Science Greta Thunberg Megathread - Dax Herrera says he wouldn't have a day ago (I somewhat doubt that)

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Why is Greta Thunberg so triggering? How can a 16-year-old girl in plaits, who has dedicated herself to the not-exactly sinister, authoritarian plot of trying to save the planet from extinction, inspire such incandescent rage?

Last week, she tweeted that she had arrived into New York after her two week transatlantic voyage: “Finally here. Thank you everyone who came to see me off in Plymouth, and everyone who welcomed me in New York! Now I’m going to rest for a few days, and on Friday I’m going to participate in the strike outside the UN”, before promptly giving a press conference in English. Yes, her second language.

Her remarks were immediately greeted with a barrage of jibes about virtue signalling, and snide remarks about the three crew members who will have to fly out to take the yacht home.

This shouldn’t need to be spelled out, but as some people don’t seem to have grasped it yet, we’ll give it a lash: Thunberg’s trip was an act of protest, not a sacred commandment or an instruction manual for the rest of us. Like all acts of protest, it was designed to be symbolic and provocative. For those who missed the point – and oh, how they missed the point – she retweeted someone else’s “friendly reminder” that: “You don’t need to spend two weeks on a boat to do your part to avert our climate emergency. You just need to do everything you can, with everyone you can, to change everything you can.”

Part of the reason she inspires such rage, of course, is blindingly obvious. Climate change is terrifying. The Amazon is burning. So too is the Savannah. Parts of the Arctic are on fire. Sea levels are rising. There are more vicious storms and wildfires and droughts and floods. Denial is easier than confronting the terrifying truth.

Then there’s the fact that we don’t like being made to feel bad about our life choices. That’s human nature. It’s why we sneer at vegans. It’s why we’re suspicious of sober people at parties. And if anything is likely to make you feel bad about your life choices -- as you jet back home after your third Ryanair European minibreak this season – it’ll be the sight of small-boned child subjecting herself to a fortnight being tossed about on the Atlantic, with only a bucket bearing a “Poo Only Please” sign by way of luxury, in order to make a point about climate change.

But that’s not virtue signalling, which anyone can indulge in. As Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, and their-four-private-jets-in-11-days found recently, virtue practising is a lot harder.

Even for someone who spends a lot of time on Twitter, some of the criticism levelled at Thunberg is astonishing. It is, simultaneously, the most vicious and the most fatuous kind of playground bullying. The Australian conservative climate change denier Andrew Bolt called her “deeply disturbed” and “freakishly influential” (the use of “freakish”, we can assume, was not incidental.) The former UKIP funder, Arron Banks, tweeted “Freaking yacht accidents do happen in August” (as above.) Brendan O’Neill of Spiked called her a “millenarian weirdo” (nope, still not incidental) in a piece that referred nastily to her “monotone voice” and “the look of apocalyptic dread in her eyes”.

But who’s the real freak – the activist whose determination has single-handedly started a powerful global movement for change, or the middle-aged man taunting a child with Asperger syndrome from behind the safety of their computer screens?

And that, of course, is the real reason why Greta Thunberg is so triggering. They can’t admit it even to themselves, so they ridicule her instead. But the truth is that they’re afraid of her. The poor dears are terrified of her as an individual, and of what she stands for – youth, determination, change.

She is part of a generation who won’t be cowed. She isn’t about to be shamed into submission by trolls. That’s not actually a look of apocalyptic dread in her eyes. It’s a look that says “you’re not relevant”.

The reason they taunt her with childish insults is because that’s all they’ve got. They’re out of ideas. They can’t dismantle her arguments, because she has science – and David Attenborough – on her side. They can’t win the debate with the persuasive force of their arguments, because these bargain bin cranks trade in jaded cynicism, not youthful passion. They can harangue her with snide tweets and hot take blogposts, but they won’t get a reaction because, frankly, she has bigger worries on her mind.

That’s not to say that we should accept everything Thunberg says without question. She is an idealist who is young enough to see the world in black and white. We need voices like hers. We should listen to what she has to say, without tuning the more moderate voices of dissent out.

Why is Greta Thunberg so triggering? Because of what she represents. In an age when democracy is under assault, she hints at the emergency of new kind of power, a convergence of youth, popular protest and irrefutable science. And for her loudest detractors, she also represents something else: the sight of their impending obsolescence hurtling towards them.

joconnell@irishtimes.com
https://twitter.com/jenoconnell
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https://web.archive.org/web/2019090...certain-men-1.4002264?localLinksEnabled=false
Found this thought-provoking indeed.
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Cosmos said:
Lol, the dumb ratings you got. This entire thread is full of climate change deniers who think environmentalism is a (((globalist))) conspiracy theory and not something we should care about so our planet stays healthy and habitable. I never thought “we should regulate corporations so they can’t pollute freely to save a few bucks” and “we should try to cut down on plastic waste” would be a controversial opinion but here we are.

Also, she’s 16 years old, insulting her and shaming her just because you disagree with her isn’t a good look.
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Haha, putting words into a 16 year old's mouth and then hiding from criticism behind her isn't a good look. But I don't see many people going after her, rather her parents in most cases. You're stating an obvious fact as if its controversial and everyone else here disagrees with you.
Plastic waste has nothing whatsoever to do with climate change, why are you bringing that up? Is someone here pro-dumping plastic into the water? Did you think this was a meeting of the captain planet villians?
 
Dynastier said:
Haha, putting words into a 16 year old's mouth and then hiding from criticism behind her isn't a good look. But I don't see many people going after her, rather her parents in most cases. You're stating an obvious fact as if its controversial and everyone else here disagrees with you.
Plastic waste has nothing whatsoever to do with climate change, why are you bringing that up? Is someone here pro-dumping plastic into the water? Did you think this was a meeting of the captain planet villians?
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If this isn't that then why do I have a computer with the AI having the voice of Tim Curry?

