They worry about their grandchildren

Elderly people protesting against climate change are under arrest

  • British police arrested hundreds of protesters.

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  • More seniors are joining the climate protests.

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Arnold Pace walks among the climate protesters, aided by a cane, and holds a folding chair when he needs to sit down.

The 93-year-old is determined to continue protesting for the Earth's future, saying, "It is very important to take serious action against climate change."

Last week, he was arrested after refusing to leave the public street.

The climate activist movement tends to be associated with young people.

It was Greta Thunberg, a Swedish teenager, who pushed hundreds of thousands of students out of school to demand urgent environmental action.

But there are indications that an increasing number of older people are getting involved in the climate demonstrations, and are concerned about what is happening to the planet.

During the protests in London over the past weeks, there were quite a few gray-haired people in the crowd.

These elderly people said they were willing to go to prison for their beliefs.

More than 500 people were arrested and then released over the course of demonstrations organized by the environmental group Extinction Rebellion.

The older protesters, who spoke with The Washington Post, said they felt a sense of collective responsibility, and this feeling is not limited to Europe. Involving the elderly in climate action.

"We will try to organize experienced Americans," he wrote on Twitter, "people over 60 like me, around climate, racial and economic justice issues."

"Our generation has done its share of damage, and we are about to leave the world a worse place than we found it," McKibbin continued.

A number of elderly people who protested in London, calling on governments to give up fossil fuels, said they were "worried for their grandchildren".

Those who led Thursday's march, slipping from the Tate Modern, over the Millennium Bridge to the Financial District, carried signs reading "I will be arrested for the future of my grandchildren" and "Grandparents against climate change."

"I will do anything to protect my grandchildren," said Charmian Keener, 67, a retired academic. "I won't live long enough to know whether our efforts have paid off for them, but here I am doing what I can."

"Sometimes protesters wonder what the older ones are doing here, you should be home," Keener added, but she said the older generations "should have moved earlier, so we need to be here, because somehow, Whether we mean it or not, we are responsible for what happened.”

For his part, John Lenz (93 years), a grandfather and retired engineer, said: "Frankly, we are responsible, there is no doubt about it."

For me, what does it matter to me if I get arrested?

I don't have a job to lose, I don't need a mortgage and I don't take care of young children.”

Retired social worker Sue Williamson joined hundreds of protesters who blocked traffic outside the Bank of England on Thursday.

Williamson, 68, said she was prepared to be arrested by a police officer present at the scene.

"You have to make the most of your remaining years," she said of her activism.

contradictory results

Oxford researcher Stephen Fisher said the new survey contradicts findings that young people tend to be more concerned about climate change than older people, which has been "largely consistent in surveys internationally for decades".

At the same time, he added, older people tend to be more energy-efficient, perhaps for cost reasons, not climate reasons.

Fischer helped with the largest-ever climate survey published in January by the United Nations Development Program, and found an age gap in each of the 50 countries surveyed, where young people are more climate conscious than older people.

This poll also found that public belief in a "global emergency" was highest in Britain, which Fisher said may have been influenced by the prominence of Extinction Rebellion.

A new group will be launched called "The Third Law", aimed at involving the elderly in climate action.

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