Greta Thunberg laughs at reports Fridays For Future protests continue
Greta Thunberg reacted with surprise and laughter when told that protesters still join the climate strikes she started in 2018, which she has since largely left behind as she turns her focus to Gaza.
Greta Thunberg laughed with surprise when she was told that protesters are still taking part in Fridays For Future, the climate movement she launched as a schoolgirl's solitary strike outside the Swedish parliament. Her reaction, in which she responded with incredulity that the climate strikes are still going, underlines how far she has moved from the campaign that made her an international figure.
Thunberg started Fridays For Future in 2018 by refusing to attend school and sitting outside Sweden's parliament to demand stronger action on climate change. Her protest spread rapidly, drawing young people into regular school strikes across many countries and turning her into one of the most recognisable activists of her generation. The movement grew around a simple idea: that students should walk out of lessons on Fridays to press governments on the climate crisis. That model gave the campaign its name and its rhythm, and it is the reason the protests became a weekly fixture in many cities.
In the years since, Thunberg has shifted much of her attention toward Gaza, and she no longer leads the movement's day-to-day activity. The change in her focus is the backdrop to her reaction. When the idea that the strikes continue was put to her, her response was not one of pride or concern but of disbelief, a sign of how distant the campaign now feels from her current priorities.
Fridays For Future still holds regular climate protests in various countries, so the movement has not disappeared. Participation has, however, reportedly declined from its peak years, when school strikes drew very large crowds in cities around the world. The reporting does not clearly quantify how many people now take part, and it does not give a figure for the number of cities or countries where protests are still held. That gap means the current scale of the movement is difficult to measure from the available reporting alone.
It is also unclear how closely Thunberg remains involved with the group. Her laughter at the suggestion that the protests continue points to a considerable distance between her present concerns and the cause that first brought her to global attention. Any ongoing formal or informal association she has with the group has not been spelled out in the reporting, so the extent of her continued involvement remains an open question.
Source: dailymail.com
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