Category Archives: health-wellbeing

The Climate Collapse Presidency

Editor’s Note: To observe the Earth Week and Earth Day 2026, we republish this timely but grim warning from a well-respected columnist, Thomas Hartmann. It was published in The Thomas Hartman Report on February 1, 2026. Unfortunately, preserving the planet’s livability continues to be a steep, uphill battle. Our only hope is that the humanity will wake up NOW and shoulder the responsibility of saying NO to the suicidal path taken by our government and business entities before things get any worse!

The Climate Collapse Presidency

“Climate change is the single greatest threat to a sustainable future but, at the same time, addressing the climate challenge presents a golden opportunity to promote prosperity, security and a brighter future for all.” 

  —Ban Ki-moon, former UN Secretary-General, Remarks at Climate Leaders’ Summit, April 11, 2024

The greatest existential threat humanity faces isn’t hiding in a military bunker or a terrorist cell. It’s in plain sight: the accelerating collapse of our only home’s life-support systems.

Trump’s first term was environmental arson. He gutted the EPA, installed fossil fuel executives in key positions, shredded over one hundred environmental protections, and abandoned the Paris Climate Agreement.1 Scientists were silenced. Research was suppressed. The words “climate change” vanished from government websites as if deleting terms could delete reality.2

When confronted about climate’s role in the devastating 2020 wildfires, Trump smirked: “I don’t think science knows, actually.”3 Tell that to thirteen-year-old Wyatt Tofte, who died in Oregon’s inferno embracing his dog as he tried desperately to save his grandmother.4 As our Western skies turned blood-orange, Louise and I choked from a summer of wild forest fires, and record hurricanes pummeled our coasts, Trump mocked renewable energy and praised coal.

But his second term has proved apocalyptically worse. By April 2025, Trump had reinstated his “Schedule F” executive order, purging government agencies of climate scientists.5 His new EPA administrator—­formerly chief counsel for a coal conglomerate—is suspending methane regulations, gutting emissions standards, and fast-tracking permits for drilling in previously protected Arctic wilderness.6 The phrase “climate emergency” is now prohibited in federal communications, while years of expensive-to-compile government climate data are being systematically altered, hidden, or outright deleted.

Climate collapse reveals democracy’s most fundamental challenge: can we save our planet for our children and grandchildren when fossil fuel profits demand Republicans force inaction? The answer is becoming horrifyingly clear as tipping points approach: permafrost is thawing, ice sheets are destabilizing, and ocean currents are weakening.7

These aren’t distant threats: they’re happening now, accelerated by policies designed to benefit the donor class while sacrificing everyone else.

This betrayal falls hardest on poor and minority communities. Environmental justice and racial justice are inseparable.8 Studies consistently show that communities of color consistently face the highest levels of air pollution, toxic waste, and climate disasters while having the fewest resources to fight back. And to add further injury, Trump and Musk have now gutted FEMA.9

As droughts intensify, coastlines disappear, and climate refugees multiply, the social fabric unravels. Democracy requires at least a modicum of stability, but climate chaos breeds authoritarian “solutions.” The Pentagon itself identifies climate change as a “threat multiplier” that endangers national security. Scientists warn we have less than a decade to halve emissions before crossing irreversible tipping points.10

Our children will judge us not by our tweets or culture wars, but by whether we protected their right to a livable planet. The machinery of climate destruction doesn’t operate in isolation: it’s connected to the plutocracy that captured our courts, the propagandists who poison our media, and the authoritarians who threaten our democratic foundations.

This is the ultimate test of our republic: Can we break the stranglehold of fossil fuel money on our politics? Can we choose a habitable planet over quarterly profits?

Time is running out, and the climate doesn’t negotiate. Physics doesn’t care about political convenience. Either we reclaim our democracy from corporate capture and dark money in politics, or we surrender both a livable planet and our system of government to collapse.

© 2026 Thomas Hartmann, Oregon. Thom Hartmann, educator and commentator, is the author of a highly respected book: The Last American President. And this article makes the Chapter 11 of the book, and it was published in  The Hartmann Report, a reader-supported publication where all weekday articles are free and available to everyone. Reprinted with permission of the author. Opinion expressed is not necessarily that of Skipping Stones, Inc.

Making A Difference: Taking Action

Making A Difference: Taking Action is a Choice 

And that Choice is Available to Us Every day

By Zoe Leitner, age 18, New Jersey.

I have a history of taking action. I believe that action is the most honest form of belief. Conviction means little unless it alters how we behave—what we build, what we interrupt, and what we refuse to ignore. Awareness is only a beginning; agency begins when we decide to respond.

My understanding of action began somewhere ordinary: the kitchen. For my mom and me, baking together, mostly chocolate, was routine, almost background noise. But in 2020, I realized that familiarity could be a tool for change. I started selling over 600 hot chocolate bombs in my community, raising more than $4,000 and reaching over 80 families. I didn’t do it to seek recognition, but in response to what I saw around me: needs that could be met, even in small ways.

The project worked not because of novelty, but because it was accessible. Participation didn’t require prior experience, complicated forms, or large commitments. Anyone could contribute in a meaningful way. It was easy to understand, easy to engage with, and immediately relevant to the people it aimed to serve. What mattered most was how the money was used afterward. Instead of deciding what organizations might need, I asked them. Jackets instead of cash. Food instead of flyers. Listening reshaped my understanding of service: meaningful help begins with attention, not assumption.

