Greta pt 2 - not all about her - well, duh!

[onalongsabbatical]

Whooa I did not stay on top of this thread but it seems to have generated a great debate so let's keep it going. Of course it's not all about Greta, but talk about climate change and environmentalism. She's a catalyst. Like Joan of Arc was a catalyst in French politics, but who remembers the French politics of the early fifteenth century, tell me that? It's big names and stories that get us talking, so thanks Greta and I'm firmly in your corner.

I absolutely agree Dr

Which is why I keep saying Greta and the strikes and consumers are one part.

@marsha
Agree every little bit helps. GT is largely symbolic but symbols are important because she is a role model for today’s teenagers who will need to pick up the torch from the generation before them.

Like the Joan of Arc anaology, this effort reminds me of the medieval efforts in building a cathedral. It would take over 150yrs to build a cathedral in medieval times...and people died young then...in their 30s. Literally they’d start a cathedral knowing it would take five generations to complete it. We have a similar situation here. Our parents/Gparents started in the 50s and we have to keep that torch burning and passed to each generation if we are to succeed. GT is part of that.

potentially horrendous economic impact of radical green policies on the lives of ordinary working people?

Because I think they think the impact of NOT doing green policies will be much much worse - a "people running around eating each other while everything is on fire" type scenario.

I am 100% an environmentalist but something about GT and the way this burden is all on her shoulders makes me uncomfortable. She is right; we are in crisis and urgently need to act. However, in the likely scenario that Trump/China/India do fuck all (or do something but it's not enough), is she going to feel like she's "failed"? The message seems to be that she had an all-consuming obsession/anxiety about the planet which was only tempered by going out campaigning. But ultimately (think someone said about locus of control eaarlier) - it's not in her control to actually change policy. So what will she do? She could have a breakdown or worse.

I've had OCD at her age, bizarrely about chemicals, and used to give dramatic speeches to my parents at the dinner table about how they've "jeopardised my health" or whatever by having lead paint on the windows, etc. They could have turned me into some campaigner going around and getting rid of lead paint and asbestos. But that's also throwing fuel onto the OCD. The correct thing was to take me to counselling and get me to focus on other positives in my life, until the obsession died down. Maybe that's not so easy for GT with Aspergers, but I'd like to think her parents tried that approach rather than pinning the hopes of saving the world on her shoulders. The climate crisis is real but it's not healthy for a child to become a martyr by having it as their sole focus in life, because if she gets to 40 and it hasn't been fixed, what else has she got?

It's easy to fall down a rabbit hole about something (one of my relatives did with conspiracy theories...), but unless it's something you can change directly yourself, it's safer to get out of the rabbit hole.

Agree every little bit helps does it though? We hear that all. the. time. I'm not convinced it does.

Comparing her to Joan of Arc is terrifying. Poor kid.

I am interested in hearing more from Wally about these long haul flights it’s fine to take

It doesn’t sound right but I’m open to hearing more

does it though? We hear that all. the. time. I'm not convinced it does.

Maybe not the whole world but on a small scale, yes. And a small scale is what we should be getting back to - people working and buying food from their local community. If I pick some litter in my town it might not help the polar ice caps, but it will make walking the pavements less shit for hundreds of people. Isn't that something?

Oh I love picking up litter. But that makes our enviroment more pleasant and maybe saves some inquisitive wildlife. It does nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

And long haul flights...perhaps the cultural and personal appreciation of another country and the people of that country might do more to facilitate peace and harmony than staying in an area small enough to walk and cycle around.

Or think of it another way. What can I do, as a 50 something western woman, to really really fuck up the climate? What could I do today that is extremely damaging?

I don’t doubt that she’s genuinely passionate about climate change and is getting people talking. However, it does worry me the number of people naively spouting ‘OMG she’s so amazing, a 16 year-old girl taking on world leaders all on her own!!’ Do these people genuinely believe she hasn’t got a massive team behind her? ‘How dare you!’ was always going to be a headline grabber, and I seriously doubt it came from her.

