open Letter to Greta Thunberg and Teachers Everywhere

3/19/2019

Dear Greta,
First and foremost, I wish to thank you. Thank you for bravely taking your solitary stand in August. Thank you for speaking so boldly to the rich and the powerful. And, above all, thank you for inspiring millions of young people to #climatestrike alongside you.

With my own students you have been held up as an example of what youth can accomplish when they raise their voices. I have even suggested that you are, at this moment, the single most important person in the world. Many – including you – may disagree with that statement, but please allow me to make the case for those who don’t yet know what we do.

Climate change is not just about worsening fires, storms and floods that seize the headlines on a daily basis. It is also about the growing number of children who spend their days pursuing water instead of education. It is about drought and malnutrition and starvation – mostly in parts of the world that are least responsible for our thickening atmosphere. It is about the “tipping point” when melting ice will release more methane than even a zero-carbon Earth can handle. It is about the scientific consensus that we are only about a decade away from crossing this line.

Despite these facts some politicians, parents, and power brokers are telling you and your followers to return to your Friday classes. To pursue change from there. To allow the “more knowledgeable” adults to continue doing their work.

Some are worried about you. Some are anxious about their jobs or their stocks. Some are willfully blind to the realities of climate change. Some are scared. But they all have one thing in common:

They’re all wrong.

Confronting injustice has long involved bold breaks from the status quo – including the breaking of rules. Your detractors, for various reasons, seek to moderate your anger and shrink your sense of personal power. Thankfully, you and the approximately 1.5 million allies who just commanded the Ides of March seem to understand your true strength and authority. And you all have every right to be furious.

I want you to know that the vast majority of educators are on your side. To teachers everywhere I wish to acknowledge the difficult position we occupy. Entrusted with children from families of all political stripes, we are expected to separate our ideologies from our instruction. While some accuse us of indoctrinating students, others will criticize us for being unsupportive. When making your own decisions, I urge you to consider climate change action not as an ideology, but as a moral imperative that speaks to the deepest levels of common humanity.

Our students also find themselves divided. One group will die from climate change, one will fight in their names, and one will be marginally better at graphing and documenting the history of this crucial moment because they missed less class time. We, the educators, should want the second group to be larger than the third.

This does not mean that we have to organize weekly strikes; our students are doing that on their own. Some, however, will look to our faces when considering whether to participate in #FridaysForFuture. Freedom of Expression allows us to smile. Our consciences want us to dance. Our school mission statements encourage us to teach citizenship and activism. Tens of thousands of scientists and political leaders have signed letters in support of this movement. And the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, signed by every country on Earth, supersede restrictive curricula. So, yes, you can teach about climate change in any subject area.

Still, some voices will seek to silence us, too. Some voices will call for threats or punishments to students and teachers alike. But to educators reading this, please know that you can be the other voices in any setting. You can echo Greta Thunberg’s assertiveness and bravery.

You, Greta, have no doubt heard teachers say that young people can change the world. Like most adults, we love to say this. In this hypocrisy vs. heroism moment, please know that your teachers are immensely proud of you. So are the 30,000+ educators who drive the global #TeachSDGs movement. We stand united behind you. And we will encourage more of our colleagues to do the same.

Thank you again. And congratulations on the Peace Prize nomination.
Ada McKim is a co-founder of @TeachSDGs and a Canadian teacher of World Issues and Law.

Donald Chandler

3/19/2019 10:17:51 am

Brilliant piece. Our local school strike group will be spreading this far and wide, I bet. On the surface, Friday’s Global Climate Strike was about climate action. Going deeper, though, it was about the beginning of the end of absolute adult authority. A necessary shift, under the circumstances.

