Barbie, Mattel get savagely trolled by environmental activist hoax

A group of creative climate-change activists have seized on the current Barbie-mania gripping the world to successfully draw attention to the large carbon (and now flat) footprint that the dolls make on the planet. Actress and environmental activist Daryl Hannah, working with the long-standing political prankster group the Yes Men, pulled off a pretty epic hoax at Barbie and Mattel’s expense.

Hannah starred as herself in a fake commercial, purportedly from Mattel, announcing a new plastic-free line of MyCelia EcoWarrior Barbies, inspired by environmental activists including Greta Thunberg and Daryl Hannah. The fake commercial also featured a major pronouncement that Mattel will stop using plastic completely by 2030. None of the information in the commercial was true, and Mattel in no way had any affiliation with the stunt, but that didn’t stop outlets like the Washington Times and People magazine from reporting it like it was real news (though both publications have since removed the articles).

Yahoo Entertainment! was given exclusive access to news that the ad was fake, and was first to report it on Tuesday. The activists were apparently trying to seize on the current Barbie-mania to raise awareness about the urgency of the climate crisis.

Splash actress Hannah proclaims in a press release falsely attributed to Mattel that, “I am honored to join forces with Mattel in their visionary efforts to create a better world through play. Barbie has changed in many ways since I was a girl, but under the surface, she’s still toxic. Now, when she’s done being used, instead of persisting forever as a poison Barbie will be able to return to the earth, just like all living things. I am thrilled to be a part of this exciting journey.”

The leaders of the Yes Men group, Igor Vamos and Jacques Servin (better known as their activist alter egos, Mike Bonanno and Andy Bichlbaum), had a unique reaction to the hoopla and buzz created by the new Barbie movie and its feminist theme.

“This is probably the most successful PR coup of all time when it comes to people thinking that because there are surface changes in the doll that it’s changing some fundamental dynamic in our culture, which it’s not,” Vamos told Yahoo in regards to the movie, which he has not yet seen but is planning to. “Barbie is still literally made out of oil by sweatshop workers,” he added. “But we’re caught up in identity politics and losing track of what’s happening, which is the planet is being destroyed right in front of us.”

He further elaborated that, “To say the doll is feminist now when the toy is contaminating the environment that the future of all humanity and all life depends on is kind of a colossal and bizarre joke.”

Mattel didn’t have much of a sense of humor about the stunt. A spokesperson for the toy company told Yahoo regarding the press release: “This release has nothing to do with Mattel. It is not a product and it is fabricated. This is false and inaccurate information.” The spokesperson also added, “It’s a hoax. Not sure if Ms. Hannah is really involved or not but this has nothing to do with Mattel.”

Daryl Hannah also weighed in on the controversy — explaining that she supports the feminist theme of the Barbie movie, but is also greatly concerned about the unaddressed plastic problem with the dolls.

“I feel like they’re separate issues,” said Hannah, who has not seen Barbie yet. Hannah has famously been arrested over the years for protesting issues from the Keystone XL pipeline to the razing of an urban farm in Los Angeles.

“I think it’s a great thing, actually, that Mattel is trying to join the modern world, and that they’re taking this sort of brave step to focus on changing that narrative of ‘math is hard’ … They took a big chance with a brand that’s very important to them,” she added. “But nevertheless, they are a multi-billion-dollar corporation. They have the means to be able to make an impact. They’re one of the largest toy companies in the world and toys don’t need to be made of something that poisons children, literally, and that gets into our bodies, into our systems, into our landfills, into our waterways, into every part of our life support systems.”

Mattel executives getting trolled like this feels like something that might happen to their Will Ferrell-led counterparts in the Barbie movie. Perhaps they want to take story notes? Sounds like a potential plot for the inevitable Barbie sequel!

The post Barbie, Mattel get savagely trolled by environmental activist hoax appeared first on ClutchPoints.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom campaigned on shutting down Aliso Canyon, a gas storage facility that was the site of the largest methane leak in U.S. history.

Now, five years later, his administration is poised to inject even more gas into the sandstone chamber 8,500 feet beneath north Los Angeles in a bid to stave off energy price spikes and power shortages.

He's also blessed extensions of gas and nuclear power plants that were scheduled to be closed. Keeping the lights on takes precedence over California's clean energy goals, at least for now.

Newsom is grappling with the same nuts-and-bolts challenges of running the electric grid as other blue-state officials in New York as well as the Biden administration. The pivot reflects the awkward reality faced by Newsom and other climate-minded governors: Politics moves far faster than the building of solar fields, wind farms and transmission lines, while power blackouts and electric bill spikes hit home immediately.

