Right now our nation’s kids are doing the thing which Australia’s politicians have assiduously avoided doing for over a decade: drawing attention to the urgent need for swift action on climate change, like right now.
And it’s adorable watching grown adults say things like “children should be protesting on the weekend!” and “b-b-but the rally was organised by adults, who are the only people that can apply for the necessary permissions!” because they’re just slightly too embarrassed to say “stop showing how goddamn useless we are, committed young people!”
“They’re being used by left-wing activists” — @RealMarkLatham on the thousands of children set to wag school to protest for action on climate change today. pic.twitter.com/G9a6mFwrpm
— Sunrise (@sunriseon7) March 14, 2019
And while it’s genuinely lovely to see how scared our nation’s worst adults are by tens of thousands of our nation’s best children, it’s hardly a surprise.
After all, how lousy a job are grown ups doing when kids are forced to pick up the slack on something as important as “not having the species wiped out by an uninhabitable climate”?
https://twitter.com/skateanderson/status/1106360597472411648
What’s more, the sixteen year old Swedish girl that started the global protest movement – Greta Thunberg – has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by a trio of lawmakers in her home nation on the grounds that climate is going to be a literal battleground as people flee uninhabitable regions.
You know, like what’s already happening.
The view from Kiribati
A spokesperson for the NSW Department of Education told SBS that “all students who are enrolled at school [would be] expected to attend that school where instruction is provided,” a message echoed by other states.
Which means that a lot of Departments of Education are going to have their expectations pretty firmly managed, and that they’re going to have to look into a detention stadium.
So thank you, kids, and we look forward to the world’s biggest Breakfast Club dance if the schools decide to punish you for giving a damn about your future.
It’s a reference you’re too young to get, we realise, but hell: you know how to google stuff.
Here’s how Gen X protested, kids. That’s why we’re in such a mess.