3 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Read Gizmodo’s Article About Seaspiracy
Among the many articles now written about the original Netflix documentary Seaspiracy, is one from Gizmodo titled “Don’t Watch Seaspiracy,” which ironically calls the documentary propaganda while aligning the bias in their article with fishing industry propaganda. Let’s at least be clear about which industry has far more power and influence, and has the most at stake to preserve their reputation — the fishing industry. Do you ever critique so hard you end up making propaganda for one of the most environmentally destructive industries on earth? It seems Brian Kahn at Gizmodo has done just that, which is why the article deserves debunking.
When I was getting my B.A. in Communications from The University of Michigan, I spent a lot of time learning about propaganda and misinformation, but let’s start with the irony of telling someone not to watch something — you can’t ask for more blatant propaganda than that. Secondly, jumping into the spotlight of a popular documentary as a way to get more views for an article that largely fails to provide an actual scientific critique of the film, is just as disingenuous as they claim the film to be. I’m aware that writing this will give a bit more readers to Gizmodo’s article, as they are aware their article gives more spotlight to Seaspiracy. I’m using their language in my title to simply highlight the flaw of their entire point.
Now let’s get into it.
#1) The Gizmodo article does not even attempt to debunk scientific claims made in the documentary: “I’ll leave much of the debunking of the bad science in the film to the subject matter experts.”
Well, that’s convenient — don’t bother providing an actual scientific critique of major points in the film, just link to a Twitter thread and a pro-sustainable fisheries website which is partially funded by “some fishing companies and their affiliated NGOs.” I have a feeling Mr. Kahn missed the entire point of the film…
The pro-sustainable fisheries website posted a list of points attempting to debunk the film, some of which I found informative, yet remained skeptical. I’m glad I did. For example, one point states,
“Monitored fish populations (representing over half of the world’s catch) are, on average, increasing in abundance and have been for years.”
That claim is linked to a study published by PNAS and has a very important competing interests section that needs to be quoted: “All authors are involved in fisheries management or provide fisheries advice in ways that can be viewed as competing interests. Many are employed by national fisheries agencies or nongovernmental organizations that advocate for specific fisheries policies. The academic scientists have received funding from sources that include government fisheries agencies, fishing companies, and environmental nongovernmental organizations.”
Oh Brian, where exactly does the propaganda end?
On a related note, a study published in 2020 by researchers from the University of British Columbia, the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, and the University of Western Australia, “is the first global long-term fishery biomass trends evaluation.” Try and guess what they found…
“The study’s results are clear and worrying — there is a significant decline in average fishery biomass in all observed regions, across all oceans and climate zones. The paper underlines “systemic wide-spread overfishing of the world’s coastal and continental shelf water.” The claim is consistent with the finding that fishery catch peaked in the 1990s, and have been declining ever since.”
The pro-fisheries website even takes an issue with the claim that 46% of the plastic in the ocean comes from fishing nets. The study of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch that came to this conclusion was referring to weight, not individual pieces of plastic, which the website points out. Great point — because a single plastic straw and a fishing net big enough to trap and kill a whale is each one piece of plastic… Thanks for that reminder.
I cannot possibly go through each of the claims attempting to debunk the film, but let’s just say the scientific claims made in the film have not been widely challenged, and those that have, are largely coming from pro-fishing industry sources, which is a perfect example of propaganda.
#2) The Gizmodo article tries to redirect blame at a handful of companies: “plastic pollution is spiraling out of control from fishing gear to failed recycling programs. Overfishing is also putting pressure on the high seas, and industrial fishing is responsible for everything from slavery and human rights abuses to dumping pollution. It is literally everything humans fucking do — or more accurately, what a few large corporations do thanks to decades of political entrenchment.”
I need to take a moment to say here Brian, decades of political entrenchment by a handful of fishing companies can easily be stopped… if people stopped eating fish. We all know how industries make their money, consumerism. So by attempting to point out the corruption between industry and politics (which ironically, the film also does) you are making a case for why people should not support those industries, and eating less or no fish is certainly an obvious option, I would argue the most effective as well.
#3) The Gizmodo article derails into an emotionally defensive diatribe and suggests that going vegan is the major claim made in the movie: “Last time I checked, veganism doesn’t reduce plastic in the ocean. Nor does it end climate change or the dominance of the fossil fuel industry. I haven’t heard of it solving slavery either, but vegans, please sound off in the comments if you must.”
For starters, for those who haven’t watched the film, the word vegan is never used. Secondly, if everyone stopped eating fish, they could still be eating hamburgers, or cheese, or eggs, or any other animal product while still not eating any fish, so calling this film “vegan propaganda” is just downright ridiculous.
Finally, last time I checked Brian, a study from 2018 published in the Journal Science titled, “Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers” came to a very different conclusion than you. In fact, it is one of the largest studies to date on the impact of our food choices on the environment.
The Lead Researcher of the study, Joseph Poore of Oxford University said, “A vegan diet is probably the single biggest way to reduce your impact on planet earth, not just greenhouse gasses, but global acidification, eutrophication, land use, and water use.”
Gizmodo reminds us that many people do not like being challenged to change their behavior and instead they recommend relying on government solutions, or even the industries themselves, to suddenly develop a conscience. The reality is, that’s just an excuse to avoid taking personal responsibility for a problem we all contribute to. Vote with your dollar, and corrupt industries will change faster than we can make documentaries about them.
