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Promotional materials for the event cite Greta as someone placed on the frontline of climate activism “by PR professionals seeking to bedevil the plant-nutrient carbon dioxide” and describe the AfD as “the only party in Germany not willing to back the supposed climate consensus”.

“The fact that many mainstream politicians from across the political divide in Germany supported a 16-year-old female activist who was virtually unknown until a few months ago, allowed the party to present belief in climate change as irrational, hysteria, panic, cult-like or even as a replacement religion. Attacking Greta, at times in fairly vicious ways, including mocking her for her autism, became a way to portray the AfD’s political opponents as irrational.”

“The AfD has been denying human-made climate change on its social media pages since 2016, and while it has not shifted its position it is clear that the party decided to communicate it more frequently.

“We are experiencing a shift to the right on social media and in society. In a short period of time, the new right has established its own counter-society on climate issues. With troll armies, agitating magazines and the support of climate sceptics like EIKE, it has created its own sphere that is massively underestimated.”

Was it also because she had been bullied at school? “Yeah, to some extent.” I ask if she literally stopped talking. “I spoke to my parents, my sister and a bit to my teacher,” she says. Why did she stop? “I don’t know. I just couldn’t.”

The only aspiration he had for Greta back then was for her to get better. As for himself, he knew little about the climate crisis, wasn’t convinced by what he did know and just wanted to get a nice big car – an SUV or pick-up truck. Over time, Greta changed his mind.

“The way she got us interested was a bit by force. She hijacked us. She started turning off lights. She cut the electricity bill in half.” He laughs. “She’d say, ‘Why have you got the lights on in this room, you’re not even in here?’ and I’d say, ‘Because we live in a country where it’s dark all the time and it makes me feel nice’ and she’d say, ‘Why? It doesn’t make any sense.’ Of course, she was right.”

Did he get pissed off with her? “Oh hell, yeah. She can be very, very, very annoying. But because we were in this crisis we had to react, so we became aware and began to do stuff for the environment, but not because we wanted to save the environment; we did it to save our child.”

By the time she was ready to return to school (initially a specialist autism school, then grammar school), she had been diagnosed with Asperger’s, obsessive compulsive disorder and selective mutism. Thunberg says the diagnosis came as a relief. “When I felt the most sad, I didn’t know that I had autism. I just thought, I don’t want to be like this. The diagnosis was almost only positive for me. It helped me get the support I needed and made me understand why I was like this.”

Does she feel guilty about stymying her mother’s career? She seems surprised by the question. “It was her choice. I didn’t make her do anything. I just provided her with the information to base her decision on.” At times like this you can see how unyielding she is – while it’s the source of her strength, you can imagine just how tough it may have been for her parents. “Of course, you could argue one person’s career is not more important than the climate, but to her it was a very big thing,” she says.

She describes her autism as her superpower. I ask why. “A lot of people with autism have a special interest that they can sit and do for an eternity without getting bored. It’s a very useful thing sometimes. Autism can be something that holds you back, but if you get to the right circumstance, if you are around the right people, if you get the adaptations that you need and you feel you have a purpose, then it can be something you can use for good. And I think that I’m doing that now.”

she says, she’s got loads of hobbies. “I also do a lot of jigsaw puzzles. The biggest was 3,000 pieces, but that didn’t fit on the table so it was very complicated to finish. And I also spend time with my two dogs [a golden retriever and black labrador] and talk lots to friends. We are very silly. Maybe people have an idea that climate activists are serious, but that’s not the case.” She hiccups another giggle.

Do you really speak to your climate activist friends every day? “Yes, many times a day.” Do you have parties? “Since we are spread all over the world it’s hard to do that, but we have Zoom calls and movie nights online and lots of chats where we just spam each other.”

She says she can’t think of a single politician who has impressed her. “Nobody has surprised me.” What about, say, New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern, who said that the climate crisis was a matter of “life or death” at the June launch of her new roadmap to control global heating? She looks sceptical. “It’s funny that people believe Jacinda Ardern and people like that are climate leaders. That just tells you how little people know about the climate crisis.” Why? “Obviously the emissions haven’t fallen. It goes without saying that these people are not doing anything.” In April, it was revealed that New Zealand’s greenhouse-gas emissions had increased by 2% in 2019.

When she didn’t have friends, did she want them? “I think I did, but I didn’t have the courage to get friends,” she says. “Now, when I have got many friends, I really see the value of friendship. Apart from the climate, almost nothing else matters. In your life, fame and your career don’t matter at all when you compare them with friendship.”

She believes the reason that so many autistic people have become climate activists is because they cannot avert their gaze – they have a compulsion to tell the truth as they see it. “I know lots of people who have been depressed, and then they have joined the climate movement or Fridays for Future and have found a purpose in life and found friendship and a community that they are welcome in.”

