A conservative politician has been slammed for holding up the animated Ice Age movies as proof that man-made global warming is fake.
Nicole Mueller-Boder, a would-be MP for the nationalist-conservative Swiss People’s Party (SVP), made the comment on Twitter.
Mueller-Boder, who hopes to win a seat in Swiss Parliament representing the Canton of Aargau, was responding to a one day strike by thousands of Swiss schoolchildren in protest at global warming.
She wrote: “If the children know the film ‘Ice Age’ and see there was an ice age, and that in the sequel it melted away again, before there were any cars or industry, they’ll learn that climate change has always existed.”
But the politician was widely mocked for simplifying the issue and for downplaying the dangers of man-made global warming.
Journalist Reda al Arbi commented: “Ice Age is her scientific source to deny man-made global warming…”
He added sarcastically that he would “reject the scientific work of all universities immediately and join in her view”.
Netizen ‘Simon Bieri’, referring to one of the Ice Age movies’ best-loved characters, Scrat, asked: “Will Mueller-Boder also be blaming a squirrel for causing the continents to drift apart?”
And ‘Ae’ wrote: “Arguing like the member of the SVP who looks out the window, sees snow and says ‘there is no climate change’ is of course not enough.”
Responding to her critics, Mueller-Boder said: “The discussion is completely meaningless as we will not be having an ice age in the coming decades.
“My contribution was intended to show that primary school pupils do not come into contact with the subject of climate change on their own initiative and if they do, then at most through the film Ice Age.”
However, Mueller-Boder insisted that she still believed that climate change could not be attributed to mankind alone.
The Swiss People’s Party currently has 65 seats in the Swiss National Council of 200 seats in total, making it the biggest party.
The Ice Age movies, produced by Blue Sky Studios, part of 20th Century Fox, focus on a group of animals surviving the Palaeolithic ice age and have themselves been criticised for showing little concern for scientific accuracy.
Five have been released so far. Ice Age in 2002, Ice Age: The Meltdown in 2006, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs in 2009, Ice Age: Continental Drift in 2012, and Ice Age: Collision Course in 2016.
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Story By: Koen Berghuis, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News
