# Time Person of the Year 2019 **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 12, 2019, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748 "2019-12-12T12:55:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Airbeck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/airbeck/32/6574_2.png) [@Airbeck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airbeck)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/101 "2019-12-16T21:34:28Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Correct. Picking her for Person of the Year is a cheap way of doing something about climate change that doesn’t actually do anything about climate change. > > Because actually doing something about climate change is hard. The Greens won’t hear of nuclear, the Chinese aren’t going to throttle back their economy, and wind and solar won’t scale up. Better to pat Ms. Thunberg on the head and say “isn’t she brave”. > > Regards, > Shodan What’s the right wing plan? We all die? I really don’t understand the right wing perspective on this. Keep in mind that you won’t be able to be snarky on the internet towards liberals anymore if we don’t figure out a way to keep surviving on this planet and prevent society from collapsing. ---
**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/102 "2019-12-16T21:37:58Z")
> [@Airbeck](#): > > - “crafted narrative”? Shes a 16 year old, shes not Fox News or George Soros. You keep assigning this disingenuousness to her like she can’t just legitimately feel this way, but rather is being used to push someone else’s agenda that is not her own. What is your basis for taking away her own agency this way? My understanding is that her parents were not on board with her activism in the beginning. Do you just not think 16 year olds are capable of starting a movement like the climate strike on their own? > > - Left wing agenda? Again, if “trying to ensure that the planet can continue to support human life” is a left wing agenda, what is the corresponding right wing agenda? I think it is you who is seeing things from a skewed perspective. If the survival of the human species on this planet is left wing, then I guess I’d have to say the left wing is on the right side of this one. The alternative seems pretty bleak. > > - You are raving like a madman and cursing about how you are not mad. You do realize how this comes across right? Maybe you should step back for a second if this is affecting you that much. There’s a reason you are so intense right now, and I guess it’s easier to just blame us not agreeing with you then to do a little self reflection on why you feel the way you do. It isn’t games, I legitimately do not know why so many people are so outraged about this Time magazine thing. You may say you’re just mad at how we’ve been responding to you, but either way you clearly have very strong feelings about the issue this thread is about. He’s not mad, he’s virtue signalling. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/103 "2019-12-16T21:51:42Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Exactly. And worse…Time did this, IMHO, because if they had made the Hong Kong protesters collectively person of the year, it would have pissed off China. Can’t have that. :Sigh: China was pissed too about Thunberg, so this complaint is still a silly one. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/104 "2019-12-16T21:55:17Z")
> [@Airbeck](#): > > What’s the right wing plan? We all die? > > I really don’t understand the right wing perspective on this. Keep in mind that you won’t be able to be snarky on the internet towards liberals anymore if we don’t figure out a way to keep surviving on this planet and prevent society from collapsing. Oh, humanity will survive… Just not in a condition that even the right wingers will want all to be. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/105 "2019-12-17T00:58:30Z")
> [@sps49sd](#): > > Because XT is trying to answer specifics brought up by other posters. …did you happen to miss the fact that I asked XT some very specific questions? Speaking of which: > [@XT](#): > > I’m unsure how you would think I was talking about a nation state, so it’s hard for me to answer this. Pretend that you didn’t write the posts I quoted, then read them as if someone else had written them. Do your post read like they are describing the actions of a 16 year old girl? > [@](#): > > I already DID say what I didn’t like about her crafted narrative, so, again, not sure how to answer this that is different than I already have. I get that many of you don’t see the left leaning nature of her narrative. It’s fairly unsurprising to be honest. As to the heat, again (for, I don’t know, the 3rd time) it’s not directed at her…let me be very clear. It’s directed and fucking posts like this and the others I’ve had to deal with that I’m getting very, very tired of. IOW, it’s directed at you. At Czarcasm for asking yet another stupid question the answer to which I’ve given something like 4 times IN THIS FUCKING THREAD ALONE. At Airbeck who is taking my heat at these silly games to be all about Greta and can’t, for the life of him figure out why I’m so hot about it. At stupid shit like your last CT jab because I have a different view point. > > Fuck it. Figure it out. Or don’t. I think I’m done with these silly, stupid fucking games. Did you miss that I asked you some very specific questions? Can you be very specific for a moment and share with us "what is so “suspicious” about her “narrowly crafted list?” Why do you think that “a lot of folks hadn’t noticed?” Are her words and actions “left-leaning?” Sure. But what part of her narrowly crafted list is suspicious? ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/106 "2019-12-17T14:59:33Z")
