Bill Nye scorches ears while torching the globe

Welp. Bill Nye’s appearance on John Oliver’s Sunday night show on HBO created quite a stir on social media Monday as a video clip of Nye’s over-the-top performance circulated on Twitter. Most notable, at least to me, is Nye’s excessive use of the f-word. In a short 37 seconds, he tossed two f-bombs and one motherf***er.

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The woke crowd absolutely loved it and Nye was trending on Twitter Monday. Actress and far left activist Alyssa Milano re-tweeted Nye’s performance. She says he’s “awesome”.

Clearly, Bill Nye was going for a shock and awe kind of scene. Climate change isn’t an unusual topic for him to talk about, as he’s been doing that for years, but the unusual part was the vulgarity used in making his point. It was a desperate attempt to be heard yet how many non-believers do you think he convinced with that little tirade? I’d venture to say he was preaching to the climate change choir and no one else took him seriously.

Nye’s demonstration was part of a longer segment devoted to the Green New Deal and carbon pricing.

Oliver first outlined the case for the Green New Deal, the environment and jobs proposal introduced by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. “To its eternal credit, the Green New Deal has succeeded in getting people talking, but that won’t mean anything unless that talk turns into action,” Oliver said.

“We’re going to need a lot of different policies working tandem, and we have to take action right now,” the comedian said, towards the end of the segment. “But you don’t have to just take that from me. Instead, I’m happy to say Bill Nye has actually agreed to drive the urgency home at this point by actually doing one of his enjoyable, lighthearted demonstrations.”

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Did Nye “drive the urgency home” though? It was more of a comedy skit than anything more substantial. I’m up for silly demonstrations as much as the next person but he missed the mark with this. I enjoyed the blow torch setting the globe on fire. That action made his point that the world is on fire. (It’s not.) I grew up watching Lucille Ball and the Three Stooges, all masters of slapstick comedy. Nye’s skit was just meant to shock, not entertain. Cursing and scolding the audience doesn’t win anyone over.

As the globe burns, he declares: “I didn’t mind explaining photosynthesis to you when you were 12, but you’re adults now. This is an actual crisis, got it?” Nye’s expletive-laden rant was received with laughter from the audience. Oliver ends the episode by joking that he’s “absolutely on board” with Nye’s “gritty reboot.”

John Oliver’s weekly show on HBO is popular with millennials. They grew up with Bill Nye the Science Guy. They watched his PBS show and enjoyed his crazy experiments because they were entertaining for young minds. Nye has outgrown all that now, though, and he’s trying to stay relevant while appealing to his former audience. The kids have grown up, you know, and now he has to appeal to them in as adults. He moved to Netflix in 2017 with his Bill Nye Saves the World show that targets the kids who grew up with him. The show has had three seasons so far.

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Gone was the Nye of the ’90s, the man whose show was a middle school substitute teacher’s secret weapon. This was the Science Guy of 2019, delivering a sermon aimed directly at the legions of Gen Xers and Millennials who were weaned on Nye’s brand of wacky pedagogy.

Nye has gone from wacky science professor and wannabe comedian to political activist. He’s fully on board with the Green New Deal. He was a part of the March for Science in April 2017. It was a time for him to advertise his new show and to scold climate change skeptics.

In April 2017, he took the stage at the March for Science in Washington and declared that “science is for all,” the best antidote to anti-vaxxers and climate deniers alike.

“Our lawmakers must know that science serves every one of us,” he said then. “Every citizen of every nation in society. Science must shape policy. Science is universal. Science brings out the best in us. With an informed, optimistic view of the future, together we can — dare I say it — save the world!”

In his political activism, Nye sounds like all the other liberals who want to curb behavior with the use of taxes. This always ends up hurting the lower income and middle-class population more than the wealthy, but that doesn’t seem to matter. Carbon emissions have been cut above America’s goals already and without passing a carbon tax.

In a separate segment during which Oliver enlisted Nye to help explain carbon pricing — a proposal to charge emitters of greenhouse gases more for their pollution — to give one of his signature demonstrations.

‘When we release carbon, say, by burning coal or driving an SUV, all of us pay for that in the form of things like fires, floods and crop failures,’ said Nye.

‘Putting a fee on carbon creates incentives to emit less carbon, and, more importantly, it also incentivizes the development of low-carbon technology, which is huge, because that’s vital to reducing emissions globally.’

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Bill Nye may think he’s saving the world but his science is off here. Hide the kids.

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Ed Morrissey 10:00 PM | December 12, 2024
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