NEW YORK (news agencies) — Six years after a teenage Greta Thunberg walked out of school in a solitary climate protest outside of the Swedish parliament, people around a warming globe marched in youth-led protest, saying their voices are being heard but not sufficiently acted upon.
Emissions of heat-trapping gases and temperatures have been rising and oil and gas drilling has continued even as the protests that kicked off major weeklong climate events in New York City have become annual events. This year, they come days before the United Nations convenes two special summits, one concentrating on sea level rise and the other on the future.
The young people who organized these marches with Fridays for Future said there is frustration with inaction but also hope. People marched in Berlin, Rio de Janeiro, New Delhi and elsewhere, but the focus often is in New York City because of Climate Week NYC. Diplomats, business leaders and activists are concentrating their discussions on the money end of fighting climate change — something not lost on protesters.
“We hope that the government and the financial sector make polluters pay for the damage that they have imposed on our environment,” said Uganda Fridays for Future founder Hilda Flavia Nakabuye, who was among a few hundred marching in New York Friday, a far cry from the tens of thousands that protested in a multi-group mega-rally in 2023.
The New York protest wants to take aim at “the pillars of fossil fuels” — companies that pollute, banks that fund them, and leaders who are failing on climate, said Helen Mancini, an organizer and a senior at the city’s Stuyvesant High School.
“A lot of older people want to make sure the economy is intact and that’s their main concern,” said Julia Demairo, a sophomore at Pace University. “I think worrying about the future and the environment is worrying about the economy.”
On a day that was at least 8 degrees warmer than average, protest signs included “This is not what we mean by Hot Girl Summer,” while others focused on the theme of fighting the coal, oil and gas industries: “Youth Didn’t Vote for Fossil Fuels,” “Don’t Be a Fossil Fool” and “Climate Crisis = Extermination By Capitalism.”
Nakabuye said she was in New York to represent Uganda “that is bearing the brunt of the climate crisis.”
“We feel like we are creating an impact in the community. However, we are not listened to enough; there is more that needs to be done, especially right now when the climate catastrophes are intensifying,” said Nakabuye . “We need to even raise our voices more to demand change and to demand that fuels should end.”
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