Stereotypes do nothing but close doors. Meet five diverse activists fighting to make the world a better place 

Exclusive | 4 min read

When you think of climate activism, what’s the first thing that comes to mind? If it’s teenagers ditching school to protest, or keyboard warriors lobbying MPs from the comfort of their bedrooms, you might be surprised to hear these stereotypes don’t hold water.

According to a survey last year, 85% of Brits are concerned about climate change - the rapidly rising temperature of the earth due to increasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere - with over half admitting they are ‘very concerned.’

Contrary to perception, the future of our planet is not solely in the hands of young, white, able-bodied people, but campaigners of all abilities, races, ages, orientations, and backgrounds.

Meet the eco-warriors storming ahead with the fight to save our planet…

‘I won’t stop after one year or one protest. Climate change is real, and we need to act now’

Daphne Frias, 22, 2019-2020 NY State Director of March for Our Lives and founder of Box The Ballot, New York

Being Latina and disabled, I have always been my own advocate. I won’t wait around for other people to do things for me: if I want to achieve something, I just go ahead and do it. 

Latin-American and disabled communities are both under-represented in eco-activism. People are not used to hearing our opinions on environmental issues, but we are often amongst the most affected with less access to knowledge, resources and services to respond to climate change.

Born and raised in West Harlem and living with Cerebral Palsy, I know exactly how these overlooked communities feel. When the opportunity of being a spokesperson during the global climate strikes in New York came around in 2019, I was finally able to speak up and represent my community. 

I’d never felt more powerful than striking with over 250,000 people in the streets of New York. I’d also never seen a more inclusive crowd. A lot of disabled people had joined the protest and I talked to people from all over the world.

That strike was our way of saying that eco-activists are not just going to go away after one year, or after one strike. Now is the time for the global community to realise climate change is real, it’s a danger, and we need to do something about it urgently. 

I feel certain the unprecedented scale of protests and human rights movements we’ve seen globally during the Covid-19 pandemic will be a catalyst for something great. Campaigns for social and climate justice don’t exist in isolation – they are entwined in many ways and I’m hopefully about where they will lead us.

• Follow Daphne’s updates on Instagram

  
  
  

‘We might disappear if we don’t do something’

Nigel Sharples, 71, from Preston, is Founder of Climate Challenge UK

I wasn’t interested in eco-activism until I became a grandfather 12 years ago. Holding my tiny granddaughter in my arms, I looked at her peaceful, beautiful face and found myself thinking: what kind of a legacy are we leaving behind for future generations? I began educating myself on the state of the planet and was horrified by things I read, with David Attenborough’s documentaries hitting home hard.

As I began talking to people about my concerns, I was sometimes met with surprise that at my age, I was interested in the topic. It’s simply not true that older people don’t care about climate change. I’ve since met a lot of older people who feel as strongly as I do about this issue.

My non-profit organisation, Climate Challenge UK, came from the idea of taking an electric car on a journey around the UK to highlight environmental projects started by locals. I thought it would make a nice one-off project, but the more villagers and communities I heard about, the more amazed I was by the sheer number of great projects out there. 

I am now building a database to help people connect locally with others in their local area who care about climate change. In this global battle, every individual matters and communities have the power to rise up together.

If we all come up with ideas and work together through a shared network, we will move mountains. 

• To learn more, visit Climate Challenge UK

‘I want to amplify African climate voices’

Sophie Mbugua, 38, Is an Environmental Journalist and Podcaster in Nairobi, Kenya

I grew up in rural Kenya and I remember fondly the beautiful white butterflies which came every summer and crickets chirping as the sun set. Those nocturnal sounds were a familiar soundtrack to my childhood, making the nights magical. 

But as I grew up, I noticed that the butterflies started disappearing and the beautiful voices of the crickets began fading into silence. I didn’t know it at the time, but climate change and human-induced environmental degradation were decimating these insect populations.

My parents had always earned their living through farming and managed to send my siblings and I to school. As I grew older, farming became more difficult for my family because of water shortages, as well as diseases that affected their crops, especially the oranges. I saw farming shift from that beautiful life I knew, to something I couldn’t really understand.

In Africa, the majority of communities still depend on farming. Without this income, the quality of life for entire families nosedives. It also impacts whether parents can afford to send their children to school, fuelling the level of conflict within farming and pastoralist (livestock keeping) communities as desperation for increasingly expensive essentials increase.

Since 2014, I’ve been reporting on these climate change issues within African communities. Though communities in Africa are so adversely affected by climate change, their voices are often overlooked in favour of European activists.  

I want to amplify Africa’s own voices. My weekly podcast, Africa Climate Conversations, bridges this climate communication gap, telling African climate stories from a truly African perspective

• Click here to listen to Africa Climate Conversations

‘Just because you’Re undEr 18, it doesn’t mean you can’t be a Valuable part of societal change’

Emma Greenwood, 16, is a Member of the UK Youth Parliament for Bury, Manchester, UK

I visited the House of Commons for the first time with my grandad when I was six, but never in a million years did I think I would have a seat there one day. Returning 10 years later to debate protecting the climate, tackling hate crime, mental health and knife crime was really surreal. What I’d done didn’t sink in for quite a few days after the debate had finished.

My passion continued to burn bright. My motivation for joining the UK Youth Parliament comes from seeing the changes in our environment with my own eyes. Since 2015, the area where I live has seen an alarming increase in natural disasters, including devastating floods and fires. 

They were known as ‘once in a hundred years’ events – and then they began happening every year, trapping people in their homes and leaving 1100 homes in Greater Manchester without power for days after. Witnessing these disasters, feeling the helplessness of my community really scared me. 

I joined the Youth Parliament as a way of engaging directly with the country’s decision makers to prove that taking action to protect our planet will give us the power to help stop some of these disasters. Coming out of that first debate in the House of Commons where my fellow MYPs and I had voted to ‘protect the environment’ as the number one issue for the UK was incredible. We actually had power to effect change.

That’s why it’s crucial for young people to understand the importance of using their voice to ensure communication between generations, especially on issues such as climate justice and change and not be intimidated by those who are older than us. Our voices matter.

• Learn more about UK Youth Parliament

‘Scientists need to study sustainability in a more sustainable way’

Robbie Mallett, 26, is a PhD student researching the physics of snow on sea ice at University College London

I took part in an expedition in 2019 to study the Arctic weather climate but I didn’t get there by plane – I travelled from the UK to Norway by train, bus and boat. The journey took eight days but I wanted to encourage scientists to think about how they can study sustainability in a more sustainable way. 

My passion for combatting climate change sparked whilst studying physics at university where I took a module on energy studies. Thats when I realised it’s extremely difficult to make enough energy to supply our society without depleting our natural resources and damaging the planet. 

I was profoundly shocked by the lack of concern from my peers on this energy problem, so I decided to study climate change and do something that had a direct and positive social impact. 

The more I became involved, the more I realised that it was the activists who had driven the positive changes that we’ve seen so far. Much more in fact than policy makers or lobbyists, it‘s the people who‘ve gone out on the street, campaigned, and sometimes broken the law, who really create change.

I created a Twitter account called Politicians Tweet Climate, because I wanted to know what politicians really said about climate change and thereby created a filter for people like me to find that discourse directly.

If you have ‘social capital’, you should use it. If you have that opportunity and people listen to you, you should definitely go on the streets, go online, choose the right profession and produce that positive change. 

There’s no better way to effect change than leading by example and that’s what I plan to keep doing.

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