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Before you read this article be aware that the FTP programm I am using messes up with the quoting marks i.e. " " see and as an inbetween solution I use < is opening quote and > is closing quote. I am very sorry and apologize for the inconvenience.

Much a do about Greta Thunberg.
Looking back and a review of a review.

Our house is on fire by and about Greta Thunberg and family, a book at the right time it , i.e. much a do about Greta Thunberg.

A review and a review of the review.

The review written by Lode Vanoost and published in The Belgian newspaper De Wereld Morgen on June 19th 1999 and translated from Dutch to English by Gino d'Artali:

 


Greta Thunberg. Photo copyright Anders Hellberg/CC
 

As the readers of the 3 monthly online magazine know I have extensively written about the ecological Schwedisch activist Greta Thunberg ,now 17 years young, and to be able to do so I needed to try and keep track of her activism , which was extensively and intense , and me only being human I missed the publication of Our house is on fire which was pubisched August 23rd. 2018 and I missed that. Still, she never left my thoughts so here I am again, reading back of what I've written in the past year or so (scroll down on the menu of Cry freedom) and writing now about Our house is on fire.
To be able to so I needed to read the review a number of times.

The book:

I searched on the net and it is incredible how many sub-publishers there are of this book and if I was the family Thurnberg I'd publisch it as an in-house publication but that it isn't does not surprise me because there are many who want a piece of the cake of the famousity of Greta Thunberg and believe me, I do not earn one cent with all my work for Cry freedom and you.

 

Watch Greta Thunberg here at the World Economic Forum:
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1445201565657211

Our house is on fire, the translation of the book written by Swedish opera singer / environmental activist Malena Ernman in 2018, with her husband Svante Thunberg and daughters Beata and Greta, is about much more than their family, the climate or Greta Thunberg, since then world famous with its Schedisch: skolstrejk för klimatet (school strike for the climate). This is a cry for help that is given a deserved chance to be heard around the world through daughter Greta's action.

Sara Magdalena Malena Ernman (1970) has been well known in Sweden and among opera lovers in Europe for years. In 2009 she took part in the Eurovision Song Contest in a well-intentioned but not really successful attempt to break open that kitschy music event and make opera "popular with a wide audience" again. She is also an environmental activist and works for the right of asylum for immigrants.

She translated her concerns about the climate crisis in this book, which is conceptually conceived as a story, a theater piece in 91 scenes. In it, she discusses with her family the many problems they face both personally and socially in their struggle for a different approach.

In the first scene, she immediately gives readers a good idea of what to expect. <This story Svante and I wrote with our daughters and it is about the crisis that has hit our family. It's about Greta and Beata. But above all, it is the story of the crisis that surrounds and affects us all. The crisis that we humans have created through our way of life: beyond sustainability, cut off from the nature of which we are all a part. Some people call it overconsumption, others climate crisis.

A family tackles its problems
The Thunberg family has not had an easy time. Both daughters have serious psychological behavioral problems that were not detected in time by the teachers and counselors. Mother Malena realizes that she herself has problems that were never dealt with. Could it be hereditary? After all, looking back on her childhood, she also sees certain characteristic symptoms of autism in her father.

The family crisis erupts when daughter Greta suddenly stops eating and starts having unexpected and uncontrollable anxiety attacks. Does she have anorexia? Why? The fear that every parent with problematic children recognizes: what are we doing wrong and can we do this on our own?

Daughter Greta sees a film at school about the enormous amount of plastic waste in the South Pacific and almost immediately translates it into drastic changes in her eating habits. She has a consistent straight line from her autism. Why don't the others see how wrong we are all doing? "Greta can't travel because of her eating disorder and she refuses to fly because of the climate. Gradually she manages to convince her parents and sister to change their daily behavior as well.

Thus, the reader arrives at the infamous quote that was taken completely out of context by climate deniers to ridicule Greta and her mother. <Greta was one of the small minority who can see our CO2 with the naked eye.> It is abundantly clear that Mother Malena means this metaphorically, not literally.

Personal, family thoughts alternate with thinking about social problems, such as our ever-increasing desire to travel. <We are committed to the good things, but as long as we work against that most important issue through our lifestyle, there is a good chance that we have ultimately committed ourselves to no avail.> Illnesses, burnouts, behavioral problems in children that are constantly increasing, something is fundamentally wrong.

The main responsible for the climate crisis are the companies - despite all their greenwashing, or green talk - that do not intend to change. The mass media do not play their role as a critical observer: <Thanks to the lack of interest of the media, our future ecological or non-being has been reduced to a political game where one word is opposed to another, where the most popular wins.> 

The responsibility of the companies (and the media companies).
When Malena wants to denounce in her newspaper column that the media <over and over again publish opinion pieces of climate deniers> their collaboration comes to an end. The column is rejected.

The weekend supplements are striking: shopping 22 percent, cars 7 percent, air travel 11 percent and climate issue 0.7 percent. There is even a new form of tourism: climate tourism: <Make sure you visit these beautiful but climate-threatened places before they are gone forever>, which accelerates their disappearance.

During their musings, daughter Greta matures the idea of a school strike, which effectively starts when the book is nearing completion. The Dutch translation puts Greta Thunberg prominently on the cover with photo and name, even though the book is mainly the work of her mother. However, once you have finished it, that is no problem. After all, Greta, her sister Beata and daddy Svante are widely discussed in the conversations they have with their parents.

This book encourages people to think about eco deniers and will not be contained, things that are not, by citations out of context to tear, due to this idealism, or so-called naive, and/or priceless, to name a few. Scientists will argue that it is not as simple as that. It doesn't matter. In this book you will find a lot of people's lives, and to doubt, not only on their individual behavior, but about the system in which they live, and the businesses in which air and sea freely, proceed to the world to choke them. For this reason, this book is of the utmost importance. Our house is on fire does not claim to be complete or perfect solution, but it puts all of us to think about and to take action. Eco deniers believe that, following the Belgian elections of may 26, the climate action of the Anuna, The Truth, and so many others, to their minor dimension that is reduced might not have been. And they are wrong.

History proves that social action pays off. Always. There were also elections shortly after May 1968. Commentators exclaimed in triumph that all that young scum was now quickly being brought to order. So many decades later, we know better. Seattle 1999, Occupy and now the climate actions do have a lasting impact, even if you do not see it immediately, even if media commentators, politicians and companies make every effort to convince us otherwise.

One day the young people of today will look back at their actions in 2019 and they will conclude that it was indeed very useful.

Gino d'Artali: A review of a review.

The article/review is clear but Lode vanoost is not taking any risks to make mistakes and does not really takes a personal point of view. Of course reporting about Greta Thunberg one walks on thin ice so it is not surprising at all and with Greta Thunberg we have somebody who speaks out loud and clear without not being heard unless one refuses to listen and that is more than walking the thin ice, that is walking a very thin rope connecting 2 mountains.

Myself: I so often wrote about the activities and actions of Greta Thunberg that I came to really admire her for her persistence, endurance and her being able to inspire tens of thousands of people worldwide but also some media like the New York Times that published a special titled 'Person of the year'.

In general: Concerning Malena Ernman, the mater familia, really writes and acts as such, or better said, as the leader of a pack of wolves in which Greta does come first and the thoughts and writings of the mother are only natural because any mother protects her children at any costs, even that of herself. But...Malena Ernman back and forth thinking that she with the book has the last word she is so wrong because Greta Thunberg might be back at school for now but...I'm convinced that she, every early night and in bed, and thinking about the ecological situation the world is in now she's crying her heart out and she'll be back, stronger and more determined than ever!!!

Read here the latest news about the dramatic climate changes now and upcoming as published by the NASA:
https://climate.nasa.gov/


Beata and Malena Ernman, Greta and Svante Thunberg. Our house is on fire - A family and the future of the planet.- Ask your local bookstore to buy a copy.

BACK TO SCHOOL

On august 2020 The guardian published the following article: Greta Thunberg returns to school after year of climate activism that you can read at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/25/greta-thunberg-returns-to-school-after-year-off

Also The Guardian, on Mon 19 Oct 2020, published the following article:
Vast majority of Europe's key habitats in poor or bad condition: report

Read the article here: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/19/vast-majority-europe-key-habitats-poor-bad-condition-report

 

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