Climate Change Demonstrations

I agree with you Mauriherb. I have always thought motor racimg was obscene/

One of my teenage grandchildren who went on the climate change demonstration yesterday has now abandoned her ambition to be a commercial airline pilot because she realises that is incompatible with being an environmental campaigner.

I accept that we have a global problem, but why does no-one complain about air shows and motor racing? I suppose money talks

Bravo to our young people for learning how to be heard.
For all you grumps moaning about the massive effect having one day off school will have, don't you believe that this is educational?

Most of them, at least those on the demos, have stopped Quizqueen.

My DGC are involved in save the planet movements and are putting pressure on their DP and DGP and DGGP to stop too!
I don't fly or use the car without careful thought. We avoid plastic and compost everything etc etc. We heat one room in winter. yes yes I know we are holier than thou.

The old saying springs to mind:
Live simply that others may simply live.

I can't help noticing that climate change deniers are the same extremists who reject any kind of factual information whatever they are discussing- particularly brexit. Pathetic name calling is another giveaway.

grand well, I’ve read some stuff in my time??. That is certainly up there with the best of them

Sarah Ellen, I agree re education. Unfortunately subjects like volcanic and sunspot activity, thermohaline ocean circulation, Heinrich events, Dansgaard-Oeschger rapid climate change fluctuations, changes to greenhouse gasses in millennial timescales, burst of cosmic rays, Milankovitch astronomical cycles of Earth's orbits which over 2.5 million years caused massive temperature oscillations, and many more, are not widely known nor taught, and I doubt there are any actual climatologists in schools. "Climate Emergency" is a politically driven organisation with chaos as its goal, and prays on our most vulnerable, ie our children. Their concerns are admirable if naive, and for some I'm sure the virtue signalling and truanting are, sadly, aims enough.

I think Greta is a champion for her age. Needed and listened to when she is required.

It couldn't have worked even a year earlier because we are so jaded by listening to and acting on the sensible reasoning we read and hear and nothing happens..

It has to come from a young person. A virgin in a way who hasn't heard it all before.

I just spoke to a young friend who was on the march on Scottish Parliament on Saturday. She said it was wonderful but even she feels frustrated about what she can do now.
She doesn't drive, she never flies, she only wears 2nd hand clothes, she eats vegetarian, local, organic.

The real baddies are those behind the global companies making money who care nothing about climate change.

Very good post paddyann

Coming from an agricultural background I totally agree with you merlotgran. Trouble is that seemingly easy solutions bring their own problems and are in turn, anything but simple!!

This- brilliantly said, thanks.

wee post on my FB page today says if you remember that Joan of Arc was leading an army at the same age Greta is ,and Anne Frank writing her diary,Jane Austen writing her first book and the wonderful Malala got her Nobel prize

then theres this... from Janey Godley on Greta Thunberg. 'She’s 16, doesn’t conform to the usual 16 year old girl look, she isn’t pouting & photoshopping her thigh gap. She is unashamedly unapologetic about wearing no make up and sporting plaits & sturdy shoes and that she openly argues with world debaters THIS is what bothers many men.
Many men who keep calling her “freakish and weird” are disturbed by her obvious lack of her “f*cks given” over how she looks. Men like Trump need women to “try hard to please them” so they can unpick that ‘need’ Greta looks too comfortable in her own skin for them.

Men who keep remarking on how she stares them down and her voice being monotone are so threatened by a young woman who isn’t worried about the length of her eyelashes as she tells us how dangerous we are to chaos over climate change.

This is a powerful stance for women, when you won’t wear what THEY want and YOU wear what YOU like - historically men will find you “unstable” and spread that rumour to discount your individuality and independence.

So what will you do with land that's unsuitable for arable farming, Hetty? Grazing is essential for the health of pastures that cannot be cultivated.

As to land used for animal feed, barley straw is the bi-product of a cereal crop. What will you do with it? It used to be burned which was an environmental disaster and thankfully banned. Barley straw is a suitable feed whereas wheat straw is used for bedding and the resultant manure spread back on the land as fertilizer. Will you be relying on chemical fertilizer?

Cutting meadows for hay is vital to maintain the health of the pasture. Do you really want to see every scrap of available land growing vegetables? What about wildlife?

I agree we should all cut down on meat, particularly beef but we need a balance between livestock and crops.

Not to mention concern for the livelihoods of farmers and their families.

We need to return to old fashioned mixed farming.

Merlotgran, you are (quite understandably) assuming that, if we stop eating meat, more land will be needed for cereal crops. In fact, as meat production is so very wasteful and inefficient, when we take away cereal for livestock feed, less land will be needed!

