Greta Thunberg, the sixteen-year-old environmental activist from Sweden, has been named TIME Magazine’s 2019 Person Of The Year. The teenager has spent the better half of her teen years protesting and raising awareness on the global climate crisis.
Thunberg started her environmental campaign In August 2018, by skipping school to protest outside the Swedish parliament. Her rapid rise from ‘solo protestor’ to a beacon of global change is laudable! Her protest sign that read “school strike for climate” motivated thousands of students around the world to leave class and join the global protest.
“For sounding the alarm about humanity’s predatory relationship with the only home we have, for bringing to a fragmented world a voice that transcends backgrounds and borders, for showing us all that it might look like when a new generation leads, Greta Thunberg, is TIME’s 2019 Person of the Year,” said TIME Magazine
“In the 16 months since, she has addressed heads of state at the UN, met with the pope, sparred with the president of the United States and inspired 4 million people to join the global climate strike on September 20, 2019, in what was the largest climate demonstration in human history,” read the article.
“Just over a year ago, a quiet and mostly friendless teenager woke up, put on her blue hoodie, and sat by herself for hours in an act of singular defiance. Fourteen months later, she had become the voice of millions, a symbol of a rising global rebellion. The politics of climate action are as entrenched and complex as the phenomenon itself, and @gretathunberg has no magic solution. But she has succeeded in creating a global attitudinal shift, transforming millions of vague, middle-of-the-night anxieties into a worldwide movement calling for urgent change @gretathunberg is TIME’s 2019 Person of the Year.”
Greta’s “Fridays For Future” movement quickly gained momentum globally. Thunberg no-nonsense approach to the movement has also brought in critics, she’s openly called out politicians and activists in her speeches in the past.
And that’s not all, after noticing a hundredfold increase in the word ‘climate strike,’ the Collins Dictionary even made it the word of the year. “Margaret Atwood compared her to Joan of Arc. After noticing a hundredfold increase in its usage, lexicographers at Collins Dictionary named Thunberg’s pioneering idea, climate strike, the word of the year,” said TIME Magazine.
A post shared by Time Magazine captioned “This was the year the climate crisis went from behind the curtain to centre stage, from ambient political noise to squarely on the world’s agenda, and no one did more to make that happen than @gretathunberg. Meaningful change rarely happens without the galvanizing force of influential individuals, wrote editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal, and in 2019, the earth’s existential crisis found one in Thunberg.”
Her “Fridays For Future” movement quickly gained momentum globally. Thunberg no-nonsense approach to the movement has also brought in critics, she’s openly called out politicians and activists in her speeches in the past.
Time Magazine’s choice for Person Of The Year drew praise from former US Vice President, Al Gore and former US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.
Despite being subjected to constant criticism, Greta has quickly become the biggest voice for global environmental justice. Her efforts towards increasing awareness on climate change earned her a nomination for the illustrious Nobel Peace Price, 2019.
Truly, a very young girl with a powerful voice. More power to you Greta!
Featured Image: Time
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