THE FANATICISM OF THE

CLIMATE CHANGE DEBATE

By David Woodbury

I have listened with a great deal of anxiety recently to the strident and loud voices of the climate debate and noted with alarm the number of children, some quite young, being involved in rallies and protests. Perhaps it came home more forcibly when we shared an evening meal a highly intelligent 19-year old young woman who is a high achieving academic. During our dinner-time discussion, she shared how scared she was of the future and whether there would be a world left for her children,

After she left I found myself quite saddened and perplexed that 19-year-old should feel this degree of anxiety and despair. I reflected back to my time as a 19-year-old and to how I felt. The cold war was raging and a small group of vocal commentators were predicting the doom and gloom of a nuclear holocaust that would eliminate human civilisation. Some individuals were constructing nuclear fallout shelters in their back yards.  While I was aware of these issues they didn’t dominate my life or my thinking.

Tragically, the climate change debate has reached a point of hysteria where we are no longer sure where the truth lies. For every claim made by those supporting drastic step to counter climate change, other scientists are putting forward data to refute the claims. The reality is that there are some pressing issues we need to address in a logical and measured way, through honest, courteous and respectful debates by adults.

While we seemed to have weathered the cold war drama without damaging a generation, today climate activists will utilise every avenue of influence to press home their ideology, even if it comes to manipulating and using children.  The latest example of this is 16-year-old activist Greta Thunberg who somehow, got to address world leaders and the United Nations. Common-sense thinking would dictate this event would not have happened without the planning and influences of older adults who had an agenda to promote. I have no doubt Greta may have strong views on climate change but the wisdom of exposing her to international scrutiny and condemnation is highly dangerous for one so young. It may well border on child abuse.

As Greta reads the comments and criticisms that her speech will elicit, some quite scathing and cynical, we have no idea of the profound and damaging effects this may well have on her mental health, effects that may be highly damaging and perhaps permanent.  We might well speculate that if this is the outcome, who then, is accountable for this girl’s mental and emotional damage? Surely it must be those adults who were responsible for encouraging and manoeuvring this girl into such a dangerous and unwise scenario.

There is a sense in which Greta is symbolic of many children and young people today being coerced and manipulated by strident and fanatical adults to promote their own agenda. It may well have been this scenario the Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison had in mind recently when he said he did not want to see Australian children subjected to “needless anxiety”. “I want children growing up in Australia to feel positive about their future, and I think it is important we give them that confidence that they will not only have a wonderful country and pristine environment to live in, that they will also have an economy to live in as well”. The Prime Minister said.

The right to protest is an inalienable right in all democratic societies. However, those who choose to protest need to be transparent and honest and not manipulate children and young people and use them as a front to pursue their personal agendas.

We have no way of knowing how impressionable young minds can be permanently damaged    when they are manipulated as a front for a cause pursued by adults. Jesus had some fairly hard things to say about damaging young people: But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea. (Mark 9:42)