Science Greta Thunberg Megathread - Dax Herrera says he wouldn't have a day ago (I somewhat doubt that)

Why is Greta Thunberg so triggering? How can a 16-year-old girl in plaits, who has dedicated herself to the not-exactly sinister, authoritarian plot of trying to save the planet from extinction, inspire such incandescent rage?

Last week, she tweeted that she had arrived into New York after her two week transatlantic voyage: “Finally here. Thank you everyone who came to see me off in Plymouth, and everyone who welcomed me in New York! Now I’m going to rest for a few days, and on Friday I’m going to participate in the strike outside the UN”, before promptly giving a press conference in English. Yes, her second language.

Her remarks were immediately greeted with a barrage of jibes about virtue signalling, and snide remarks about the three crew members who will have to fly out to take the yacht home.

This shouldn’t need to be spelled out, but as some people don’t seem to have grasped it yet, we’ll give it a lash: Thunberg’s trip was an act of protest, not a sacred commandment or an instruction manual for the rest of us. Like all acts of protest, it was designed to be symbolic and provocative. For those who missed the point – and oh, how they missed the point – she retweeted someone else’s “friendly reminder” that: “You don’t need to spend two weeks on a boat to do your part to avert our climate emergency. You just need to do everything you can, with everyone you can, to change everything you can.”

Part of the reason she inspires such rage, of course, is blindingly obvious. Climate change is terrifying. The Amazon is burning. So too is the Savannah. Parts of the Arctic are on fire. Sea levels are rising. There are more vicious storms and wildfires and droughts and floods. Denial is easier than confronting the terrifying truth.

Then there’s the fact that we don’t like being made to feel bad about our life choices. That’s human nature. It’s why we sneer at vegans. It’s why we’re suspicious of sober people at parties. And if anything is likely to make you feel bad about your life choices -- as you jet back home after your third Ryanair European minibreak this season – it’ll be the sight of small-boned child subjecting herself to a fortnight being tossed about on the Atlantic, with only a bucket bearing a “Poo Only Please” sign by way of luxury, in order to make a point about climate change.

But that’s not virtue signalling, which anyone can indulge in. As Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, and their-four-private-jets-in-11-days found recently, virtue practising is a lot harder.

Even for someone who spends a lot of time on Twitter, some of the criticism levelled at Thunberg is astonishing. It is, simultaneously, the most vicious and the most fatuous kind of playground bullying. The Australian conservative climate change denier Andrew Bolt called her “deeply disturbed” and “freakishly influential” (the use of “freakish”, we can assume, was not incidental.) The former UKIP funder, Arron Banks, tweeted “Freaking yacht accidents do happen in August” (as above.) Brendan O’Neill of Spiked called her a “millenarian weirdo” (nope, still not incidental) in a piece that referred nastily to her “monotone voice” and “the look of apocalyptic dread in her eyes”.

But who’s the real freak – the activist whose determination has single-handedly started a powerful global movement for change, or the middle-aged man taunting a child with Asperger syndrome from behind the safety of their computer screens?

And that, of course, is the real reason why Greta Thunberg is so triggering. They can’t admit it even to themselves, so they ridicule her instead. But the truth is that they’re afraid of her. The poor dears are terrified of her as an individual, and of what she stands for – youth, determination, change.

She is part of a generation who won’t be cowed. She isn’t about to be shamed into submission by trolls. That’s not actually a look of apocalyptic dread in her eyes. It’s a look that says “you’re not relevant”.

The reason they taunt her with childish insults is because that’s all they’ve got. They’re out of ideas. They can’t dismantle her arguments, because she has science – and David Attenborough – on her side. They can’t win the debate with the persuasive force of their arguments, because these bargain bin cranks trade in jaded cynicism, not youthful passion. They can harangue her with snide tweets and hot take blogposts, but they won’t get a reaction because, frankly, she has bigger worries on her mind.

That’s not to say that we should accept everything Thunberg says without question. She is an idealist who is young enough to see the world in black and white. We need voices like hers. We should listen to what she has to say, without tuning the more moderate voices of dissent out.

