Commotion: Attenborough’s Comments on Famine
The Claim
English wildlife broadcaster David Attenborough said that sending food to poverty-stricken regions is foolish.
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Emerging story
David Attenborough has been narrating nature documentaries for decades, such as the popular Planet Earth and its sequel. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, Attenborough said, among other things, that sending flour to famine-strike regions is “barmy” (a primarily British word for foolish). Several articles were written about the interview, some containing headlines like “David Attenborough: trying to tackle famine with bags of flour is 'barmy' or “Attenborough: Food aid to African famine is 'barmy”. While this interview was conducted several years ago, social media users still perpetuate this claim.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar’s investigation found that many of these headlines take Attenborough’s comment out of context. In the interview, he never claimed that sending food to famine-stricken regions is foolish. What he actually said is that food aid alone isn’t going to stop famines.
He proposes that measures like providing birth control and sex education are also essential to helping these regions. Reducing overpopulation is as necessary as food aid, he maintains. This would lessen the amount of food the famine-stricken regions need and could prevent famines in the future. With this context, Attenborough's comments are quite different from what many claim.
