Greta Thunberg Or Naomi Seibt -- How They Enforce Official Orthodoxy

Almost certainly, you have heard of Greta Thunberg.  Indeed, you undoubtedly know a lot about her.   She is the Swedish teenager who for more than a decade has suffered from various mental illnesses, including depression, Asperger’s syndrome, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and even something called “selective mutism.”  Apparently, in between bouts of mental illness, at some point she became interested in the issue of climate change.  In late December 2018, at the age of 15, Greta suddenly sprang on the world stage, when she got invited to speak at a UN climate conference in New York.  That’s when we first got to see her trademark anger — fury, even — about what she perceived to be the crisis of the climate.  In 2019 she spent the year playing hooky from school and leading climate “strikes” and demonstrations wherever she could get an audience.  On September 23, 2019 she was back at the UN in New York giving a barn-burning speech letting everyone know how deeply furious she is that anyone is enjoying their life.  Here is some text from that speech:

[Y]ou all come to us young people for hope. How dare you! You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words. And yet I'm one of the lucky ones. People are suffering. People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth. How dare you!

Here is a picture of Greta delivering that speech:  

And what exactly was it that anyone had done to her to “steal [her] dreams and [her] childhood”? I’m still trying to figure that one out. My own inclination is to feel very sorry for this young lady. As a high-school age girl who hasn’t even attended school much of the time and hasn’t yet studied these things at all, she obviously has no real idea about whether “entire ecosystems are collapsing” or whether we are “in the beginning of a mass extinction.” Clearly, before her unhinged anger takes over everything and destroys her life, she needs to get some professional help with her mental issues. But that’s just my view.

Then there’s Naomi Seibt. You may not even have heard of her. She’s a little older than Greta — 19 to Greta’s 17 — and hails from the German state of North Rhine Westphalia. Naomi graduated from high school in 2017 at the age of 16, and while there won a first prize for research in physics. After high school, Naomi started on her own to develop a presence on YouTube as a climate skeptic, and attracted the notice of the Heartland Institute. On December 4, 2019 she appeared at the behest of Heartland in Madrid, Spain, at the time of a UN climate conference in that city, and delivered what looks to me like a very reasonable and appropriate speech for an intelligent young lady to give. Excerpt:

Science is based on intellectual humility and it is important that we keep questioning the narrative that is out there instead of promoting it. And these days ‘climate change science’ really isn’t science at all. We’ve heard it today. They draw their conclusions before testing their hypothesis and base their assumptions on incoherent models. It’s an insult to science itself.

Here’s a picture of Naomi delivering that speech:

By contrast to Ms. Thunberg’s rant on subjects like ecosystem collapse and mass extinctions about which she obviously knew nothing, Ms. Seibt’s talk was about the basics of scientific inquiry, like humility and skepticism — things that high school students can and should have studied thoroughly. Certainly, you might think, there could be nothing objectionable about a young woman making such obvious points in the context of what goes under the name of “climate science.”

If you think that, then you don’t understand how this game works. Try googling “Naomi Seibt” and see what comes up. It’s one completely vicious take down after another. Here’s one from Greenpeace; one from DeSmog Blog, one from the Guardian. At Greenpeace the headline is “‘Anti-Greta’ Climate Denier Naomi Seibt Marched with Neo-Nazis and Promotes White Nationalism.” Wow! But if you read the piece with a critical eye, the charges quickly disintegrate like a castle of sand. The “marched with neo-Nazis” charge stems from Seibt having attended a pro-life rally in 2018 where a photographer got a picture of at least one person attending who has been identified as a neo-Nazi. OK then. The “white nationalism” charge, per Greenpeace, stems from a remark she made praising Canadian podcaster Stefan Molyneux, and from a charge that she has been associated in at least some way with the AfD political party (which she has denied). I don’t know much about Molyneux, but taking a quick look at his website, it seems that recent guests on his shows have included the likes of Walter Williams, Jordan Peterson, and Michelle Malkin. That sounds rather respectable. Greenpeace quotes the Southern Poverty Law Center (which I have identified as a hate group) as calling Molyneux an “alleged cult leader who amplifies scientific racism, eugenics and white supremacism.” Greenpeace doesn’t have any objectionable quote from Molyneux, but apparently relies on the SPLC to smear him. The DeSmog and Guardian pieces basically repeat the same smears.

And did I mention that Seibt is facing a criminal prosecution from something called the State Media Authority in her home state of North Rhine Westphalia? It’s almost beyond ridiculous, but apparently there’s a new law in that state making it a minor crime to put a “product placement” in an online video without some kind of required disclosure. Seibt is being prosecuted for three videos where the alleged “product placement” involves mention of the Heartland Institute. Here is a write-up on the subject from Christopher Monckton today at Watts Up With That. Monckton points out that the supposed case falls on its face because only one of the three videos mentions Heartland, and that one is only a brief announcement of Seibt’s association with the Institute, thereby meeting the supposed disclosure requirement. And then there is the protection of free speech contained in the German constitution. Nevertheless, Seibt is facing prospective fines of several thousand euros and up to 28 days in jail.

Well, that’s how you are treated if you dare to violate the official party line, and you get even a little bit of traction. If you follow the link to Watts Up With That, you will find directions for how to contribute to Ms. Seibt’s defense, should you be so inclined.

And Thunberg? Go to this Wikipedia biography for a list of the honors and awards that she has won over the past couple of years — some dozens of them. Time’s 25 Most Influential Teens of 2018; Swedish Woman of the Year; 2019 Rachel Carson Prize; the “Laudato Si” Prize from Pope Francis; the Ambassador of Conscience Award from Amnesty International; Keys to the City of Montreal from its Mayor; Time’s Person of the Year; Glamour’s Woman of the Year; and on and on and on and on.

These are the methods by which the official orthodoxy is enforced.