It's a bit warm/ wet/ cold outside

[Definitely Not Mister Pops]

As usual, it takes a 17 year old to show many folk what a mature response looks like:

This is kinda the point I was trying to make earlier.

Fuck me, a wean using her second language is more eloquent than I.

[shaolin_monkey]

Yeah, I got what you meant, and it definitely is a silver lining in this awful situation.

[JayzusB.Christ]

Well said, that girl.  She's a force to be reckoned with now; I hope in a few years she'll be even more powerful.  And the US has proved that being 'on the spectrum' is no barrier to becoming the most powerful person in the world.

Meanwhile, I've read the comments below thejournal.ie's article about her recent speech in the UK, and it seems that a huge proportion of Irish people think she's either no longer relevant or just out for self-promotion. Anything other than face the truth that she's angry at our generation for fucking the world up for hers, and she's right to be.

[von Boom]

Well said, that girl.  She's a force to be reckoned with now; I hope in a few years she'll be even more powerful.  And the US has proved that being 'on the spectrum' is no barrier to becoming the most powerful person in the world.

Meanwhile, I've read the comments below thejournal.ie's article about her recent speech in the UK, and it seems that a huge proportion of Irish people think she's either no longer relevant or just out for self-promotion. Anything other than face the truth that she's angry at our generation for fucking the world up for hers, and she's right to be.

First rule of Internet Club: Don't read the comments.

Sometimes I think comments to articles are just wind ups. At least I bloody hope so or this world is more fucked than I want to imagine.

[Gary James]

Sometimes I think comments to articles are just wind ups.

Depends on both the site and the page in question. A great many of the comments might be offensive for the sake of being offensive, the posters not realizing that there's a qualitative difference between some random asshole on the internet and George Carlin.

At least I bloody hope so or this world is more fucked than I want to imagine.

There's enough hopeful things on the internet to balance out the awful (or, at the very least, to mitigate some of the worst), and the loudest voices aren't necessarily that of the majority. Yes, there are utterly vile, destructive, malicious trolls making a nuisance of themselves, but there are people who are really amazing. And not everyone is even on the internet.

I'm giving humanity the benefit of the doubt. We're good. There's enough people doing things which are inspirational, heartwarming, and life-affirming to show up the nihilistic ramblings of a few idiots for what they are. Having said that, it is 2020 and I am still having to point out that racism / sexism / ageism / whatever else is not cool, so the message isn't sinking in to a few people out there.

Sometimes those comments might be automatically added as well. People have bots for all kinds of things, so a few screens of similar comments might only be one person, amplifying their anger and impotence through technological means.

[Tjm86]

Sometimes I think comments to articles are just wind ups. At least I bloody hope so or this world is more fucked than I want to imagine.

I've taken to listening to LBC on occasions as an opportunity to get a sense of some of the thinking that goes on among different segments of the population that don't frequent comment sections.  If you think some of those comments are wind ups then I would not recommend it without a strong constitution.  Some scary ideas floating around, and that is just the presenters!

Thunberg's visit to Bristol has had folks whipped up into a lather, complaining of how 'woke' everything is on BBC in particular.  Newsround has come in for some heavy criticism for talking about nothing but Thunberg and the climate crisis.  Apparently CBBC is now indoctrinating our youth!  'Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells' has nothing on some of LBC's listeners.

On the plus side though, more and more kids are coming round to the idea of having to do something about this.

[IndigoPrime]

What gets me about the anti-Greta brigade is they throw such ridiculous accusations her way. "She's no scientist!" Well, she's not – she's literally just telling people to respond to the warnings from scientists. "She's coming to the UK? She's a hypocrite because she'll be using carbon!" She's not against transport nor even carbon footprints; she's against overuse, and in favour of sustainability. I suspect she took the train to Bristol. She took a fucking BOAT across the Atlantic. "What does a kid know anyway?" More than you, internet troll...

[Tjm86]

"She's no scientist" ....

.... and yet when scientists do try to get their point across they get slagged off too.  The data is equivocal.  It isn't clear what the cause is.  It could be solar activity.  It could be the natural cycle of the earth.

There are times when I wonder if the last season of the Newsroom had it right.  "It's like your sat in your car in your garage with the engine running and you've just slipped into a coma ..."

[IndigoPrime]

It isn't clear what the cause is.

Although if it isn't humans, the massive spike post-industrial revolution, and very rapid increase over the past couple of decades regarding extreme weather is quite the coincidence. I recognise correlation isn't causation, but the general consensus among scientists is we're massively fucking things up, and are now at best in a damage limitation scenario.

"It began with the bees..."

[TordelBack]

Meanwhile, I've read the comments below thejournal.ie's article ...

When I'm Supreme Leader I'll be using TheJournal's comment section and the Newstalk text line to draw up the list for the Re-Education Camps*. It's not representative of the people of this country, or the last two referenda, two GEs and the Euros would have gone very differently.

