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.

 

[ditto]

this girl will have a mental breakdown

She'll get elected to the Swedish equivalent of the Senate and enjoy a long if pointless political career, before maybe graduating to the EU or UN if either of those are still around.

 

[Local Coyote]

Good. She needs to get out of the spotlight and her parents need to get fucked. What they should've done with her autistic fixation on environmentalism is assure her the world isn't ending, told her to go the hell back to school, and redirect her anxiety into something positive she can do with her peers like a beach cleanup or a community garden.

Instead they scared the fuck out of her by agreeing the world is ending and inviting the media to come see their pet child with the face of a middle aged man have an autistic meltdown. It's cruel and disgusting. I know she won't get the therapy she needs which is sad.

 

[PS1gamenwatch]

Well this happened:

Full Metal Panic! Creator Shoji Gatoh Apologizes For Tweet Disparaging Environmental Activist Greta Thunberg

Now deleted tweet stated his desire to feed Thunberg steak and 'watch her cry'

www.animenewsnetwork.com

Full Metal Panic! Creator Shoji Gatoh Apologizes For Tweet Disparaging Environmental Activist Greta Thunberg
posted on 2019-12-10 13:45 EST by Kim Morrissy

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Now deleted tweet stated his desire to feed Thunberg steak and 'watch her cry'
Full Metal Panic! light novel author Shoji Gatoh apologized on Tuesday for an inflammatory tweet he wrote on Sunday about environmental activist Greta Thunberg.
Gatoh's original tweet was a quote-retweet of an NHK article regarding the activities of 16-year-old environmental activist Greta Thunberg. He wrote: "I dislike this girl. If I ruled the world from the shadows, I would take everything from her and sneer at her when she hits rock bottom. Then I'd make her eat a delicious, piping hot steak and watch the tears of frustration on her face. I really want to see it."








Gatoh has since deleted the tweet and wrote an apology: "Yeah, it was a horrible thing to say about an underage girl. I've reflected on what I've done, and I'll delete the tweet. In the meantime, I'll take a break from Twitter. I apologize for causing discomfort to so many people with my disrespectful conduct."

賀東招二@gatosyoji
https://twitter.com/gatosyoji/status/1204247405723471872

未成年女性を相手にさすがにひどい表現でした。反省して削除します。当面Twitterについては休止します。他人への尊重に欠けた私の言動により多くの方にご心痛をおかけしたことをお詫びします。

2,391
7:52 PM - Dec 9, 2019
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Gatoh's original tweet inspired backlash, including from those who have worked with him. Full Metal Panic! 0 ‐ZERO‐ manga artist Tetsuro Kasahara tweeted on Monday that he would not be drawing any sequel to the manga, although he has since retracted that statement following Gatoh's apology.
Full Metal Panic! illustrator Shikidouji also commented on the original tweet, initially remarking, "I feel like I just witnessed the birth of a villain who's actually a good person." On Tuesday, they followed up by tweeting, "Oh? [Thunberg] is a vegetarian? I didn't know that. Sorry for my ignorance."









Shoji Gatoh is best known as the author of Full Metal Panic!, Amagi Brilliant Park, and Cop Craft, all of which have been adapted into anime. The original Full Metal Panic! light novel series debuted in 1998, and have more than 11 million copies in print. Gatoh launched the Cop Craft novels with illustrations by Range Murata (Last Exile, Blue Submarine No. 6) in 2009. He launched the Amagi Brilliant Park series with illustrations by Yuka Nakajima (Listen to Me, Girls. I Am Your Father!/Papa Kiki!) in 2013.
Greta Thunberg is a Swedish environmental activist. In September 2019, she addressed the UN Climate Action Summit in New York, calling for immediate action from world leaders to address climate change.
Source: Shoji Gatoh's Twitter account via Hachima Kikō

 

[CWCissey]

Well this happened:

Full Metal Panic! Creator Shoji Gatoh Apologizes For Tweet Disparaging Environmental Activist Greta Thunberg

Now deleted tweet stated his desire to feed Thunberg steak and 'watch her cry'

www.animenewsnetwork.com

Should have stuck by what you said dumb gook.

