Crying kids is the latest imagery popping out of the climate-left’s playbook.
CFACT was there when Greta Thunberg’s group “Fridays for Future” staged a press conference at COP 25 in Madrid.
Daisy Jeffrey has been called Australia’s Greta Thunberg. She’s been leading regular climate “strikes” Down Under where students boycott their classes usually on Fridays. She lost all composure at the UN climate conference when describing the wildfires that have been plaguing Australia. “My country is burning,” she said, “Koalas are dying. My government’s inaction is appalling. We’re being told that we are doing enough and we are not.” Between sobs and tears she continued: “We are so young, none of us are getting any sleep. We are risking our grades, risking getting into university, and there is so much talk and no action. I don’t know what to do. We kids at this table should not have to be here, we should be in school. I call upon our leaders to do better.”
Perhaps if Daisy showed up for school, she might have learned that the fires afflicting Australia, thought tragic (as fires tend to be), are occurring under natural conditions and not a a result of “climate change.” There would still be fires even if the industrial revolution never happened.
Elizabeth from Kenya told us that “buildings are collapsing as the result of the climate crisis.” She also called for rich nations to pay for the loss and damage when such events occur. “Loss and damage” is a long-standing effort by the extreme Left that is really all about redistributing wealth. Climate kids like Greta, Daisy and Elizabeth are easy pickings for extreme climate pressure groups to sweep in and radicalized them.
Seventeen-year-old Saoi O’Connor also broke down in tears. “I’ve been school striking for 49 weeks this year,” she said. “I have stopped going to mainstream school and am homeschooling so I can dedicate my life to working on the climate crisis,” she added, “They don’t want us to understand what’s going on in there. It’s incredibly jarring the amount of jargon that is going on in here (referring to the UN COP).” Miss O’Connor spoke against carbon trading which seems to be a big push for the UN and something the climate kids and their handlers don’t like one bit. “Article 6” Miss O’Connor said (referring to part of the UN climate pact) “is about countries believing that our future is something that can be bought and sold. They still do not put values on our lives… on our ancestor’s lives. They think as long as they can buy and sell everything will be all right.”
Later Greta Thunberg, who was just named Time Magazine’s 2019 “person of the year, appeared on a panel, not in the press room but before the UN’s main plenary session, to also speak out against carbon trading. “People are dying from the climate crisis,” she said, “this seems to have turned into some kind of opportunity for countries to negotiate loopholes and to avoid raising their ambition. Countries are finding clever ways around having to take real action, like double counting emissions reductions and moving their emissions overseas.” Greta’s speech writer is correct about offsets having no impact on the climate, but surrendered to the hyperbole on the people are dying bit. There has never been a better time in history for human well-being than right now.
CFACT offered a hefty balance to all the climate hype by handing out our latest 36 page skeptical talking points on climate, assembled by Marc Morano, who runs CFACT’s Climate Depot. You should save them. They provide a handy primer for cutting through the hype.
Propaganda and emotion are no way to form climate and energy policy. CFACT’s going with the facts and arming you to help us.