Shell called out for promoting fossil fuels to youth via Fortnite game::Climate activists condemn oil giant for paying influencers to showcase marketing game from new gasoline campaign

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    1 year ago

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    Climate activists are calling out Shell for partnering with popular video gamers and online youth influencers to promote fossil fuels to a younger generation.

    The oil giant, which in July reported quarterly profits of more than $5bn (£3.9bn), worked with Fortnite creators and paid popular gamers on multiple platforms to showcase its “ultimate road trips” promotion, part of a marketing campaign for a new gasoline it calls V-Power Nitro+.

    According to the group Media Matters for America, the company is targeting young players on Twitch, TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, encouraging them to fill up virtual vehicles at interactive Shell gas stations and post screenshots of the game with a #Shellroadtrips hashtag.

    Aru Shiney-Ajay, executive director of advocacy group Sunrise Movement, whose student members staged a climate sit-in at then-speaker Kevin McCarthy’s office last week, also criticized the promotion.

    They are sitting in at [Republican party] offices and organizing to make their school boards teach the truth about the climate crisis and the fossil fuel industry’s role.”

    A 2020 article in Wired highlighted issues ranging from the manufacture of largely plastic consoles at Chinese factories powered by fossil fuels, to their intensive energy use during comparatively short lifetimes, and mass dumping in landfills when they are discarded.


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