Michael Moore, filmmakers respond to criticism of new bombshell environmental film

the solutions are out [Music] there's no turning back so what exactly are those illusions planet of the humans directed by Jeff Gibbs an executive produced by Michael Moore pulls back this curtain of corporate interest controlling the mainstream environmental movement specifically the film says that green technologies like solar and wind which preserve a way of life but do not preserve the planet we are joined now via Skype by producer Aziz a nur Academy award-winning filmmaker and executive producer Michael Moore and director Jeff Gibbs gentlemen we're glad to have all three of you agree more thank you great to see you guys let me start with you first of all the films been very controversial we're gonna get to that in a moment but what was the message that you wanted to send here well you know you were saying the film is controversial I think the existing environmental movement is going to be the last to come around to the story in this film they'll continue to argue that solar cells and wind turbines are going to become more efficient and cheaper these sorts of things what they miss is that it doesn't really matter these are based on technological processes they require fossil fuels for their construction it hasn't worked after spending a trillion dollars we're no better off in fact we're much worse off than we were when we started this 30 years ago and just this brief virus period in one week has done more than the environmental movement has done in 30 years to reduce consumption and so that should give us the first hint that we've been on the wrong track and we need to switch very interesting Jeff I want to go to you as well I mean what we've seen a letter circulated by Josh Fox who seems to be one of the chief antagonists of the film he says quote the film touts blatantly untrue fossil fuel industry talking points deceitfully misleading its audience on renewable energy and disparages and attacks important climate leaders Jeff what's your response to that yeah thank you Wow we went to great pains to show you what was happening actually in the field with solar and wind and many of our experts are actually people in the solar and wind industry that we went to Tver by what we were saying we actually filmed a lot of the interviews at a solar expo and we don't attack any environmental leaders we need our environmental leaders we just are in the wrong story so most of the film shows you in their own words of what they're advocating for and what they're doing so the the you know we're the opposite of from the fossil fuel industry we're from our own side asking questions about what we say is going to save the world and I think it's it should be permitted to have discussions you know among ourselves among the people who believe in climate change that know that the environments in trouble about what's going to work and what's not going to work and that was our intent to trigger a discussion and to raise a lot of questions we don't have all the answers but we want to have a discussion about you know this is so much bigger than climate change you know we've eaten 90% of the fish in the ocean half of the wildlife have disappeared in the last 40 years primarily because of expanding logging and agriculture thousand feels is tragic but there's a lot more to our damaging the planet than just climate change and so I wanted to spark a holistic discussion about all the things we humans are doing and about whether these green technologies were even going to solve climate change let alone all of these other things that are happening around the planet so and I think looking at ourselves as a single species that's got this addiction to growth my theory is that infinite growth on a finite planet is called suicide and that's what we have to address Michael speak to that piece the addiction to growth because I mean part of why you've been you know candidly so influential in my thinking is you've had this capitalist critique that really opened my eyes in a lot of way and it seems to me like that's kind of a core piece of this film as well so to speak to that part well let's just look at our system our economic system it requires Wall Street let's put it out there Wall Street requires that every business grow from year to year if a business does really well this year it's not good enough that they do the same thing next year they have to do more which means we have to consume more buy more we have to make bigger profits and when we have a system based on profit as opposed to need the actual what do we really need what do each of us really need and what what we've signed up for by agreeing to this economic system that we have in our country is that we're supposed to need more more more more more this has and is killing this planet and we never stop to say do we have enough when is enough enough actually I think the word enough is the dirtiest word in capitalism because there's not supposed to be any such thing as enough but because we are told we need more and companies are punished by Wall Street if they don't do more and grow more growth is really the death of us and we've been saddened over the years we started really thinking about this film over a decade ago because we were we saw that this evil economic system that we have is based on greed and it's and and we saw some of our environmental groups hopping into bed with corporate America and you've seen this happen over the last decade how they're all they all they all gone green well they're