“If there’s a blackout, it’s the governor’s fault," said former Gov. Gray Davis (D), who was recalled in 2003 partly due to rolling blackouts and electricity price spikes during his term. "Certainly they don’t send you congratulations when you keep the power on, but ultimately they’ll hold the governor responsible for maintaining the grid.”

Newsom is scarred from not only the state's bout with two nights of rolling blackouts in 2020, when energy demand spiked during a heat wave, but the memory of a political upset 20 years ago. He's keenly aware of the political risks and the real-world consequences of outages that affect not just comfort and convenience but health, safety and the economy.

“If that comes at the expense of the lights staying on, you know, you have to be practical,” Newsom spokesman Anthony York said earlier this month of Newsom’s position on delaying the nuclear and Aliso closures.

The Newsom-appointed Public Utilities Commission is scheduled to vote Thursday on whether to approve the Aliso Canyon expansion, which would boost storage by two-thirds to nearly 69 billion cubic feet.

His administration also extended the life of three aging natural gas plants in Southern California last month and is helping keep Diablo Canyon, the state's remaining nuclear plant, open despite his prior support as lieutenant governor for closing it.

Underpinning all of the extensions is a rapidly changing energy picture on multiple fronts. Extreme weather is becoming more common, producing dramatic swings in demand and extreme events such as wildfires and floods that can abruptly wipe out transmission.

At the same time, energy demand is climbing due to a push to electrify everything from cars to homes. And new sources of renewable energy are backed up for years in permitting bottlenecks.

“Climate change is making it harder to fight climate change,” said Patty Monahan, a California Energy Commission appointee, earlier this month during a meeting on extending the natural gas plants. “As we moved from a system that was really around how we just reduced demand for electricity to a system where we say ‘No, no, let's scale up as fast as possible because that's how we clean the air,’ it's stressing our system. We are finding it really hard.”

The CPUC has been studying closing Aliso Canyon since shortly after a 2015 leak from one of the 114 storage wells at the site, which sits at the foot of the Santa Susana Mountains near the neighborhood of Porter Ranch. The leaking well spewed methane along with benzene and other compounds, sickening residents. It went on for 111 days as attempts to plug it repeatedly failed and prompted 8,000 residents to relocate. Former Gov. Jerry Brown (D) directed the agency to close it by 2027, and Newsom backed closing it even earlier when he first took office in 2019.

Regulators are bucking heavy political pressure in favor of closing the site, including from Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and the three leading candidates to succeed her, California Democratic Reps. Barbara Lee, Katie Porter and Adam Schiff.

Others are backing the move, including consumer advocates worried about natural gas shortages and price spikes.

Customers of SoCalGas, the company that owns the storage facility, saw their bills skyrocket by 128 percent from December to January, a shock the company — and the federal Energy Information Administration — attributed to widespread cold, reduced gas flows and pipeline constraints that SoCalGas said could have been moderated by additional Aliso reserves.

Environmental advocates, community organizations and at least 11 legislators are skeptical of the claims, pointing to the profits that SoCalGas’ parent company, Sempra, recorded last winter.

“Prices spiked irrespective of inventories,” state Sen. Henry Stern (D-Sherman Oaks) and 10 other lawmakers said in a letter to PUC President Alice Reynolds last week. The letter noted other supply shortages over the last 10 years were not attended by such big price hikes. The CPUC is investigating the spikes, and Newsom asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in February to launch its own probe.

A PUC analysis published a year ago identified an “undeniable” link between Aliso storage and prices not just in Southern California but across the state. A staff report suggests the commission should expect to phase out the facility between 2027 and 2035, noting the challenges of replacing it with renewable electricity, building electrification and energy efficiency improvements.

SoCalGas spokesperson Brian Haas said in a statement that the company supports the state investigation and that Thursday's expected vote will "help advance our shared goal of maintaining energy reliability at just and reasonable rates.”

Stern said he wants to see Newsom take a more aggressive stance toward Sempra.

“He’s just got to fight,” Stern said in an interview. “We’re going to need him to put the gloves on and make things a little bit uncomfortable for people and push the envelope.”

Porter Ranch residents have been flooding a PUC web page with public comments opposing the expansion and calling on Newsom to keep his word to close the site.

“It is impossible for me to tell if anything has changed or what has changed in the governor’s perspective,” said Issam Najm, a neighborhood resident and environmental engineer who is involved in the closure proceedings. “I would expect him to chime in on this situation. We have not heard from him yet.”

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