That lesson stayed with me. In 2023, I founded Chocolate4Charity, a nonprofit that channels my love of baking into meaningful impact. Through partnerships with Pink Jewels Boutique, David Chad Beauty Parlor, Nicole Nicosia Hair, and Smith & Company Gifts, we’ve sold over 800 boxes, raising nearly $10,000 for causes I care deeply about: $3,000 to the Mark Schonwetter Holocaust Education Foundation, $3,500 to the Montclair Animal Shelter, $1,000 to MIB Agents Pediatric Cancer Research, and 200 chocolate boxes donated to Comfort Zone Bereavement Camps.. Over 80 students have joined me in volunteering, packaging, and delivering chocolates, discovering firsthand how small actions ripple outward. Each box doesn’t just deliver chocolate; it gives people a chance to contribute, participate, and see the real impact of their efforts.

Chocolate is the vehicle, not the focus. Some causes reflect my family’s history. Supporting Holocaust education honors my great-grandparents, Holocaust survivors, and my grandparents, immigrants, whose experiences shaped my understanding of responsibility. Other causes reflect friendship, grief, and compassion, such as supporting a peer battling cancer, helping children navigate loss, and advocating for animal rights.

The most important measure of success is not the money raised but the number of people who participate. Many people want to help but hesitate because they do not know where to begin. Chocolate4Charity offers an accessible entry point through packaging chocolates, sharing a cause, or delivering donations. I have watched classmates who rarely speak up—over 80 in total—discover a sense of purpose simply by stepping into action. Real impact begins not with grand gestures but with invitations that inspire others to act.

In 2025, I was honored as a Top Upstander at an event organized by a library in Montclair, New Jersey, in collaboration with children’s book author Dr. Janice Cohn. The recognition was meaningful, but I do not see it as a title or an accolade. To me, being an Upstander is deliberate. It is the refusal to remain passive once you notice something that needs attention. It is the choice to respond, even when the right path is unclear or imperfect.

This understanding resonates with a message Dr. Janice Cohn often shares: “Light a tiny candle.” Action is not about being seen; it’s about aligning belief with our behavior. It is found in everyday decisions—listening, offering help, stepping forward when silence would be easier. That philosophy continues to guide my work with Chocolate4Charity and in other parts of my life.

Being an Upstander, like any meaningful action, is not a single moment. It’s a practice, a habit, and a commitment to notice what others might overlook. In that sense, recognition matters less than the choices that lead to it. Action remains its own reward.

Action began in a kitchen for me, with melted chocolate and a question I could not ignore: What will I do with what I see? That question has guided every choice I’ve made since that first chocolate, and to the moments when I have chosen to speak, listen, and act.

Meaningful change requires aligning belief with behavior, noticing what needs attention, and inviting others to work with you. Real impact is rarely sudden or dramatic. It is built from small, intentional acts that ripple outward, shaping communities, relationships, and lives in ways that are often invisible, yet enduring.

I truly believe taking action is a choice, and that choice is available to us every day. That’s where responsibility begins, and that’s where belief becomes real!

—Zoe Leitner, Age 18, New Jersey.

In Defense of Dirt: Rewilding Our Children

In Defense of Dirt: Rewilding Our Children
Before their Bodies Forget

 From Finnish forest floors to Michigan creek beds, the science is clear:
real dirt is medicine, memory, and the immune system’s original teacher

By Thom Hartmann, author, speaker, activist, and educator

I grew up on the edge of Lansing, Michigan, with a stream just down the road and woods that felt like a secret frontier. We all did: the neighborhood kids, barefoot in the damp grass after rain, boots mucked up with creek-silt, hands scrubbed raw from climbing fallen logs and digging in the undergrowth. Getting in the dirt was part of childhood. We didn’t ask permission from microbes.

So when I read the recent report in The Guardian about Finnish nursery experiments transforming children’s health by simply letting them play in real soil, sand, leaves and forest-floor, I felt the past crash into the present and I knew again that the story of our species and our health lies in that innocent, messy contact.

In Finland, at a daycare center in Lahti (north of Helsinki), the researchers from the Natural Resources Institute of Finland adopted a radical experiment: rip out the asphalt, dig into the soil, roll out a live carpet of forest-floor moss and blueberry bushes, build compost heaps for children to feed, invite the kids to play, dig, muddle, get their hands in it.

The result, in a two-year study of three- to five-year-olds, was striking: children in the “rewilded” yards had fewer disease-causing skin bacteria (like Streptococcus) and showed stronger immune regulation (increased T-regulatory cells) within weeks. Gut microbiomes were healthier, inflammatory-associated Clostridium levels dropped.

This is the antithesis of today’s “modern” societal perspective on childhood and nature.

On the one hand, we have the modern obsession with pristine, sanitized lives: rubber-surfaced playgrounds, plastic mats, antibacterial everything. On the other, there’s the simple fact that our inner biology, our immune systems, our gut and skin microbiomes, were forged in the wild: the wild of forest floors, streams, soils, plants, bugs.

As I argued in my earlier essay “It’s All One Thing – The Story of the Worms” here in Wisdom School, our estrangement from that substrate is the seed of auto-immune disorders, of chronic inflammation, and a body that’s forgotten it’s actually part of nature.

