- “For way too long, the politicians and the people in power have gotten away with not doing anything to fight the climate crisis, but we will make sure that they will not get away with it any longer,” Thunberg told the crowd at a school strike in Antwerp, Belgium this month. “We are striking because we have done our homework and they have not.”
- Thunberg became the icon of the United Nations climate talks in Katowice, Poland, in December. Not that she was too impressed by them. “I expected it to be more action and less talking — it’s mostly just small-talking,” she said during the event. “This is an amazing opportunity. But if it continues the way it is now, we are never going to achieve anything.”
- At the end of the climate talks, Thunberg delivered a firecracker speech condemning inaction. “You say you love your children above all else, and yet you’re stealing their future in front of their very eyes,” she told the gathered leaders.
- The activist took another swipe at the global elite during a rousing speech in Davos, Switzerland, in January. “At places like Davos, people like to tell success stories,” Thunberg said at the World Economic Forum. “But their financial success has come with an unthinkable price tag.” Ouch.
- Thunberg showed off her knack for metaphor, too. “Yes, we are failing, but there is still time to turn everything around — we can still fix this,” she said in Davos. “I want you to act as if the house was on fire. Because it is.”
This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The best zingers from Greta Thunberg, 16-year-old Nobel Peace Prize nominee on Mar 14, 2019.