Climate change activist Greta Thunberg says global protests set off by the death of George Floyd are signs of a social “awakening.”
Speaking with BBC chief environment correspondent Justin Rowlatt on Saturday, Thunberg said the protests are a “tipping point.”
“It feels like we have passed some kind of social tipping point where people are starting to realize that we cannot keep looking away from these things. We cannot keep sweeping these things under the carpet, these injustices,” Thunberg told Rowlatt.
Thunberg said the protests, which have at times turned violent and destructive, prove that people are willing to do “whatever it takes” to overthrow what they allege to be systematically unjust political and cultural institutions.
“They’re saying, ‘We will do whatever it takes because we cannot put a price on a human life,'” Thunberg said. “If you use that logic, it changes the discussion and the debate.”
The 17-year-old activist has risen to international notoriety over the last two years with several global tours to speak on the topic of climate change.
Thunberg, who is in Stockholm under a voluntary self-quarantine in spite of the country’s relaxed restrictions, noted that her autism is a “superpower” and that she doesn’t listen to critics of her activism.
“They’re trying to silence you for a reason, and that reason is because you are too loud. And if you are loud, you are having a difference, having an impact,” she said.