In Michigan I was lucky: the woods and stream were mine for the exploring. I remember fingers crawling over moist logs, the smell of leaves turning, the damp cold run-off water slipping under my boots. I didn’t know at the time that those experiences were more than play: they were calibration.

They were training my immune system, teaching my skin and gut to know what nature looked like and smelled like and felt like. To know that dirt is not an enemy. And those childhood experiences are probably why I’ve never been troubled by autoimmune disorders or asthma.

So let’s call this what it is: a radical restoration. Not of some exotic wilderness, but of our lost contact with the natural microbial terrains that co-evolved with our species. The Finnish results are more than a Kindergarten trend; they’re a signal of what our children—and we all—are missing.

Here are some of the stakes:

  • When kids play in dirt rich with soil microbes, their immune system steps into a healthier balance: fewer disease-causing bacteria on the skin surface, greater regulation of internal immune responses.

  • The “outer layer” of biodiversity—soil, plants, forest floor—directly influences the “inner layer” of biodiversity in our bodies, our skin, gut, and airways. This is co-evolved, not incidental.

  • The modern shift away from exposure—to “sterile” play surfaces, indoor confinement, sanitized surfaces—may appear benign, but it’s been quietly shaping the epidemic rise of allergies, auto-immune disorders, and inflammatory diseases that both disturb the quality of life and can shorten lifespan itself.

  • This is not just personal wellness: it’s ecological and societal. The health of children, the immune burdens we carry, the resilience of future generations: all of this ties back to whether we let the next generation touch the living earth.

  • In the Finnish classroom yard they said: “We’re moving the action from inside to outside. We want to show the children nature so they learn about it.”

That sentence is packed. Show the children nature. Let them learn through contact, through play, through mess. Not as a museum piece, not as a “nature corridor” behind a fence, but as the ground they run on, dig in, climb across, whose bugs and fungus mix with theirs.

So, I want to issue a personal call to you—if you have children, nieces, nephews—or if you’re planning for grandchildren—or if you’re simply human, who used to feel the dirt under your fingernails and the creek cold on your shins—do this: Let the next generation get messy.

Plant a compost heap. Bring real soil into the sandbox. Create a border of moss and stones. Let the rain puddle, let the bugs crawl, let the children burrow. Let the forest floor not be exotic but ordinary.

I remember that stream down the road from the house I grew up in, the woods on the edge of Lansing, the sticky Michigan clay, the little fish, frogs, and crawdads under rocks, the mud mixing into water. I remember coming home with smudged socks, grass stains and a face kissed by sap.

I didn’t know at the time that I was feeding my immune system. I simply knew I was alive and it was a thrill.

We’ve forgotten that aliveness. Our culture has prized immaculateness, separation from the “dirty” wild, the exclusion of microbes like we exclude strangers. Yet the wildness is in us. The soil is in us. We’re made of the same living matrix as the tree roots and the beetles and the moss. Broken contact with that matrix isn’t harmless: it’s a literal loss.

In the wise old words I referenced in “It’s All One Thing”: “When we remove ourselves from that web of life, we do so at our own peril.”

The Finnish story is not just cute or scientific: it’s urgent. Rebuild our contact with the living earth. Let children scoop sand and soil, let them bury their hands, let them build mud-cakes like Aurora in Finland’s day-care. Laugh as they smear soil on their faces. It’s not chaos: it’s calibration.

Yes, modernization has brought us many gifts. Clean water. Sanitation. Vaccines. But modernization taken too far, with too much separation from our biological roots, leaves us with immune systems that misfire, bodies that mistake harmless soil microbes for threats, children who never taste actual dirt. The Finnish experiment is clear: get back to the soil, get back to the forest floor, get back to the messy, ordinary earth.

And the earth—our living earth—benefits too. More forest-floor carpets. More compost heaps. More kids playing outside, fewer rubber mats, fewer sterile boxes. We begin to treat biodiversity as not just glamorous (rainforests, coral reefs) but local (yard patches, old tree stumps, rain puddles). We begin to remember that our health is tied to the health of that biodiversity.

So my invitation to you: On your next weekend, find a patch of ground the kids (or you!) can mess with. Dig into it. Feel the soil. Let a leaf rot into the compost. Let worms do their work. Let the world pull you back. Because we’re not apart from nature: we are nature. And when we pretend otherwise, we hurt ourselves and the world around us.

It’s time to stop treating microbes as abstract threats or invisible villains. They are—and have always been—our companions, our allies, our ancestral family. The Finnish children’s laughter in the sandy forest-floor yard is our ancient laughter too.

Let’s dig in.

—Thom Hartmann, educator and commentator, is the author of many respected books. Reprinted with permission. To receive new Wisdom School posts you can become a free or paid subscriber of this reader-supported digital publication, The Wisdom School: What It Means To Be Human. All Wisdom School articles are free and available to everyone. Copyright by Thom Hartmann, 2025.

The Humane Hoax

The Humane Hoax: Animal Industry’s Labels and Lies

By Hope Bohanec, author and activist, Oregon

As consumers become aware of the animal agriculture industry’s cruelty and environmental impact, clever industry marketers adapt with “humane” labels, small-scale tall tales, and other feel-good falsehoods. The term “humane hoax” is defined as new language and labels in animal product marketing that convey a false narrative of humane treatment and sustainable management of farmed animal operations. The marketing language and euphemistic labels tell a story of a supposed distinction from conventional animal products. But the reality on the ground, in the manure pits, during the mechanical milking, and inside the terrifying slaughterhouse, is fundamentally unchanged, despite promises to consumers of something new. Humanewashing and greenwashing are becoming more prevalent and pervasive than ever.