all they all help the big green thing and and they saw basically that enough of us believed in green because we want to live we want this planet to live and so and so they saw wow there's the supply and demand right there the demand is for green let's give them green and let's make a lot of money off it certainly I think the failure of the movement has been to address this this serious flaw which is we are not going to save the planet or ourselves by allowing Wall Street hedge funds corporate America to be anywhere near us as we try to fix this we are in desperate shape our our environmental leaders told us a decade ago if we went past 350 parts per million of carbon in the atmosphere that was it that's the limit we were done we would not be able to reverse it we wouldn't be able to turn it back we'd be so where we have today we're at 410 420 parts per million of carbon in the atmosphere we're way beyond over and and unless somebody sounds the warning siren and that's what we're trying to do with this film we're we're never going to make it at this point and and so you know yeah as critical as we are of some people in the environmental movement or some organizations the real point here is is that it's only your friends that can tell you when you're messing up when you're doing wrong and it's and it's we are because we are the environmental movement because we've been involved in it since Jeff and I since the first Earth Day sorry to date us here but we're we we we are lifetime lifelong environmentalists and if we can't say to each other hey look we might be on the wrong path here because we're not winning this battle everybody knows it everybody watching this knows are we winning the battle against the climate emergency that we're in the middle of no so if we're not winning why don't we have the discussion on what we need to do because it cannot go on any longer right and so Michael and pic and Jeff picking up on those points Ozzie I want to get you in here which is that a critique of growth in talking about growth could lead some to surmise they are saying that we don't need any more growth or it could even lead to the idea that we need to restrict our populations our growth in many of these things is that something that the film is suggesting just help me Ozzie think through the implications of the film and its critique of growth as a species and economically our basic conception of economic growth is flawed in a big way and the reason is because actually as we grow our human and president grows there is less natural material available for us to live on so actually growth means that there is a reduction in natural material per capita worldwide as more and more people consume more and more what we need is a rethinking of that system trying to think how do we come back to a level where everyone can have what they need in order to survive which people don't have currently and also be in line with the long-term viability of the planet that we live on and so Jeff what just to get you in on that question as well I mean it sounds a bit Malthusian some of what you're suggesting here is that an act in accurate characterization what's your response to that absolutely we never use the word population control we're not in favor of population control we merely point out as there was a UN study that came out one or two years ago that just points out that the doubling of our human numbers and the quadrupling of our human economy is the prime driver of extinction on this planet is the UN favoring you know vibration control no there many scientists are pointing out the obvious but you don't read about that that much in the press anymore because it's all only focused on climate change which again is a terrible terrible issue but I think we have enough on this planet in this economy to take care of everyone and right now we're learning that the three times when climate change and thoughts of you use went down you know we're during this pandemic the days after 9/11 and during the Great Recession now we're just raising the question we've got to come to terms with this expansion we don't have the answers in the film but it is our growth and especially our growth in consumption driven by capitalism that's that's driving this this piece so and Michael let me ask you because I've you know some of the activists who have critiqued the film are people that I like that I think are acting in good faith people like Josh Fox people like Michael Mann and I think the core of their concern is this idea that if you make the problem so big if you make it such that look we really can't address the problem without sort of fundamentally structuring everything then in a sense plays into the hands of the fossil fuel industry who sort of want people to just throw up their hands ago the problems too vague let's just keep doing what we're doing is that a valid concern is that something that you grapple with no it's dangerous actually what what they want us to do is tone this thing down tamp it down so that people don't become too overwhelmed we can't just change overnight well as Jeff just said we have changed overnight haven't we in the last month we are able to make serious fundamental changes in the way we live immediately if we think we're gonna die and that has forced the majority of people to say I will do what needs to be done in order to live right now this pandemic this should teach us a lot about where we have failed when it comes to battling the climate emergency that we're in the middle of this anybody watching this think that well