Hello. Without being patronising, I truly think that her case is a pitiful one.

Hello Serg97,
So far, the children in my community are OK, as far as I can tell that is; I haven't picked up from the local media that any children skipped school to join protest marches. Touch wood.

You have made some good points. Yeah!

Hello. Thank you very much for your time and your close thoughts. Much appreciated
I would say your view differs from mine in that I don't necessarily consider hate speech and mickey-taking comments as part of free speech. I happily admit that I am not a free speech absolutist. To me, free speech has to be meaningful and productive; whether it is a conversation, discussion, debate, or any form of communication, it needs to be meaningful and productive. When it is reduced to mickey-taking, bickering, name-calling, that sort of things, I no longer consider it as free speech; it's simply rude, childish and disrespectful (OK, I don't deny that they can be entertaining, sometimes. ) To me, justification of "I can say whatever I like" in the name of freedom of speech is wrong. It doesn't necessarily mean that I try to stop such nonsensical behaviour and utterances, let alone banning them legally, but once I decided that I am not gaining anything valuable, I would probably disengage myself.
Another thing I would say is that as the definition of free speech varies, I find it impossible to define/measure "hate" along with many other words that describe emotional states, e.g., anger, happiness, sorrow, disappointment, etc., etc. These words can only be measured subjectively by different individuals in my opinion.

@Naomi So who gets to define hate speech Naomi? I think most of us can agree that directly promoting violence is problematic, but what about voicing other non violent opinions that may possibly influence others in that direction. Where is the line then? Who draws that line and what if you disagree with it?

Hello GaryLK.

"Who gets to define hate speech?"
"Where is the line then?"
"Who draws that line and what if you disagree with it?"

I don't know.

And how about you? Do you know the answers to these questions?

Hello. We agree to disagree. We appreciate different types of sense of humour.

@Naomi Im always willing to agree to disagree. If we all thought the same way life would be awful boring

Hello. My reaction is "stop this hysteria". I think that the politicisation of climate change is wrong. For this reason, I'm not supporting the left, nor am I supporting the right.

If you Google for "Greta memes". You'll find many derogatory images of her, apparently circulated by the right. If it is the left who are manipulating her, as believed, then, I think the right are just as bad for sneering at her.

@Naomi It matters little if one if left or right when one is extreme.

@Naomi I googled, Most are direct from TV - so actually Factual reporting - No wander everyone is scared ... There are more trying to make her the next kardashians, and that is far more worrying for her future mental health. IMHO

@The_Q Good point.

Hello. So you don't think it's high time to stop taking a mickey out of the girl. You don't think it is childish. You enjoy mickey-taking. Well, I don't. That makes us two very different people. That's a fact and I can live with that.

Hello. Support her or not, I'm just sick of all the mickey-taking of the girl. So childish. It's been going on far too long .

I don't believe that most people are ridiculing the child but a combination of obvious brain washing and manipulation by those who have an agenda which makes little sense if one takes the time to learn for themselves what are the facts.

@ScottforKing And debate her by all means, sit down, talk to her face-to-face and make her aware that there may be something she hasn't thought through, or there may be a better way to get the message across. it isn't right to tell children that they're all going to die in a matter of years.

@Naomi It is difficult to discuss matters with anyone who can not accept another point of view because they have a mental or emotional deficit which apparently she does.

@ScottforKing That is the more reason why this hysteria has to stop, for the well-being of the girl and for the well-being of other children.

@Naomi The two extremes are showing the emotional maturity of children. Perhaps a campaign to bring back spanking for poorly behaved children.

@ScottforKing LOL I think there is better ways to instil morals and self awareness in children. Though, I don't have kids... but I have always felt surrounded by them. Right now we don't condem bad behavor, in a veriety of ways. If it was socially unacceptable to make fun of this little girl, maybe we would spend more time focusing on the real problems. There are some schools focusing on teaching kids epathy at a young age, I think if this was normal we might start to see some real progress.

But everyone wants to be a comedian, does that make us a society of jesters?And yet we criticise philosophers. Our priorities are showing, and its a joke. If she is able to have such pull, and if it is an over reaction, or going in the wrong direction its only able to do so because we refuse to look at and address the problem. Like it or not she does represent significant issues in our society and its not her fault.

@Oxfret Sorting out the problem from the issues has always been a problem. Right now this is a problem child who has problem parents supported by a culture with a big problem of responsibility, few want to accept any, most want the government to do it for them.

@ScottforKing, @Oxfret
In my opinion, the politicisation of climate change is wrong, and young minds are caught up in the middle of it, if not being exploited by it. I think that adults have a duty of care which includes protecting children from the evil so to speak.

@Naomi I can't argue with that. From what I have read and heard from several who I respect as being objective, climate has not changed over all for a thousand years. The crisis has been created as a political force for the politicians to use. Greta is being used in this battle. It is difficult to find adults who are able to discuss the science behind the arguments of either side.

@Naomi I've seen a lot of stuff lately trying to get young people to vote. It's the first year I see them laying it on thick and all I can think is that it seems like a very convinent push. Grabing all the young people who don't understand how they might be being used. And they are doing so in a very sensasionalism sort of way. This should be the discusion, more people focused on the patern instead of the person at the head of the media snake.

Again, I don't have the where withal to research and have a very educated opinion on this topic right now. I won't bother starting something like that I can't put enough time into because its too hard to sort out the misinformation. But that naive perspective is exactly what scares me, because I'm sure most people don't even know how to research and weigh both sides against each other to try to find the truth in between. We are consumers, and we consume the story politicians give us without necessarily thinking about the whole picture.

@Oxfret, @ScottforKing
I was watching this video the other day, which you might also be interested to watch.

Considering that Greta is 16, some (including myself actually) say she is old enough to know what she is doing, while considering that she has mental disorders, some say she has been used. It is hard to decide whether she is part or the victim of the fallacy.

Incidentally, the vlogger in this video is apparently perceived as a far-right white nationalist by the left. Well, they would say that wouldn't they? I'll take that with a pinch of salt. As far as this video is concerned, the vlogger seems to have done his homework well.

@Naomi It appears to be well researched, well written and well presented in an objective way. In other words excellent! Thanks for posting.

My pleasure. X

I can't remember who wrote this one: "Failure's hard, but success is far more dangerous. If you are successful at the wrong thing, the mix of praise and money and opportunity can lock you in forever." What level of awareness can a sixteen year old have, even if she was normal and brilliant? There is no doubt that she has not arrived at her passionate beliefs alone. She is no doubt being used.