In March 2018, a Swedish 16 year old girl decided to skip school to sit outside the parliament and strike for our climate. She had no expectations that anyone would see her or listen to what she had to say, but she kept on doing it, week for week. She started this in September 2018, and by November, her message had gone viral and global. People were hash-tagging, “Skolstrej for klimatet,” or “School strike for our climate.” People hopped on the trend. Swedish people skipped school to join her, and day by day more people showed up. In a year, Greta Thunberg involved 70 countries and billions of people. Her words translated to different languages, and parades, strikes, and social media overflowed with her name. 

Thunberg recently became Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year.” Along with that, she has received multiple prizes, titles, and requests from the world. She won the alternative Nobel Prize 2019, and she has hosted a lot of TV shows such as making her own TED talk. In the center of San Francisco, a painting of her has been made to celebrate her name. 

A young woman with this much influence often scares people. Her success is clearly not supported by everyone. Some people like to believe that Thunberg is making climate changes up. Well, look around you and open your eyes. Is it a coincidence that all the icebergs are melting and Australia is on fire? Countries like Sweden are supposed to be cold and full of snow by now, but they haven’t even seen snow yet this year since it’s still warm outside. This is not something our generation is making up. Climate changes are real, and people need to take action. By the time our generation has the power, it will be too late to do something, and to be honest people in power right now feels like a lost case. They won’t listen because they are scared. That might be the death of our planet. 

What change can you make in this world?