So the best thing that has come out of your activism has been friendship? “Yes,” she says. And now there is no mistaking her smile. “Definitely. I am very happy now.”

Bolt repeatedly referred to Greta’s mental health, saying she was “deeply disturbed”.

Greta Thunberg (@GretaThunberg) I am indeed ”deeply disturbed” about the fact that these hate and conspiracy campaigns are allowed to go on and on and on just because we children communicate and act on the science. Where are the adults? pic.twitter.com/xDSlN0VgtZ

"You have aroused the world," the 93-year-old Attenborough told Thunberg in reply, adding that she had achieved things "that many of us who have been working on the issue for 20 years have failed to do."

Greta Thunberg’s unique strength when she first emerged as an activist was that, as a child, and one with Asperger’s to boot, she had almost unassailable moral authority

We are watching a new front open up in the culture war, and its timing is probably no coincidence

The nihilists don’t necessarily deny that the planet’s frying but, essentially, they refuse to feel bad about it; they want their sunshine holidays and their 4x4s, come hell or (possibly quite literally) high water, and screw anyone who gets in the way.

most people recognise that hers is still an innately vulnerable age; not quite a child, not quite grown up, instinctively evoking protective feelings in anyone with an ounce of humanity.

She is still so young, so vulnerable, for someone carrying such an impossible weight of expectation. How would she cope if the world leaders who have paid lip service to her demands don’t ultimately do what she wants?

the violence of the backlash adds a more worrying dimension. If she were my daughter I would be both immensely proud of her, and terrified for her; torn between not wanting her to be bullied into silence, and wanting to hide her away from it all.

A society that cannot bear to be lectured by its children, even when they’ve got a point, while the adults are behaving like spoiled toddlers refusing to clean up their own mess, is one that can never progress. Perhaps our children can finally be children again, when the rest of us grow the hell up.

“I get chills when I see those young people, especially at Fridays for Future. They are screaming and shouting and they’re generally terrified,” she said in an interview. “They don’t want the world to end.”

Naomi said she does not dispute that greenhouse gas emissions are warming the planet, but she argues that many scientists and activists have overstated their impact.AD“I don’t want to get people to stop believing in man-made climate change, not at all,” she said. “Are manmade CO2 emissions having that much impact on the climate? I think that’s ridiculous to believe.”

Naomi argues that other factors, such as solar energy, play a role — though the amount of solar energy reaching the Earth has actually declined since the 1970s, according to federal measurements

The German media have described her as sympathetic to the nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD), the biggest opposition party in parliament, whose leaders have spoken of fighting “an invasion of foreigners.” Naomi says she is not a member of AfD — she describes herself as libertarian — but acknowledges speaking at a recent AfD event.

Founded in 1984 and funded largely by anonymous donors, Heartland has increasingly focused on climate change over the past decade. Its staff and researchers enjoy ready access to the Trump administration, and one of its senior fellows, William Happer, served as a senior director on the White House National Security Council between September 2018 and 2019.

An emeritus professor of physics at Princeton University, Happer has repeatedly argued that carbon emissions should be viewed as beneficial to society — not a pollutant that drives global warming. During his time with the Trump administration, he sought to enlist Heartland’s help in promoting his ideas and objected to a U.S. intelligence official’s finding that climate impacts could be “possibly catastrophic,”

Why would an American think tank want to get involved in German politics? Because it worries that Berlin’s strong stance on reducing greenhouse-gas emissions could be contagious, according to a recent investigation aired on German television.

For two decades, Germany has been a leader in pressing other nations to curb carbon output and shift to renewable energy. Though it is falling short of its ambitious goals, Germany has pledged to cut its greenhouse gas emissions this year by 40 percent compared to 1990 — and by up to 95 percent by mid-century.

The proposal described Naomi as “the star” of a “Climate Reality Forum” organized by Heartland during the Madrid talks. With “over 100,000 people viewing her talk on climate realism,” the proposal said, Naomi was well-positioned to fight German climate policies.

Taylor said the tendency to associate Naomi with Greta is “kind of natural” — and benefits Heartland’s message.“To the extent that Naomi is pretty much the same, just with a different perspective, yeah, I think that it’s good that people will look at the two as similar in many ways,” he said.

A cohort of mostly male, middle-aged, out-of-touch media commentators and journalists are dismissing her call for change as a childish, unrealistic dream, indulged by liberals.

How do you position yourself as the next “controversial” media voice? It’s pretty simple. Pitch yourself as the stable, brave voice taking a stand against the liberal brainwashing machine. Say something outrageous or offensive on social media and, soon enough, you’ll be invited onto television. If all else fails, you’ll at least bump up your Twitter followers.

