Al Gore is the bogey man, turning boys into metrosexuals.
Not long ago my wife and I went out to dinner at a restaurant with another couple, who, like us, have two boys. The conversation inevitably turned to our kids, school, family stuff. Their older son made the transition this year to junior high school. I asked how this was going. Pretty well, the mother said, except he had recently become anxious and wasn’t sleeping well. “He’s worried about climate change,” she said. “It’s keeping him up at night.”
Shortly after that outing, my wife and I had dinner with another couple. Again, the conversation revolved around our kids. (They have a 13-year old son and an 11-year old daughter). Their teenage boy, I learned, was also having anxiety and sleep issues. “He’s become obsessed with climate change,” the father told me. “He thinks the world is doomed.”
My own call to action was the nuclear freeze movement in the 1980s. Yes, I remember worrying about nuclear annihilation in high school, especially after seeing The Day After. But I wasn’t overcome with feelings of fear or futility; I wasn’t paralyzed by a sense of hopelessness. I channeled my existential concerns through the college newspaper and protest marches.