On the signs of the hundred demonstrators gathered in the center of Besançon Saturday 6 November, we can read both the growing concern of these environmental defenders and their skepticism regarding the decisions that could be taken at the COP 26 which continues in Glasgow. “COP26, it’s not serious”, for example wrote Estelle, a protester, on a piece of cardboard. “My Earth hurts,” read yet another sign.
Feeling of helplessness
“We’re going straight into the wall“, worries Aurore. For this mother of a family,”something dramatic is happening“. According to the latest report by UN climate experts, global warming should indeed reach the threshold of + 1.5 ° C compared to the pre-industrial era around 2030. That is ten years earlier than expected. Among the protesters in Bisont, many are wondering what they can do, on their own, to contribute to the fight against global warming. “We do as we can: we take pieces of cardboard and markers and we come together“, indicates Aurore.
Ahead of COP26, several countries have already made the promise to achieve carbon neutrality in 2050. Words in which many climate activists do not believe. “I’m not 26 years old, there were some COPs before I was born, what were they used for?“asks Alex, a young protester.
Growing eco-anxiety
Faced with the increasingly pressing threat of global warming, the hopes of climate advocates are dwindling year after year.
I am rather naturally optimistic but this is the first time that I feel that my optimism is crumbling.
Mireille, who came to demonstrate with her daughter, indicates that she has “it’s hard to believe that the answers are going to be up to the stakes.“
This increasingly strong anxiety about the future, Mireille’s daughter, Estelle, a teacher, also feels it. “I love my job, I am happy, I have friends but there are this huge shadow that hangs above and which sometimes causes deep trouble, this fear of the future, fear for our loved ones, our children and for life, like a kind of great pain for the world “, she describes. Eco-anxious? “Yes, it is a word which appeared in the vocabulary and which seems to me to correspond entirely to my state“, replies Estelle.
Young people particularly affected
If the phenomenon of eco-anxiety affects all age groups, it is above all among young people that it is most noted. Three quarters of 16-25 French people find the future “scary”, according to a study in the journal “The Lancet”, published in September 2021. “When we are young and we are aware of the dangers and risks that the future holds in store for us, it is the normal posture to worry“, analyzes Alex, the young protester to whom it happens”to have periods of eco-anxiety“.
“Eco-anxiety echoes anxieties of death, of knowing what will become of us, anxieties often relayed by the media at the moment.“, analyzes psychologist Marie Demahis, based in Besançon. She herself observes this anxiety in some of her young patients. What also characterizes eco-anxiety, according to her, is”this idea of lack of control“.”This is what makes that it can affect everyone at some point in the phases of life“, specifies the psychologist.