I also have to say, I don’t think that team is doing a great job at the moment either. She’s in danger of becoming a parody of herself. She’s on the cover of GQ this month with trademark severe hair, almost comically stern expression and a top with the slogan ‘Do you HEAR me?’ She’s in danger of coming across as a bossy little girl in a TV commercial, telling her useless father ‘NO Daddy - we do the washing up BEFORE telly!’

Of course the media was always going to love the concept of a 16 year-old taking on the world. But if she wants to end up as more than a ‘Do you remember?’ segment on an I Love 💗 2019 show in the future, she needs to be more than a concept.

I can’t buy into that given the stat about killing a chunk of rainforest. Marketing says Wally but yet to be convinced.

And it’s my own enjoyment that I’m curtailing

Talking of litter, how do we all, all of us, the human race collectively, live with this on our conscience? Spot the woman.

And the river of plastic waste

clip

The strikes have reached millions so this is better than that will be in the minds of more people But they have barely touched NotLondon. Honestly!

Across the urban areas around me had so few peole in each of the latest marches that ALL of the pictures are of smiling individuals or posed group pictures with only one place kicking that trend - it is a very trendy, hip place that is already very woke, in all ways!

School strikes? Not really. Our local paper ran a headline "It's not just young people..." many because there were almost NO young people.. one picture with 5 kids, as far as I can see.

It is NOT reaching everybody. It is NOT necessarily galvanising millions, young or old, unless they are already aware and active.

Most people round here do what they do and have no interest, or financial ability, to do more! Sadly, this is NOT the great breakthrough so many want it to be. It is just another in a long line of popular/populist moments in the climate change movement.

Still millions Curious in 125 countries

It’s odd when people complain everyone isn’t doing something, despite millions, the answer is to scrap it and no one do it

The socialism is a huge turn off for me and other Americans. The track records of who is greenest and taking radical steps are the capitalist countries. The track records of the socialist countries- China, Venezuela is one of environmental devastation and going backwards to being worse polluters.

This has nothing to do with the fact they are socialist and everything to do with the fact they are developing industrial countries.

There was a time when western countries were the biggest polluters and these currently developing countries were barely polluting at all. Some of their governments now feel its unfair that they would have to limit their output for a problem that was started elsewhere.

She’s a child who I’m my opinion needs to be in school. I didn’t find her speech empowering. I found it immature and that of a child having a tantrum.

Still millions Curious in 125 countries I know you think that is grea, but you have missed my point. Millions in capital cities, very large urban areas but not necessarily the heartlands, the places such messages get lost in... the places where it is hearder to be green, harder to save anything, harder to act upon your consscience due to very real financial and social constraints!

Basically it is preaching to the converted and ignoring/not caring about the reasons why the unconverted reman so.

Blue Planet did what it could to raise awareness on single use plastics. It was probably more influential than XR or GT, I know that's not really their focus. I'm not interested in the socialist agenda of XR either.

I believe in climate change and I am not going to make nasty comments about Greta, but I also think that what she is doing is futile, if two very large countries do not STOP building coal fired power stations - China and India, because the scale of it is immense.
China are going to construct between 300 to 500 of these plants before 2030.

unearthed.greenpeace.org/2019/03/28/china-new-coal-plants-2030-climate/

Look at this map of the World

www.carbonbrief.org/mapped-worlds-coal-power-plants

Finally a couple of statistics, the Carnival cruise ship fleet emits more cancer causing gases than ALL of the passenger vehicles in Europe.

www.ft.com/content/8bceef94-86cd-11e9-a028-86cea8523dc2

The World's 15 biggest ships produce more pollution than ALL the cars in the World.

www.industrytap.com/worlds-15-biggest-ships-create-more-pollution-than-all-the-cars-in-the-world/8182

Why is it either or? Blue Planet exists so strikes / Greta go away

I disagree millions in urban centres is pointless

Maybe you can rouse the outside urban centre versions Curious

Yes and the maritime industry and China are NOT listening to Greta. I think my dd thinks by follwing GT on insta she's doing her bit for the environment. I certainly think there's some virtue signalling going on here.

Why is it either or? Blue Planet exists so strikes / Greta go away

what are you talking about?