The month of March has seen unprecedented heat and temperatures. A rational thinking, scientifically-grounded individual could only posit, “Well, hmm, I bet climate change has something to do with the fact that in Madison, WI, it is 80 degrees in mid-March. Sometimes it’s 60 or 70 degrees colder than this!”

While that individual would be positing something that is the well-accepted scientific consensus, in some states, under law, that is only a “controversial theory among other theories.”

Welcome to Tennessee, which on March 19th became the fourth state with a legal mandate to incorporate climate change denial as part of the science education curriculum when discussing climate change.

First it was Louisiana, back in 2009, then Texas in 2009, South Dakota in 2010 and now Tennessee has joined the club, bringing the total to four U.S. states that have mandated climate change denial in K-12 “science” education. 

Many other states could follow in their footsteps as well, given that, as DeSmogBlog exposed in late-January, this is an American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) model bill, a near miror image of its Orwellian-titled “Environmental Literacy Improvement Act.”[PDF]

The machinations of ALEC are best explained by the Center for Media and Demoracy‘s “ALEC Exposed” project.

The ALEC bill passed as H.B. 368 and S.B. 893, with 70-23 and 24-8 roll call votes, respectively. Tennesse Republican Governor Bill Haslam is likely to sign the bill into law soon.

The ALEC Model Bill

As DeSmogBlog reported in January, the Tennessee bill is based on an ALEC model bill passed in May 2000. We explained at the time,

“The bill’s opening clause reads [PDF], ‘The purpose of this act is to enhance and improve the environmental literacy of students and citizens in the state by requiring that all environmental education programs and activities conducted by schools, universities, and agencies shall…’

• Provide a range of perspectives presented in a balanced manner.
• Provide instruction in critical thinking so that students will be able to fairly and objectively evaluate scientific and economic controversies.
• Be presented in language appropriate for education rather than for propagandizing.
• Encourage students to explore different perspectives and form their own opinions.
• Encourage an atmosphere of respect for different opinions and open-mindedness to new ideas.
• Not be designed to change student behavior, attitudes or values.
• Not include instruction in political action skills nor encourage political action activities.”

To summarize, under this model bill and its relatives, global warming will be taught as a “theory” among other “credible theories,” including those unscientific “theories” peddled by the well-paid “merchants of doubt.” 

This, of course, flies in the face of the well-accepted scientific consensus, which has proven global warming as the harsh reality, time and time again. The science speaks for itself, and the fossil fuel money funding climate change deniers speaks for itself.  

The Tennessee Bill

Key portions of the Tennessee bills are as follows (emphases mine):

• “The teaching of some scientific subjects, including, but not limited to,biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and humancloning, can cause controversy.”
• “The state board of education, public elementary and secondary school governing authorities, directors of schools, school system administrators, and public elementary and secondary school principals and administrators shall endeavor to create an environment within public elementary and secondary schools that encourages students to…respond appropriately and respectfully to differences of opinion about controversial issues.”
• Neither the state board of education, nor any public elementary or secondary school governing authority, director of schools, school system administrator, or any public elementary or secondary school principal or administrator shall prohibit any teacher in a public school system of this state from helping students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught.”

Look familar? It should. 

The bill was opposed by a broad-based coalition, including the National Association of Biology Teachers, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, the American Institute for Biological Sciences, the Knoxville News Sentinel, the Nashville Tennessean, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, the National Earth Science Teachers Association, the Tennessee Science Teachers Association, and all eight Tennessee members of the National Academy of Sciences.

These voices of reason were no opposition to ALEC, its corporate backers, and the politicians who serve them, which saw the bill pass with little opposition whatsoever. 

A Review: Bill Written By and For Corporate Polluters

We wrote this back in January:

“The money paper trail for this ALEC model bill runs deep, to put it bluntly. 

When the ALEC model bill was adopted in 2000 by ALEC‘s Natural Resources Task Force, the head of that committee was Sandy Liddy Bourne, who after that stint, became Director of Legislation and Policy for ALEC. She is now with the Heartland Institute as vice-president for policy strategy. In Sandy Liddy Bourne’s bio on the Heartland website, she boasts that “Under her leadership, 20 percent of ALEC model bills were enacted by one state or more, up from 11 percent.” 

SourceWatch states that Liddy Bourne ‘…is the daughter of former Nixon aide and convicted Watergate criminal G. Gordon Liddy, who spent more than 52 months in prison for his part in the Watergate burglary…[and her] speech at the Heartland Institute’s 2008 International Conference on Climate Change was titled, ‘The Kyoto Legacy; The Progeny of a Carbon Cartel in the States.’

The Heartland Institute (of Heartland Exposed infamy) was formerly heavily funded by ExxonMobil and Koch Industries, just like ALEC was at the time that Liddy Bourne’s committee devised the ‘Environmental Literacy Improvement Act.’ These two corporations are infamous for their funding of climate change “skeptic” think tanks and front groups.  

Today, the corporate polluter members of ALEC‘s Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force include representatives from American Electric Power, the Fraser Institute, the Cato Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Institute for Energy Research, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, the Heartland Institute, and the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, to name several.”

Getting Them While They’re Young: A Cynical Maneuver 

DeSmogBlog stands by what it wrote in January:

“Maneuvering to dupe schoolchildren is about as cynical as it gets. Neuroscience explains that young brains are like sponges, ready to soak in knowledge (and disinformation, for that matter), and thus, youth are an ideal target for the “merchants of doubt.”

The corporations behind the writing and dissemination of this ALEC model bill, who are among the largest polluters in the world, would benefit handsomly from a legislative mandate to sow the seeds of confusion on climate science among schoolchildren.”

Looks like its four down, 46 states to go for ALEC.

The fight has only just begun.