No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference by Greta Thunberg

That’s what No One Is Too Small To Make A Difference is a collection of Thunberg’s words which, to my consideration, have the potential to shape a whole generation. Amidst the rise of her climate activism, Penguin Random House took it upon themselves to compile her most moving speeches and publish them as a book. Thunberg made the younger generation the environments’ agent of change overnight, and as a result, she has been invited to participate in critical and far-reaching spaces, such as the World Economic Forum, the European Parliament, and the United Nations Climate Action Summit. It is exceptionally more progressive than what was considered adequate a few years ago. The “Overton window” is what is considered acceptable by the public and the media when it comes to environmental conservation, mitigation, and adaptation. So much so that she has managed to mobilize millions of people to strike for the climate, which has completely shifted the Overton window when it comes to environmental policy discussion. There have been young people advocating for the environment for decades, but I think we can all agree that by far, the one that has gotten the most media attention is Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg.

He said, “Every social cause has an agent of change.” The civil rights movement is upheld by Black and indigenous people of colour, the feminist movement is upheld by women, but for the longest time, the environmental movement didn’t have such a defined group of advocates. This puzzle that I battled with for years was promptly solved by one of my university professors, who gave me a short and simple answer that made everything seem crystal clear. I couldn’t understand why, in spite of the life-threatening hazards that were staring humanity in the face, the ecological crisis didn’t get a fraction of the attention it deserved. For the longest time I felt as if the whole world was blind and that, for some enigmatic reason, I was one of the few people who had 20/20 vision. Hell, I’m so passionate about it that I managed to shape my professional life around it. I’ve always felt incredibly strongly about sustainability.

Even though the younger generation is advocating for every cause imaginable, one of the movements that have been getting more attention as of late is climate action.

Malala Yousafzai standing up for the right of girls to go to school in the East, Parkland students marching for gun control in the West, and countless others fighting for what they believe in from their own trenches. It seems that, as of recent years, youth activism has shot up in every corner of the world.

No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference by Greta Thunberg