Episode 8: The Never-Ending Greta Thunberg Climate Conspiracies
At 16 years old, Greta Thunberg led the largest climate protest in history—and became a target for right-wing conspiracy theories. Scholar Emily Ryalls dissects how Greta was recast as a hysterical pawn of globalist billionaires and why the “Greta Effect” continues to provoke such powerful backlash. Then, TikTok misinformation researcher Abbie Richards clears up why the climate space is so littered with disinfo and media distractions, from anti-Greta memes to the Great Reset conspiracy to private jets at climate change conferences.
Read the transcript.
guests:
Abbie Richards is a TikToker and TikTok misinformation researcher. She specializes in understanding how misinformation, conspiracy theories, and extremism spread on TikTok and she creates educational content that explains these complex issues to a wider audience. She's amassed a multi-platform following of over half a million people who are interested in learning about these issues. Abbie is a senior video producer at Media Matters and is a co-founder of EcoTok, an environmental TikTok collective that specializes in social media-based climate communication. For her work as an online educator, Abbie was included in the Forbes 30 Under 30 2023 cohort, and the Mozilla Rise25 cohort, and was awarded the WIN WIN Youth Award for 2023.
Emily Ryalls is an Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at California Polytechnic State University. Her research and teaching interests are in the areas of critical/cultural studies and feminist media studies. Dr. Ryalls's research has explored issues of age, race, class, gender, ability, and sexuality in media sites such as Scream Queens, Gossip Girl, 13 Reasons Why, and The Hunger Games. Her book, The Culture of Mean: Representing Victims and Bullies in Popular Culture, is the first sustained feminist critique of the contemporary bullying narrative in media. She is the recipient of the 2023 Cal Poly Distinguished Teaching Award. In her free time, she can be found watching Bravo TV and hanging with her dog, Henry.
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