The fact that the comment sections of these posts are always the same just shows how much oil propaganda has affected the situation.
That and people thinking protesting isn’t deliberately meant to disrupt the daily lives of people in an attempt to force them to acknowledge there’s a problem and do something about it.
By nature protests are supposed to be disruptive to the average person because it’s the average person that decides what policies and laws we have.
The problem is the average person is too stupid/ignorant/tired/lazy to realize this and just sees it as a personal attack and reacts with pure emotion.
No. Protests are supposed to change the mind of the average person, or at least bring their attention to a given cause.
Holding someone’s time to ransom doesn’t help your cause, it just makes people resent you.
Has the UK become more environmentally aware since Just Stop Oil kicked off?
Do you not remember the protests for civil rights? The sit ins? The marches? The protests outside the white house?
Literally every part of what is protesting is based on disrupting everything for the average citizen so the govt is forced to make a change.
The point of protesting is to force action without violence. People blocking traffic or stopping people from entering certain businesses is exactly what protesting is.
Protesting isn’t just rallies where people come together to talk about what they all agree on. It’s actively forcing people to acknowledge the issue without resorting to violence.
Edit: I didn’t see this was a UK post which is my bad but it’s still relevant
The USA is a special case though, they refuse to change or progress socially until they have no other option, which means violence is often the only option.
More civilized countries will enact change long before this.
Lmao, I can imagine what you think of France then
France is the reason change usually happens before things get violent.
I do hate the French, but not for that reason.
I do hate the French
I’m sure I will regret asking this but why?
-
They sunk the rainbow warrior.
-
Just generally being arrogant twats.
-
You sound dumb as shit.
Do you not remember the protests for civil rights? The sit ins? The marches? The protests outside the white house?
No? I’m from the UK, as is the subject of this article, why would we remember what happened in some other country? I’m also a millennial, would I even remember the protests for civil rights in your country if I had been from there?
Just food for thought is all, you have a point of course :-)
Yeah I realized after I made the comment that this was based in the UK. That’s my bad. I don’t really have an excuse lmao
Here’s a quote from Martin Luther King that I think is very relevant:
First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”
Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
You posted this twice.
Lol and you all wonder why most surface life on the planet is going to die along with most humans
So long as it does so quietly and without disturbing the neighbors, he’s fine with it.
I’m amazed at how few people realise this. I don’t agree with jailing this guy but people seem to think that as long as a protest gets noticed by people it MUST be effective.
Arguing with anger makes people who are already on your side agree with you, arguing with calm and logic might actually change a few minds though.
Just Stop Oil are the former and appears to me to be doing nothing to help the effort, do they think that people believe oil is good for the planet and that they’re actually making others aware of the environmental impact? Nobody is learning anything but plenty of people are getting pissed off with the cause because it’s unnecessarily disruptive and furthers nothing.
Edit: you guys proved the point phenomenally. There’s the people already on their side agreeing, meanwhile at least 2 commenters who are anti oil are painted like we coat penguins in it for fun in our free time. Why do so many suggest it’s either JSO or ineffective sanctioned protests? Could there not be something in between? What would be so wrong with protesting directly to MPs by the houses of Parliament? You could chain yourself to whatever if you need to make a strong point, throw oil/paint/whatever at 10 downing street, do something that the decision makers will actually notice and have people talking about you favourably. Most conversations about JSO are one side saying they’re fucking morons, and the other side naively echoing this chamber like that has any chance at changing anyone’s mind.
Ah well, lemmy seems even less flexible than reddit did with its views, so I shouldn’t be surprised. There is no room for nuance here.
A JSO representative had a great interview with Alex O’Connor and he basically said that negative attention is still better than no attention.
Yeah and that’s the exact outlook that I think is dumb. It might be true if they were trying to make the world aware of some very serious but largely unknown issue, but that’s not what’s happening here at all.
Nobody learns anything, FEWER people will sympathise with you, and you disrupt people’s lives for exactly fuck all.
Yup. Unfortunately, these people live in an echo chamber of like minded people, so they never realize how far out of touch they are.
Amazing. Losing democratic rights quite quickly up there in the UK, I see.
The solution is to break the social contract on both sides.
Governments need to learn they answer to the people, not the wealthy.
Nothing will be accomplished without violence.
Civil disobedience, more likely.
Civil disobedience is what the history books say is the thing to do. Not what reality says is the thing to do.
Agreed. See Scheidel’s The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century.
deleted by creator
Por que no los dos?
What are you talking about? They still have the right and ability to vote.
Yeah because we know democratic rights evolve just around the right to vote and nothing else on top of that
I’m sure North Koreans feel blessed with democracy and freedom every time they hit the polls LOL
They would be totally good if they got 2 choices instead of one.
The UK is truly becoming a fascist hellhole.