Grandeliquent
I am sure by the time our children are at the level where part of the curriculum includes pre history of the earth I would expect to find those providing this part of their education already well educated themselves in this subject This now is not enough and what should be included in this section of education and yes most certainly educate the teachers on how if humanity is to survive all of us are responsible in preventing further destruction.

Icanhandthemback
Ref: How about this.
You know, as I know, most unlikely.

If you take the lifespan of the earth as one year, then in that timescale the climate has always changed, and to a far greater extent than anything we have seen since the Maunder Minimum and the Little Ice Age. In that scenario man appeared at one minute to midnight on 31st December. All the green things that we do and aim to do are good in themselves. They will have little or no impact on climate change. Trashing our city centres, preventing ambulances and fire engines reaching their destinations, monopolising our police force, leaving mountains of litter, including un-recyclable food packaging and empty plastic bottles to be cleaned up at the taxpayers expense - these are bad things. What our children need is a proper education on climate science and the history and pre-history of the earth. Of course we would need to educate our teachers first . . . . .

We have to change our wasteful and environmentally damaging lifestyles. Some of this will be inconvenient. None of us are perfect but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive to do the least harm. The best thing we can do for the planet is to adopt a more plant based diet, but people will resist changing their comfortable habits and always make excuses.. We must Reduce - stuff buying, meat eating, waste making, polluting, We must Reuse as much as possible - no single use plastics for a start. We must Recycle as much as possible. Hats off to the protesters let’s hope it wakes a few people up.

Pride about what? I'm no placard waving greeny.

Shouldn’t we all strive to be such a thing?

When the children, who are protesting, chose to do so on a weekend, when they get rid of their smart phones and gaming machines, when they ask their parents to turn off the heating and stop giving them lifts or taking them on holidays abroad, when they stop buying new clothes and plastic tat, when they stop eating junk food and consuming canned drinks, only then can they be taken seriously as wanting to do something for the environment.

However, there is really only one thing which can save the planet and that is to get rid of a good 90% of the human population.

Alexa
Exchange the 'We' for 'I'.

Alexa
What you think some grans think is of no consequence unless it's fact.
As it's only what you think they think it remains a fantasy.

Wow! Someone despises the rest of the human race.

I read this on FB today:

"To all the school kids going on 'strike' for Climate Change:
You are the first generation who have required air-conditioning in every classroom.
You want TV in every room and your classes are all computerised.
You spend all day and night on electronic devices.
More than ever, you don't walk or ride bikes to school but arrive in caravans of private cars that choke local roads and worsen rush hour traffic.
You are the biggest consumers of manufactured goods ever and update perfectly good expensive luxury items to stay trendy,
Your entertainment comes from electric devices.
Furthermore, the people driving your protests are the same people who insist on artificially inflating the population growth through immigration, which increases the need for energy, manufacturing and transport.
The more people we have, the more forest and bushland we clear and more of the environment is destroyed.
How about this...
Tell your teachers to switch off the air-con.
Walk or ride to school. Switch off your devices and read a book.
Make a sandwich instead of buying manufactured fast food.
No, none of this will happen because you are selfish, badly educated, virtue signalling little 'princesses', inspired by the adults around you who crave a feeling of having a 'noble cause' while they indulge themselves in Western luxury and unprecedented quality of life.
Wake up, grow up and learn to research facts and think for yourself and not blindly accept the words and thoughts of others - I don't think you formulated this action plan all by your self - suspect you may have had some influence and 'guidance' from those you trust ....a word of warning, be cautious of the influence of the 'left' because there may be a time in the future that you will be the ones left out..."
I also read this: "I appreciate people want to protest trendy things and if you're rich its fine. The people dying on our streets now won't care about global warming. It couldn't be less relevant if the human race survives if it continues to create a larger underclass everyday. Sorry if this sounds miserable but I couldn't care less if the rich have a nice planet for their darlings to look forward to. There isn't a livable habitat for all at the moment, that should be the first priority. So it's not about "all of us"."
I thought it very sad that the efforts of young people were being belittled but there is an element of truth in both statements.
We are making a lot of effort to go green in our housebut it must be done thoughtfully. If I remember rightly, in my youth there was a huge outcry about the use of trees to make paper, card, etc and the knee-jerk reaction for plastic happened. We must be sure that we don't exchange one harmful thing for another.

Virtue signalling, did you say? So don't care what you think, for sure. My I do care about what the youngsters and ma grandchildren think - and their future.