National Geographic says it 'went too far' with emaciated polar bear video

One year after a controversial videolinkedan emaciated polar bear to climate change, National Geographic has published an article on what went wrong.

Written by SeaLegacy co-founder Cristina Mittermeier, the articlepublished in National Geographic's August issue says the conservation organization "lost control of the narrative" surrounding the footage. It also says National Geographic "went too far" with the opening video caption that stated "this is what climate change looks like."

Perhaps we made a mistake in not telling the full story.- CristinaMittermeier,SeaLegacyco-founder

The story and corresponding video werepicked up internationally, including by CBCNews,in December 2017. It is still the most-viewed video on National Geographic's website, the article says. On itsYouTubechannel, the video has more than 1.6 million views.

Mittermeiersaid while she andSeaLegacyco-founder PaulNicklenhad taken photos and video of the bear on Somerset Island, Nunavut, in August 2017 to "illustrate the urgency of climate change,"it is impossible to know why the bear was sick.

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"Perhaps we made a mistake in not telling the full story that we were looking for a picture that foretold the future and that we didn't know what had happened to this particular polar bear," she wrote.

Iqaluit Mayor Madeleine Redfern, who criticized the video when it went viral, says there is still something missing from the latest article any mention of northerners or Inuit.

"It's shocking that Inuit and northerners were excluded," she said.

"It does have areal influence on worldwide views of the health and state of polar bears and it influences policy to the detriment of Inuit."

Inuit co-exist with polar bears, she said, and the animals are part of theirdiet, along with seals and whalessomething that is particularly important given food insecurity in the North.

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That point wasechoed by Nunavut polar bear monitor Leo Ikakhik. He was among those whoinitially weighed-in on the video and, at the time, saidhe suspected the bear was likely sick, old or injured.

He told CBCNews this week that Inuitareaware of the effects of climate change, including that polar bears are changing their eating habits.

"I hope for the bestbecause they're really part of our diet," he said.

"Keep the environment for our water and on the dry land, if you try to keep all that clean they can have healthy food so they can have ahealthy life."

Real-world consequences

Redfern saidthe controversy surrounding the polar bearvideo isn't just a one-off, and that misinformation or excluding Inuit from stories has real world impacts. This week, for example, she said she received angry emails about a recent bowhead whale hunt near Iqaluit.

She noted that many conservation organizations fail to include Inuit on their boards or in the management of resources.

"It's about ethnicity and it's about class and it's about money and, if anything, we're inconvenient," she said.

"Clearly the green movement has a diversity problem and [the] conservation movement has a racism problem."

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Moving forward, Redfern said the views of northerners and Inuit should be at the forefront inArctic policy development and play a strong role in the management of resources.

"I understand the Arctic is important to global citizens but at the same time we need to ensure that Southern voices, or the 'white saviour complex' based on misinformation, are not the views that dominatenational and international stories," she said.

"The imbalances and hypocrisies are endless and those must be challenged."

A media representative for Mittermeier declined a request for an interview. National Geographic did not return requests for an interview.

Conservation group releases video of polar bear on iceless land

6 years ago

Duration 1:22

Conservation group releases video of polar bear on iceless land