if we just get through this pandemic that'll be the last of this there won't be any more pandemics the Mother Nature is sending us a huge huge warning Mother Nature has sent us to our timeout rooms right now and and we're supposed to spend this time thinking about how have we messed things up so bad that in this particular case this virus left from a species that had been abused by humans and now we are suffering from this we're the ones in the cages not not the bats in China we're the ones I hope being forced to think about this and I think what you said crystals under I understand and let's make this clear we have huge admiration for all of our fellow environmentalists and people that have worked so hard in the last five decades to fix this problem the problem is it isn't fixed and all of us you know when we when we don't accomplish what we need to accomplish in our lives aren't we supposed to be somewhat self reflective somewhat self-critical and and say okay this doesn't seem to be working what do we need to do to change this and they don't want I know they don't want people to freak out so they don't want to tell them the real truths of what is happening but I have seen this from my own reporting in my own on my podcast I've talked a lot about how people are not being told the whole truth from the beginning and back in the end of February beginning of March I started saying what I knew to be true from my sources but this is a two year pandemic that's the first thing I heard from my source at the NIH this is a two year pandemic nobody wants to hear that everybody wants to hear we're all going outside in June it's all over it's not over it's not anywhere near over the six feet we were told to stay from each other it's really if you really talk to scientists who are deeply involved but they don't know how to message this it's more like 13 feet that but coronavirus it can travel farther than what they told us at the beginning at the beginning remember they just said stay away from people that are coughing and sneezing that's gone they've had to change their their story a number of times and I think from the beginning it would have been better just that people don't want to be kept in the dark they want transparency they want the truth and I think that that all of us in the environmental movement need to talk to each other we hope this film we wanted to ignite a discussion that has happened there's a lot of people in the environmental movement a lot of our fellow environmentalists that have seriously praised this film and and thank Jeff for having the courage to give us the awful truth that we don't want to hear we don't have any more time though to keep going down roads that aren't taking us to this place where we are look climate change whatever that is you want it's not really climate change anymore we're way beyond change we're in serious trouble what what has what we've all been doing hasn't worked now we need to talk about what will work instead of certain people in the environmental mom there are certain organizations that decide to they decided to hook up with corporate America with Wall Street let's let's try to get them to go green let's let's work with them there's no working with a devil here and and we the people hold the power we need to exercise that power we need the man we need to demand that this issue is on the agenda in this election year and and we need to get we need to have candidates acknowledging this and ringing ringing that warning bell loud and clear well I can tell you one thing we very much believe in the show is that people are adults they can handle the truth they deserve the truth and so we would recommend to our audience you check the film out and decide for yourself and really quick Jeff where can they find the film where can they watch it on YouTube on Rumble media or on our website planet of the humans calm great well congrats on the film guys they got all so much for joining us really interesting interview thank you appreciate you thank you and the movies free everybody so please watch it there you go you got no excuses alright next on rising Nancy Pelosi says she's open to the idea of a minimum guaranteed income and has has thanks MSNBC for their quote objective coverage that was interesting our thoughts when rising continues

Channel: The Hill

Views: 794,625

Rating: 4.6363635 out of 5

Keywords: Rising, Krystal Ball, Saagar Enjeti, 2020, Campaign, 2020 Election, Progressive, Progressive Politics, Democrats, Democratic Party, Republicans, GOP, Republican Party, New York, Cuomo, Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Covid-19, New York City, coronavirus, Michael Moore

Id: Bop8x24G_o0

Length: 17min 9sec (1029 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 28 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/kiwittnz]

Exactly ... "Infinite growth on a finite planet is suicide" says Michael Moore

[u/TreeVivalist]

Unfortunately, Jeff chickens out during the population question. The producer of a film that clearly implicates population as the primary driver of climate change can’t even speak openly about the topic out of fear for the public’s reaction. He showed courage in creating the film, and I hope he has the courage to continue to speak up rather than let the media dilute the message.

[u/collapse1122]

the only criticism is from people who were making massive money in the 'green' energy scam. now they are exposed and angry about it. also the people who don't want to hear about overconsumption and overpopulation being the main drivers