Scientists recruit children for climate propaganda – Are you interested in that?

Guest essay by Eric Worrall

h/t Dr. Willie Soon; Climate scientist Marji Puotinen is working hard to recruit the next generation of young soldiers for the climate movement.

Children are interested in climate change with colorful drawings

A giant banner helps spread the message across the globe.

ViaMary Jo DiLonardo
Published December 27, 2021 10:00 AM EST

There is a giant banner that goes around the world, spreading the message of How children care about climate change. The banner is a colorful patchwork of more than 2,600 drawings by children from 33 countries.

The drawings are entries in an international drawing competition where children are asked to describe how trees help cool the Earth and how this helps protect penguin, Coral reefsand everyone. A tree has been planted for each drawing entered in “Children care about climate change” Competition.

The banner measures a whopping 23 feet by 14 feet (7 meters by 4.2 meters) and was recently displayed at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland.

The competition was created by Marji Puotinen, a geographer and research scientist in Perth, Australia, who studies the effects of natural disturbances such as stormy on the world’s coral reefs. She is a member of the Reef Resilience and Adaptation Program working to help the Great Barrier Reef survive with short-term interventions while the world is reducing its carbon footprint.

“Perhaps more important than this is that I am a mother of three who deserves a safe planet to grow up and live on. So the drawing contest to create HUGE banners is part of my free time work, involving my kids as much as possible,” Puotinen told Treehugger.

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“The goal of displaying and filming the giant banner was to amplify the voices of the children represented in their drawings, to show them a drawing they made might go unnoticed. but by joining other kids around the world, an impact is bigger than Puotinen says.

“It is also to inspire and empower the adults around these children, who may have a hard time finding ways to act on their own on climate but find it easier and more satisfying to collaborate. with their children. With this goal in mind, we especially wanted to bring a giant banner to COP26 to remind delegates and world leaders of the obligation to achieve climate justice outcomes for children and those around the world. The world has caused the least climate crisis but is being affected the most. ”

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Read more: https://www.treehugger.com/kids-care-climate-change-colorful-drawings-5210497

Treehugger magazine seems excited by the evidence that children can influence their parents’ responses to climate messages (from the first link above, “how children care about climate change“).

Children influence parents’ opinions on climate change

Via Katherine Martinko

Updated May 7, 2019

One study found that kids exposed to climate change science at school use it to convince their parents of the urgency of the issue.

Before the age of 16, Greta Thurnberg started her now famous climate activism, skipping school on Fridays to sit in front of the Swedish parliament with a sign saying “Climate strike” she started with his parents. She presents facts and documentaries, sharing everything she’s learned, until they’re satisfied and admitting the truth in what she’s said. Greta told the Guardian, “After a while, they started listening to what I was really saying. That’s when I realized I could make a difference.”

As it turns out, parents aren’t the way they are, and a child can be a profoundly influential person. A new one research from University of North Carolina, published May 6 in Natural climate change journaling, set out to discover how effective children can be at changing parents’ minds – and the answer is very.

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The researchers found that children took home what they learned in school and communicated it to their parents, engaging in ways that prompted parents to reconsider their views. This is partly due to the trust that exists between parents and children, making it easier to talk about an emotional issue like climate change. Over the years, both the control group and the experimental group were more concerned with climate change, but this change was most evident in families with children being taught the program.

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Read more: https://www.treehugger.com/children-can-change-their-giving-opinions-climate-change-4853781

The summary of the study was even worse (from 2019).

Children can fuel their parents’ concerns about climate change

Danielle F. Lawson, Kathryn T. Stevenson, M. Nils Peterson, Sarah J. The carrier, Renee L. Strnad & Erin Seekamp

Natural climate change episode 9, pages 458–462 (2019)Quote this article

abstract

The collective action needed to mitigate and adapt to climate change is extremely difficult to achieve, largely because societal ideological biases perpetuate polarization on climate change. . Because children’s perceptions of climate change appear to be less influenced by worldviews or political contexts, they can inspire adults to show greater concern about the climate, and to in turn, collective action. Intergenerational child-to-parent learning — that is, the transfer of knowledge, attitudes, or behaviors from child to parent — can be a promising avenue for overcoming barriers. socially ideological barriers to climate concerns. Here, we present a pilot evaluation of an educational intervention designed to build parents’ climate change concerns indirectly through their middle-aged children. their campus in North Carolina, USA. Parents of children in the treatment group expressed higher levels of concern about climate change than parents in the control group. The effects were strongest among male parents and conservative parents, consistent with previous research, which showed the lowest levels of climate concern before the intervention. Daughters are particularly effective in influencing their parents. Our results suggest that intergenerational learning can overcome barriers to building climate concerns.

Read more: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-019-0463-3

I am personally appalled at the efforts of climate activists to recruit children to their cause, exploiting the special relationship children have with their parents to spread the message of this day. their climate apocalypse.

Climate advocacy efforts like Marji’s can create an emotional bond between some parents and their children, and raise anxiety levels in families, especially if parents do not wholeheartedly accept the urgent climate messages that children have been conveyed. There is proof climate anxiety is ruining the lives of some young people, which pushes some children to engage in self-destructive behaviors such as heavy drug abuse.

I’m not suggesting that Marji wants to hurt anyone, physically or otherwise – but please stop.

Worse consequences are the tragic devastation of personal life that can ensue. Dangerous seeds sown by good intentions will make good people like Marji think that the world is in danger, that parents who were wrong and must be re-educated about climate change can be nurtured. and exploited by the enemies of freedom and democracy.

Every totalitarian movement in history has targeted children, because children are mentally vulnerable. Most children, especially very young children, do not have mastered critical thinking skills that can allow them to evaluate and reject climate propaganda.

For example, Mao’s cultural revolution was fueled by teenagers who wholeheartedly swallowed the teachings and lies they had been fed, which turned them into communist fanatics. produce. in some cases willing to kill their biological parents, after their parents disapproved of the extreme political beliefs the children tried to share.

That means teachers, some of whom helped sow the seeds of Maoism, find themselves powerless to stop the killer once it’s kicked off, and most end up dead if they try.

Please stop now Marji.