Peter Cunningham link

11/14/2019 04:48:01 pm

BOLLOCKS!
The problem is you people - the indoctrinators of youth.
Clearly you have no understanding of the complexities involved and resort to the touchy feely. Failure to deal with the real issues means you people are part of the problem. IN A NUTSHELL:
It is pointless harping on that CO2 alone and nothing else is responsible for climate variation.
Air does not warm the oceans - the oceans warm and cool the air.
Solar and geological factors control water temperatures.
A standard atmosphere is 784 times less dense than water (or) 0.1275% the density of the same volume of water and depending on moisture content, air has 45 times less thermal conductivity than water.
The ONLY solution to cleaner air is modern, inherently safe nuclear. USE IT.
The USA alone has sufficient stockpiles of decommissioned nuclear warheads to power the entire world for over 500 years, and neutralise that waste TOTALLY to the value of beach sand in just 300 years.

You people prattle on with utter irrelevance, and in so doing are part of the problem, not the solution.

Anon

11/17/2019 10:06:21 am

You deniers get so desperate these days resorting to myth and fables rather than fact. Your kind is in decline and you cant accept it.

Squirrel

11/14/2019 05:22:34 pm

Where is the data that says the air is thickening?

Can you supply a link, it would make an interesting read.

11/14/2019 10:59:57 pm

Clearly comprehension isn't your forte'. Another try:

Let us first examine the first examine the Thermal Conductivity and Specific Heat of some atmospheric gases.

You have a peek at: www.engineeringtoolbox.com
Look for "Comparing Gas Specific Heat Capacity with Thermal Conductivity and Radiation Peoperties". READ and absorb.

When done - How "much less" the density of air is to water.
Water has a density of 1000 kg/m^3.
If you had a meter cubed of water it would weight about 1000 kg.
Air that is near sea level has a density that averages 1.275 kg/m^3.
If you have a balloon containing a meter cubed of sea level air, the air itself would weight only 1.275 kg.
Therefore, to find how much more dense water is than air all we need to do is find a ratio of water to air.
1000 kg/m^3 divided by 1.275 kg/m^3 yields 784.
Therefore, at sea level, air is 784 times less dense than water.
Expressed in another way, a volume of air at sea level has 0.1275% of the density of the same volume of water.
Dirt is about 2.5 times the density of water.

As you asked about air density:
The density of air is usually denoted by a Greek letter 'p', and it measures the mass of air per its unit volume. Dry air mostly consists of nitrogen (~78%) and oxygen (~21%). The remaining 1% contains many different gases, among others, argon, carbon dioxide, neon or helium. However, the air will cease to be dry air when water vapor appears.

As a mixture of gases, air doesn't have a constant density; this value depends in large on air composition. Most components have similar densities and don't influence the overall density in a substantial way. One of the exceptions is the water vapor; the more water vapor in the air, the lower its density.

For dry air, the density of air at sea level at a temperature of 15°C and pressure of 101.325 kPa (mean sea-level pressure), the density is approximately equal to 1.225 kg/m³. If you change the air temperature, humidity, or the altitude (and hence the pressure), the air density will change, too. As a rule of thumb, you can expect a drop of 0.11-0.12 kg/m³ per 1000 m of altitude change.

Now on a hot day you sweat, so you use a fan, and what does that do? It cools you.
Now examine the laws of thermodynamics - particularly the second.

This is why the oceans substantially affect the air temperatures - and why Greta and Indoctrinators, and sensationalist media are so damned dangerous. The politicians aren't stupid - they are using alarm to control, and the sheep simply cannot see.

Ardhendu Biswas link

11/14/2019 11:38:05 pm

If We, the parents can't do anything for our children and they ignite the change,how dare we to crab them back?

