Agree……60% vote for LePen here doesn’t help, and their info comes from CNews. The two sparky kids are the teacher’s children.
Yet you say you’re ‘lucky’ to live there? Personally, I’d move!
Also interesting how the same words mean different things to different people - when I talk about ‘young people’ I mean people, not children - say 18-30 or to mid-30s. Under 12s and most ubder-20s are still children in my book . Nor are most of your comments about this age group really about political engagement - more about general lifestyle issues that, as you say, have much more to do with their parents - the middle-aged - than the children.
The possible link you raise between right-wing politics and harmful lifestyles is fascinating in itself - but don’t judge the whole world by one fairly extreme right-wing village!
Exactly! (Although children are people too) 
if only “little people”
Are you absolutely sure about that?
I remember my daughter, c.aged 13-14, storming out, slamming doors, shouting ‘I hate you! I hate this whole family!’
Now, at 21, she’s a lovely and loving young woman, politically engaged, active in the environment movement, etc, etc…
I suspect many of those village children Jane despairs of will eventually move away from their parents’ influence, and from the (for teenagers) empty and oppressive village life, and engage with the world and their own identities in entirely different ways.
People are often ghastly and can behave appallingly, at least teenagers have a bit of an excuse 
Don’t remember saying that!
Oh dear - it’s worse than I feared, then!
Of course, BLM and XR fall into a broad definition of “political” - but it’s also a very shallow approach, if your engagement ends there. Real/proper politics includes
i. identifying a problem (and, if you’re Greta Thunberg, a further step i.(a) blaming people)
ii. drawing it to public attention
iii. seeking a solution
iv. finding a solution
v. persuading people to adopt the solution
and of course, stages iii to v are where the real work is!
I imagine we all know young people (however you want to define “young”) who are engaged.
And I’m sure young people over the last 30 or so years have been “educated” - but again, it depends what you mean by that: certainly many (perhaps the less intelligent ones) seem unable to deal with alternative views to their own, or even able to justify their own beliefs, but that is probably the way tertiary education has gone in the UK over that period! Don’t teach 'em to think for themselves: teach 'em what to think!
I think you have this completely upside down Porridge - it’s these campaigns that are ‘proper politics’ - and the parliament/media bubble kind that are shallow…
A good description of middle-aged and elderly people, if the evidence of social media is anything to go by (I could give you a few examples…)
The UK government and assorted Gradgrinds have certainly tried to squeeze out ‘liberal education’ - questioning, creativity, critical thinking - in favour of mindless rote learning - because they have ‘had enough of experts’ - and critical scrutiny - but this is less so in other countries, and resisted by decent committed teachers everywhere.
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Well, we can disagree about whether “single issue politics” is deep or shallow, I suppose.
We can agree that incapacity to deal well with challenge, a lack of curiosity about the beliefs of others, and an inability to cope with challenge without just being rude, is not the preserve of younger people. In fact, it seems to be more common in older people, who have formed their beliefs and let them become set, so that they live “the unexamined life”. I’m not sure younger people are necessarily better at engaging with different views, or arguing their corner, but they are often more likely to be cautious about being offensive.
But your final point is absolutely right, in my respectful view: when the UK made a degree a consumer product like a car - only much more expensive - they also turned universities into businesses whose sole interest was profit. It must be desperately dispiriting for teachers in those institutions to have to cram their students for exams, rather than to educate them.
I suppose the only bright point is that, from what I’ve seen, if the child has already been encouraged to be inquisitive and to question stuff, it’s too late by the time s/he’s at university to knock it out of him/her!
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This starts earlier on. Grade inflation is a problem at GCSE level and at A level. It really depends upon the school too. Some schools are brilliant, others won’t even enter students for exams if it will adversely affect their standing in league tables. Or it is down to the teachers to micromanage the students learning to such an extent that most have no agency and no real learning takes place.
But as I said earlier in a slightly different context it s impossible to make sweeping generalisations about groups of people.
In HE there has also been considerable grade inflation which coincided with the introduction of the much higher fees.
Interesting in this light to read about Bella Lack today.
Through her work, Lack has become friendly with several other young climate activists. Greta Thunberg wrote the introduction to her book; she often chats with the Irish environmentalist Dara McAnulty. Both are bestselling authors under 20. When I ask Lack why she thinks it’s incumbent on young people to publish on climate change, she says, a little angrily, “I’m trying to work that out. I don’t know why older people don’t feel this same sense of urgency. I mean, I know . It’s the futures of young people that are more imperilled. But why isn’t that sense of urgency being felt by everyone right now?”
“Greed?” I suggest.
“Habit, greed, vested interests…” she says. “But I still don’t understand how people would put that above protecting the environment, above protecting future generations. Like, on a superficial level, I get it. But it’s short-termism. People looking at how they might profit in the next month… What’s the point in profit on a dead planet?”
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Oh so funny - I posted this very article earlier today!
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Yes - I saw that after my post. Great minds…
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Topical again
“ Over the past two years, groups of young athletes practicing Parkour— a sport that consists of running, climbing and jumping over urban obstacles — have been swinging around big French cities switching off wasteful shop signs at night, in a bid to fight light pollution and save energy.”
“ More than a decade ago, Paris City Hall issued orders requiring stores to turn off all signs and window displays from 1 a.m. to 6 a.m., but the ordinance is widely ignored with little consequence.
“For 10 years there has been no follow-up, no control, no sanction,” said Anne-Marie Ducroux, the head of the National Association for the Protection of the Sky and the Night Environment, which has long lobbied to increase efforts against light pollution.
That is why On The Spot members have taken matters into their own hands. The group often converges on the so-called Golden Triangle neighborhood, in western Paris, the epicenter of French luxury, where elegant Haussmann-era buildings with cream-colored facades line the streets.
Enforcing the orders in place of the authorities certainly enters a legal gray area. But the group said all the police officers they have met during their rounds have approved of the initiative — as long as it causes no damage. And they have the full support of the City Council.
“They are right to take action,” said Dan Lert, a Paris deputy mayor in charge of the environment. “It’s also thanks to them that we’ll put an end to these shocking habits.”
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Well it beats throwing tomato soup at some sunflowers.
They are very lucky, in some countries they would be removed from the arms and left as exhibits.
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They will probably get custodial sentences
If that was my mother in the delayed ambulance, I expect that I would be in jail now.
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