By Nina Argel
“We showed that we are united and that we, young people, are unstoppable,” said Greta Thunberg – a Swedish teenage climate change activist at the first UN Youth Climate Summit. Kids all over the world are making their voices heard as they fight and advocate for change. The uprising of young activists and the radicalization of kids is a phenomenon everyone should read up on, and perhaps, join.
A critical issue the world’s facing is climate change. Climate change is increasing our Earth’s temperature, affecting all life on the planet, and increasing the intensity of natural disasters. It’s also threatening the lives of the younger generations. With climate change slowly killing the earth and nature, there might not be a healthy future ahead. The uprising of millions of kids worldwide fighting for authorities to take climate change seriously is an incredibly strong example of the radicalization of kids in these modern times.
In the podcast, How To Save A Planet, hosts Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Alex Blumberg, along with their guest, Rachel Waldholz, touch on the topic of youth speaking out about climate change. Waldholz, who worked as a reporter in Germany saw first hand how youth-organized protests and strikes spread across Europe.
“It started with just a few strikes and it just spread. Teenagers were organizing [protests and strikes] on WhatsApp, and it went from town to town until you were having these protests in twenty-five, fifty … hundreds of cities and towns across Germany”, said Waldholz. He continued by saying, “Teenagers around Europe seized on this idea of staging school strikes. They began walking out of school on Fridays to demand that politicians do something about climate change. They called their movement Fridays for Future”. Who were these strikes and protests inspired by? Greta Thunberg herself. This environmental activist began her career early. She would skip school to protest in front of the Swedish Parliament with her famous sign sporting the words “Skolstrejk För Klimatet”, which translates to “School Strike For The Climate.”
Thunberg gave one of her many famous speeches at the 2018 United Nations Climate Change Conference where she delivered the powerful quote, “You are not mature enough to tell [climate change] like it is. Even that burden you leave to us children”. Just three months after this speech was given, student-led protests began to spread across Europe. “[Protests] started with high school students, and then it was middle school students, and then it was elementary students coming with their parents. And then [the protests were] huge”, said Waldholz in the podcast How To Save A Planet. An incredible fact about this phenomenon is that it was kids inspiring kids to make a change.
When emphasizing the pressure put on Generation Z to reverse and mend all the damage inflicted on our planet by the older generations, it’s important to understand that this pressure was man-made; this pressure weighs down heavy on the shoulders of these children. This does not only act as a lazy excuse for a solution made by older authorities, but it also contributes to the fuel that ignites the young kids’ passion to fight for change – hence the increasing radicalization of young people. When discussing this topic in How To Save A Planet, host Dr. Anaya Elizabeth Johnson brings her feelings to light about pressuring the younger generations with her generation’s mistakes when she said, “It’s so crazy that we’re putting all this on the shoulders of kids because our leaders are incapable of leading … it breaks my heart that we’re stealing all these kids’ childhoods because they have to try and save us from ourselves”.
Generation Z is the first generation to have such incredible access to technology and the digital world. This doesn’t just make them tech-savvy, it also makes them more prone to being educated about current events and social issues through the media. Some issues that have always existed are now being documented online, and due to the younger generation’s relationship with technology and the media, they are more likely to learn about these issues and speak out about them. With these digital platforms, kids harness technology, and use it to promote change; this is called digital/online activism.
Digital activism also contributes to why the numbers of youth activists are increasing. Kids are taking what they have and using it to strengthen their advocacy for change. This is talked about in a HAD (Human Academy for Development) article when it is stated, “Rallying behind Greta Thunberg and Fridays for Future, millions of people all over the world were able to use online platforms to mobilize and organize strikes and protests”. Not only do these kids go online to speak out, but they also connect with others (that could be countries away), who share the same ideas and passion for change, and together, they strengthen each other’s voices.
The young people of this planet see the world with fresh eyes – they see through the filter misinformation, ignorance, and aging creates and they stare directly at the problems of these contemporary times. There is a refreshing way the youth looks at the world and it’s important to recognize that their perspectives are significant. Whether it’s protests organized online or student-led organizations, it’s very certain that the younger generations are determined to make a change. Hearing snippets of the news and seeing glimpses of headlines titled, “The Youth Take to the Streets to Protest …” is something to get accustomed to because young kids are not going to stop trying to change the world.
Sources:
Cover photo credits: National Geographic, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/kids-march-climate-action
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