The article in the url below is the best article I have seen about the Swedish teenager, Greta Thunberg, who is campaigning to reverse climate change and, as a result, appears to be changing the world. By starting her no school on Fridays campaign, Greta has shifted the conversation and achieved a significant amount in a very short period. Not many of us can say we had a global impact at 16 years old.
Recognizing this, the article focuses on the consequences of her success in terms of our collective fixation on her (both idolizing her and mean personal attacks) and subjugating her message to the background. While criticizing those who have targeted Greta to serve their own ideological goals (various forms of climate change denial), the author turns the argument on those who say they support the young campaigner:
"However, the uncomfortable question for Thunberg's supporters is whether their virtual canonisation of her has presented a gift to their opponents. Making a young and idealistic teenager the figurehead of a movement makes it too easy to dismiss the campaign as a whole as naive and idealistic. Indeed, the commentator Christopher Caldwell, who is supportive of the cause, worries that the rallying around Thunberg reflects a refusal to engage with complexity. 'People have had enough of balance and perspective,' he wrote in the New York Times, 'They want single-minded devotion to the task at hand.' That is exactly what Thunberg has come to represent."
The author continues with a point that I think is particularly insightful:
"The French philosopher Raphaël Enthoven hinted at another problem in a Delphic tweet in which he called her 'an anti-product product' that we use to buy virtue with our support and retweets without actually having to do anything ourselves. Many of those who ostentatiously bid her bon voyage across the Atlantic [recently] are hardly strangers to airports. 'When you consume Greta, you do not help the planet,' wrote Enthoven. 'You play the game of the system that destroys it.'"
This reminds me of the research on moral license – where a minor positive act allows us the liberty to do something much more harmful and negative. For example, you feel good about recycling an aluminum can, which then allows you to ignore the fact that you drive a Ford F-350 truck. Similarly, you personally donate to a worthwhile cause, while working for a company that trades with authoritarian regimes. In other words, believing in Greta and supporting her in superficial ways (e.g., liking one of her social media posts) then allows us to overlook the fact that we have not actually changed anything personally and, as such, are part of the problem:
"Thunberg has been clearer than anyone that it is a mistake to place too much attention on her. 'I think there is a lot of focus on me as an individual and not on the climate itself,' she told the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle. 'I think we should focus more on the climate issue because this is not about me.'"
Greta is clearly wise beyond her years. She is also an example to many of her followers/admirers who need to act rather than merely applaud from the sidelines.
Take care
David
David Chandler
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Greta Thunberg's attackers are morally bankrupt, but her deification isn't helpful
By Julian Baggini
August 19, 2019
The Guardian
