Youngsters, Leading The Way

MOST GOOD IDEAS come from teenagers. Something to do with an uncluttered mind, being too young for cynicism, being possessed of a full compliment of brain cells. A case in point: the Viet Nam war, which the Vietnamese still call "the American war", dragged on for a decade, and its conclusion was finally forced upon the establishment by millions of rabble rousing high school and college students. The legalization of marijuana comes to mind. The old folks never would have thought to stop treating it as if it were a crime, without the persistent assistance of the young and the restless. Not long ago, in Sweden, a female teenager decided that she had had quite enough of living on a dying planet, quite enough of ninety degree summer temperatures in a country in which the average temperature used to be about fifty in the summer, tired, of living in a world in which the old folks, aware of their own impending demise, seemed to care little or nothing about taking the drastic steps necessary to reverse climate change and preserve life on earth for future generations. So, she decided to do something about it. The world, Goethe said, advances only because of those who oppose it. She decided to oppose the world. She started by making a cardboard sign, getting a few of her friends together, and standing outside her school when she should have been in class, and having a little protest against the willingness of the world to accede to its own destruction at its own hands. Her project gained momentum, fueled by the affinity of teenagers with the internet. Now, it has spread across Europe, to Germany, Italy, and other countries, and has the potential to conquer the world. In Belgium, ten thousand high schoolers with homemade placards gathered together this week to inform the world of its responsibility to its progeny, and of the dire need to get off its ass, and to do something about climate before its too late. Like all protestors, doing something consists is gaining the attention of the community, and then, lord willing, the world. Reactions very. Classrooms are empty; what good is a protest if it isn't manifested amid a spirit of defiance, if it isn't a display of sacrifice? To protest properly, one must be defiant, one must skip class. The students are sacrificing their educations, temporarily. or as long as it takes. One old timer, a protest retiree, remarked that in his day, kids did their protesting outside school hours. He, of course, has the luxury of piety. School districts vary, country to country, town to town. some threaten to require protesting students to repeat the school year, next year, with mandatory full attendance. Others give their blessing, with the rationale that the first lesson to learn in any school is civic involvement, contributing to the community, serving humanity. The progressive schools are easy to identify. Climate change protesting among they youth has not come to America in large numbers, yet, but, as usual, European culture is leading the way, and America is a clone of European culture. The students realize that they lack the power to implement their ideals, and that their only hope is to arouse the empathy of those in power now. but since those in power now are not responding adequately with vitally needed policy reform, somebody has to light the fuse, and hope for help. As one seventeen year old girl said: "we want to live in a livable world, and we think we have that right. Somebody has to do something, wo, since nobody else is, we are." As always, the young people are the ones who tell the truth.