Climate Anxiety:
Coping with the bad news and
the good news
Students lead the way-activism
Resources for understanding the challenges
facing youth in dealing with the climate crisis:
The SEI’s own Xiao Behlendorf has prepared a webpage via the LA Valley College library that hosts resources for faculty and students in confronting this challenge. Beginning with a useful definition of this phenomenon, the site offers links to book titles and short reviews as well as articles. There are podcasts and videos as well as links to local environmental organizations where students can volunteer, intern, and even get paid positions. Most importantly, the page offers several organizations that can help people facing a mental health crisis. The tab on Climate Crisis Conversations hosts 17 of them running from 30 minutes to 1 hour. The TED talk on mental health is also very well selected. Xiao was recently featured in the Valley Star for her work at the LAVC Library.
Recently the national availability of an emergency phone number, 988, is now national service for the most immediate help in a crisis. The issue is also getting attention in the LACCD so that Student Health services on each campus are stepping up their capacity to help students distressed by the tsunami of bad news. The SEI hosted a roundtable of sorts on November 10 as part of the Professional Development College series of Summer/Fall talks. See other article here on the planned schedule for these talks.
Articles on climate anxiety....
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3/22/22: OK Doomer and the Climate Activists who say it's not too late
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3/23/24: How Covid lockdowns hit mental health of teenage boys hardest
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10/6/21: "‘Eco-anxiety’: fear of environmental doom weighs on young people"
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9/24/21: "Young global climate strikers vow change is coming – from the streets" Guardian
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2/27/21:"Climatologist Michael E Mann: 'Good people fall victim to doomism. I do too sometimes'"
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3/18/23: TED talk: Why I became a climate activist—and why you should too
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9/13/19: Mary Robinson: Disruption is best option left to head off climate disaster
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6/3/2019: It's Time to Rebel Against the Existential Threat of Climate Change MED
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7/11/2019: Climate Despair VICE
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5/16/19: How the Mental Health Community Is Bracing for the Impact of Climate Change
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5/6/2019: Climate Crisis Forces Us to Ask to what do we devote ourselves? TRTH
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4/23/2019: To stop global catastrophe we must believe in humans again, McKibben GUA