Just Stop Oil activist jailed for six months for taking part in slow march [UK]
Just Stop Oil activist jailed for six months for taking part in slow march [UK]
Stephen Gingell, 57, thought to be first to receive prison sentence under new Public Order Act
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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.
Also saw the news about blocking an ambulance and firetruck. Also blocking the road to the hospital.. Putting lives in danger
They were blocking electric cars Isn't that kinda bad messaging?
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.
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.
The whole of "stop oil" is about stopping "oil, gas or coal" use.
it's true it does take quite a lot emissions to build one. However in the long run it's much better.
https://climate.mit.edu/ask-mit/are-electric-vehicles-definitely-better-climate-gas-powered-cars
https://www.entergynewsroom.com/article/are-electric-vehicles-really-better-for-environment/
A valid protest targets the perpetrators of the offending acts, not the victims of those acts.
Harassing people for having been victimized by a bad actor is not a protest. It's a temper tantrum.
So protesting is only ever acceptable if the only people impacted by the protests are precisely the offenders being protested. If anyone else is affected, protestors should go to jail for their heinous crime of protest. If the very people the protest target make themselves inaccessible to protesters, then protest is not allowed.
"The quarterback stole our lunch money, so we're going to beat up the chess club."
That's you. That's what you sound like.
If you want to be apt about this, it's more correct to say "The quarterback stole our lunch money, has been doing that for years, we asked the principal to step in, but they did nothing and gave the quarterback school funds. We put up banners asking the rest of the students to join in ousting the principal, but they did not pay attention, most of them didn't even know there were banners as the school paper didn't report on it. So now we are blocking the entrance to the school to bring attention to it.
"Also, this weirdo on the internet keeps saying we are doing things just as bad as the quarterback because they had to take the side entrance, fucking weirdos man"
Blocking the school doors would actually affect the quarterback, as well as all the other students. JSO isn't blocking the school doors. "Beating up the chess club" is the much more appropriate analogy to JSO's idiotic methods.
The equivalent of blocking the school doors would be something like picketing fuel stations. Same operational concept: inconveniencing people to bring attention to the cause. Except now, the people suffering that inconvenience are actually a part of the oil production and distribution chain, and not just some random people going about their lives.
They have been picketing fuel stations, refineries, more. It doesn't work, you obviously didn't take notice. What's the point in doing something that doesn't work, just, well I was going to say so "you" aren't inconveniced but you never were inconveniced you're just mad that someone else might be.
He wants them to do something that doesn't work because he wants to be able to ignore it. He doesn't like the aesthetics of social protests and doesn't understand the history of Civil Disobedience movements.
That's all there is to it.
Have each of these JSO nitwits record a video telling a major car dealerships that only the back half of their lot can be used for ICE vehicles. The front half is for electrics and hybrids only.
They'll scoff.
Go paint a line down their lot, separating front and back halves.
They'll scoff.
Target your JSO "civil disobedience" at any of those ICE cars in the front half.
They'll notice. At that point, stop talking to them and paint some more lines.
Start talking to insurance companies: they are the ones who will be putting a dollar amount on that extortion, and charging dealers commensurate to the risk. When they all realize the dealers just need to stock and promote electric vehicles instead of ICE vehicles, they'll take the hint.
Pitting the insurance industry against the oil industry is much more likely to achieve the goals of JSO than harassing the general public.
They did that for 40 years, and you didn't give a shit and nothing changed. Every effective protest has been more than holding up signs. It's caused inconvenience and disruption to society so that society takes notice .
So... anyone driving a car?
Not saying they are the worst perpetrators, but if you're saying it should only target offending acts then "just stopping oil" should be righteous in grinding pretty much every vehicle to a halt.
The further up the chain you go, the more respect I will have for your cause. Target fuel stations instead of the general public, and we can talk.
Why are the poor petrol station workers the ones who should be bothered instead of people driving cars? It's not going to annoy Shell, as a global mega corp, any more impactfully by blockading one of their stations. Its just the same annoyance with less impact and visibility.
But at least it's less likely to affect emergency vehicles that way.
The objective is to "stop oil", is it not? With oil gone, those "poor petrol station workers" are going to be out of a job anyway. They're part of the problem: they make their living selling oil. As employees working in the industry, they are legitimate targets for protest action.
You don't need to confine yourself to annoyance. Once you're actually targeting someone profiting from the sale of oil, you can escalate your protest.
Go dismantle their fuel hoses. They all have breakaway fittings to avoid causing serious damage if someone drives off with one. Go pull down some fuel hoses and put some pumps out of commission. Jam card readers. Hit E-Stop buttons. All are simple (albeit illegal) nuisances that don't actually cause property damage, but will disrupt operations and gain attention.
Want to go further? Target car dealers that sell only or mostly ICE vehicles. Go spray paint a red line separating the front and back halves of their lot. Tell them the front half of their lot is for electrics and plug-in hybrids only. Find an ICE vehicle in front of the red line,, and their dealership will be targeted for protest actions. Again, because these are legitimate targets working against your cause, you can escalate well beyond simple annoyance.
What you've laid out there are a few ideas for much less legal and much less exposure rich disruption. Annoying small businesses profiting from the sale of oil vehicles and fuel isn't going to make them pack up and start a new business and it's certainly not going to get more exposure to the cause. Sure it's an escalation, but you only want it so you don't have to sit in a traffic jam.
The article is about someone getting jail tome for a peaceful protest which is quite outrageous. Getting jail time for actual vandalism would be less outrageous.