However, the extent to which thst forum normalises hate speech which should be beyond any legal threshold is deeply disturbing. If you saw some of it in '30s Nazi propaganda you'd be shocked.



*Euphemism. They can't be re-educated because they were never educated in the first place. It's just Rockall and a few fishing rods.

[Professor Bear]

I'm against re-education camps, having invested heavily in the guillotine industry.

Right wing opinions being seen as the default serves the interests of the ruling classes, but if you go to DogPoopEaters.com and read the comments, you don't come away thinking the world is full of people who eat dog poop - so why the BBC put writers from DogPoopEaters.com on Newsnight is anyone's guess, but they are not journalists and the media should not be uncritically platforming their ideas as normal because they are the opinions of people who literally eat dogshit.

[shaolin_monkey]

BristolLive names and shames some folk who made particularly abusive comments.

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/abuse-threats-made-greta-thunberg-3897936

[shaolin_monkey]

The latest Project Drawdown report is out!

What follows is an overview of climate solutions in hand—now, today—to reach Drawdown and begin to come back into balance with the planet's living sys- tems. These solutions are tools of possibility in the face of a seemingly impossible challenge. They must not remain the domain of specialists or select groups. Widespread awareness and understanding of climate solutions is vital to kindle agency and effect change worldwide, across individual, community, organiza- tional, regional, national, and global scales. People and institutions of all kinds, in all places, have roles to play in this great transformation, and the solutions in these pages are a synthesis of collective wisdom and collec- tive action unfolding around the globe.

https://www.drawdown.org/drawdown-framework/drawdown-review-2020

[shaolin_monkey]

Wow, this is an amazing website!

We know scientists are warning us we're racing towards a climate change cliff edge, as we're not reducing CO2 emissions anywhere near fast enough, but how do they FEEL about this?

The website collects handwritten notes from scientists the world over about how they feel about their own findings, and the collection is incredibly powerful.

Fear, anger, betrayal, optimism, support, care - all the emotions, all around what the human race collectively faces.

Haves a look:

https://www.isthishowyoufeel.com/this-is-how-scientists-feel.html

[shaolin_monkey]

Something positive for a change - a fantastic book that can be enjoyed by everyone:

Cranky Uncle versus Climate Change!

This is a review of the paperback, not the Kindle edition.  I would strongly recommend getting the paperback - it is beautiful!

When I ordered this book I wasn't expecting the astounding quality, humour, inventiveness and ease of reading! Or the volume! I was maybe expecting a fairly slim volume with perhaps some general climate change science in it, some funny cartoons, and maybe some examples of what climate science denial looks like.

I am so pleased at how my expectations have been blown out of the water - this book is absolutely superb, and deserves to be on the shelves at every school, university, home and workplace. 

Why is this so unique compared to all the other climate change literature out there?  I think the main difference is accessibility.  I've been working my way through several courses and books, and despite the best efforts of the authors it can be tough going for a lay person such as myself to follow the science.  And as for those who create debate about the science where there is none - what do you do about those folk??

What Dr Cook has created is quite special.  He has presented the science in straightforward terms in the text, but then used his cartoon and design experience to create visuals around the text that further accentuate the point, and often had me chortling as I read.  Sometimes the chortling was 'laugh or cry' as whichever way you cut it, the subject matter is still about the deadly changes we are seeing in our climate.

He uses the Cranky Uncle figure to represent climate science deniers beautifully, and with great feeling and humour.  I understand this figure may have come from Dr Cook's own personal experience with a family member, but anyone who has spent any time on social media will have no doubt seen similar people making similar misguided clams about the science.

Also, the book can be read in a number of ways.  You can read it cover-to-cover, and follow the well structured layout of the science, the history, the scientific consensus, then the psychology of denial, and plenty of examples of the science versus the denial.  This never gets dull, as the subjects are structured into accessible bite-sized chunks.

Or, you could just open the book at a random page, and enjoy a snippet of the science alone with the great cartoons and fact-myth-fallacy fiction on the edge of many of the pages. The layout and content is so effective you could let the book fall open anywhere, and you'll both learn and be amused by what you see. The book strangely makes it a joy to read and understand the situation we are in.

It is the design and creativity in putting across the science which makes this tome as enjoyable for a child as it is for an adult - it truly is THE climate science book for all ages, and for all levels of learning and understanding.  While a five year old may not understand the science, they certainly would enjoy the colourful and funny cartoons.  I can guarantee my 13 year old daughter will love this book, being at a place in her education where her scientific understanding is just taking off.  As an adult who has been away from education for decades I am finding this a hugely enjoyable way to understand the current course we are on, what we need to do to turn the situation around, and what we face in terms of he science denial, and how to tackle it.

Buy this book for you, buy it for your friends, buy it for your kids, buy it for your workplace, your schools, your libraries - get this on shelves everywhere.  Leave it out where people can see it, pick it up, flip though it, and be totally charmed and amused learning about the greatest challenge the human race has ever faced.