The Strong Women of the Future!

“Adults keep saying we owe it to the young people, to give them hope, but I don’t want your hope. I don’t want you to be hopeful. I want you to panic. I want you to feel the fear I feel every day. I want you to act. I want you to act as you would in a crisis. I want you to act as if the house is on fire, because it is.”

Greta Thunberg addressing the World Economic Forum, Davos, January 2019

I appreciate she's not everyone's cup of tea however, I have a tremendous amount of respect for Greta Thunberg! For those of you that have been living under a rock, Greta is the teenage environmental activist whose withering look when faced with the tiny fingered, Cheeto faced, ferret wearing, shitgibbon that is Trump, was one of the images of 2019! Even if you disagree with her ideology, the fact she is autistic, despite English not being her first language, despite the fact she's only just turned 17, despite the fact she's a she, you have to acknowledge and ultimately respect her passion and conviction.

I’m not the only one that admires Greta though, her passion has spurned a whole cohort of young women who will not be told to be quiet, who will make sure their words are heard and who will ride the scorn of the tabloids in the name of their cause. Four such women from the UK that stand out for me are; Elizabeth Fiennes, Bella Ramsey, Elsie Luna and Bella Lack.

Elizabeth Fiennes is the daughter of celebrated explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes. Last week she addressed an event in parliament organised by the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting (CBTH), demonstrating her willingness to make powerful people feel decidedly uncomfortable.

“Greed-based destruction of habitats, pollution and persecution, have brought the world’s wildlife to the brink of extinction,” she told an audience that included Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park, the environment minister, and Stanley Johnson, father of the prime minister. “Your generation is responsible, and those before you. My generation is begging you to stop.” Strong words from a thirteen-year-old!

Eduardo Goncalves, founder of CBTH, said that young people such as Miss Fiennes had such a powerful effect because they did not mince words.

“They have no filter,” he said. “They don’t think, ‘I’m in a room of politicians, I should couch my speech in a certain way’. They are shooting from the hip.”

Elsie Luna, who is eleven years old, has been promoted by Extinction Rebellion as “the UK’s answer to Greta” and last year founded the protest group’s junior wing, XR Kids. Last year she lobbied oil companies in 2018, visiting their London offices and asking to speak to senior executives about the need to keep fossil fuels in the ground. People listen to her, she landed a 20-minute audience with Sinead Lynch the Chairwoman of Shell no less, apparently they spent 20 minutes discussing the company’s response to climate change. Go girl!!

Now remember she’s eleven, Luna has co-written an academic paper about her experiences as a climate activist. The paper uses her own words with minimal editing to avoid what it calls “adultism — the power adults have over children”. She’s Eleven!!

Bella Ramsey, who is sixteen years old is an actress who appeared in Game of Thrones, Well, I think every single English actor appeared in GoT at some point! Bella was the star speaker last month at a Greenpeace event to launch a film highlighting the threat to turtles and other marine life from climate change, pollution and overfishing.

John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace UK, said that she made a vital contribution to the debate. “There’s something uniquely powerful and unsettling in hearing a young person speak passionately about an issue that will impact the rest of their lives, long after my generation is gone,” he said. “Ultimately it is their generation that will have to live with the impacts of the nature and climate emergency that we have bequeathed to them.

Bella Lack who is seventeen, is not just the “ambassador” for one organisation, she’s an ambassador for the Born Free Foundation, RSPCA and Jane Goodall Institute and has spoken at conferences attended by world leaders, including the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference in London in 2018 hosted by the Duke of Cambridge.

As with all these brilliant young women Bella is incredibly articulate. On the subject of the new generation that green groups are encouraging as “British Gretas” she says they are trying to do more than just copy the Swedish teenager.

“It’s a movement and Greta says herself that she’s not a leader of the movement,” she said. “This whole thing about the Greta of England or Greta of New York is flawed because it’s putting the focus on the people.

“We need to transform the way we think and act towards the natural world.”

I love our society that allows young women like this to stand up and be heard, to stand up and inspire people like me that have evidently been just a spectator up until now – up until now as I’m going to be attending a rally in the near by future but, that’s another story!

What’s on today?