Pakistani Climate Activist Ayisha Siddiqa Gets Featured In TIME’s Women of the Year List

Good news for Pakistan as our climate activist Ayisha Siddiqa is inclu in the list of TIME’s Women of the Year 2023. The list also includes names like Angela Bassett, Cate Blanchett and Phoebe Bridgers.

Siddiqa is a 24 year old climate and human rights activist who aims to bring “humanity back into the staid, high-level conversations that increasingly occupy her time.” TIME’s Magazine wrote, “Siddiqa felt the effects of this lack of action viscerally last year as she witnessed from afar the life-altering impacts of Pakistan’s floods, likely made more extreme by global warming. She channeled those feelings into poetry as a form of protest.”

Siddiqa said, “It’s an effort to preserve what I have left, while I still have the time, in written form. Art makes life worth living, and in my opinion, it’s what makes humans worth the fight. Like all of the things that we leave behind, all the creations, wouldn’t it be so unfortunate if there’s nobody on the other side to witness and observe them?”

She added, “The wounded world is so beautiful because she keeps producing life. And my work is in defense of life. By default, its defense of the rights of women. Therefore, it’s also by default human rights.”

The climate and human rights activist also said, “I was raised with the idea that the earth is a living being, that she gives life to you and in return, you have a responsibility. And I think we, collectively, have come to a point where we are ignoring the cries of the earth mother.”