Also encompassed in the concept of the humane hoax is the new trend of people attempting to “do-it-yourself” with backyard farmed animal raising and slaughtering, generally with good intentions, but all too often, with cruel consequences. It has never been more important to educate people on the truth behind the industry lies, and people are hungry for the truth.

Overview:

In the time since I wrote the first book on the subject of the humane hoax, called The Ultimate Betrayal: Is There Happy Meat?, consumer awareness of the suffering of farmed animals has grown exponentially and so has the “alternative” animal product industry. “Cage-free,” “Certified Humane,” and other comforting labels are no longer elusive—dusty items only seen in the back corners of health food stores. They are now as common and numerous as cattle on a feedlot, spotted in common places like Walmart and your local coffee shop. In 2010, eggs labeled cage-free were a mere four percent of the market; that had risen to sixteen percent by 2017. The industry predicts that to meet consumer demand, cage-free production will be seventy-five percent of the market by 2026.

It is a hopeful sign that consumers are demanding better treatment for animals, but the actual difference in the life and death experience for a cow or a chicken with humane labeling is sadly minimal. I have done extensive research on this issue, interviewed numerous stakeholders, and personally visited multiple animal operations, and concluded that these unregulated labels mean very little, if anything at all, for the animal’s experience. I have examined this particular area of farmed animal advocacy, having written the first, and one of the only books on the topic, and having been professionally involved in the field for over two decades. I found, for example, that comparing hens confined in battery cages to those in cage-free barns bodes only slight improvements and those differences can vary widely from farm to farm.

Animal activists have time and again exposed the horrors of egg-laying hens crammed tightly in battery cages, with only the space comparable to a crowded elevator to live in. In response, the shrewd marketers representing the egg industry have distorted the story, altered the labels, and changed consumers’ conceptions. Instead of rejecting the inherent cruelty of commercial egg production, shoppers have been deceived by the fictitious choice of a seemingly “humane” alternative of “cage-free”—but the reality for the birds, however, is bleak.

The difference in the experience of a bird in a conventionally managed operation versus a cage-free one is negligible. Despite the optimistic label, most chickens in cage-free egg facilities still live in miserable overcrowded conditions in massive windowless buildings. Their eyes and throats burn from the ammonia gas released from their accumulated waste. They never feel the sun on their wings or experience a simple satisfying dust bath. Irrespective of any label, all the chickens still go to a brutal slaughter at a very young age. We must not let the deception of “new” marketing eclipse the fundamental cruelty of animal agriculture. The perception invoked by the “cage-free” label—that the birds are now living a good life—is a decidedly false one, a mirage created by the interaction of euphemisms and consumer hopes in the absence of accurate information.

As animal agribusiness attempts to wash the blood off its hands with a new fabrication of fresh farming methods, consumers, activists, and other caring people must educate themselves about the new narratives that the industry continues to weave. This anthology features a range of knowledgeable authors who are at the forefront of this marketing shift, chronicling every aspect with in-depth analyses and intellectual rigor. Among other topics, the book explores how so-called alternative animal agriculture intersects with feminism, affects the environment, is represented in the media, and impacts human and non-human communities alike.

On Contributors to the Anthology:

This anthology has an impressive list of contributing writers who are a diverse assortment of activists, academics, authors, and campaigners. They range from radical protesters to educating advocates to professional scholars in the academy. Of the seventeen expert contributors, eight are published authors, five leaders of advocacy organizations, eight have Ph.D. degrees, and three have masters. What they all share is a forward-thinking vision and common concerns with animal agriculture’s marketing shift from big to small, from industrial to local.

The Humane Hoax contains essays by noted animal rights and environmentalism figures like Carol Adams, Robert Grillo, Sailesh Rao, Karen Davis, and Christopher “Soul” Eubanks. Some of the contributors have done extensive peer-reviewed research on the subject while others have been working with farmed animal advocacy for decades thinking deeply about this issue. Still others are rescuing farmed animals directly from local and small-scale farms, witnessing first-hand the undeniable suffering that is commonplace in animal farming.

The Humane Hoax: Essays Exposing the Myth of Happy Meat, Humane Dairy, and Ethical Eggs; edited by Hope Bohanec. The book is available as a paperback and also as an e-book from Lantern Publishing & Media; lanternpm.org.

Scrambled Lessons

Scrambled Lessons

By Yimeng (Nicole) Wang Yu, age 17, P. R. China

I have an estranged relationship with eggs. We aren’t completely cut off from each other—we still cross paths on occasion—but our encounters are awkward, fleeting, and never quite right. At most, I’m allowed to see them once every couple of weeks, and when I do, they always insist on showing up in some strange outfit. Sometimes they’re draped in a heavy coat of soy sauce, other times they’re wrapped in a knitted avocado-green sweater of their own making, smugly nestled against toast. But bare? Never. On the rare occasions they appear unadorned, it feels less like a gift and more like a threat. My stomach churns, my throat tightens, and my face knots itself into lines I don’t consciously form. I try to be polite, because it isn’t every day I get to share a meal with eggs, but honestly—they make me deeply uncomfortable.

