Battles of GenZ
I am not sure whether we can achieve the massive overhaul of our systems and behaviors that is needed to solve this problem.
But I can live with the uncertainty because I know I won’t live long enough to see the worst of it.
But what about the kids these days. The Gen Z teenagers who are just studying about climate change in school right now. What must they be thinking about their elder generations’ inaction to deal with the issue.
What an overwhelming thought it is that the burden of fixing this humongous problem lies with the delicate generation of humans who haven’t even come of age so far.
What do we even teach them about climate change? The sheer magnitude of the problem is causing the kids anxiety and depression.
Do we not keep climate change in the syllabus to prevent them from this ‘Eco-anxiety’ ? Or if we do, do we give them false hope that slow incremental changes will solve the problem in the long run?
This article from the Washington Post grapples with issue of eco-anxiety and the challenges that Gen Z is facing in coming to terms with the climate change problem.
A bone chilling passage from the article goes like this —
“Eco-anxiety” or “Climate depression” is playing out in real terms among young people, sometimes in extreme ways: A 2008 study in an Australian medical journal chronicled the case of a 17-year-old boy who was hospitalised after refusing to drink water during a nationwide drought, in what the authors called the first case of “climate change delusion”.
A psychiatrist I interviewed told me a patient had confessed that she secretly wished a pandemic would strike to ease the stress on the planet.
The article dives deep into the challenges faced by teenagers, their parents and teachers, and the conundrum of how do we keep their hopes up without misinforming them about the magnitude of the problem.
Its a long, interesting read, check it out —
The Environmental Burden of Generation Z
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