In an eye-opening exchange, John Stossel sits down with Jon Entine, an award-winning journalist and Executive Director of the Genetic Literacy Project, to debunk what they call the media‑driven “bee‑pocalypse.” For years, headlines have warned that pesticides—especially neonicotinoids—are wiping out honeybee populations, threatening our food supply and ecosystem. But as Entine reveals, the actual data tells a very different story.
“The real science is nuanced. Bees face challenges, but they are not going extinct—and pesticides are not the primary problem,” said Entine, underscoring the disconnect between public perception and scientific reality. Instead, Entine points to a combination of factors affecting bee health, including habitat loss, parasites like the varroa mite, and changing agricultural practices.
Entine exposes how advocacy groups have amplified selective studies, downplayed contradictory findings, and leveraged panic to push for sweeping bans and to raise funds. “There’s been a lot of cherry-picking of the science by environmental groups that want to push a precautionary principle agenda,” adds Entine.
Transcript:
Environmental groups are now rich.
In 2020 (the most recent data available), they collected $8 billion in donations.
$8 billion!
“The environmental industrial complex actually has more money in the PR game, the lobbying game, than the real industry,” says physicist Mark Mills in my new video. “Insufficient attention is paid to following the money.”
He’s right.
Go to their websites.
“DONATE” appears first. Sometimes it explodes onto your screen.
You’d think they were poor and desperate.
But they’re rich.
They get richer by peddling deceit.
“Polar bears face extinction and bees are dying off!”
It’s not true.
Polar bear and bee populations are increasing.
“These scares drive donations,” says science writer Jon Entine. “They feel that the only way they can talk about environmental issues is to frame it with hysteria, crisis.”
“But they’re not trying to trick people,” I push back. “They believe it.”
“Sometimes they believe it,” he says, “but they also recognize that hysteria generates donations. The oxygen for these organizations is money donated by people who think they’re doing good.”
So, you give them billions.
You think your money goes to “doing good,” like cleaning up rivers or parks? Most of Big E spends very little on that.
Your donations to the World Wildlife Fund pay for its 250,000-square-foot headquarters with its “stunning eight-story, sky-lit atrium.”
The Natural Resources Defense Council holds galas with fashion brands and celebrities. They get Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Redford to make commercials for them.
But what bothers me most is the damage they do.
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Sierra Club spend your donations on lawyers. The NRDC filed a new lawsuit every 10 days.
The Center for Biological Diversity has more than 70 active lawsuits, while their executive director brags, “We do more environmental litigation than any other environmental group in the country.”
“They have billions of dollars to not build a thing, but just to oppose building things,” complains Mills.
“There’s a rich sense of irony there,” says the director of energy and environmental policy studies at the Cato Institute, Travis Fisher.
“Irony because while they say they’ll save the bees, ultimately, that donation goes to a lawyer suing someone, preventing you from using gasoline.”
The Sierra Club brags: “Our legal team has stopped thousands of miles of fossil fuel pipelines and dozens of large power plants.”
But pipelines are better for the Earth than shipping oil by truck.
America needs power plants to power our future, including nuclear plants. But last year, Friends of the Earth sued to shut down Diablo Canyon, California’s last nuclear plant.
The NRDC, Sierra Club, and Defenders of Wildlife even sue to stop solar and wind farms. They claim, for example, that California’s Calico solar project would destroy the habitat of desert tortoises.
Once upon a time, the big threat to development was NIMBY: Not In My Back Yard.
Today, it’s BANANA: Build Absolutely Nothing, Anywhere, Near Anyone.
“What that means is we don’t get the lifestyle that we want,” says Fisher. “If you wanted to build a new house, what kind of permits do you have to get? Who do you have to talk to? Is the Sierra Club going to sue?”
I’m ashamed that I once fell for their scams. WCBS TV even ran ads promoting my environmental reporting with a headline that said, “If you wore a gas mask…you might be better off.”
Now I realize that the big environmental groups fed me lies.
Today, they mostly stop progress and make lawyers richer.
I invited the big groups to bring a spokesman to my studio and tell me why I’m wrong. None would agree.
“It’s a shame, says Fisher, “When I think about what America could be, what we could be building, we could be so prosperous, so much more prosperous than we are.”
Jon Entine is the Executive Director of the Genetic Literacy Project and a life-long journalist with 20 major journalism awards. Follow him on X @JonEntine
John Stossel is an author, columnist, investigative reporter, and television host with over 40 years of experience. He is best known for being the former co-anchor of 20/20. Find John on X @JohnStossel
This video was previously posted at Reason and is reposted here with permission. Any reposting should credit both the GLP and original source. Find Reason on X @reason