“For more than 30 years, the science has been crystal clear,” Thunberg added. “How dare you continue to look away and come here and say you’re doing enough when the politics and solutions needed are still nowhere in sight?

ou say you hear us and that you understand the urgency, but no matter how sad and angry I am, I do not want to believe that, because if you really understood the situation and still kept on failing to act, then you would be evil, and that I refuse to believe."

“You’re failing us, but the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, I say, we will never forgive you.”

Two in 10 respondents said it was a minor problem, with just 16% considering it not worrisome at all.

More than half of polled Americans said they wanted the climate crisis to be confronted right away, with smaller groups happy to wait a few more years and just 18% rejecting any need to act.

“Americans are finally beginning waking up to the existential threat that the climate emergency poses to our society,

This is huge progress for our movement – and it’s young people that have been primarily responsible for that.

However, just 44% of poll respondents said human activity was a major contributor to climate change.

There is an even starker split on the findings of climate scientists. According to the CBS poll, 52% of Americans say “scientists agree that humans are a main cause” of the climate crisis, with 48% claiming there is disagreement among experts.

“Our own and others’ research has repeatedly found that this is a critical misunderstanding, promoted by the fossil fuel industry for decades, in order to sow doubt, increase public uncertainty and thus keep people stuck in the status quo, in a ‘wait and see’ mode.”

“These results also again confirm a long-standing problem, which is that many Americans still believe scientists themselves are uncertain whether human-caused global warming is happening.

“This remains a vitally important misunderstanding – if you believe global warming is just a natural cycle, you’re unlikely to support policies intended to reduce carbon pollution, like regulations and taxes,”

While nearly seven in 10 Democratic voters understand that humans significantly influence the climate and 80% want immediate action

just 20% of Republicans think humans are a primary cause and barely a quarter want rapid action.

On the science, nearly three-quarters of Democrats said almost all experts agree that humans are driving climate change, with just 29% of Republicans saying the same.

Younger people are far more likely to consider it a personal responsibility to address the climate crisis and to believe that a transition to 100% renewable energy is viable.

Young people have been galvanized by climate science being taught in schools as well as a spreading global activist movement spearheaded by Greta Thunberg

This generational divide even cuts across party affiliation, with two-thirds of Republican voters aged under 45 considering it their duty to address the climate crisis

Just 38% of Republicans aged over 45 feel the same.

Around three-quarters of all respondents said they understand that climate change is melting the Arctic, raising sea levels and causing warmer summers

Just 19% said humans can stop rising temperatures and the associated impacts, with nearly half thinking it possible to slow but not stop the changes and 23% refusing to believe humans can do anything at all

“By saying we should merely slow and not reverse global warming, we are passively accepting the deaths of billions of people,” said Margaret Klein Salamon, of the Climate Mobilization Project.

“The only thing that can protect us is an all-out, all-hands on deck mobilization, like we did during the second world war. Avoiding the collapse of civilization and restoring a safe climate should be every government’s top priority – at the national, state, and local levels.”

It may appear that the trolling of women is an unpleasant by-product of the internet era. In fact, the tactics used are remarkably similar to those employed in ancient times, especially if you compare the trolling of Greta Thunberg and the way the ancient Greeks used to treat "hysterical" women.

Shortly after his tweet, she had updated her Twitter profile to read: “A teenager working on her anger management problem. Currently chilling and watching a good old fashioned movie with a friend.”

At her U.N. appearance, Thunberg chastised leaders for praising young activists such as herself while failing to deliver on drastic actions needed to avert the worst effects of climate change

following an appearance at a United Nations climate summit where she offered an impassioned — and somewhat fatalistic — plea to global leaders.

Trump, who has called climate change a “hoax,” also took note of Thunberg in September,

“she became the biggest voice on the biggest issue facing the planet this year, coming from essentially nowhere to lead a worldwide movement.”

Trump, who was among the five finalists for the distinction this year, has had a long obsession with the magazine’s selections, dating back before he became president.

"It is not news or surprising to me that critics and the media have chosen to ridicule me for speaking out on the this issue, and that's OK," the first lady said last year in opening remarks at the Family Online Safety Institute's conference in Washington. "I remain committed to this topic because it will provide a better world for our children, and I hope that like I do, you will consider using their negative words as motivation to do all you can to bring awareness and understanding about responsible online behavior."

During the War the Nazis discovered that Greta and her husband, Adam Kuckhoff, were members of a famous Soviet spy ring, known as the Red Orchestra (Rote Kapelle). Adam was executed. Greta had her sentence commuted to life imprisonment. She survived the war, and in her autobiography she describes her first meeting with James Murphy, who she refers to as Mr M.

He spoke French, Italian and German fluently. He harboured dreams of a United States of Europe - at peace. Ultimately, though, even if it wasn't his intention, he'll be best known as the man who translated Hitler's Mein Kampf.