(The New American) The headline to an article posted on the website of the World Economic Forum (WEF) on August 26 asks, “Should schools teach climate change studies?”
The question is rhetorical, of course, since the WEF globalists have been in the forefront of the worldwide push for “climate change” indoctrination of children and youth for decades. The article begins with this familiar farrago: “As the effects of climate change become ever more apparent, this summer has brought intense heatwaves, severe flooding and damaging storms.” Although the WEF statement does not explicitly claim that the severe weather events mentioned are being caused by man-made global warming, that is the implicit message, one that is piggybacking on the thousands of stories in the “mainstream” media that do explicitly charge that “extreme weather” is increasing due to climate change. (Climate alarmists and their media allies have been escalating their apocalyptic claims in this area for the past decade, but as we have shown in the past — and show here regarding current claims — top climate experts have debunked these wild assertions. Hurricanes, droughts, floods, wildfires, heatwaves, and storms have not measurably increased in number or intensity in recent years or decades. See here, here, here, here, and here.
Exploiting Children and Youth
“Last year,” the WEF continues, “climate anxiety was revealed to affect the daily lives of nearly half of young people, according to a global study.” The WEF provides a link that takes one to a press release from the University of Bath in the UK boosting the “study” by the university’s “climate psychologists.” “Nearly half of global youth surveyed (45%) say climate anxiety and distress is affecting their daily lives and functioning — according to results from the largest scientific study into climate anxiety in children and young people,” the Bath press release claims.
The Bath study, published in The Lancet Planetary Health and titled “Climate anxiety in children and young people and their beliefs about government responses to climate change: a global survey,” says it “surveyed 10,000 children and young people (aged 16–25 years) in ten countries (Australia, Brazil, Finland, France, India, Nigeria, Philippines, Portugal, the UK, and the USA; 1000 participants per country).”
According to the study:
Respondents across all countries were worried about climate change (59% were very or extremely worried and 84% were at least moderately worried). More than 50% reported each of the following emotions: sad, anxious, angry, powerless, helpless, and guilty. More than 45% of respondents said their feelings about climate change negatively affected their daily life and functioning, and many reported a high number of negative thoughts about climate change (eg, 75% said that they think the future is frightening and 83% said that they think people have failed to take care of the planet). Respondents rated governmental responses to climate change negatively and reported greater feelings of betrayal than of reassurance. Climate anxiety and distress were correlated with perceived inadequate government response and associated feelings of betrayal.
The study concluded that the widespread “climate anxiety and distress” among children and youth must be blamed on the failure of governments to enact the oppressive restrictions advocated by the climate fanatics. It is not the incessant bombardment of children with “climate emergency” frightmares (melting ice caps, rising sea levels, drowning polar bears, dying coral reefs, droughts, floods, wildfires, species extinction, etc.) that is causing the devastating mental anguish. Oh no, of course not; the “researchers” don’t even consider that. No, they say record numbers of kids are going into mental meltdown because governments have refused to lock down the entire planet in a “green” globalist-communist regime.
From The Lancet Planetary Health article:
Climate anxiety and dissatisfaction with government responses are widespread in children and young people in countries across the world and impact their daily functioning. A perceived failure by governments to respond to the climate crisis is associated with increased distress. There is an urgent need for further research into the emotional impact of climate change on children and young people and for governments to validate their distress by taking urgent action on climate change.
It would seem worthy of note that the lead author, Caroline Hickman, not only is a leader of the Climate Psychology Alliance (a left-wing outfit that demonizes as “deniers” citizens and world-renowned scientists who dissent from global warming fanaticism), but also has been featured as an author for the WEF. But neither the WEF article nor the University of Bath press release — nor The Lancet, for that matter — is anxious to point this out. Also, Hickman and Dr. Liz Marks, her co-lead author of the Lancet article, were both promoted by the WEF in January of this year, after the Lancet article appeared. “Our children’s anxiety is a completely rational reaction given the inadequate responses to climate change they are seeing from governments,” Hickman said in a WEF posting. “Children and young people are now mobilizing around the world and taking governments to court; arguing that failure to act on climate change violates their human rights.”