> [@Taesahnim](#): > > I would suggest that they should have chosen President Trump instead. Nope. As noted above, attributing influence to the guy in the Mickey Mouse suit (Trump) instead of the CEO of Disney (Putin) is just silly. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/107 "2019-12-17T15:02:13Z")
> [@Ale](#): > > ITSM she’s a marketable figurehead for subversive extremists, that is to say people who seek to subvert an environmental issue into a tool to further an extremist agenda because it doesn’t get more extreme than wanting to tear down everything as the starting point for the Big Idea. > It may not have started that way but that’s how it looks to me at the moment. Wow; I’m having flashbacks to that Lyndon LaRouche infomercial I watched back in the 80s because I was bored out of my skull and everything on the other channels was even more lame. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/108 "2019-12-18T16:09:57Z")
> [@Airbeck](#): > > What’s the right wing plan? We all die? > > I really don’t understand the right wing perspective on this. Keep in mind that you won’t be able to be snarky on the internet towards liberals anymore if we don’t figure out a way to keep surviving on this planet and prevent society from collapsing. > [@GIGObuster](#): > > Oh, humanity will survive… > > Just not in a condition that even the right wingers will want all to be. Just to reiterate, we are looking at 1.5 degree increases by 2050 and 3-5 degree increases by 2100 is we don’t do anything. That is not a hellscape. There is nothing you can do politically (short of throwing the world into a new great depression) that will move those numbers around very much. And frankly as new economies come online, things might get worse before they get better. Cap & trade is basically meaningless for most industrialized countries where the conversion from coal to natural gas; the improving economics behind solar, electric vehicles, tankless water heaters, non-centralized climate control, LED lights, smart energy, etc.; the increase in work from home opportunities and ordering stuff online instead of going to the store. Cap & trade is not going to go anywhere for industrializing countries, you are not going to get countries like brazil, China, India where they are trying to get their citizens up to our standard of living to slow down their growth in order to address climate change. Unless the industrialized nations decide to build nuclear power plants for them, they are going to keep burning fossil fuels, especially as their prices stabilize due to lower demand from industrialized nations. This problem is lot closer to the global overpopulation problem than the cold war. We are not going to scold out way out of this, we are not going to politick our way out of this. We will have to science our way out of this. ---
**Author:** ![Airbeck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/airbeck/32/6574_2.png) [@Airbeck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airbeck)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/109 "2019-12-18T16:15:38Z")
The problem is we keep electing violently anti-science politicians. That is what we need to change. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/110 "2019-12-18T17:26:09Z")
> [@Airbeck](#): > > What’s the right wing plan? We all die? The right wing plan is the same as the left wing one - avoid the hard questions, don’t do anything to piss off your base, shift the blame, and hope for the best. > [@](#): > > The problem is we keep electing violently anti-science politicians. > > That is what we need to change. Absolutely. People like [Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren](https://www.theverge.com/2019/9/5/20850763/climate-change-cnn-town-hall-democrat-candidates-nuclear-energy-2020-elections) don’t belong anywhere near DC. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/111 "2019-12-18T17:34:14Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > The right wing plan is the same as the left wing one - avoid the hard questions, don’t do anything to piss off your base, shift the blame, and hope for the best. How’s that “Mona Lisa by Roller Brush” project coming along? :dubious::rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/112 "2019-12-18T18:15:24Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > The right wing plan is the same as the left wing one - avoid the hard questions, don’t do anything to piss off your base, shift the blame, and hope for the best. _checks forum header_ \*performs \*intense _emotional labour_ No, sir, it is not, and I do dispute your premise. _breaks down and slaps Shodan with a calfskin glove right in the fucking kisser_ ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/113 "2019-12-18T18:27:15Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > _breaks down and slaps Shodan with a calfskin glove right in the fucking kisser_ This seems to be an unnecessary image of violence for someone who disagrees with you. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/114 "2019-12-18T19:23:05Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > This seems to be an unnecessary image of violence for someone who disagrees with you. The Wet Trout was recently placed on the Endangered Species list. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/115 "2019-12-18T20:01:00Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > This seems to be an unnecessary image of violence for someone who disagrees with you. I _know_, right ? That’s fucked up ! ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/116 "2019-12-18T20:16:28Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > _checks forum header_ > \*performs \*intense _emotional labour_ > > No, sir, it is not, and I do dispute your premise. > > _breaks down and slaps Shodan with a calfskin glove right in the fucking kisser_ You’re not doing it right. If you are challenging me to a duel, you are supposed to say “I will have a friend call on you.” To which the response is “I didn’t know you had one, but thanks for the heads up - I will give particular instructions to the servant girl to lock up the spoons.” - Cribbed, more or less, from Dickens in _The Pickwick Papers_. In any event, perhaps you could explain how Warren and Sanders are following the science by rejecting the only remotely reasonable technology available that is scalable and doesn’t emit GHG. Or how bold and daring it was for _Time_ to herald a sixteen year old for telling us to do something or other about climate change, without specifying what exactly. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Airbeck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/airbeck/32/6574_2.png) [@Airbeck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airbeck)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/117 "2019-12-18T20:36:44Z")
Why don’t you tell us what the hell you’re doing except trying to snark on the internet? What valuable contribution to solving the problem are you offering? You do realize that just trying to tear other people down is the opposite of being constructive right? ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/118 "2019-12-18T20:50:22Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > You’re not doing it right. > > If you are challenging me to a duel, you are supposed to say “I will have a friend call on you.” No, you uncouth barbarian. I was supposed to claim that I \*\*would \*\*have satisfaction. Sheesh, the sheer Donning-Krüger nerve of those colonial peasants. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/119 "2019-12-18T20:59:55Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > You’re not doing it right. > > If you are challenging me to a duel, you are supposed to say “I will have a friend call on you.” To which the response is “I didn’t know you had one, but thanks for the heads up - I will give particular instructions to the servant girl to lock up the spoons.” > > - Cribbed, more or less, from Dickens in _The Pickwick Papers_. > > In any event, perhaps you could explain how Warren and Sanders are following the science by rejecting the only remotely reasonable technology available that is scalable and doesn’t emit GHG. Or how bold and daring it was for _Time_ to herald a sixteen year old for telling us to do something or other about climate change, without specifying what exactly. > > Regards, > Shodan I suspect you are talking about the societal aversion to nuclear power? And you’re right, the aversion is illogical and harmful to our society: > **[If Nuclear Power Is So Safe, Why Are We So Afraid Of It?](https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/06/11/if-nuclear-power-is-so-safe-why-are-we-so-afraid-of-it/#198af0e26385)** > > Experts agree that nuclear power is the safest way to make electricity. Why then are people so afraid of it? But the aversion is from both sides. Conservatives are no more likely to embrace nuclear power than liberals AFAICT. The anti-nuclear power crowd has done with nuclear power what the anti-vaccine crowd hopes to do with vaccines. They want the irrational fear to be so pervasive throughout society that even rational people will have an irrational fear of it. And it’s costing us dearly in lives and fortune. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748/120 "2019-12-18T21:11:58Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > I suspect you are talking about the societal aversion to nuclear power? > > And you’re right, the aversion is illogical and harmful to our society: > > [If Nuclear Power Is So Safe, Why Are We So Afraid Of It?](https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/06/11/if-nuclear-power-is-so-safe-why-are-we-so-afraid-of-it/#198af0e26385) > > But the aversion is from both sides. Conservatives are no more likely to embrace nuclear power than liberals AFAICT. > > The anti-nuclear power crowd has done with nuclear power what the anti-vaccine crowd hopes to do with vaccines. They want the irrational fear to be so pervasive throughout society that even rational people will have an irrational fear of it. > > And it’s costing us dearly in lives and fortune. Alledgedly. Or rather, it’s all sunk cost. Yes, we _should_ have invested more into nuclear back then (and now we’d have a huger nuclear waste issue but NO MATTER). But that’s too late now. Nuclear is not the answer any more, to the extent that it might have been at some point. The simple time cost of building new nuke plants, and the billion checks and regulations those have to observe (FOR GOOD REASON) keeps that particular solution strictly out of the ecuation. So while, by all means, be my guest if you want to say “I told you so” (because who doesn’t love that ?) ; don’t even begin to pretend that’s still a reasonable course today. Or that nuke power is in any way, shape or form a future-proof, renewable, durable solution for that matter. Even if it worked (which it doesn"t, not really) it would still be swapping plague for necrotizing fasciitis. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-person-of-the-year-2019/844748.md?page=7)