And yet, as repulsed as I am now, I’ve probably consumed entire dynasties of chickens in the form of eggs over the past sixteen years. I grew up in a household where protein was fuel, and eggs were regarded as the most reliable gas station. My parents, convinced that my athleticism required a steady supply of scrambled yellow, believed they were doing me a favor. So, for sixteen years, they placed eggs before me every morning. Scrambled, boiled, fried, buried in fried rice, floating in soup—eggs became the guest at all of my meals. 

For years, I wished this unwelcome visitor would finally excuse itself from my breakfasts. I told my parents that eggs made my stomach feel as if it were gnawing on itself from within. My complaints, however, were dismissed as excuses and childish exaggerations. “You’ll get used to it,” my mom would say. “It’s good for you,” my dad would add. And so I swallowed my objections along with the eggs, because, after all, parents must know best. Didn’t they always?

Until last year.

After a lifetime of groans, gags, and grimaces, my mom finally relented and scheduled a food intolerance test. We waited one long week. When the results arrived, it felt as though the SAT scores of my digestive system had been released. My mom and I huddled around the phone, tense with anticipation. Then the screen flashed with numbers, and chaos erupted. There was screaming, crying (mostly mine), leaping, refreshing the page again and again as if the result might shift if stared long enough. The report confirmed what my body had been insisting all along: I was intolerant to eggs. Not just mildly intolerant, either—I had obliterated the intolerance scale. The threshold for high sensitivity was 200. I scored 900. Four and a half times the limit. Eggs and I weren’t simply mismatched; we were sworn enemies, cosmically opposed.

In that moment, years of swallowed frustration finally poured out of me. My intuition had been right, and science had finally corroborated it. Turns out I wasn’t a dramatic complainer. At last, my mom believed me. I was vindicated.

But looking back, I realize those mornings of forced eggs were not acts of cruelty but of love—misguided, perhaps, but love nonetheless. My parents weren’t trying to torture me; they were trying to keep me healthy in the way they knew best. Only now, with hindsight, can I see how much care went into those breakfasts. At the time, I couldn’t imagine it. I just assumed that because my parents insisted, they must be right, and because I was a child, I must be wrong.

It reminds me of the way I thought about growing up in general. As a child, I carried this foreign but persistent belief that everything would improve as I got older. I thought the world itself would change with me—that kindness and fairness were waiting just beyond the next birthday. My greatest problem then was the cafeteria bully, and even that seemed temporary, destined to dissolve once we were all old enough to know better. In my imagination, adulthood was a yet-to-be-discovered place where everyone made good decisions, where people were kinder, wiser, gentler—because they were grown.

Of course, the reality was never that simple. Growing older didn’t fix the world; it merely sharpened my vision to see it more clearly. Eggs did not suddenly stop making me sick when I turned sixteen—it took years of paying attention to myself, of insisting on what I felt, before anyone else would listen. Adulthood did not sanctify those around me—it simply gave me the ability to recognize their complexity, their contradictions, and, sometimes, their well-intentioned mistakes.

In that sense, perhaps I was not entirely wrong as a child. The world did get better—not because it grew kinder, but because I learned how to navigate it. I learned to trust my body when it screamed at me. I learned that being believed is not automatic, even by those who love you most, but that persistence matters. And I learned that the very things that cause you pain can, years later, soften into strangely tender memories.

So yes, eggs and I remain estranged. I avoid them, and I live a happier life because of it. But I can’t quite bring myself to hate eggs. They’re a part of my story, a relic of mornings at the kitchen table with my parents, who—despite their misplaced faith in scrambled yolks—were only ever trying to love me in the way they knew how. And maybe that’s what growing up really is: not escaping discomfort, but learning to hold it alongside love, until the bitterness—or the grossness—tastes almost sweet.

—Yimeng (Nicole) Wang Yu is a 17-year-old junior at Shanghai American School, P.R. China. She grew up in Spain and now lives in China, and she speaks, reads, and writes in English, Chinese, Spanish, and French. When she isn’t writing, she can be found on the basketball court, blasting music through her AirPods, or noticing the small, everyday details that might inspire her next piece—sometimes all at once.

No Phone, No Problem

No Phone, No Problem

By Nasiruddin Hamid, Qadian, Punjab, India.

We all love playing video games, watching funny shorts, and making movies on our smartphones. However, some of us use the cellphones much more than others.

I live in Northern India with my family. After school, my father gives me his cellphone for ten minutes to play games and enjoy SnapChat and YouTube, etc. When those ten minutes turn into 20 or 30 minutes, and then into an hour, I don’t even realize it—but my father does.

Last year, I started avoiding playing outdoors and spending time with my friends. I was using the phone more and more without telling my parents. But my parents never stopped keeping an eye on me.

One day, my father told me when he was a kid, he used to play many outdoor games like Pakadam Pakdai, Baraf Pani, Pitthu Gram, and Addi (see the end note below for a short explanation of these games children play in India). He said, “We didn’t have phones, but we’d read comics and novels in Urdu and English for our pasttime.”

Thinking of those outdoor games and thoughts of reading comics and novels really got me interested. So I made a deal with my dad that he and I would play outside and read books together. He bought me a new bicycle, and now I go riding; he runs beside me while I ride my bicycle, which is quite fun! He also bought me new comics and a few novels, and he reads them with me.