 

[BrunoMattei]

Pretty much, yes.



They picked her because:

1) She is stupid. She has multiple learning disabilites, autsim and is functionally a sped. This allowed them a massive shield and pretended, like a lot of people, autism gives people super intelligence and super powers. It doesn't. It cripples your understanding of the world.

In fact, autisim is linked with LOWER IQ. 33% of people with autism have learning disabilities and lower IQs. This made her a dumb cow and easy to spew out whatever shit they wanted.

But, the movie The Predator (2018 )told me that autists are super geniuses and the next evolution of humanity! You mean to tell me that Shane Black doesn't know what he's talking about?

 

[The Last Stand]

Brazil's President Calls Greta Thunberg a 'Brat'

Bolsonaro's comment came after Thunberg spoke out about slayings in the Amazon

time.com

Brazil's President Calls Greta Thunberg a 'Brat'


BY MARCELO DE SOUSA / AP
1:51 PM EST
(RIO DE JANEIRO) — Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro on Tuesday called young Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg a “brat” after she expressed concern about the slayings of indigenous Brazilians in the Amazon.
Bolsonaro questioned the coverage news media have given Thunberg, 16, who on Sunday tweeted a link to a story about the murder of two indigenous people in Brazil’s Maranhao state.
“Greta said that the Indians died because they were defending the Amazon,” Bolsonaro told a group of journalists. “It’s impressive that the press is giving space to a brat like that,” he added, using the Portuguese word ”pirralha.”
Following Bolsonaro’s comments, Thunberg changed the bio on her Twitter profile to say “Pirralha.”
Thunberg became a symbol for youth demanding radical change to confront climate change when she sparked global school strikes.


Greta Thunberg Says 3-Week Voyage Across the Atlantic 'Energized' Her Climate Change Fight
Climate activist Greta Thunberg arrived Tuesday by catamaran in the port of Lisbon after a three-week voyage across the Atlantic Ocean from the United States.
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Her comments about the deaths of the indigenous people came as the U.N. was hosting its international climate change conference, where Brazil’s environmental policies have been the subject of criticism. Deforestation of its Amazon rose nearly 30% in the 12 months through July.


“Indigenous people are being literally murdered for trying to protect the forrest (sic) from illegal deforestation,” she tweeted. “Over and over again. It is shameful that the world remains silent about this.”
The comment by Bolsonaro, who has frequently expressed his admiration for his U.S. counterpart, follows Donald Trump’s sarcastic dig at Thunberg in September. Trump responded to a video of Thunberg discussing suffering people, dying ecosystems and looming mass extinction, saying, “She seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future. So nice to see!”

 

[CWCissey]

Following Bolsonaro’s comments, Thunberg changed the bio on her Twitter profile to say “Pirralha.”

I wonder if I could get Greta to change her profile to say 'Scumfuck'...

 

[moocow]

Following Bolsonaro’s comments, Thunberg changed the bio on her Twitter profile to say “Pirralha.”

I know that's her "shtick" but who gives a flying fuck? Why is "changing the bio" something that deserve space in a news article?

 

[ColtWalker1847]

Nuclear energy wasn't enough to end climate change, they had to end the patriarchy and colonialism. Not even joking.

Not surprised. Curbing consumption, capitalism, trade, and dismantling western liberal democracies is the goal. The environment is just a means to an end. A communal peasant subsistence-farmer pre-industrial society with a few central urban centers of government and culture where the elite live is what they want. Maoism, basically.

 

[billydero]

I know that's her "shtick" but who gives a flying fuck? Why is "changing the bio" something that deserve space in a news article?

It’s the press trying to portray her as “edgy teen with sick burns”, to deflect attention away from her true self, an ineffectual crybaby.

And also I’m sure ‘brat’ or whatever it means sounds cool to her.

