High school students in Hamamatsu inspired by Greta Thunberg

Yesterday the 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg made a speech at the UN Climate Action Summit. I saw her video on the Internet for a few times. In her speech, she was expressing her emotions straight toward world leaders who hadn't worked on the climate crisis seriously. I had never seen her speaking like that before. She said; "We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is the money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth. How dare you!” While critizing world leaders, she repeated "How dare you!" a few times. She also said; “If you choose to fail us, I say we will never forgive you.” Throughout the speech, my heart ached as I saw her expressions. I saw how angry and sad she was.

I wonder how our new environment minister Shinjiro Koizumi felt hearing her speech. He also attended the UN Climate Action Summit. Soon after his arrival at New York, he went to a steak house for dinner. He said that he wanted to eat steak every day. How dared he! Apparently, he doesn’t know the relationship between the livestock industry and climate change. This topic is ignored by Japanese media, and people are poorly informed even though they are politicians.

Recently, Greta Thunberg and her school strike have been increasingly covered by Japanese newspapers and TV programs. But I haven’t found any articles that mentioned that she is a vegan to reduce the effects on the environment. I think they must write about her lifestyle as well as her activities. She not only demands politicians to take actions, but she herself leads an environmentally friendly lifestyle.

On September 20, 4 million people participated in the global climate strike. Even in Hamamatsu, about 400 students in Kaiseikan, a combined private junior and senior high school, marched from JR Hamamatsu Station to the city hall with placards and balloons. They appealed to people in the town by shouting “Save the planet, save our future!” Finally, they handed recommendations to the mayor to require implementation of RE100 in schools and hospitals, establishment of a “youth conference” to collect opinions of young people about climate change, promotion of greening in the urban area, etc. They responded to Greta’s call to children in the world.

I was surprised to hear this news because I had thought the global climate strike would be held in only big cities. But I was wrong. I have the book “No One is Too Small to Make a Difference”, a collection of Greta’s speeches. I wish this book will be used in English classes in high schools all over Japan so that more and more students will get interested in the world they live in.