Photo by Aslıhan Altın on Unsplash
Journal Review:
I am Greta Charlie and Nicola
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reta Thunberg, a sixteenyear-old climate activist, has powerfully shared her views on climate change and what she believes needs to be done before our actions become irreversible. This documentary outlines the key issues of climate change, following the battle of a resilient key activist rallying for a system change and a better future. ‘I am Greta’ follows Greta’s story from her first protest, displaying the struggles she faces when exposed to the media, as well as how factors such as her Asperger’s has enabled her to be the activist she is today. Arguably, a significant factor that has allowed Greta to become
such a leading activist over other environmentalists, is her Asperger’s. In this documentary, Greta’s family explains how her autism allows her to notice more details and have ‘laser focus’ on topics that she’s interested in, in this case, climate change. With a photographic memory, she is able to read and recall details about climate change more easily which is practical for interviews, conferences and protests. Because of Greta’s Asperger’s, acknowledging the suffering that species and habitats face has had huge effects on her. She spoke about how watching starving polar bears on television was so awakening for her, that she fell
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into a depression and experienced anxiety as a result of her concern about climate change. Greta reflects that her Asperger’s has allowed her to have a clear outlook on what needs to be done and ‘[sees] the climate issue in black and white’, which has been very important in her journey, she feels like ‘it would be good if everyone had a bit of Asperger’s’ so we aren’t as ‘distracted’ by other factors and instead see the issue of climate change as clearly as she does. Greta has taken substantial action in an effort to encourage others to think more about how their behaviours are affecting the planet. Her first climate strike in 2018 was
