In the last few months, teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg has drawn international attention for her role as a leader in the fight against climate change. But with her newfound fame has come a barrage of criticism, much of it rooted in the established power dynamics that shape the conversation around climate change and other global issues. This criticism of Thunberg is just the latest example of the consequences of entrenched inequalities between men and women, adults and children, developed and developing countries, and the establishment and upstarts. Instead of measured responses, we see knee-jerk reactions and dismissals from Thunberg’s critics, who default to the status quo or shift the blame rather than focusing on creative problem-solving.

Camilla Nelson and Meg Vertigan argue that powerful men have coloured Thunberg with the language of mental instability because she gave herself the authority to call out the establishment’s failure to take stronger action on climate change. Andrew Bolt of the Herald Sun called her a girl with “many mental disorders” and Chris Kenny of Sky News, a “hysterical teenager.” In reality, Thunberg is autistic, not mentally ill. Mary Beard, a professor of Classics at Cambridge, documents in Women & Power: A Manifesto how since Antiquity, misogynistic men in Western societies have used particular language to describe women who vocally challenged the status quo. Popular misogynist punishments to ‘shut up’ these women included killing (like in the case of witches), rape, and categorizing them as mentally ill. Authors such as Sylvia Plath, in ‘The Bell Jar’, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, in ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’, have also shown us how the categorisation of women as mentally ill has played out.

Similarly, children are robbed of agency when raising objective concerns. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison conveniently dismissed Thunberg’s concerns, saying “We’ve got to let kids be kids.” However, Morrison seems to forget that children who die due to climate change-related extreme weather conditions never make it to adulthood - they are ‘allowed’ to remain kids. The adults in power are protecting some children from the consequences of climate change while letting others die, simply because those others are not their kids. We all know age is not equivalent to maturity, intelligence, or good sense. The notion of truth ‘out of the mouths of babes’ holds weight. It is clear that Thunberg has not learned the self-justification, manipulation, and knee-bending that is the purview of many powerful adults. Kids with a keen sense of justice and logic see the world for what it is, point it out, and are impatient with complacency. At her speech before the United Nations, Thunberg did not smile or take any action to make her listeners more comfortable. She did not defer to their seniority or authority. She is not subservient, nor is she attempting to be subservient. How unsettling for those who would like to play at ‘being adult’ without taking responsibility.

The ‘developing’ world, or ‘emerging’ markets, have also been told by established, ‘Western’ powers how to act with reference to climate change. Author and journalist Pallavi Aiyar notes, a little tongue-in-cheek, that prior to the 2008 financial crisis, the European Union focused on debating climate change because it was the one issue it could speak to with some authority. Yet, while living in Brussels, she noticed how Europeans took for granted the privilege of access to basics such as clean water, healthcare, and good infrastructure. Europeans seem to forget that they polluted abundantly during their period of industrialisation in order to achieve the living standards they enjoy today. Historically, developing countries such as India have been reluctant to comply with environmental stipulations, arguing that it is unfair and patronizing for ‘Western’ powers, who have reached a certain ‘finish line’ level of economic growth, to tell them to run the race to catch up with one foot tied. Between death by hunger or death by climate change, the former has been categorised as the more pressing issue.

It is important to move away from the status quo and open up the conversation to those from marginalized backgrounds so we can explore new solutions. For example, in coastal Mumbai, climate change has caused more severe flooding in the monsoon season. Grassroots ‘ecopreneurs’ are developing new products to address the issue. Beco, an Indian start-up that sells biodegradable alternatives to kitchen-based plastic packaging, is another example; however, it lacks government and corporate support. 

Climate leaders like Thunberg are right: the conversation needs to move away from maintaining the status quo and toward effectively responding to climate change. Changing the power dynamics within that conversation should be the first step. This will open up the conversation to those who advocate for greater, measurable progress, and those who can make that change happen.  The status quo is not good enough. Climate change is an issue that poses an immediate danger to us all, not just to those at risk of losing their lives due to greater exposure to extreme weather conditions in areas that lack preventive infrastructure. We are on a slippery slope if we ignore the problem simply because nothing directly harmful has happened to us yet.