I really like reading the tales of Akbar and Birbal, as well as the stories of Mullah Nasruddin. They are full of humor and wisdom. I must say, I find reading books or riding a bicycle outdoors much more interesting than playing video games or watching YouTube shorts.

Yes, I know cellphones have their own benefits, but as my father says, “They are more useful after a certain age.” We should limit our phone usage. I have read that too much smartphone use can damage our brain cells, affect eyesight, and even our emotional health.

I believe my parents when they tell me that there can be many unforeseen negative impacts of these devices. I always trust them with any issues that come up.

As school age kids, we should use cellphones only for short duration, and under parental supervision and guidance.

By Nasiruddin Hamid, Qadian, Punjab, India.

Notes:

Akbar and Birbal Stories: Akbar was a Mughal emperor who ruled a large region in South Asia that includes modern-day Northern and Central India, Afghanistan, and Pakistan during the 16th century. Birbal was a close advisor and wise minister in the court of Akbar for some 30 years. The Akbar and Birbal stories are not only entertaining but also witty and are widely-read favorites of Indian kids.

Mullah Nasruddin (aka Nasreddin Hodja) appears in countless stories—mostly witty or wise—where he is shown as a (holy) fool that teaches great wisdom to the world. He is considered a Sufi (Islamic) character and he may have actually lived in the 13th century in present day Turkey and may have traveled to many lands as his stories are widely known.

A Short Explanation of the Games:

Pakdam Pakdai: Run and catch game One kid tries to catch others who try to run away.
Baraf Pani: When caught, you freeze like “Baraf” (Hindi word for ice) until someone frees you by saying “Pani” (Hindi word for water)
Pitthu Gram: Players break a stack of seven stones with a ball and then try to rebuild it before getting tagged by the fielders.
Addi: is played with two teams of 5/5 players. One team starts in a circle and tries to reach the end of the field line while the other team chases and blocks the players from reaching it.

 

Taking Care of North Dakota

Taking Care of North Dakota

By Yusuf Dean, 13, North Dakota.

Moving to Harvey, North Dakota felt…different.

I was so used to the bustling streets of Orlando and the nearly constant sound of cars, that in North Dakota everything seemed peaceful and quiet by contrast. Rolling hills for miles around, and only the sound of your car on the highway. Now, Having lived here for almost seven years, I can say that the peaceful and pristine image of North Dakota was nothing but a facade.

The majority of the middle and high school boys here always talk about their big, gas-guzzling trucks, diesel combines, and other farm equipment. They also talk about semis (tractor-trailers) and whether Peterbilt or Volvo is better. My preference for smaller and more fuel-efficient vehicles amuses them.

During recess, a big, loud pickup might rumble by, belching black exhaust, and one of my friends will say, “How’s that smoke treatin’ ya?” It annoys me because, well, they’re just trying to provoke me. Plus, most of the people in my community are totally fine with high fuel emissions and polluting the environment, and they dismiss the fact that these things are contributing to climate change as untrue and silly. I’m pretty good at putting on a neutral mask, but really, when they make comments like this, I’m fuming inside.

One time, my friend Bentley and I were going on a bike ride, so I told him to meet me at my dad’s house. When I met him in our driveway, the garage door was open. Bentley saw my dad’s Mazda CX-90 and said, “That’s a nice looking car!”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Is it an EV?”

“Um…”

“Hybrid?”

“Yeah, it’s a hybrid.”

Bentley rolled his eyes. “Bruh.”

“What?”

“I like it and don’t like it at the same time.”

I instantly knew why. Any car that used any amount of electricity to move was definitely not his type.

“Come on, Bentley,” I said.

“What? It’s a freaking hybrid. No one likes those.”

I clenched my fists. I absolutely hate when someone makes a blanket statement or speaks in absolutes when they’re expressing an opinion that might not be as popular outside of Harvey. “Maybe not anyone here, but I’ve seen countless hybrids and even fully electric cars in places other than NORTH DAKOTA!!!”

In the U.S., the deaths of around 200,000 people each year are linked to poor air quality. If people don’t put in an effort to reduce their carbon footprint, our health and our climate will suffer. Many people in North Dakota think that their gas-guzzling vehicles are better and that EVs are just piles of junk metal with batteries in them that pollute the environment. What they don’t see is that humanity as a whole has to work together to change our transportation system and energy production system; they think that the idea of one’s personal choices helping fight climate change is futile. They are, in part, correct, but not for the reasons they think they are.

The greatest damage being done is not by individuals, but by huge fossil fuel companies, one of them being an oil company based right here in North Dakota. Marathon, the world’s 22nd-largest oil producer (based on 2022 data), is the seventh-largest emitter of greenhouse gas emissions in the oil and gas industry. This means that they are emitting way more greenhouse gases than they should be. Owing to Marathon’s carelessness, Fort Berthold Reservation, right here in North Dakota, has seen several crude oil spills due to broken pipelines that pollute the air and water, and flaming does not completely eliminate the harmful gas emissions produced by the oil.[1] North Dakotans are perfectly capable of showing empathy to their community, so they should not be okay with this.

In fifth grade, Bentley was my best friend. We’d hang out together, go to the pool together, but most importantly, he played a huge role in helping me through my parents’ divorce. He is one of the few kids in my class whose biological parents were separated. He empathized with me and gave me a few tips on what to do in certain situations, like when my parents were fighting, but most of the time, he was just there for me.

