Guest essay by Eric Worrall
How do you keep radical greens on side, by supporting the climate change school strikes, yet maintain the moral high ground on children’s Education standards? Australian Opposition Leader Bill Shorten is market testing what he hopes is a workable compromise.
Protest climate after school hours, Shorten tells kids
By Nick Pearson 12:13pm Mar 14, 2019
Children should protest on weekends or after school rather than participating in tomorrow’s walkout over climate change, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said.
…
“Kids are allowed to have an opinion,” he told reporters in Melbourne this morning.
“In an ideal world, they would protest after school hours and on weekends.“
But he said it was “a bit rich for the government to lecture schoolkids”.
“This government’s been on strike about climate policy for the last five-and-a-half years,” he said.“They’re really not the best role models for the kids on climate policy, are they?”
…
Read more: https://www.9news.com.au/2019/03/14/12/12/school-strike-for-climate-action-bill-shorten-climate-change-politics-news
I admire the effort, but I don’t think this idea will fly. Children might be happy to sacrifice their school hours to demand climate action, but get real – how many children would sacrifice their X-Box time for the sake of the planet?
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
All this has been meticulously organised by GetUp activists, who understand the pull of the visual media. Those well-fed, well-dressed morally satisfied kids will now watch themselves performing for the viewers on hundreds (thousands?) of screens.
Nobody reads much these days, they watch moving pictures on screens.
The narcissistic addiction we all experience as youngsters, unsure of who we are, wanting to join in, seeing ourselves as others see us – recorded as well, for ever and ever, Amen.
“how many children would sacrifice their X-Box time for the sake of the planet?”
What environ mentalled kids: X-Boxes ain’t IC powered.
Something striking children might not know: https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/sea-ice-tools
The graph on the linked page shows a greater Arctic sea ice extent on March 10, 2019 (14.696 km2) than on March 10, 2006 (14.620 km2). These dates are “cherry picked” but accurate. Arctic sea ice is going to be around for a long time.
Here in Sarasota the school board has dealt with the problem,either intentionally or by accident,by scheduling a teacher work day so there is no school today meaning no walkout protest.
The mother of Greta Thunberg, Malena Ernman, admits on Facebook that Greta got the idea for the strike from the Swedish activist Bo Thorén, after she came second in a newspaper essay competition about climate change. This page is in Swedish, but I guess there are translating services available.
https://samnytt.se/malena-ernman-erkanner-professionell-lobbyist-bakom-klimat-gretas-strejk/?fbclid=IwAR0yTAK_vSvY7SnCDl5ecuM7ewct468M8LOD42esag72NngHKQ2icupRjc8
Bill Shorten is a typical politician, remember the old Chines saying,
“Wind blows, grass bends”.
But just as Bob Hawke and Paul Keating were the best pair to change
Australian politics for the better, and both were Labour, Bill may surprise us.
If indeed he and his team want to stay in office longer than the usual two
and a half years of the three year Federal government term, then they will
have to come up with a sensible energy policy.
After all the 50 % say’ politically of the Union movement, its membership
base while much smaller than in the 1980 time of Hawke and Keating,
should still cause them to be concerned about their members having a job,
which if the Green left have it way will not happen, this will result in
Bill and his team, while paying lip service to their left wing, will fix this
nonsense of Australia in effect proposing to commit suicide economically
to “Save the World”.
Australians 1.5 % of the so called CO2 emissions compared to the bi\g
three, USA, India and China, would never make any difference, and Bill must
know this.
Hopefully President Trump’s panel of proper experts will “Prove” to the rest
of the World just what nonsense this whole CO2 come Climate Change matter
really is, and the rest of the “Western World” countries “will then change their ways.
MJE VK5ELL