On topic, it seemed very strange to me that this dumb Swede started being glorified by globalhomo all of a sudden. Like my granddad used to scream at my grandmom, "What are Swedes but Norwegians with their brains knocked out!?"
 
TaimuRadiu said:
If this isn't that then why do I have a computer with the AI having the voice of Tim Curry?

On topic, it seemed very strange to me that this dumb Swede started being glorified by globalhomo all of a sudden. Like my granddad used to scream at my grandmom, "What are Swedes but Norwegians with their brains knocked out!?"
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The whole point is to have a big target saying ridiculous things. They want another "those mean jerks are being mean to a little girl!" To overwhelm the debate using emotional manipulation and pull intersectionalism into it.
 
Alec Benson Leary said:
Next time you hear some blowhard complaining about overpopulation and saying that white people need to stop shitting out babies, show them the stats about the two countries with by far the highest birth rate in modern times: Nigeria and Pakistan. Then ask them to continue their point about which races are having too many babies. Watch how quickly they stammer and try to change the subject. I've seen it happen personally more than once.
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"B-but.. white children live a five planet lifestyle while Nigerian children are content to live hand-to-mouth!"-Them, probably.

Edit: "Five planet lifestyle" is from some old alarmist video called "The Story of Stuff" that alleges the average Westerner lives so lavishly that if everyone on Earth lived like us 5 Earths would be required to support it.
 
Jarolleon said:
"B-but.. white children live a five planet lifestyle while Nigerian children are content to live hand-to-mouth!"-Them, probably.

Edit: "Five planet lifestyle" is from some old alarmist video called "The Story of Stuff" that alleges the average Westerner lives so lavishly that if everyone on Earth lived like us 5 Earths would be required to support it.
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To which you can counter they are more than welcome to lead by example and get rid of their car in favor of public transportation, move to a smaller home, do without their smartphone and electronic toys that cost materials which pollute the world. Ask them why it's everyone else's job to make the hard sacrifices and they lucked out with the easy job of "spreading awareness".
 
Alec Benson Leary said:
To which you can counter they are more than welcome to lead by example and get rid of their car in favor of public transportation, move to a smaller home, do without their smartphone and electronic toys that cost materials which pollute the world. Ask them why it's everyone else's job to make the hard sacrifices and they lucked out with the easy job of "spreading awareness".
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The first step to being an insane activist is to have no self-awareness. Or they could be cynics who think the only way for people to live green en masse is if the West collapses and the world's economy with it.
 
Manwithn0n0men said:
She is a child who has been taught lies and weaponized. Thats why she makes me angry
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What if she's actually right, though, and recklessly dumping unprecedented amounts of pollutants into the air actually does represent a grave threat to life in the world?
 
AnOminous said:
What if she's actually right, though, and recklessly dumping unprecedented amounts of pollutants into the air actually does represent a grave threat to life in the world?
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Her black pilled bit on the environment is inaccurate on the facts, and inaccurate on the metaphysical truth

she represents rich (Russian and Saudi) interests in an attempt to make the world a worse place.
 
A good chunk of adult women can't even be single moms without bashing their kids' skulls in and 'accidentally' burying them in the back yard...

...and I'm expected to take one seriously that isn't even old enough to drive in most places?
 
Cosmos said:
Lol, the dumb ratings you got. This entire thread is full of climate change deniers who think environmentalism is a (((globalist))) conspiracy theory and not something we should care about so our planet stays healthy and habitable. I never thought “we should regulate corporations so they can’t pollute freely to save a few bucks” and “we should try to cut down on plastic waste” would be a controversial opinion but here we are.

Also, she’s 16 years old, insulting her and shaming her just because you disagree with her isn’t a good look.
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once again the staff (whether they are mods or supervisors) show that they are a bunch of moralfags

Way to generalize A&H, buddy. Climate change exists and has been a constant in our society since the beginning, regulating corporations to save the environment doesn't do a whole lot of shit either, and trying to spend so much money to save the environment won't do jackshit either. Environmentalist propaganda has existed for years "muh save the planet". People have been fear-mongering about this shit for years. They say all the same shit. SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT, DON'T YOU CARE ABOUT THE ENVIRONMENT?, WATCH WHAT YOU EAT, WATCH WHAT YOU DRIVE, USE SOLAR PANELS INSTEAD OF ELECTRICITY, STOP USING FOSSIL FUELS, THE WORLD WILL FALL TO A FASTER DEATH IF YOU DON'T THIS, yada, yada, yada. Nobody gives a shit, dude.

Humans should have no control over what nature does since we'll eventually get fucked over by a meteor someday. Live and let live. That's what it should be. Humans already use lots of natural resources anyway and they make more resources. Eventually, we run out of resources and the world will probably start over again. No need to prolong the inevitable of a circular cycle. As long as the self-interest of my environmental needs is met, then I could care less, not to sound selfish, but that's just reality.
 
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The Pink Panther said:
Humans should have no control over what nature does
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We already don't, we can't prevent earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, drought, flood, or a million other things that sink our ships, derail our trains and cut off our power supply by damaging the grid.

Yet, in the same breath, every bagel you toast ruins the planet just that much more.... by wrecking the climate. Which controls all those weather phenomenon.....

Maybe that's the fundamental disconnect that makes me view environmentalism with suspicion, the idea that the Earth is, at one, as fragile as a crystal plate, but hearty enough to not give a fuck about us?
 
I don't mind her. I think her efforts to bring attention to the dangers of drinking alcohol during pregnancy are commendable.

Fetal alcohol syndrome is still a big problem.
 
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