EDITORIAL On strike for the future

Young people in Victoria and about 1,000 other communities went on strike on Friday to try to save their future. They see climate change threatening the world they must grow up in. They want action. Will adults listen? These are not the late teenagers and young adults who usually populate street and campus protests. Many of these strikers walked out of middle and high school, not university.

The local organizers said in a statement: “Through education, we prepare for our future. However, all of the scientific reports indicate that we may not have a future. We are panicking and we would like for you to start panicking, too.”

Too often, waves of youthful enthusiasm break upon adult intransigence and indifference.

Friday’s strikers have scientific consensus and a plethora of environmental organizations on their side. Governments, including British Columbia’s, have at least paid lip service to the need for strong action to stem climate change. International conferences and agreements all point toward solutions.

But as the young people say, the pace is too slow. The most recent scientific warnings give the world a dozen years to slow the rate of global warming or face catastrophic transformation of climate and weather.

By that time, today’s 14-year-olds will be in their 20s, and still facing a lifetime of floods, droughts, rising seas, human migration and conflict born of climate change.

Their parents and grandparents will have to answer to them — now or later.