if I would have supported Franklin Delano Roosevelt when he was in office?), slept, washed, dried and folded a bunch of laundry, exercised twice, watched “Oprah” while taking care of a 6-month old baby, read the newspaper, and gone to a sort of company dinner with my husband. I think I had a point when I started, but now, it’s just a jumble of observations, which has its own particular point, I suppose.
Actual Unretouched Photo 
Oh, but please don’t forget that Al Gore lives a carbon neutral life by purchasing verifiable reductions in CO2 elsewhere. (Just like Catholics purchased indulgences back in the 15th century!)
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I’m all for personal and corporate responsibility.
I’m all for taking care of the planet. Seems totally Biblical to me.
Yet, I feel guilty about the ice age. I’m sure it had something to do with me.
And, all the problems on other planets? Yah, that’s me, too.
I don’t have a car and I haven’t flown since 1974.
But, it’s me. I tell you. It’s me.
Because I never mastered Algebra, most likely.
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I heard about the “fever” thing and saw a really funny parody about it on Late Night With Conan the other night- they were accentuating how ridiculous the metaphors have been regarding global warming… and I still can’t believe moms today think they have to give tylenol the instant their child appears to have a fever. When will they learn?
Steph
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Given your topic, you might enjoy this article: http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=259542253407130
in Investors Business Daily on Al Gore & the Global Warming debacle.
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You and I are of the same minds.
Benign neglect, indeed.
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Yeah. Al Gore has been doing this for 30 years. You’d think he’d be able to do something other than burn jet fuel and spend money on advertising. I haven’t seen the movie, but I read the book. Then I read his first book. And I realized, whoo-doggies. He’s nuts. That’s not to kill the message, per se. But he’s definitely not the right messenger to deliver it. Not for me, anyway.
And that study? It’s not new, and I’ve been trying to figure out why they’re selling it as new. Maybe they need funding for another study …
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I can’t bring myself to care all that much ever since Darryl Hannah told me I should be fueling my car with peanut oil, but FWIW, Inconvenient Truth is the first movie that I’ve ever seen that really truly explains the science of how the earth is heated in a super, super easy to understand way…If you don’t watch any other part of the movie, I think it would be a great little classroom supplement. There’s nothing political about the ozone.
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Well, while you may not like Al Gore and while it is pretty lame that he isn’t making any personal efforts to combat global warming with his own energy consumption, if you deny that there is a problem with the environment, then you are really burying your head. Global warming isn’t something that a bunch of tree-hugger invented. The science is out there, the data speaks for itself, despite how you might feel about Al Gore.
What is benign neglect with regards to your kids?
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Another benignly neglectful mother here, too! I’ve heard it somewhere else before, but I don’t remember where. Can I rename it the go-outside-and-play philosophy?
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You are a brave woman to bring it up Mel! What bothers me most about the global warming issue is the hysteria that surrounds it. I’m just not a “chicken little” and I really doubt the sky is falling or is going to fall.
I’ve been doing some historical research of my own (just the facts ma’am) and find the historical record (such as we have) to be so ambiguous (are we really heating up or cooling off? gee, that depends on what part of the historical record you look at and what agenda you’re interested in promoting) that I’m further convinced that I don’t need to join the hysteria.
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