Maldives: Satire is Hurtful

You remember the Maldives? The string of twenty-six small islands is frequently portrayed as the entity most threatened by climate change as rising sea levels would submerge them. The Maldivians adapted well to their poster child image and have done their level best to extract pity and money but especially money from the developed world. They held a mock climate change treaty signing underwater prior to the failed climate conference in Copenhagen. The Maldivian are serious people not given to levity, at least at their own expense. As part of a hoax following
Times Comprehensive Atlas Of The World decision to produce a map suggesting that Greenland has lost 15 per cent of its ice cover in the last twelve years, James Delingpole of London Daily Telegraph wrote:

"All right, it may not be strictly geographically accurate to say the Maldives and Tuvalu will definitely have disappeared in about ten years time when our next edition appears," said Times Atlas spokesman David Rose. "But did you see that picture of the Maldives cabinet holding a meeting underwater? If the Maldives government says the Maldives are drowning, they must be drowning. And frankly I think it's despicable, all those deniers who are saying it was just a publicity stunt, cooked up by green activist Mark Lynas, to blackmail the international community into giving the Maldives more aid money while simultaneously trying to lure green Trustafarians to come and spend £1500 a night in houses on stilts with gold-plated organic recyclable eco-toilets made of rare earth minerals from China. Why would a government lie about something as serious as climate change?"

The probably don't get Saturday Night Live in the Maldives but maybe someone should send them a couple of DVD's and in the future the government would not embarrass itself by demanding a retraction and an apology which was the exact government response. The Maldives' acting high commissioner in London has written to the newspaper's editor seeking a clarification and apology. He said "the post had implied that his country's climate change plight was a con-trick, and this was despicable and hurtful."

"Hurtful"? Did this guy major in women studies? Let me end this post with another quote from Delingpole without comment.

"Though full details of the Uber Rogue Trader – known only by his initials B.O. – have yet to be released, he is believed to be either of Hawaiian or Kenyan birth, with a plausible speaking manner and a deceptive aura of competence and gravitas. He is said to be "coolly unrepentant" about his crime, which, he claims, he was only doing to provide "hope and change" to his 200 million victims."