“Malin Persson Giolito”
“the Kids do it, we ought to – shall we settle it?”
“”Plus chaud, plus chaud, plus chaud que le climat”, chanted I (and an estimated 1.5 million other people the world over, on the same theme, but slightly different language) on march 15 under the Global Strike for the Environment. The environment is simply scorching, as Glenn (probably not) would say. Were you also with? Were you – just as I and my youngest skolkande daughters – and cast you in the snålblåsten with an increasingly wetter kartongplakat and wondered why it always rains when you are demonstrating? It is as if someone up there wants to test the belief. Only wearing a raincoat to be proven level of commitment.”
“irrespective of whether you were with, how committed you are, and what you think about the demonstrations (it IS embarrassing to chanting silly chants, loudly, and it IS suspiciously with the crowds all going in the same direction) so it is impossible to not be affected by the power of what this movement says: we must stop carbon emissions and save our planet from going under.”
“The vast majority of adults I speak with says the same thing: the kids are amazing. The children of hope. The kids do it we should. But should we really be content to repeat platitudes such as ”we are ashamed, posterity will judge us”? Or should we as adults actually DO something (in addition to discuss if the truancy is good or not)? Something that our children CAN’t do for us? (Hint: this is a so-called rhetorical question. More than Greta should be able to answer.)”
“When Jimmie Åkesson was asked why SD is not longer actively working for Sweden to leave the EU, he mentioned climate as one of the issues (admittedly far down on the SD agenda) that need to be managed jointly, together with the other EU countries. That the environment is not going to manage by building a wall around the outside world, it seems, therefore, advise a political consensus on. What a fantastic tour it in just over two months, the elections to the european Parliament. But what an amazing bad luck that it is so insanely trååååååååkigt and, above all, a HASSLE to try and put into question what the EU can and should do for the environment?”
“I have worked as a lawyer with the EU-issues in the half of my life, so I am more aware than most about what could be done if the parliamentary conditions were, on the national and EU level. The fight against climate change is also an explicit objective of EU environmental policy. It is in the EU constitution, if you will. And the ambitions are high. But as in all democracies is the EU’s legislative bodies are limited by what they have to do and – simply put – what gets support from the elected parliament. And yes, by that I mean the exact same people’s assembly 2014 (the last time there were elections to the EU parliament) only 51% of the vote, the swedes didn’t bother to try to influence how it would look. 49% of the swedes chose – entirely voluntarily – to be at home in their very comfortable sofflock. But it is clear. Probably, it was horrible weather.”
“I would like to suggest one thing. The next time you touches on the idea that the responsibility for our future may not only rests on a bunch of protesters, school kids, or regrets over that it doesn’t matter what YOU do, the next time you complain that the POLITICIANS don’T DO SOMETHING (or just doing it WRONG), then I think you should spend fifteen minutes to consider who you want to represent you in the EUROPEAN parliament. You don’t need chanting silly chants, not even set up your trip to Thailand. You may have to put on a raincoat if it is raining on may 26, but vote, do it, just. In the worst case, you ask a teen in your vicinity for help with putting you into the very substantive issues.”