Following the pandemic, it was my first year of in-person school since second grade, and I didn’t have any friends. My parents were almost always arguing, and of course, I couldn’t talk to my brother—he was just four! One morning, my dad had shouted at me for forgetting to wash my face, which really hurt my feelings. I knew I’d have to bottle it all up before I got to school because I didn’t want to attract too much attention.

When I got to school, I took a deep breath and went inside to see a large curtain in the corner of the commons area where the seventh-grade boys liked to hang out before class started. I went behind the curtain and there was Bentley; I sat down, put my head in my knees, and started to cry.

“Yusuf, are you okay, bro?” Bentley asked.

“I’m fine.” I said, tears rolling down my face.

“Did your dad say something?”

“Bentley, it’s fine!” I said.

“I’m texting your mom,” he said as he opened his messages app.

I perked up, wiped my face with my sleeve and swiped at his phone, knocking it out of his hand. I put my head in between my knees again and my breath quickened.

He embraced my curled body in a hug, my heartbeat slowed, and the tears on my face began to dry.

We are humans, and we should always help our fellow humans in their time of need. If people here in North Dakota—good people like Bentley—took pride in a cleaner environment and the strength to take on a huge company like Marathon Oil, not only would people on the Fort Berthold Reservation be safer, but we could be proud that North Dakota is a state that takes care of its own.

By Yusuf Dean, age 13, North Dakota. He adds: “I live in the U.S. with my brother and my two Sri Lankan immigrant parents. I don’t speak Sinhalese, but I speak a bit of Spanish as my second language. I value curiosity, especially in children, because it is, in my opinion, the driving force behind learning and ultimately being successful in life. When I moved to North Dakota from Florida seven years ago, I found that while it was very different from the city life I was used to, there were some similarities. My essay is a reflection on one of the sources of tension I’ve encountered in my North Dakota community.”

[1]  Marathon Oil and EPA reach $241 million settlement over Clean Air Act violations in North Dakota | PBS News

 

 

One Baby Tooth, One Giant Tantrum

One Baby Tooth, One Giant Tantrum

By Divya Rejeev, grade 6, California

When I arrived home after a vigorous session of P. E., I could barely walk straight. My legs felt like noodles, and my stomach was doing somersaults. I headed straight to the pantry and spotted a lone granola bar sitting like a hidden treasure in the corner. Famished, I tore it open, collapsed onto the jet-black leather couch, and took a massive bite.

Crunch

Not the satisfying crunch I expected. My mouth froze. A sharp jolt shot through my gums—my already wiggly tooth now hung by a minuscule string of my gums.

Looking back, I admit that as a child I was a tad bit dramatic over even the smallest scrape, sting, or bump. When I was five, I tripped over a stepping stone one fateful afternoon, cut my knee, and had to be carried to urgent care. To be fair, it wasn’t all in my head—I ended up with five stitches and a follow-up visit the next week.

After that, I began expecting the worst in every situation. I screamed at the sight of spiders no bigger than a breadcrumb, hollered if a honeybee came within a foot of me, and treated paper cuts like full-blown injuries I’d now brush off without a second thought.

So when my first loose tooth arrived, I didn’t exactly handle it with grace.

With a mix of euphoria and fear, I rushed towards my mom. “Mom, it’s loose!” I exclaimed, jumping up and down on the plush off-white carpet. My mom hastily turned off her favorite Netflix show, Designated Survivor, mid-episode and stared at me with wide eyes. “Okay… I guess I’ll have to pull it out! Then the tooth fairy will come!” she said, motioning for me to come closer as she was heading to the closet for the mini tooth-shaped container in which she said she would put my first pulled-out tooth.

But the thought of my tooth being yanked out sent me into full panic mode. “No! Anything but that!” I cried, flailing like a fish out of water, my arms and legs thrashing in every direction.

My mom’s eyes widened as she watched me thrash around the room. For a moment, she looked caught between stifling a laugh and offering moral support. She took a steadying breath and said, “Oh, Sai,”—using my nickname with a warm smile—as she knelt down to my level, her hands outstretched like a warrior bracing for a fight. “This is a big moment! However, if we don’t pull it out now, it’s only going to get worse—and the tooth fairy might not be too happy if it’s still hanging on tomorrow.”

Her voice was gentle, but there was a familiar sparkle in her eyes—a glimpse of nostalgia, remembering the excitement and chaos of when my older brother lost his first tooth.

Six-year-old me wasn’t having it. “Don’t, don’t!” I hollered. “Get away from me!” Exasperated, my mom sighed. “How about this, show your fingers from one to ten when I pull. The higher the number, the greater the pain.” Reluctantly, I agreed, and prepared for bloody doom.

Then, I saw my mom’s finger reach towards my mouth, hearing her say, “I’m gonna pull in 3, 2…1…”

Plink

I blinked, surprised at how painless it felt. I stared at that tiny tooth, the perpetrator of all my panic. I wondered, how could I have been so scared of that little thing? I figured that I was more grown up than I’d thought. After all, I had just survived losing my first tooth with absolutely no tantrums. Lost in thought, I headed towards the bathroom, put some ice in my mouth, and went on with my day as if nothing happened.

By Divya Rejeev, grade 6, California. Divya comes from a South Asian ancestry, and  aspires to become a writer.