Why is Greta Thunberg so triggering? Because of what she represents. In an age when democracy is under assault, she hints at the emergency of new kind of power, a convergence of youth, popular protest and irrefutable science. And for her loudest detractors, she also represents something else: the sight of their impending obsolescence hurtling towards them.

joconnell@irishtimes.com
https://twitter.com/jenoconnell

https://web.archive.org/web/2019090...certain-men-1.4002264?localLinksEnabled=false
Found this thought-provoking indeed.

 

[Ginger Piglet]

https://soranews24.com/2020/02/14/greta-thunberg-lookalike-advertises-pachinko-slot-machine-parlor-in-japan%E3%80%90video%E3%80%91/

Even a slight parody or mock of this girl that is harmless and funny offends people who think they're morally superior meanwhile they wished for the death of a 16 year old Trump supporter.

Old but still funny:

 

[Secret Asshole]

That would be Vandana "Fertilisers are rape" Shiva. Who wrote the foreword to Extinction Rebellion's book. And, oh look! Here she is hobnobbing with the Swedish doom goblin in Paris! Imagine my shock.

So, yes, basically they are all one and the same. They don't want to make any fucking difference. They don't want to solve global warming because if they did that they'd be all of a sudden unemployed. That is why they shriek at actual solutions (i.e. GMO crops for world hunger, nuclear energy for global warming) in favour of demanding "system change" (read: people like them in charge).

A lot of them also have this rather uncomfortable and dare I say it, racist, attitude towards the third world. They see them as a sort of noble savage living in bucolic harmony with nature. When in reality they are starving and dying of preventable disease or civil war and would do anything, ANYTHING, to gain a Western standard of living because the idea of having a life expectancy above 50 and an education and a stable, non-corrupt government is more important to them. But they can't have that. Think of all the pollution!

Honestly, Shiva is a cunt deserves a fucking bullet for the human misery she's caused. She's a hypocritical piece of trash that enriches herself as being a 'defender of the poor' while they live in human misery and die suffering from easily preventable diseases. Vitamin A deficiency causes mass amounts of misery world wide. She's a 'defender' while she eats well, lives a rich lifestyle while they suffer and die. When she finally fucking dies, the world will be a better place.

 

[Windows XP Home Edition]

I'm very surprised that nobody on this thread has mentioned Boyan Slat. Not only is he handsome, kind, and intelligent, but he's been doing far more to help climate change and the environment than some naïve teenage girl having a tantrum at the UN. He's relentlessly resilient even when his projects don't go to plan and he never gives up. He deserves more spotlight and credit for what he's doing.

 

[Adamska]

I'm very surprised that nobody on this thread has mentioned Boyan Slat. Not only is he handsome, kind, and intelligent, but he's been doing far more to help climate change and the environment than some naïve teenage girl having a tantrum at the UN. He's relentlessly resilient even when his projects don't go to plan and he never gives up. He deserves more spotlight and credit for what he's doing.

But he's not a child that can be used as a human shield by narcissistic parents and antisocial morons who want to shove talking points down your throat.

Like terrorists, that seems to be the method the current "conservation" groups prefer. That and shoving all the pollution to shithole countries and using bird mulchers and soil rotters. Oh I meant wind and solar power.

 

[Autistic lurker]

New rant from Greta

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/nov/09/hypocrites-and-greenwash-greta-thunberg-climate-crisis

So basically she wants to ruin the global economy right now in order to save the planet from a climat crisis. So nothing new. Also

In an interview with the Guardian, Thunberg said leaders were happy to set targets for decades into the future, but flinched when immediate action to cut emissions was needed. She said there was not a politician on the planet promising the climate action required: “If only,” said the teenager, who will turn 18 in January.

Soon she'll be no longer a child. I hope the media will stop use her age to shield her from criticism.

 

[Bec]

I'm very surprised that nobody on this thread has mentioned Boyan Slat. Not only is he handsome, kind, and intelligent, but he's been doing far more to help climate change and the environment than some naïve teenage girl having a tantrum at the UN. He's relentlessly resilient even when his projects don't go to plan and he never gives up. He deserves more spotlight and credit for what he's doing.

