Bookmarks
Key
Download PDF

Extracts from Ofcom Complaint, by Category: Misrepresentation of People’s Views

1. Extracts From Complete Transcript and Rebuttal

[Patrick Moore]	The environmental movement has evolved into the strongest force there is for preventing development in the developing countries.
[James Shikwati]	We are being told: “don’t touch your resources; don’t touch your oil; don’t touch your coal.” That is suicide.
[Patrick Moore]	I think it’s legitimate for me to call them anti-human – like, okay, you don’t have to think humans are better than whales, or better than owls, or whatever, if you don’t want to, right; but surely it is not a good idea to think of humans as sort of being scum, you know – that it’s okay to have hundreds of millions of them go blind, or die or whatever. I just can’t relate to that.

[Comment 136: Again, (see previous comments, especially Comment 123, page 104 [of the full complaint]), this statement is either extremely ill-informed or profoundly and intentionally misleading. Furthermore, it is an extreme ad hominem attack (an ad hominem is a logical fallacy, which consists of replying to an argument by attacking the person making the argument, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument).

Moore’s comments are also a further example of the “straw man” logical fallacy (see Comment 132, page 31) since very few (if any) members of the environmental movement hold the views he ascribes to them. The remarks are also deeply offensive and slanderous to many millions of people, but are unlikely to be actionable since no individuals are named. It is in clear breach of Section 7 of the Ofcom Broadcasting Code.]

(In breach of the 2003 Communications Act Section 265, Ofcom 5.4, 5.5, 5.7, 5.11, 5.12, 7.2, 7.3, 7.6, 7.9)

[Bookmarks on this page: Click the following link to go to that bookmark. You can then copy and paste the bookmark’s url from your address bar, and send it to someone as a link straight to that bookmark:
Comment 136: Extreme ad hominem attack on environmentalists, using a straw man argument ’]


Page 33 of 50	Final Revision	Last updated: 11 Jun 2007