“You’re allowed to protest, but only between 5PM and 6PM and you must get a permit and also don’t bother anyone or make too much noise and also you must walk at the right speed otherwise you’re just being a meanie and we’re going to arrest you >:(”
While I think some of Just Stop Oil’s previous antics were counterproductive to the public image of climate activists, arresting someone because they didn’t protest “at the right speed” is ridiculous. The whole point of protests is to be disruptive and bring attention to the protesters and their cause, and this is an incredibly mild way of doing it.
Also did the British government forget about the troubles? When folks cant peacefully protest shit tends to explode both metaphorically and sometimes literally. Oh wbo am I kidding the British government is full of dipshits. Give it to the inbred english aristocracy and oligarchy to repeatedly smash their dicks with a hammer.
Gotta pick up some little Armalites
Are you crazy?! 5-6pm is rush hour! No it must be 2-3am, but if any of your neighbours are woken up, they must spend six months in a re-education camp kindly funded by our BP sponsors.
People have a right to go about their day, you can’t have everyone with a gripe going around blocking roads all the time.
You are an awful status quo, please don’t rock my boat it’s working for me and I don’t care about anybody or anything else person.
Here’s a quote from Martin Luther King that I think is very relevant:
First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”
Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
This has “if you’re not for us, you’re against us” vibes.
If you’re going to get six months for slow walking then you may as well make it six months for hurling rocks at Rishi Sunak.
I’d respect that a lot more than what they’re currently doing.
What a fucking abomination. Everyone who passed this law needs to be locked up.
Well shit at this point the British need to protest the laws around protest.
As much as I loathe the civil disobedience tactics of movements like Just Stop Oil, Insulate Britain and Extinction Rebellion; I feel like attacking our freedom to protest like this is going to backfire.
This may push such groups into radicalism because “we’re going to prison anyway, may as well go all the way.”
deleted by creator
How have we forgotten that an oil heiress is behind just stop oil ??
Good
Hey at least you’re unarmed and can’t fight back against your fascist government when they take your rights.
deleted by creator
Do EVERYONE a favor and pick up a history book at least ONCE in your sad little life.
The only people who say this are people who are ignorant of history. Here’s a quote from Martin Luther King that I think is very relevant:
First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”
Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
These people keep causing problems and inconveniencing everyone except the people that actually have the influence to do what they want.
The only thing they have accomplished is making “Just Stop” people look like clowns, and making everyone else dislike them and their message.
Just Stop Oil activists are among the worlds ultimate clowns.
Yes, it’s the people who are protesting the thing that are wrong, down with them. Jail is too good for them, I saw on the news that five people were a little bit late to work that day, so obviously, we can’t stand them.
Maybe you should stomach some of this contempt for the oil companies.
Just so you are aware, there are people who believe Just Stop Oil is intentionally trying to make climate activists look bad because some of their funds come from a member of the Getty family. I first became aware of the conspiracy theory when they threw soup on that painting. I do not have the opinion that they demonstrate behavior that is significantly worse than any other group.
I fund climate activism – and I applaud the Van Gogh protest
Aileen GettyThe Just Stop Oil protest shocked the world, but we must take disruptive action on the climate crisis before it’s too late
…
I am the daughter of a famous family who built their fortune on fossil fuels – but we now know that the extraction and use of fossil fuels is killing life on our planet. Our family sold that company four decades ago, and I instead vowed to use my resources to take every means to protect life on Earth.People often come up with theories about my motivation to engage in the climate movement. My motivation is clear: I am fighting for a livable planet for my family and yours. I am not dwelling on the past. I am looking to build a better future.
There’s nothing you can say or do to make climate activism palatable to those people. It’s best to ignore them, and steamroll them where it counts. The best revenge against them is stopping fossil fuels, and living well.
deleted by creator
Just FYI, an electric car isn’t environmentally friendly, a brand new electric vehicle is worse than using a second hand diesel car.
What we need to do is build working and viable public transport and to stop cancelling massive projects so the Tories can throw the cash at their mates.
deleted by creator
Whilst absolutely true for the short term, the ‘lifetime’ emissions of a EV can be up to 70% lower than petrol cars in countries with renewable electricity, or 30% lower in the UK now with its mixed power generation.
Yes, if everyone switched to a EV today, the environmental impact would be immense due to manufacturing. But if they switched to it after their current ICE vehicle usable life has expired, longterm it would be better for the environment.
If everyone switched to an EV today, the electric grid would collapse and there would be mass catastrophe.
These protesters have a good point but they are extremely short sighted. We simply cannot just stop oil. We can slowly phase out oil usage, which is what most major economies are doing. Which is why these protesters look like clowns to anyone paying any attention at all.
If you go to the just stop oil website, they are very clearly talking about stopping all new contracts, not existing ones. It’s perfectly possible to achieve this.
…but the white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: ‘I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action‘ …
Thank you, this is exactly what’s going on.
