How to Watch Greta Thunberg Testimony at the UN Climate Change Summit
On Monday, 16-year-old activist Greta Thunberg testified before the United Nations at the Climate Change Summit – and pulled world leaders away from the new.
“I shouldn’t be up here,” she said. “I have to go back to school on the other side of the ocean. And yet you all come to us, young people, for hope. How dare you. You stole my dreams and my childhood with your empty words. And yet I’m one of the lucky ones. “
Thunberg continued her remarks, criticizing insufficient efforts to reduce carbon emissions and prioritizing “business as usual” over the existence of future generations. Her statements – and her unrelenting gaze directed at President Donald Trump, who appeared at the summit for 15 minutes – rocked social media.
Thunberg has become an independent leader in environmental activity; In 2018, her protest against climate change went viral and sparked this year’s Climate Strike, an attempt by young people to demand change in the days leading up to the UN Climate Change Summit.
If you want to watch Thunberg perform – and you definitely need to – PBS has her full testimony onYouTube. ( NPR also has a transcript of the talk in case you can’t watch it.)
Meanwhile, President Trump, who has more or less ridiculed Thunberg’s emotional call to action, obviously has other things to do; On Tuesday morning, the President delivered a speech to the United Nations on military power and globalism.