Is Convenience Worth the Last Drop?

Is Convenience Worth the Last Drop?

By Mikaela Gee, age 16, New York.

As we walk from the sea to earth, along paths carved by rapids long ago,
It was Mother Nature’s tears that nourished and raised—
Our bodies, our cells, our kin who’ve begun,
To shape the earth with a boundless run.

And yet, we have forgotten our mother,
Who raised us through countless years.
Her lifeblood, pure and versatile,
Now depleted, unwaveringly so.
She gives us the sweetest fruits to savor,
Irrigates our crops to yield golden wheat,
And builds the grand towers that power our homes.
Yet we poison her roots, her veins,
Choking the motor, seizing the reins.
Our pipes leak lacquered oil into her seas,
From which we fish, then we eat.
Steel succumbs, its strength turned frail by decay,
Her hands unearth truths time cannot betray,
Empires crumble, bound by nature’s say.

And so I call upon you—
My peers, future generations, and past:
Let us pause and remember: the taste of water, sweet and crisp.
The refreshing rain that quenches earth’s thirst.
Without water, no harvest will grow,
No forests, no flowing seas—no us.

Let us act before time discreetly seeps away,
With hands that halt the careless streams,
And choices that honor the gift we’ve known—
So the rhythm of life may endlessly flow,
So that our cups will always be filled to the brim.

By Mikaela Gee, age 16, Chinese-Malaysian, New York. Mikaela explores life’s complexities through quiet reflection, capturing universal emotions in still moments—like gazing out a car window at the world rushing by. She’s eager to share her voice and connect with readers, blending personal introspection with themes that resonate widely. Expect to see more of her poems in near future.

ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer’s World

Why School Breaks the ADHD Hunter’s Spirit

By Thom Hartmann, author, educator and commentator

The modern school system wasn’t built with the hunter in mind. But that doesn’t mean we have to keep using it.

Every September, countless ADHD kids return to school full of promise, only to feel like failures by October. It’s not because they’re lazy, stupid, or broken. It’s because the system was never designed for them in the first place.

We built our modern education system during the Industrial Revolution. Its purpose wasn’t to foster creativity or honor individual strengths—it was to create obedient factory workers and good soldiers. Schools emphasized conformity, repetition, and hierarchy. Sit still. Follow the rules. Memorize and repeat. Don’t ask too many questions.

For kids with ADHD—what I call Hunter brains in a Farmer’s world—this is a death sentence for the spirit.

The Classroom as a Factory

Think about it: A standard classroom requires kids to sit still for long periods, absorb abstract information, and stay quiet unless called on. That’s not how Hunters are wired. A Hunter scans their environment, reacts quickly to movement, explores, wanders. Their learning is active, kinetic, sensory.

Now imagine putting that child in a chair under fluorescent lights for six hours a day. Penalize them when their minds wander. Shame them for blurting out brilliant but untimely observations. Force them to repeat tasks that bore them to tears. That’s not education—that’s imprisonment.

The Myth of the Lazy Kid

One of the most insidious myths about ADHD kids is that they “just need to try harder.” But ADHD isn’t about willpower. It’s about neurological wiring. The hunter brain isn’t motivated by future rewards; it responds to immediate stimuli. It craves novelty, intensity, and challenge. Long-term projects, repetitive drills, or quiet reading time simply don’t register as important. It’s not a choice. It’s chemistry.

This leads to an avalanche of negative feedback: low grades, constant reprimands, damaged self-esteem. The message they internalize is clear: you’re not good enough. And so they begin to disengage, act out, or give up altogether.

Rebellion Is Not a Flaw

We treat rebelliousness in children as a character defect. But sometimes it’s wisdom. Hunter kids resist systems that don’t serve them. That resistance, if nurtured, becomes the same trait that leads adults to become inventors, artists, entrepreneurs, and change-makers.

But too often we crush it early. We reward conformity. We punish curiosity. We drug children into silence.

This isn’t just a tragedy. It’s a massive loss of potential. How many future Einsteins and Edisons have we labeled as disruptive? How many future innovators dropped out to escape systems that refused to see their genius?

Real Learning Happens in Motion

Look at how young children naturally learn: by touching, exploring, imitating, asking questions. That’s a Hunter’s learning style. The farther we move from that model, the more we lose those kids.

Project-based learning, outdoor education, apprenticeships—these approaches work brilliantly for ADHD brains. They restore meaning to the learning process. They offer feedback in real-time. They respect movement, engagement, and challenge.

Why do so many ADHD kids come alive in summer camp, theater, robotics, or sports? Because such environments match their wiring.

What Can We Do?

First, we stop blaming the child.

Then we fight to reform the system. Advocate for alternative learning models that honor multiple intelligences. Support teachers who think outside the box. Push back against standardized testing regimes that reduce learning to a number.

And at home, we tell our Hunter kids the truth: You’re not broken. You’re different. And in many ways, you’re better suited to thrive in a world that desperately needs new thinking.

The modern school system wasn’t built with the hunter in mind. But that doesn’t mean we have to keep using it.

Let’s rebuild it. Let’s build schools where Hunters can run. 

—Thom Hartmann, educator and commentator, is the author of a highly respected book, ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer’s World. Reprinted with permission from ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer’s World with Thom Hartmann. To receive new posts you can become a free or paid subscriber of this reader-supported publication.