Helen Keller’s opinions on issues other than blindness did not attract the same censure from opponents as they did for non-disabled people, but at the same time, they were often not taken seriously either. This is interesting to consider in the context of reactions to Greta Thunberg. One description of Keller states that ‘her politics for anyone else would have got her lynched’ (ibid.), because of the reference to lynching, one assumes that this refers specifically to her support for civil rights for black people.
The reference to lynching is also a link between Keller and Thunberg, because an effigy of Thunberg did get lynched during the course of a climate protest in Rome. Similarly, Greta Thunberg’s promotion of environmental issues has made her many enemies. As well as the widespread hatred to which she has been subjected, particularly on social media, she has also become the target of more powerful enemies. Climate activism threatens a number of interest groups, and most of these are supported by the US President Donald Trump. On hearing that Greta Thunberg had been awarded Time magazine’s ‘Person of the Year’, in December 2019, Trump tweeted:
‘So ridiculous. Greta must work on her Anger Management problem, then go to a good old-fashioned movie with a friend. Chill, Greta, chill!’
As mentioned above, other people have argued that, because of her autism, Thunberg is too vulnerable to be laughed at, criticised – the implication is that she is too vulnerable to be a public figure at all. In relation to Donald Trump’s criticism of Thunberg, a woman wrote to the Washington Post to suggest that Trump was ‘cyberbullying’ Thunberg, and that this was particularly the case as autism is 'protected disability’. This attitude is well-meant but patronising – it sought to protect Thunberg, even though she frequently (including on this occasion) responded to Trump’s sour tweets by pointedly incorporating them into her own Twitter profile.
Greta Thunberg has explained repeatedly why being on the autistic spectrum is beneficial to her climate activism. In an interview on BBC Radio 4, she said: ‘Being different is a gift. It makes me see things from outside the box. I don’t easily fall for lies; I can see through things. If I would have been like everyone else, I wouldn’t have started this school strike for instance’. Though it is perhaps surprising, there were also people who made similar arguments in relation to Helen Keller. For example, a newspaper cutting in the American Foundation for the Blind’s Helen Keller Archive argued that the fact that Helen Keller had risen to such great heights despite having only three of the usual five senses was proof of both her intelligence and the truth of Socialism. In addition, the article referred to those who doubted Socialism despite being in possession of the usual number of senses as being ‘deaf, dumb and blind’. This might not have been a majority view, but it is an ingenious and very interesting argument.