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

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

https://web.archive.org/web/2019090...certain-men-1.4002264?localLinksEnabled=false
Found this thought-provoking indeed.

 

[kidatari]

good for her

 

[Water-T]

Lol china can barely throw it's weight around in it's own region, nevermind another continent. The strongest military in the world struggles to gain victory over sandniggers in the mountains and gooks in the jungle, so I highly doubt China will have any success. China might enslave Africa economically, but for them to start being that oppressive they would need military power there as well.

If the fucking Dutch were able to come in and colonize most of South Africa, then I think China won't have a problem. Remember, Africa is full of black people still fighting and killing each other simply because they are from different regions. So it'll be like coming in after two ret@rds have worn themselves out slap-fighting each other.

 

[Dolphin Lundgren]

See this shit just creeps me out. Why the fuck do you have a collage of pictures of a little girl, and how many times has your mother told you to stop masturbating to the giant version of it you have on your basement wall?

They're making murals of her on buildings as well. The whole thing freaks me out.

 

[VHD2012]

As if the Church had enough problems with people losing their faith in God. We are long overdue for a good smiting

The church and the elite among the chosen ones might as well be the same entity they both push the same crap on everyone.
Its like the catholic church, the white european elite elite, and the elite jewish israeli dual citizens all have the exact same agenda and all work in tandem with this weird shit they keep shoving down everyones collective throat.

 

[Matthew216]

Marxpope Francis has nothing to do with Catholicism and everything to do with the Davos Economic Forum, his new god.

It’s no surprise that we are in a new Dark Ages. Extreme ignorance is everywhere but now it’s being spread through schools. We need a new renaissance, but only something like viable space travel could actually do such a thing as far as I know.

 

[Ahriman]

 

[The best and greatest]

They normally don't retire, they are expected to die on the job. When Benedict stepped down, certain things happened.

Lightning Bolt hits Vatican TWICE at the night of Benedict's resignation

Perhaps someone was upset?

As for the current Pope, sometimes he does things I approve of, and sometimes he doesn't. The stuff he does that I don't is REALLY bad, and that's why I tend to think he's in trouble. Wasn't Benedict supposed to be the culmination of some kind of prophecy?

There's one of those Nostradamus prophecies about men turning away from the pope and abandoning the church or something.

 

[teriyakiburns]

There's one of those Nostradamus prophecies about men turning away from the pope and abandoning the church or something.

There's a nostrodamus prophecy about everything if you squint at his witterings hard enough.

 

[LordofTendons]

There's a nostrodamus prophecy about everything if you squint at his witterings hard enough.

Quasimodo predicted all this.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

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An upper middle class Swede like her would never, ever acknowledge this.

 

[Matthew216]

There's a nostrodamus prophecy about everything if you squint at his witterings hard enough.

No this was different. It was about a guy who ho predicted symbolically all the popes by name and action up to the one who would be last, and Bendict was at it near the end.

 

[teriyakiburns]

No this was different. It was about a guy who ho predicted symbolically all the popes by name and action up to the one who would be last, and Bendict was at it near the end.

The prophecy of the popes is a list of vague references to papal crests or mottos and is only accurate up to 1590. It's pretty obviously a forgery written around that time. Everything after that date bears little or no resemblance to any reigning pope.

It certainly didn't "predict" Benedict.

 

[Webby's Boyfriend]

View attachment 970925

There is no way like this can be a normal healthy 16-year-old Swedish lass.

 

[Kane Lives]

View attachment 970925

You know, when I saw this particular photo, it struck me.

Who's taking these pictures? Like, does she have someone who just follows her around taking these? What does Greta the Bertha think about her fellow handlers taking up precious fuel and precious CO2 consumption just to follow her around?

 

[VHD2012]

See this shit just creeps me out. Why the fuck do you have a collage of pictures of a little girl, and how many times has your mother told you to stop masturbating to the giant version of it you have on your basement wall?

There is no way like this can be a normal healthy 16-year-old Swedish lass.

There is definitely sonething wrong with her beyond veganism.If she were more horrific looking I would definitely store pictures of her to freak people out, sadly shes not nasty enough.

 

[Webby's Boyfriend]

There is definitely sonething wrong with her beyond veganism.If she were more horrific looking I would definitely store pictures of her to freak people out, sadly shes not nasty enough.

That "sonething[sic]" is called autism, which she proudly admits to have.

 

[Franjevina]

 

[Mikoyan]

They've gone and named a beetle after her. While intended as an honor, I chuckled.

 

[Hatoful Dandy]

They've gone and named a beetle after her. While intended as an honor, I chuckled.

...how do you pronounce that name ("N. Gretae") without Black Twitter swarming you?

 

[Haramburger]

They've gone and named a beetle after her. While intended as an honor, I chuckled.

Skimmed the article a bit:

And sometimes the animals bear some resemblance to the celebrity they're named after.
For example, there is a golden-haired fly named after Beyonce - Scaptia beyonceae. There is also a moth called Neopalpa donaldtrumpi which, biologist Vazrick Nazari said in 2017, is known for its distinctive blonde head and "comparatively small" genitals.

Those cheeky bastards, swinging for a two-fer.