Or you could say these protestors are regularly getting in headlines, showing that there’s an escalating culture of absolute rejection of social mores so long as major, vital changes don’t happen. Creating serious problems for bureaucrats and elected officials that forces a response that often makes those officials and bureaucrats look like assholes.
The protests are factually inconveniencing and causing problems for people that have the influence to get policy changed, at least so long as democracy is functional. You aren’t going to be able to protest an oil magnate. They are not accessible for protest.
Your thesis is that people will vote against climate protestors just because they were late getting to work one day. If that’s correct, we may as well get out the Flavor-Aid because this world’s beyond saving. Everyone needs to be reminded and thinking about this crisis. Every day. It needs to be front and center. Time is running out. We have the solutions needed to avoid catastrophe, but too many are simply not aware and thinking about how terrible the danger is and need daily reminding.
We seem to be forgetting that protests once involved burning down neighborhoods and executing rulers. Which really is what we should be doing, given the enormity of the problem. This is a more civil compromise. Don’t buy into the media powers that want to turn you against anyone expressing discontent.
If the Earth Day protests happened today, the media narrative around them would be “Look at all these fuckers, on the streets, stopping me from getting to the gas station to buy a Slim Jim!” It’s fucked. The attitude is fucked.
They’re not specifically targeting their protests to inconvenience the influencers, politicians or industries supporting the licensing of Big Oil. The majority targets making a large spectacle, with a significant amounts of criminal damage - something to become news-worthy.
Not once have I seen them promote alternative policy changes for oil & gas use. They’re also not promoting projects dealing with climate change.
They’re certainly getting exposure, but they’re not winning the public vote. I agree with their cause, but I despise their methods.
Ah, more ways you aren’t allowed to protest to add to the list.
- You aren’t allowed to protest unless the protest only affects the Officially Designated List (ODL) of “influencers”, politicians, or industries. Other people affected by protests is unacceptable.
- Democratic action cannot be a goal of protest. Protest must only be targeted to inconvenience bad guys (see ODL) and nothing else.
- Protests must not cause spectacle. The must be subdued, quiet, and easily ignored.
- Protestors must always be of a positive nature; only protests that have specific solutions and plans of actions are allowed. Protesting against things is unacceptable, you must only protest FOR things.
- Protest that involves property crime must be entirely shut down, permanently, with the entire organization tarred and feathered. ESPECIALLY if the property crime was throwing soup at a museum painting that was fully-sealed behind glass and totally protected. Protecting fine art matters more than keeping our civilization running.
Let me know if you’ve got more Unacceptable Protest Options (UPOs). I’ll maintain the list for you.
Agreed they should show up to the oil executives houses drag their families out in the street and hang them from the streetlights from shortest to tallest.
What are they going to do put them in prison? The same thing they do for a slow walking.
No need to involve the families. Just take the executives out back.
Those aren’t children. They’re heirs.
I’d actually respect that more than what they are currently doing.
The time and effort you put into typing this comment, would have been better spent discussing the more important, relevant and dangerous issues you can find simply in the headline. 1- big oil has our politicians in their pockets. 2- The UK government is putting people in jail for protesting, not rioting. And so what if you’re late for work? Are you so overpaid that you prioritize getting to the office on time over a protest to avoid planetary genocide? Turn off your car and join the march!!
The time and effort you put into typing this comment would have been better spent overthrowing your corrupt government and replacing it with an incorruptible one. Or at least a less corrupt one.
Ah, but why do that when you can scold random people on the internet for not joining a protest you admit is pointless?And is it not pointless to protest when the government is corrupt? They will not care after all since they’re in someone’s pocket…
Look around the world and say how many protests against corrupt, tyrannical governments actually work instead of being squashed into silent submission?Now I’m not saying you shouldn’t do something about it, but to do something that actually works instead of just walking down the street with a sign and then calling it a day once you’ve pissed off enough people.
I did achieve something through protest: pushing out an invading army. Beirut 2005. But please tell me more about your inconveniences.
mic drop
Bravo, friend!
Why’d you stop there, then?
The only people who fall for this propaganda from upholders of the status quo are ignorant of history. Here’s a quote from Martin Luther King that I think is very relevant:
First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”
Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
Every-time this is said I always think of this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gje3HiouzvQ
You’re quite right, they never go after the politicians, or anyone with actual power. It’s always the average guy that ends up copping it.
They are bankrolled by fossil fuel groups, right ?
No, that’s basically misinformation.
There’s a major donor who’s the daughter of a family who’s previous generation made money on fossil fuels and has since divested and wants to distance themselves. Based on the fact that it is now clear how utterly destructive fossil fuels are.
Conservatives / climate deniers use some parts of this fact as part of a campaign to discredit the organization and keep the media narrative around these protests on “oh, this style of protest does not match my aesthetics so it must be bad” instead of “the climate is on fire and the perpetrators are getting rich doing it and we should ALL be in the streets making noise and inconveniencing people until something is done.”