 

[Dreamland]

Greta Thunberg Is TIME’s 2019 Person of the Year

The climate activist has succeeded in turning vague anxieties about the planet into a worldwide movement calling for global change

time.com

Greta Thunberg sits in silence in the cabin of the boat that will take her across the Atlantic Ocean. Inside, there’s a cow skull hanging on the wall, a faded globe, a child’s yellow raincoat. Outside, it’s a tempest: rain pelts the boat, ice coats the decks, and the sea batters the vessel that will take this slight girl, her father and a few companions from Virginia to Portugal. For a moment, it’s as if Thunberg were the eye of a hurricane, a pool of resolve at the center of swirling chaos. In here, she speaks quietly. Out there, the entire natural world seems to amplify her small voice, screaming along with her.

This is pretty powerful, if you ask me.

Along the way, she emerged as a standard bearer in a generational battle, an avatar of youth activists across the globe fighting for everything from gun control to democratic representation. Her global climate strike is the largest and most international of all the youth movements, but it’s hardly the only one: teenagers in the U.S. are organizing against gun violence and flocking to progressive candidates; students in Hong Kong are battling for democratic representation; and young people from South America to Europe are agitating for remaking the global economy. Thunberg is not aligned with these disparate protests, but her insistent presence has come to represent the fury of youth worldwide. According to a December Amnesty International survey, young people in 22 countries identified climate change as the most important issue facing the world. She is a reminder that the people in charge now will not be in charge forever, and that the young people who are inheriting dysfunctional governments, broken economies and an increasingly unlivable planet know just how much the adults have failed them.

Whoops, forgot this:

Don't give them free traffic:

Greta Thunberg: TIME's Person of the Year 2019 | Time

archived 11 Dec 2019 13:02:51 UTC

archive.vn

 

[Guts]

Sure, it's okay when she says "o.k. boomer" in so many words...

 

[Fareal]

I felt sad for Greta when she said last week that the school strike has accomplished nothing. I feel like when the shoe shortly drops about the amount of lip service she is being paid whilst the adults carry on as usual, she will find that a terrible personal blow.

I think the use of an autistic severely anxious child to act as both a mouthpiece of a movement, and as a token sop to that movement, in the long term will be profoundly damaging to her, and I can't agree with that being done to a wee lassie who is not all there in the top stories.

 

[Alec Benson Leary]

Time's greatest person of the year is supposed to be an individual who had major impact on the world, for good or ill. Hitler was once their person of the year, and he fit the definition. Greta hasn't impacted the world because who the fuck is even still talking about her outside of us?

 

[Jmz_33]

Didn’t she say that she didn’t want this exact kind of treatment. Kinda shows that most of these adults’ support is just a superficial act just so they could get good guy points.

 

[dreamworks face]

I'd say she fits right in with a bunch of select company...

 

[Dreamland]

Didn’t she say that she didn’t want this exact kind of treatment. Kinda show that most of these adults’ support is just a superficial act just so they could get get good guy points.

You have a point, the idea was supposed to bring attention to climate, not get this kid roped into this heroic media circus. Still, here we are.

 

[Fareal]

Didn’t she say that she didn’t want this exact kind of treatment. Kinda show that most of these adults’ support is just a superficial act just so they could get get good guy points.

Yes. Whether you agree with her views or not (and I know what A&H thinks of her), she is absolutely autistically sincere in her desire for change and urgent action. Greta is one of the few high profile 'activists' who is genuinely not just on the make for herself. (Her parents are a different issue.)

Time covers etc are the sort of lip service and tokenism she specifically doesn't want, and the fact she's getting it is the best demonstration that her attempt to convince boomers that the climate is important has failed. This is just headpats for being a strong willed wee lassie. No one wants headpats.

Rather than a symbol of 'the power of youth', Greta's experiences are an illustration of the complete disempowerment of youth. This shit is genuinely very important to a lot of young kids, and no one is going to do shit about it. She's right, the school strike has failed.

 

[bippu_as_fuck_ls400]

Don't give them free traffic:

Greta Thunberg: TIME's Person of the Year 2019 | Time

archived 11 Dec 2019 13:02:51 UTC

archive.vn

 

[Plank]

https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=Greta Thunberg&geo=US

She was briefly a meme.

This is her future: