How to talk with young people about the climate crisis
By guest contributor Laura Glover, MSW, RSW, PhD(c).
Climate change is a crisis and young people are uniquely impacted
Climate change is an environmental and existential crisis.
Young people are uniquely impacted because they have limited institutional power to influence its progression, and they will inherit the worst of its effects as they age.
Anyone who interacts with young people – parents, teachers, social workers, soccer coaches, aunties and uncles, siblings, doctors – will likely encounter the topic of climate change when talking with them. These conversations can feel daunting; it’s not easy to balance honesty and hope, especially when adults are at the same time grappling with uncertainties about the future.
Climate emotions refer to emotional responses to the climate crisis. They are experienced individually and collectively, can be difficult to cope with, and can be simultaneously mobilizing.
Complex climate emotions
Young people are experiencing a range of complex emotional responses to the climate crisis including worry, anxiety, sadness, guilt, feelings of betrayal by adults and governments in positions of power, and fears about the future.
Solastagia – a term recently coined by Glenn Albrecht – encapsulates the profound grief and existential distress associated with climate change. It refers to the loss of landscapes, non-human species, and sense of space and place. It is the feeling of homesickness for a home still physically occupied, where the general shape remains the same but the rhythms, textures, colours, and temperatures have changed and are changing. It is nostalgia for a place not fully disappeared, and fear of the impending loss of it. When we experience this feeling, questions about the future may follow.
Solastagia, or climate grief, is not only difficult, exposing, or vulnerable. It is also reflective of what we care about. Like a shattering breakup or the loss of a loved one or a life altering injury, grief is at once devastating and it also signals something about what matters to us. After all, to feel pain and despair is to make contact with the world around us. To experience grief is deeply human, it is to exercise agency and autonomy, and it is an act of resistance.
If we think about difficult emotional experiences from this perspective, we can also understand them as adaptive. For example, eco-anxiety is, at its most basic primal level, the body’s nervous system interpreting danger and responding accordingly to keep us safe.
Vulnerability to climate issues, then, can be understood as demonstrative of a young person’s desire for a different future, and that can be positive and even transformative.
It’s our job to amplify young peoples’ voices and priorities, and to hold space for these difficult emotions with an understanding of their complexities and without judgement.
How to talk with young people about the climate crisis
- Assert young people as experts on their experience
Remember that a young person’s vantage point is different than yours which means that they know more about their experience than you do.
- Understand that young people are not a homogenous group
They are diverse in terms of race, gender, sexuality, age, ability, Indigeneity, geographic location, and socioeconomic class. Their identities and lived experiences will influence their concerns and priorities, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Take time to understand their concerns rather than making assumptions.
- Validate and empathize with their concerns
It is important for young people to know that what they feel matters and makes sense, even if their worries are different from yours. Reflect back what you think you are hearing to show that you understand, and affirm that their concerns are valid.
- Ask open-ended questions
Open-ended questions typically start with “what” “how” or “why” and cannot be answered with a simple “yes” or “no”. They encourage us to examine our own thoughts or feelings and give space for a range of responses. Examples could include “how do you feel?” or “why do you care about this issue?”
- Work with them to find outlets or coping strategies
Are there local clubs or groups your young person can get involved in? Are there ways for them to learn more? Do they need to take breaks from social media because the information is too overwhelming? Are there activities, big or small, (like attending a protest or cleaning up trash) that would allow them to take action in some way?
- Make art!
Research shows that art is an effective outlet for emotional processing, story telling, and coping with the effects of climate change because it allows for self-expression without constraint.
Young people are taking the lead, let them
Ecojustice’s Mathur et. al. v. Ontario case is an example of how young people are harnessing their climate emotions to advocate for just climate futures.
Sophia, Alex, Beze, Madi, Shaelyn, Shelby, and Zoe are leading a Charter challenge arguing that their province’s weakened 2030 climate target violates the constitutional rights to life, equality , and security of the person of everyone in Ontario.
Not all young people will engage in direct climate activism like these youth. Some may get involved in clubs at school, learn from their peers on social media, attend local protests, make art, or they may simply choose to speak to trusted loved ones in their lives.
About the author
Laura Glover is a doctoral candidate at York University and a social worker based in Toronto, Ontario. She researches the relationship between the climate crisis and mental health, emotions, justice, and activism with a focus on how young people are uniquely impacted. Laura works as a psychotherapist at an abortion clinic where she supports people navigating pregnancy options and post-abortion experiences, runs a private practice where she primarily works with LGBTQ2S+ emerging and young adults, and is part of a community of psychotherapists that offer low-barrier counselling in the Greater Toronto Area.
In her research and practice, Laura is curious about what is made possible after individual and collective grief. She asks what these experiences teach us about our capacity to hope, love, care for, and consider each other, toward building more justice-oriented futures. She is an adjunct professor at York’s School of Social Work where she teaches on justice and critical social work theory and practice. Laura is a lesbian, an athlete, and a dog-mom to a cute and badly behaved miniature dachshund.
Contact: laura@lauraglover.com
For more information about Laura’s work: lauraglover.com
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