Et Tu Ranger Rick?

My eldest (9) has had a subscription to Ranger Rick for about as long as I can remember (and I'm sure as long as he can), mostly because at an early age he has expressed a great interest in animals and his grandmother has been kind enough to give him the continuing subscription. If you ask him what he want to be when he grows up, he doesn't say fireman or policeman or astronaut, he says "Marine Biologist". How am I to argue with that?

Not that I have any desire to. Often he come to me and give me some outrageous animal fact like: did you know that a Camel can do spit 100 yards? (OK, I made that up, but you get the idea) I used to tell him 'that can't be right' until he hands me his Ranger Rick. Now I have learned that he probably knows more than I do about animals and I should just trust him.

On the whole Ranger Rick has been a great asset to him and I am happy to have it in my home, and really haven't given it a second thought. However, (you knew this was coming , right?) yesterday what do I see on my counter but his Ranger Rick on the cabinet opened to a page Entitled "What's Up with Global Warming" by Gerry Bishop. Crap! Can't they just stick to animals? Of course 'What's Up' is that Humans are causing the earth to warm because of all the CO2 that we put into our environment. And if we don't drastically reduce our use of fossil fuels it will be a disaster. Did they present the other side? Did they state that there is a growing number of reputable scientists that doubt that Global Warming is caused by humans? Is it possible that Global Warming could be a good thing? Is there a 'right temperature' that earth should be at? Nope, not one word.

Ranger Rick's young readers now know as a fact (because they trust Ranger Rick to be right - even when their own parents didn't know things that are in the magazine) that Global Warming will be a disaster and it is being caused by humans. I started explaining this to my children at supper yesterday and I got this interesting question, 'What does bias mean, daddy?' Do you see how influential our children are? be sue to fill them with the right stuff.

Upon further examination their website is full of Scary Global Warming 'Facts' and even links to Greenpeace. I suppose I should not have been so naive. It's still sad to see how acceptable it is for a magazine as reputable as this to push an agenda on our children, and that they have bought into our non-thinking culture. Ranger Rick will continue to come to my home, but I will spend a bit more time looking it it myself. Maybe then I will be able to tell you some cool stuff you didn't know about animals...