To let my DD go on strike on Friday? (Youth Strike for Climate Change protest)

[PuppyMonkey]

She’s very passionate about the environment and has even been suffering from anxiety worrying about the future of the planet. I think it’ll be good for her to attend the local protest march on Friday.

She’s written a brilliant letter to her form teacher expressing her reasons for wanting to go. The teacher said “thanks for this, it’s great.” I’ve also emailed the head informing him she intends to strike, no response yet.

Am I going to get a massive fine?

I think she has a basic right to peaceful protest. Am I wrong?

She’s in Year Seven.

Call me a cynic, but whenever I see these groups of climate change protesting teenagers, I do cheer them on, but I wonder how many of them will be flying off to travel the world on their gap yah in a couple of years..

Call me a cynic too

Schools usually make such a fuss about time off there is absolutely no way they should allow any student to miss school for this imo.

I think it's good that the kids feel they take ownership of this, hopefully it will set them on a lifetime of political involvement- and it's sounds like life is going to get complicated over the next few years . . .

Even though some stuff is quite simplistic (cotton buds rather than the carbon footprint of pets for eg) it's better to let them think it through themselves

All the kids in Edinburgh got an email today saying they were authorised to go and strike if they wanted.

I'd let her go anyway though.

Thanks for the views everyone.

Ken, she’s actually been a lot better since finding out about this event and pledging to go along. More positive and sort of empowered because others feel the same as her. She feels she’s doing something and she’s not alone in her worries. Yep I totally understand the cynicism from some, but I think she has a right to express her concern.

I don’t think she’ll do a gap year tbh, we’re too skint.

I would, it's good for young people to engage politics

On a practical level, I’ve written the email to the head and DD has handed in her letter to school - but should I also call in and leave a message on the absence line on Friday morning saying “she’s not coming in today, she’s on strike .”???

Or just leave it because we’ve notified them in writing...?

It's a day off school with her friends. Lots of fun. But if the protests are successful then it won't be fun - it'll be very painful for us in our comfortable Western lives.

Would she:

• Be prepared to give up the family dog/cat if you have one? Pets have a huge impact on the environment - more so than almost anything else we do.

• Have a cold house in the winter

• Pay to use renewable energy instead of carbon-based - even if not subsidised by government

• Use public transport or walk/bicycle all the time. No private car journeys anywhere

• Never fly on holiday

• Only buy second hand clothes.

• Not work in any industry that isn't carbon neutral

... and many more. An no, it's not unreasonable to ask these questions because they are effectively what is being demanded by the strikers.

None of her friends are going, latebreakfast.

As for your other points, time will tell - she’s only 12, so this is just the start of her life. As I said, She’s never been on a plane for one thing, our family haven’t flown since 1999.

Mine went to one of the Friday strikes and the whole thing was brilliant! I was hugely inspired by the passionate youth, like I once was before I got jaded and cynical.

However, they're below the attendance targets at the mo so they'll miss it this time.

Those talking about gap yah kids and 'would your kid be prepared to give up xyz' - my feeling is that a lot of those on the march will be listening hard and as a result encouraging their families not to book flights in the future, questioning how changes can be made at home etc etc. Not all of them I'm sure but the speeches and general level of feeling at these events are pretty compelling.

If you've let them know in writing already I don't think you need to ring the school too

I think she has a right to express her concern

And you're absolutely right, even if with 12 year olds it's very often ill digested cant. But there are endless ways she can do it without bunking off school, so maybe encourage her to use one of those?

And don't forget to insist on her using ethical transport for optional activities, rather than expecting lifts ... you'll soon find out just how "committed" she really is

FFS, of course she should go.

Especially if she suffers from anxiety about the future. Being politically active alleviates anxiety because it makes her feel that she is changing the future.

All the pickiness about how she's getting there... it's about urging the government to make change at a societal level as well as encouraging individuals.

She's striking about something which is is very important. Send her my luck OP.

I thought I’d misread latebreakfast’s post for a second. If the protests aren’t successful what then? Climate breakdown isn’t just going to go away and the results will be a hell of a lot more painful - they already are for people in countries like Mozambique.
It really winds me up, too, this insistence on moral purity before anyone can try and bring about change. It basically means ‘go away and shut up’. I mean, people seriously think that teenagers’ (IMO well-founded) criticisms of governments around the world failing to act on climate change should be ignored because said teenagers got a bus to the protest?

I think this Friday is the wrong day to do it. There will be minimal publicity given the Brexit saga and the European elections.

And conventional climate marches on Saturday have been going on for decades without having a tenth of the impact of the global school strikes, so if you think them missing one or two days of school is more important than trying to keep the planet in a state to be able to support the human population we have, I think your priorities are a bit skewed.

I wouldn’t let her go. It makes my blood boil when I see children at protests. Her time will come.

She’d be better focusing her time on her education to actually gain qualifications that will help her work in industry to reduce the effects of climate change. Rather than adding to it.

ForalltheSaints yes it’s unfortunate timing but it’s been planned for ages as a global date in about 100 countries.

I don’t know why people think that going into a career that helps climate change and attending school strikes are mutually exclusive. And given the timetable we’re on, by the time a 12 year old graduates, if we’re still on the current path it will be too late to avoid catastrophic climate change. Young people know that.

Teenagers at the moment have very little to give up

Hair straighteners
Fast fashion
Lifts to activities
The latest phone or other gadget
Food waste
Littering/recycling
All areas in which teenagers can control what they do, even if they can't control what anyone else does.

should I also call in and leave a message on the absence line on Friday morning saying “she’s not coming in today, she’s on strike
Yes phone in, the office staff might not have had the letter passed on.

it'll be very painful for us in our comfortable Western lives
Not as painful as food and water shortages with large parts of the whole uninhabitable will be though
What a ridiculous attitude’oh it’s hard so let’s not bother and all starve to death instead’

I’d say no. DD and her pals were talking about it as an excuse for a ‘day off’.