He helps with plastic stuff from what I've seen which is a real issue as opposed to screeching about how the world is going to end soon if we dont make millions of people lose their jobs.

 

[Long Tongue Silver]

View attachment 1668286

SHANIQUA THUNBERG

Goddamn. 50 Cent really put a lot of effort into his Holloween cosplay.

 

[Ginger Piglet]

Soon she'll be no longer a child.

What's the betting that MindGeek or one of its studios will send her an offer to do a porno on that day and claim that they'll donate all the proceeds to researching environmentally friendly technologies.

 

[bippu_as_fuck_ls400]

What's the betting that MindGeek or one of its studios will send her an offer to do a porno on that day and claim that they'll donate all the proceeds to researching environmentally friendly technologies.

I was thinking more along these lines:

Once she turns 18, I could see one of those parodies with a doppleganger being released:

Greta Cumsperg starring in Hot Potato

 

[Ginger Piglet]

I was thinking more along these lines:

"How dare you! You have stolen my anus and its virginity from me!"

...Jesus fuck, I have a diseased brain at times.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

I was thinking more along these lines:

I see the potential for a rebellious phase as a strong grrl gunning to be the queen of the historical NHRA, running dragsters and burning tires all night long, finishing 22 gallons of fuel in 3.5 seconds.

This will be around the time our green personal cars are made out of woven birch bark and runs on potato batteries. Plastic, paper and recyclable bags have been replaced with smart wheelbarrows that can also work like an umbrella.

 

[Windows XP Home Edition]

GRETA.EXE has stopped working.

 

[Ginger Piglet]

GRETA.EXE has stopped working.

Must be Trump or Russian hackers installing malware onto her.

 

[Jonah Hill poster]

https://twitter.com/GretaThunberg/status/1324439705522524162

Archive - (https://archive.is/AcbTR)

The sting doesn’t really work when:

1) copying Trump’s tweet word by word by replacing your name with his
2) not realizing that you have a temper as well
3) you’re still a young child as well
4) you didn’t even have the guts to step up to the President face to face

 

[Windows XP Home Edition]

https://twitter.com/GretaThunberg/status/1324439705522524162

Archive - (https://archive.md/AcbTR)

View attachment 1721968

The sting doesn’t really work when:

1) copying Trump’s tweet word by word by replacing your name with his
2) not realizing that you have a temper as well
3) you’re still a young child as well
4) you didn’t even have the guts to step up to the President face to face

Doesn't her dad manage her account or something like that?

 

[Ginger Piglet]

https://twitter.com/GretaThunberg/status/1324439705522524162

Archive - (https://archive.md/AcbTR)

View attachment 1721968

The sting doesn’t really work when:

1) copying Trump’s tweet word by word by replacing your name with his
2) not realizing that you have a temper as well
3) you’re still a young child as well
4) you didn’t even have the guts to step up to the President face to face

I remember how she was fellated in all the press for her "searing staredown" of Orange Man but in reality it just looked like she was glowering at him and he basically waltzed on past her totally oblivious and uncaring as to her being there.

 

[Snekposter]

I remember how she was fellated in all the press for her "searing staredown" of Orange Man but in reality it just looked like she was glowering at him and he basically waltzed on past her totally oblivious and uncaring as to her being there.

"You have stolen my dreams and my childhood."
"I don't even know who you are."

 

[Noideawhattopick]

I remember how she was fellated in all the press for her "searing staredown" of Orange Man but in reality it just looked like she was glowering at him and he basically waltzed on past her totally oblivious and uncaring as to her being there.

Her face when he does it like an adult and ignores the remote controlled potato.

 

[ditto]

How soon before President Biden invites Greta for a sniffing at the White House.

Doesn't her dad manage her account or something like that?

Worse, it's some Indian UN guy.

 

[A Useless Fish]

How soon before President Biden invites Greta for a sniffing at the White House.

What, that old hag? What use could she be to him?

Then again, I guess she could keep Hunter busy for maybe an hour, or two.