Thread by @SteB777

What a truly nasty and cynical article.

"a monument to our new religion of environmentalism"

"because she has devoted herself to a cause that, realistically, will never be won"

I will deal with this cynicism in the thread below.
independent.co.uk/arts-entertain…

1) Let's deal with the sack of it sneering argument that environmentalism is religion and that Greta is some sort of quasi saint being worshipped by environmentalists. These are false arguments, specious arguments, and this is sophistry as I will demonstrate.

2) The situation is very simple. The best scientific evidence available to humanity says currently our civilization is on a globally suicidal path because of anthropogenic climate change and the systematic destruction of the Earth's biodiversity.
theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

3) This potential catastrophe is entirely avoidable. The 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm realised we were at a juncture in history, and we had to change direction to avoid catastrophe. See the report on this page.
sustainabledevelopment.un.org/milestones/hum…

4) As no action was taken the UN set up the Brundtland Commission in 1983, who's 1987 report Our Common Future, led to the 1992 Rio Earth Summit.
sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/docume…

5) Neither the industrial revolution, which led to this globally suicidal path, or the failure of governments to address the climate and ecological emergency, is the fault of humanity per se, or the public. Despite claims that it is driven by humanity.
news.un.org/en/story/2011/…

6) The industrial revolution was a project by a small clique of wealthy people of Britain to create industrial production from which they could make immense profits from. It took huge social engineering and changes in the law to create it. It didn't just come happen.

7) First, people were fenced off from the land under various Inclosure Acts that effectively prevented them from being able to support themselves, forcing them to work in the new industrial system for a pittance.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inclosure…

8) Most people in Britain never had the vote when these massive changes were made to force people, often by starvation, to work in the new industrial system. The Reform Act of 1832 only gave 1 in 7 men in the UK voting rights.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Ac…

9) People didn't willing accept what was being imposed on them. There were huge protests and uprisings, usually put down brutally by military force. Examples are the Newport Rising and the Luddites.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite

10) My point being that industrialism and the economic model of capitalism that went with it, was something imposed on people by a wealth few. It wasn't an economic model people chose to take up.

11) After the 1992 Rio Earth Summit politicians made great big speeches about how they were going to address the climate and ecological crisis. For over 20 years people voted for politicians and parties committed to addressing the crisis.

12) There were no protests against policy to address the climate and ecological emergency. Politicians simply failed to implement measures because of lobbying by corporate interests, the fossil fuel industry and billionaires etc.

13) The false narrative is peddled that politicians couldn't implement the measures because of the consumerists demands of the public. How did the public stop politicians taking this action? Evidence please?

14) As recently as 2010 David Cameron was campaigning on his green credentials promising the greenest ever government, because it was a vote winner. Not because the public were protesting against environmental measures.

15) The majority of the public are still in favour of far more radical action to address the climate emergency than anything politicians are offering.
undp.org/content/undp/e…

16) Therefore, we are hurtling to global suicide, not because it is being driven by public demand, but because of the economic dogma of a small clique of powerful politicians, industrialists, billionaires profiting from this economic model. Such dogma is of a religious type.

17) If we are hurtling to towards global suicide because of dogmatic people who believe profit and economic growth is more important than survival, then these people are part of a death cult which is most definitely religious in nature, the worship of money and wealth.

18) This is why it is an outrageous lie and falsehood to label environmentalists as some sort of religious cult, and Greta Thunberg as some sort of religious figure. No, environmentalists and Greta are the rational opponents of this suicidal, quasi-religious death cult.

19) It is utterly bizarre that the people saying, no we don't have to cause the collapse of our civilization and the unnecessary death of billions people -to create huge wealth for a few - are the ones being accused of being religious fanatics.

20) Self-evidently those driving this entirely preventable global suicide pact, a death cult, are the religious fanatics. They believe making huge wealth is more important than life itself.

21) Therefore the arguments presented in this article are utterly untrue and why has the @Independent published this? @_SeanOGrady @GeorgeMonbiot @GretaThunberg @ClimateHuman @KevinClimate

Should be, "it didn't just come 'to' happen".

@threadreaderapp please unroll.