Mr Hill

11/15/2019 04:09:35 am

Here is a hard truth to ponder, Greta: if the great producers of this world whom you excoriate were to withdraw their productivity, wealth and talents—in short—their minds from the world today, your generation would simply perish. Why? Because as children you have done nothing as yet, with your lives besides being born. This is what we expect of children until such time as they can be producers by learning from their elders. You are understandably social and ecological ballast. You are not yet cognitively advanced to replicate the structures of survival of which you are the beneficiaries.
Children are important installments on the future. We have invested in you. It is you and your smug generation which think they have nothing to learn from the older ones who are failing themselves. Whom do you expect to employ the majority of you if you have neither the job credentials or life competency skills to navigate the world? The future unemployable-skipping- school-on-Friday obstreperous children?
The truth, as one anonymous blogger aptly put it, is that your generation is unable to work up to forty hours per week without being chronically depressed and anxious. Its members cannot even decide if they want to be a boy or a girl, or both, or neither, or a “they.” They cannot eat meat without crying. I might add that your generation needs “trigger warnings” and “safe spaces” as pre-conditions for learning in school. Its members have a pathological need to be coddled and protected from the challenging realities of life. Your generation is the biggest demander and consumer of carbon spewing technological gadgets and devices. An hour without any of them and too many of you succumb to paralyzing lethargy. Your generation is the least curious and most insular set of individuals one has ever encountered. Your hubris extends so far that you think you have nothing to learn from your elders. Greta, living in complete harmony with nature is the death of creativity. Understand this. All great civilizations were forged in the crucibles of proper exploitation of the earth. Those who lived on land with oil and did nothing with it never had a right to it in the first place. Non-usage of God’s resources is the cardinal sin because it results in the un-development of our human capabilities, and makes us indistinguishable from beasts.
Your generation needs to be taught the morality of wealth creation, rather than only parasitically benefiting from it. The only revolution you will lead is one into nihilism and civilization regression.

Robert Sellani

11/15/2019 07:17:20 am

To add some counterbalance - also from an educator....

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2019/11/open-letter-greta-thunberg-jason-d-hill/

Prof.Kamal Bhattacharyya link

11/16/2019 09:47:08 pm

My Dear Greta Thunberg,
I am from India, the place of Nobel laureate Rabindra Nath Tagore in literature (1913), Arartya Sen in economics(1998), Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee in economics (2019). Despite all odds, how you are going alone makes you no lesser than super heroes. Our capital Delhi is suffering from acute environmental pollution where people are to go in oxygen parlour to take fresh oxygen, in this situation your emergence in loke an incarnation of divine power. I on behalf of all the Indians invite you to India. Let me tell you one quote from Rabindranath Tagore "If no one responds to your call, then go alone".
With blessings
God speed

Yours ever
Kamal Bhattacharyya

Vyacheslav Luchkin link

3/20/2019 01:29:10 am

Climate change is highly complicated issue. Why wouldn't these young and energetic leaders tackle more evident problem? It is disgusting that UN Mafia prospers and insolently and shamelessly robs and milks the world community! UN is managed by a gang of swindlers, thieves and outright bandits. I think that bringing UN criminals to justice is a right thing to do. Head of UN Mafia (HUNM) Guterres and his cronies must be sent to jail! I saw at the Instagram page of Greta Thunberg her photos with HUNM Guterres. Does that mean that she supports UN Mafia?

Charlie

3/20/2019 04:46:51 am

Where is your evidence for your rude allegations?

11/14/2019 11:41:44 pm

From the UN down, the climate change delusion is a gigantic money tree. It is a tyranny that, despite its pretensions, favours the rich and politically powerful at the expense of the poor and powerless. But the madness of the crowds is waning. Punishment is sure to overtake them sooner or later. We can only hope it comes before most of us descend into serfdom.

You asked for evidence, so some bigger words - here are but a few ... FACTS:

Ottmar Edenhofer, IPCC official, 2010:
“…one has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. Instead, climate change policy is about how we redistribute de facto the world’s wealth.”
Edenhofer also stated,
"Developed countries have basically expropriated the atmosphere of the world community and so they must have their wealth expropriated and redistributed to the victims of their alleged crimes."

Maurice Strong, organiser of the first UN climate summit, 1992 :
(a) “We may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrialized civilization to collapse.”
and
(b) “Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?”.
and
Maurice Strong – speech to Club of Rome – and “invented” referred specifically to ‘Global Warming’
(c) “In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that .. the threat of global warming.. would fit the bill…. the real enemy, then, is humanity itself….we believe humanity requires a common motivation, namely a common adversary in order to realize world government. It does not matter if this common enemy is a real one or…. one invented for the purpose.”

Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change
(a) The December 2015 climate treaty in Paris will be “a centralised transformation” that “is going to make the life of everyone on the planet very different"
(b) At a news conference in Brussels in October 2015, she admitted that the goal of environmental activists is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to destroy capitalism.
“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution."
(pc: That should be taken also in the context of Strong’s statements quoted above and the intent to de-industrialise the developed world. A potential return to lifestyles of the 15th and 16th centuries.)

Richard Benedick, US State Department, 1992:
“A global warming treaty must be implemented even if there is no scientific evidence to back the greenhouse effect.”

Christine Stewart, Canadian Minister of the Environment, 1988:
“No matter if the science of global warming is all phony…climate change the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world.”

Mikhail Gorbachev, former chief communist of the planet, 1996:
“The threat of environmental crisis will be the international disaster key to unlock the New World Order.”

WELL - You did ask ...... and there are more!

Lawrence Taylor link

3/21/2019 04:58:20 am

Thank you for this letter. Our leaders are not taking this seriously and we have run out of time. Unfortunately, I don't think there is going to be meaningful change and your actions will be needed. I am trying to incorporate Windyday Concept. If you can have your city declare a Climate Emergency, have them build worker coop factories to make solar panels, batteries, wind & tide turbines, and set up local farms. We will have to break the present system based on fossil fuels, including food supply which is worldwide and produces plastic in quantities that are overwhelming our planet. We should plant hemp and bamboo to detoxify the soil, build up it's root structure, and can replace plastic. And hemp is 7X better as a CO2 trap than trees. Please spread this letter and my comments.

Merci pour cette lettre. Nos dirigeants ne prennent pas cela au sérieux et notre temps est écoulé. Malheureusement, je ne pense pas qu'il y aura un changement significatif et que vos actions seront nécessaires. J'essaie d'intégrer Windyday Concept. Si vous pouvez demander à votre ville de déclarer une urgence climatique, demandez-leur de construire des usines de coopératives de travail pour fabriquer des panneaux solaires, des batteries, des éoliennes, et de mettre en place des fermes locales. Nous devrons casser le système actuel basé sur les combustibles fossiles, y compris l'approvisionnement alimentaire qui est mondial et qui produit du plastique dans des quantités qui submergent notre planète. Nous devrions planter du chanvre et du bambou pour détoxifier le sol, renforcer sa structure racinaire et remplacer le plastique. Et le chanvre est 7 fois meilleur en tant que piège à CO2 que les arbres. S'il vous plaît diffuser cette lettre et mes commentaires.

Sharon Schaub

11/14/2019 08:51:07 pm

Holy Crow. Why are you worried about plants! If you get rid of CO2 we won’t have plant life nor human life. You climate people are all uneducated crazy people 😂

11/17/2019 10:05:17 am

Silly deniers in decline.

Fred Sagwe

3/21/2019 06:53:41 am

The hour us cometh to speak out on how to mitigate on #climateaction with bravery.Right now my country Kenya and else where in the world is adversely affected .With drought ,hunger & famine wreaking havoc.
#ISTANDWITHGRETATHUNBERG

layla

5/13/2019 02:46:03 am

shes an inspiration

Remedial Suggestions

10/2/2019 09:04:40 pm

Greta,
Congratulations. Some ideas put very briefly. We need to morally enforce a voluntary lifestyle code.

1.Let the youngsters boycott fossil fuelled vehicles. Let each one insist on cycling and buying adult tricycles or quadricycles
for the elders. in the family.

2. Let all children insist on having VERMIcomposting (the best method which uses red worms) of waste at home. You get suitable bins for the purpose( The colonies and municipalities will never do it...only exceptional ones will). Organic soil sequesters carbon better than anything else. Its our duty to produce it out of waste.

3. Let all children identify carbon guzzling plants and trees. Let them insist on planting and propagating eg. medium size NEEM trees in BUCKETS in balconies. Let children cultivate this great hobby. Many full grown trees' roots may rip up the foundations of buildings, but if grown in buckets or large planters the trees and roots will remain contained and small.