You could pit the insurance industry against the oil industry. You could make it so expensive for a dealership to insure a brand-new ICE vehicle that they don't want the liability of having one on their lot. If an insurer had to pay out on one ICE vehicle at the same dealer every damn day, they would tell their dealer to comply with your extortion, or drop that dealer.
You are right, I don't want to sit in a completely unnecessary traffic jam. The roads are for travel. Travel is a human right, second only to the right to life itself. My right to travel extends out to the point where it intersects your right to travel. As fellow travelers, we must share the roads with each other, not deliberately impede each other.
Travel is so fundamental a right that deliberately and unnecessarily impeding traffic violates about half of the articles in the UN Declaration of Human Rights. The right to travel is sacrosanct. Your right to protest does not grant you any power to detain me or impede my travel.
If you are going to insist on violating rights and privileges in an attempt to persuade the public to your cause, pick some less important ones. From a human rights perspective, violating the right to property by torching an empty car is far less injurious than violating the right to travel by impeding traffic.
You are right, I don’t want to sit in a completely unnecessary traffic jam. The roads are for travel. Travel is a human right,
Then get out of your car, and travel. Nobody is stopping you. Except the fascist government, who will ticket you.
The right is to travel. That right is not limited to "walking". The human right to travel is not restricted to those places a human can reach on foot. Further, your assumption that a particular individual is even capable of walking violates two additional human rights relating to the handicapped.
Go read each of the articles of the UN Declaration of Human Rights and carefully consider whether being detained by some random "protester" while attempting to exercise the described rights would constitute an infringement.
I think you would be surprised at how many rights are predicated on the right to travel.
A valid protest draws attention... Past that, were talking effectiveness.
I tend to agree that inconveniencing workers isn't a good strategy in general... But we're talking about it
The only "talking" being done is a demand for more police action to be taken against such disruption. The general public has identified its "hero" as the tribal cop who shut down a similar protest in Nevada by driving his cruiser through a group of protesters, and arresting them at gunpoint.
If your actions are so egregious as to make the public broadly yearn for American-style policing, you'be fucked up.
You would have demanded more police action to be taken against suffragettes
This protest targeted the perpetrators of the offending acts.
…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.
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.
The only policy they are affecting is the policy on jaywalking.
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.
Yes, that is the effect that JSO is achieving with their idiocy. They are fucking that attitude right into the general public.
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.
Here's your litmus test: when the public's general response to your actions are to call for American-style policing, you've fucked up, big time.
You can't make a fascist individual stop being a fascist individual with words. Only violence works.
Even worse, the public general response is to roll their eyes and laugh at the short sighted, uninformed, naive idiots.
Same as the suffragettes. Abolish women's suffrage!
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?
Because he lives in Beirut, not London?
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.
They did attack trucks at oil refineries. Do you know what the lasting impact was? Nothing. It didn't even make the news.
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.
Do you realize they blocked the road in front of an oil refinery before this?
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.
@Ilovethebomb @RightHandOfIkaros The higher level politicians are better defended. It is often necessary to strike at targets that are both high value and soft. For every general secure in their fortress there are a dozen war profiteers just begging to be dragged to the front to clear their own mines.
For every general secure in their fortress there are a dozen war profiteers just begging to be dragged to the front to clear their own mines.
People driving to work aren't the enemy.
Why not?
@Ilovethebomb The big multinational oil companies ARE-and their execs and those of their major stockholders have names and addresses.
Since peaceful protests are getting so much whining about an obstruction less than that created by a minor functionary's motorcade and now prosecution, I suggested targetting those execs personally as we did over HLS. Tell Shell etc to "Ask the FBI about Huntingdon Life Sciences"(they are US based but have offices globally).
I would respect that a lot more than what they're currently doing.
They go after politicians and people with actual power all the time. You ignored it because it didn't inconvenience you.
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."
Go picket gas stations. Same technique, similar level of disruption, but now the affected parties are actually part of the oil industry, and not just random people going about their lives.
And how is picketing roads for cars any different than that?
It's fucking not and you know it. You just don't like protests.
Picketing roads targets the general public. Obstructing traffic violates about half of the articles in the UN declaration of Human Rights.
There are plenty of things they can do to draw attention to the issue and effect meaningful change. Get 20 people together with cans of spray paint. Paint a simple line separating the front and back halves of a car dealership.
Then start posting flyers and social media posts, telling that dealership to move all of its ICE cars behind that line. Only electrics and hybrids are allowed in front of it. If you find any ICE cars in front of that line after a certain date, the dealership will be targeted for protests. Now that they are targeting an entity actually supporting the oil industry, the gloves can come off.
Next day, go paint a couple more red lines at different dealerships.
I like the way you shifted from gas stations to car dealerships when you realized that your first attempt really was the same thing.
And now you're okay with vandalism and threats of property crime, but making some people a little late to work oh that's unacceptable. So long as the protest has no effect on you personally you won't ban it. Thanks.
I didn't shift anything; there is a big difference between targeting the general public and targeting gas stations. I've posted some thoughts on such approaches to gas stations in other comments.
The point is that there are a whole host of viable targets to choose from. You don't have to pick between just impossible to reach oil executives or random members of the general public. You can take aim at any number of viable targets in between, and take a wide variety of approaches toward them.
You are correct, I have few qualms with minor property damage in the course of non-violent protest, where such damage is necessary and reasonable for achieving an important goal.
The right to travel is sacrosanct. It is secondary only to the right to life itself.
Impeding a person's travel violates about half of the articles in the UN Declaration of Human Rights. Yes, I have a big fucking problem with the cavalier attitude that JSO has toward stopping traffic.
Because random people don't go to gas stations? Only oil industry executives buy gas? What are you smoking?