Millions of students and youth march against climate change
By
Bryan Dyne
16 March 2019
An estimated 1.4 million students and youth walked out of school and took part in Friday’s worldwide demonstrations against climate change. The internationally coordinated protests, the largest in 16 years, were organized in response to the growing realization among young people that the governments of the world are incapable of taking any significant measures to halt global warming.
The latest UN report states that there may be as few as eleven years before the impact of climate change on human civilization becomes exponentially more devastating. The demonstrators have also directed their outrage against international agreements such as the Paris Accord, which have all proven to be worthless in addressing the crisis.
The initial impulse of the movement, known as the Youth Climate Strike and Fridays For Future, was given by 16-year-old Greta Thurnberg, who began protesting against climate change outside the Swedish parliament building last August. This has been followed by a series of protests over the past several months.
Yesterday’s protests were on a larger scale. The official list counts actions in more than 2,000 cities in at least 120 countries on every continent, including Antarctica. There were 235 in Italy, 214 in France, 200 in Germany, 195 in the United States, 144 in Sweden and 120 in the United Kingdom.
The single biggest demonstration was in Milan, where an estimated 100,000 students and youth marched. Organizers counted 60,000 participants in Montreal, 50,000 in Naples, 40,000 in Paris, 30,000 in Brussels and Rome, 20,000 in Berlin and 10,000 in London. Smaller protests involving dozens or hundreds of students and youth occurred in every corner of the globe,…