As more such trees begin to abound let these be kept on pavements.

4. Tell your parents and family members to redeem money deposits from oil companies. And to never invest, ie. buy shares of these.

5. Tell your science teachers and Principal you want to learn how to make electricity using a stationary bike. Keep a record of how much clean electricity you generated on which date. At the end of note how much carbon emission you saved the planet.

6. Make it a weekly hobby to install a solar power driven gadget even if it drains some part of your pocket money. Learn to cook in a solar cooker.

Much Love. Wishing you Greta success!!! God Bless

Andrew Gibson

11/14/2019 04:41:24 pm

"...morally enforce a voluntary lifestyle code". Hmmmm... did your brain hurt after thinking of that?

11/14/2019 10:07:44 pm

First - Andrew -- aka: "the wit".

"morally enforce a voluntary lifestyle code"

YES - That's exactly how the UN works - Voluntary compliance, but enforced with financial penalties.

Andrew - if you doubt me, and surely you do, then I suggest you digest the UNs Agenda 21 and it's spawn Agenda 2030.

Get back to me here and enlighten everybody.

11/17/2019 10:07:49 am

Yawn boring denialist crap

Andrew Lalvawnhima

11/14/2019 05:54:13 pm

Well, this just shows teachers are dumb about climate science. Europeans are just so self righteous. The rest of the world agrees climate is changing but unless you provide us with sustainable Nuclear powerplants, the rest of the world will mostly die of economic collapse. Sustainable energy costs more than fossil fuels and are unreliable, they cant even power up low voltage streetlights consistrntly let alone a city. You dont burn coal, the rest of the world will burn trees. Thats sad, but a reality. And The EU or America wont wet other countries experiment with Nuclear power, and there are only a few that would even dare to experiment with that.

Truth is Greta Thunberg is delusional and so are most climate activists and since European Children seem to be getting dumber, they are of no importance to solving a climate issue. Greta does read a lot about the negatives but doesnt read at all about the positives of fossil fuels which by far outweighs the negative. I would suggest her to stop that Asperger's arrogance and stop leading children who have the potential and the RESOURCES to actually solve Climate Change in the future without depriving the Energy resources it takes to bring up the Economy and Mental well being of us 3rd world developing countries.

Im from India and I hope Greta would stop with her delusions of being used as a political puppet, seriously she has no idea of the damage she's causing. I have no hard evidence but everyone here can see that Climate change activists and government employees are the most corrupt departments in India. A person from our locality got an iphone and a car in 3 months after he joined as an assistant in a govt funded Climate activist organisation... Its just bullcrap and political motive for the rest of the world so just stop

11/14/2019 06:03:35 pm

Yes, an iphone and a car in one buy is hard to get around here with a salary topping at around 20k per month... Thats 60k in 3 months at most... That wont buy you an used iphone 8... He got an XR and an SUV... He had no job and lived with his parents who work at an NGO... So in European context, it would be equivalent to working as an intern and buying a yatch

11/14/2019 10:01:45 pm

In short: YES!
I am actually amazed that this site was so open and fair as to allow dissenting but constructive comment (yours and mine), so that's a step in the right direction.

I am from Australia, and like you can see that feeling good about something ranges from "nice" to "destructive".

Righteousness bears its ugly head in many places and is always destructive. This article and many of the comments is an example of claiming the moral high ground, but so blinded by ideologies - can never be constructive.

I am a civil engineer. I MUST examine the whole before embarking on a task. Not so with the righteous.

The dangerous element here is that this site/forum contains educators. No wonder the workd is being screwed up!

Mike link

11/15/2019 01:06:14 am

Not so said Professor Hill...

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2019/11/open-letter-greta-thunberg-jason-d-hill/

Peter

11/16/2019 12:31:29 am

This stream-of-consciousness rant occasionally verges on making an actual point, but never quite gets there. How much time did you waste on this absurd rhetorical pat on the back? Please waste more! The less time you spend interacting with children, the better.

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