Deny, deflect and delay are three of the key strategies used by climate change denialists for ignoring or putting off the urgent changes needed to avoid the worst impacts in the decades immediately ahead.  In Malta we should probably add three additional strategies – keeping your legs tightly crossed, burying your head and ultimately, engaging in special pleading.

Despite living on an island that will be directly and negatively impacted by climate change, most of our politicians, many businesspeople, and a large cohort of our population at large act as if its ‘business as usual’ – no need for concern or action.  A large dollop of greenwashing here and there will suffice nothing fundamental needed nationally or regionally despite all the evidence pointing in the wrong direction.  

This is not a view shared by all, if the perspectives and passion of a group of young people taking part in the Gozo English Speaking Union’s recent public speaking competition are anything to go by. The dominant issue addressed by participants was climate change and, more specifically what we should and could do to address it. What was especially obvious to all of us who were present was the passion, conviction, and urgency with which they spoke.

Not a hint of equivocation, no ‘ifs and buts’, just straight talk – a breath of fresh air and a break from the dominant ‘adult’ prevarications.    

In this, they clearly echoed the sentiment, arguments, and determination of a growing worldwide youth movement that has taken on the issue of climate change insisting that far too many adults, world leaders and commentators have failed and failed spectacularly to do their duty.

Despite the importance and urgency of the issue, a dominant response to the views of young people on climate change (and to the emergence of that militant youth movement worldwide) is to patronise, dismiss, ridicule and even attack (often personally, as the comments board of this paper attests). Locally, the micro-management of key elements of our education system to ensure political acquiescence and non-critical thinking is yet another dimension of that response.

The concerns of young people are fully justified and supported by the available science, and a growing body of them understand this and recognise that the current measures for protecting the climate and our biosphere are deeply inadequate.  

In the context of COP26 meeting in Glasgow in 2021, Greta Thunberg famously criticised world leaders over constantly unrealised promises to address the climate emergency, by dismissing such promises as ‘blah, blah, blah’. Other leaders of the youth climate movement such as German Luisa Neubauer, Indian Disha Annappa Ravi, American Jerome Foster, Micronesian Yolanda Joab Mori and Sri Lankan Anoka Primrose Abeyrathne have all echoed (in diverse ways) the passion and immediacy expressed internationally and locally at that ESU event in Gozo.

The relevance and accuracy of youth-led activism on the climate emergency and in particular on the aggressive and damaging behaviour of the fossil fuel industry (routinely spending many millions on greenwashing) is evident.  So much so that, in 2019, OPEC Secretary General, Mohammad Barkindo described that activism as ‘an existential threat’ to the fossil fuel industry.  He expressed particular concern that the divestment strategy advocated by them is not just beginning to shape policy but is also gaining considerable public support and is now valued at some US$40 trillion divested to date from pension funds and universities.  

Waiting for the ‘adults in the room’ to get their act together is not a realistic option nor is waiting until younger people gain political power. As acknowledged by Greta Thunberg, ‘If you belong to that small group of people who feel threatened by us, we have some very bad news for you, because this is only the beginning. Change is coming whether they like it or not’.

We know the key causes of our urgent climate emergency, we have substantive solutions already in place, what we lack are those qualities on display at the ESU event and in current youth-led activism - passionate commitment, the urgency of youth and a clarity of vision.  Youth activism on the issue not only deserves our respect, it also demands our full support.  

The failed deny, deflect, and delay tactics are well past their expiry date.