Greta Thunberg vs. climate change
Greta Thunberg is a sixteen-year-old from Sweden fighting climate change. She first heard about it when she was eight and from that age, she couldn't let it go compared to her classmates. Her movement started this past summer when she sat outside the Swedish parliament in Stockholm with a sign that said: "skolstrejk för klimatet" which means school strike for climate. However, when she started, she was alone and others pitied her or laughed.
Now, Greta is famous for leading the school strike for the climate movement and led a worldwide strike in November. There were 71 countries and 700 cities involved with people of all ages coming together to raise awareness for the issue. She was inspired by the Parkland strike for gun laws when students from Parkland high school protested the massacre.
Greta is still leading worldwide protests but she has been holding speeches, in English which is her second language, in front of different countries and organizations. She started by speaking in front at the People's Climate Change March rally and has continued speaking in different countries. Her speeches are incredibly candid and honest which is applauded by many politicians while others try to discredit her and instead critique her for skipping school.Greta has been praised by the UN, met Emmanuel Macron, shared a podium with the European Commission president and endorsed by the German chancellor. Greta is reaching great audiences and is spreading the seriousness of the issue while inspiring young people to stand up for the issue and do what they can to work against climate change.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/11/greta-thunberg-schoolgirl-climate-change-warrior-some-people-can-let-things-go-i-cant
This is such an interesting topic! I saw a video of her speaking and she is so inspirational! I had no idea that she was the one that started the school strike movement- that was so huge! Has she been skipping school every day in order to bring attention to the issue of climate change? It is almost like she's giving up her future to help bring awareness, which is probably a difficult choice for a teenager.
ReplyDeleteThis is interesting especially because of the climate change protest that occurred recently, organized by Los Altos students. I think her activism mirrors our own protest in showing that teenagers are not, in fact, in a position where they cannot make change. In fact, Greta seems to have drawn more attention precisely because she was so persistent and also so young. Los Altos students seem to have learned from that their own ways to participate in activism they care about.
ReplyDeleteI love this! At such a young age she is advocating for such an unfortunate problem on our planet earth. This gives me great hope for our future generation, as she is setting up the perfect example. She had the power to get 71 countries on board, and advocating toward the same thing, I can only imagine what she will do when she's older.
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