Greta Thunberg

Greta Thunberg

Content

Asperger

Overseas

11

10

Elections and the Vatican

The adults

Katowice's speech

Fridays for Future

The strike for the climate

The parents

Sensibility for the planet

Biography

index

Activist Greta Eleonora Thunberg Ernman was born in Stockholm, under the sign of Capricorn, on January 3, 2003. She became famous all over the world for her struggle to protect sustainable development and for her peaceful demonstrations in front of the Riksdag. At just 16 she was proposed as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize. Strengthened by his tenacity, he pursued the dream of spreading greater sensitivity for the planet, and generated a global movement with followers in 95 countries!

biography

Thunberg was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome in 2016 and suffered from selective mutism and obsessive compulsive disorder. She herself has no difficulty talking about the subject and indeed considers her particular condition an element that has helped her focus on the great problem that afflicts the planet. Diagnoses "mean that I only speak when I consider it necessary." In an interview with the New Yorker he demonstrated awareness of the political potential of his condition. In an intervention at the TED conferences in Stockholm he made it even clearer that when it comes to the environmental crisis, non autistic people seem very strange, given that they talk about the problem as if it were urgent but then continue to behave as before. The ability not to get distracted in this case helps.

Asperger

Thunberg's reaction is as strong as it is simple in its content. He does not claim to have come up with the solution to global warming. Indeed, in his opinion, the solution is already there and it is the one indicated by the IPCC and the scientific community and ratified as an official commitment in the many agreements on the climate, most recently that of Paris in 2015: reducing pollution and above all the emissions of anhydride carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Farewell to fossil fuels, farewell to environmentally unsustainable practices. His position starts from a scientific basis but is political, it is a reaction against the lack of reaction to such a dramatic situation by those who play the role of political decision maker. Even his Sweden, among the countries with the best environmental policies, has not done enough.

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Content

Greta's first interlocutors are the parents. Both belong to the wealthy Stockholm art world: the mother is an opera singer, the father is an actor. After trying to alleviate their daughter's frustration with reassuring answers, they are forced to deal with Greta's obstinate determination which convinces them to adopt more responsible behaviors; and so the fossil fuel car is replaced by an electric car, the vegan diet becomes the family diet and the Thunbergs undertake to no longer use highly polluting means of transport such as planes. Which makes international careers impossible for mothers, but consistency comes at a price.

The parents

The change that the 16 years old Swedish girl is promoting is not reserved exclusively for teenagers. Indeed, their mobilization is only the extreme ratio against the immobility of adults. Adults are more than welcome, indeed "necessary", like everyone else. In fact, many are following the initiative of Greta, like many parents who are organizing in associations to support this necessary urgency to change the relationship with the planet manifested by the children who infected them.

The adults

Greta, like all her Swedish peers, is informed of the problems caused to the environment by pollution and CO2 emissions at school. Lessons and in-depth videos that leave a much deeper trace on her than on her classmates. Then she inquires, studies, keeps up to date, in short, worries about the topic. And she is deeply disappointed by the ignorance of governments around the world. International climate agreements are not respected, every new official data shared by the UN Intergovernmental Group on Climate Change (IPCC) paints an increasingly dramatic situation. The phenomena of the impending disaster are visible at almost all latitudes. Yet the rulers do not seem troubled by the disaster, the newspapers do not talk enough about the topic.

Sensibility for the planet

The trigger for the activity that made her famous was a series of catastrophic fires that occurred in the Swedish forests in summer 2018, yet another symptom of the disastrous consequences of global warming. The then 15-year-old decided it was more useful to protest the government than to go to school. From the beginning of the school year - which starts in Sweden in mid-August - until the Swedish general elections on 9 September, he gets up early every morning, gets on his bike and goes to Parliament, where he stays until the time at school lessons end. He brings with him a wooden board with Skolstrejk för klimatet, 'school strike for the climate' in Swedish, and some information material printed at home.

The strike for the planet

Friday for Future

On the first day his protest remains completely isolated, but on the second day some passersby start to get curious and talk to Greta; over time, the curious increase and someone becomes sympathetic, stopping to keep her company. In the aftermath of the elections Greta resumes attending school and limits her protest to Friday. Thus were born the FridaysForFuture, the Friday for the future. After the local press, even the international one becomes aware of the protest and Greta's fame rises during the autumn. FridaysForFuture groups are beginning to blossom in many cities and in December Thunberg is invited to speak at the COP24 Climate Conference.

The representatives of the states that were in those days of December discussing in Katowice on the definition of the implementing rules of the Paris agreements probably thought to spend a few minutes less boring than usual when Greta took the floor. They were wrong, it was time for the accusations without appeal. "We must speak clearly, it doesn't matter if it's uncomfortable - lashes the audience with tone - You are afraid of becoming unpopular, you want to go on with the same ideas that put us in this mess. You are not mature enough to say things how are they". And if the introduction was not flattering, the statement was definitely a declaration of exauthoration. “We didn't come to ask the leaders to take care of it. You have ignored us in the past and will continue to do so. You have no more excuses, we have no more time. We are here to let you know that change is coming, whether you like it or not.

Katowice's speech

On the eve of the European elections, Greta is back in Brussels, this time in front of the members of the European Parliament. In her speech, she calls young people who can vote to vote pro-environment, asking them to be spokespersons for those who still cannot vote, such as Thunberg and her schoolmates and protesters. The following day he arrives in Rome, listens to the general audience of Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square, shakes hands with the pontiff and exchanges a few words with him, praising him for the encyclical Laudato si ', dedicated to the defense of the planet and obtaining support from Bergoglio

Elections and Vatican

Greta's tour of the most important places in the 'official' debate on global warming involves two overseas stops. The problem is to reach America without polluting. Before participating in the Global Climate Strike called between 20 and 27 September and attending the Youth Climate Summit, she was invited to the US Congress where she took part in a very laconic intervention: eight sentences in all, referring to the true contents of his testimony, namely the latest update of the report of the International Panel on Climate Change. While at the UN climate summit, after the unexpected arrival of US President Donald Trump, he gives a fiery speech addressed to the greats of the Earth

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Overseas

And!!!