Extinction rebellion. Waste of police time.

[sabrinablue]

Whilst I worry about climate change and try to do my bit, I can't help but feel that the extinction rebellion protests are going a step too far. So many officers in London are dealing with protestors that they can't get resources to those who are in trouble and need it. As a survivor of domestic violence who needed to call the police and have them attend quickly, I can't imagine what would've happened if they couldn't attend.

AIBU to think that a) the protests will likely not influence any government plans to tackle climate change, and b) that protests such as these are a huge unnecessary drain on police resources as soon as people start breaking the law.

Or am I missing the point entirely?

Our London Borough has just put up most residents' parking permits by 70% to discourage car use

Call me a cynic, but isn't it more likely they've just discovered a nice wheeze for making more money, using the oh-so-convenient environmental thing to hang it on?

The "problem"is fundamentally this.....

I know climate change is happening but frankly I don't care enough to give up my long haul holidays, cruises and cars.

At 43 I'll be nearing the end of my life before its a major problem to us in the developed world.

Also, I've done more than my fair share for climate improvement by not having kids.

Except it means I have less invested in the future of it.

Kind of a catch 22

I was on my way back from seeing my brother in ITU last night and the train was filled with protestors going home from their day out.

Apart from the woman shrieking at her bloke what a cunt he was because he'd said it probably wasn't the best idea to be filmed smoking a spliff when she hasn't started her new job yet, and was telling everybody just how much fucking money she made and everybody was doing it, I had to sit between a discussion between James and francesca about how Ed and Jasper were going to arrange the next 'big' thing for x date and how it's going to be great for their career as a vegan activist to be seen doing this x. Followed by swapping notes in the photos they'd posted, retweets and a comment on a shelter about how awful they were for only having 12 ex battery hens, they could easily take a thousand in the shed (ignoring the fact that would make it exactly like what they've just been living in) and how Sam the dog goes for every chicken when they visit, but he'd never hurt them, he is only going to sit on them, so it's really unfair that the sanctuary owner told them to fuck off when they're Real Activists the sanctuary 'need' to have onside. And then a long chat about their planned longhaul holiday with various other friends. Flying out next week, apparently.

I didn't bite because I'm too screwed with dealing with my brother, but I have never heard quite such a level of privilege and obtuseness. Or ignorance about fucking animals.

It was all very disheartening, as it came across as a Lifestyle choice and career path, not an effort to change anything that might affect their cosy lives of wealth and comfort. They would get their longhaul holiday, they just didn't want other people (poor people?) to travel.

This is exactly my problem MitziK.

I questioned the lifestyle of some and was told they aren't perfect and you don't have to be perfect to join and that it was not about individual choices.

Which is great. I don't expect them to be perfect just trying but when the person telling you to give all this up is a jet setting , gas guzzling car driving person leaving rubbish all over London and blocking your way to work where they are telling you to leave work and come and have fun when you don't have that privilege it's a bit galling tbh

And I say that as someone who doesn't eat red meat, doesn't fly, doesn't drive, recycles, only has one child etc.

I am really annoyed to discover that a number of our Police have been drafted in to deal with the protesters.
I hope it rains, suddenly and drastically, in a limited area. It will be interesting to see how many of them stick it out.

Some of these are ad hominem attacks. Citing examples of hypocritical protesters does not undermine the premise of the protests. Oh look, the house is on fire - but the person telling us is someone I don’t like so let’s just ignore it.
XR also isn’t about telling individuals how to behave. The whole point is to get governments to act, because I agree, unless they make changes and rein in the multinationals then it doesn’t matter how much any single individual consumes.
Personally I think that we are f**d because those that need to change won’t and there aren’t enough people who do care enough to change. It makes me sad that mine is probably the last generation that will remember the world as it was. Countless species have gone extinct in my lifetime. We lived it up for a while and now the bill is being sent. I am really sorry for young people and I genuinely fear for those with very young children - let alone the children themselves.
I had one child and if I’d known then what I know now I would have chosen to remain childless.

It's so deeply, incredibly sad.

You'll be more annoyed when climate changes ducks over your kids' futures.

Easy to say if you aren't dealing with a serious crime and no police to tackle it.

Zero support here.
Would have had bigger impact if they'd actually done something positive like cleaning up beaches rather than the rent-a-mob-rabble hellbent on interrupting the lives and livelihoods of as many people as possible.
Not impressed one bit.

Inclined to agree, Japonica. Or at least tidied up the site before going home.

Oh well ... according to the BBC they're offering to "pause" the protests, so they can enter "a new phase of rebellion to achieve political aims"

Translation: they're getting bored now, and would quite like to spend the rest of their easter break doing something else

It's a good idea to be responsible with your own use of resources in the UK but what about China and India for example.

Huh.

Massive wild fires in April in the UK, including one on the Isle of Bute in Scotland.

It’s interesting how people are bothered with the waste of police time, but not the waste of fire fighters time as a consequence of climate change.

Keep going, extinction rebellion. This is a fight worth fighting.

For what it's worth bugger all, I've always agreed with their apparent concerns, long before many of them were born, going by the ages of the people in the train carriage.

It's just so disappointing to hear it out loud that it's a career move/lifestyle/self identity choice without any obvious study or even understanding of science/animal behaviour. Or of common sense - like not discussing plans where there could easily be undercover police listening in, rather than a dumpy old bag who obviously can't possibly comprehend what's being said right next to her. You just don't do that - it's fucking stupid.

The pause is to plan and organise the next Big Event, not to do anybody a favour, going by the conversation around me. It's going to be a big one, too. Going to make Ed and Jasper's careers, apparently.

[sigh]

i have seen this stuff on the news. I have to ask how do these people manage to spend days doing this, do they not work? have family responsibilities?
they seem happy to cause disruption and don't care who they hurt. the police who have their leave canceled. the people trying to get to work. people going about their important daily lives. they don't care.
I hope it rains.

when I see school kids "marching" through my city(not London) I respect them.
these rent a mob people in London.....nah they are just on a jolly

the people trying to get to work. people going about their important daily lives

Those jobs, and people to work in them, won't exist if we don't do something about climate change. Do you understand this?

What are you doing to press the government / large corporations to act?

If nothing, then you have no right to criticise people who are actually doing something about it.

Doing a bit of recycling is not going to cut it. This is an emergency, do you understand that?

Our house is on fire. There are a bunch of people trying to get the authorities to send in the fire engines, but you're standing there criticising the people doing that, saying some of them are just there to meet their mates / have a jolly. Perhaps some of them are, but not all will be. And at least they're calling for the fire engines.

What are you doing to stop the fire? Perhaps you - like others here - are chucking on cups of water (ie recycling). But it's too late for cups of water, the fire is too big.

DO SOMETHING about it. FFS!

If you're not going to do something sensible to stop the fire, at least don't stand about criticising those who are.

I think its fantastic, I might go next week

You are wanting government to do something more than tokenistic about climate change. Perfectly reasonable.

So you disrupt electrically powered public transport.
So you protest when parliament is in recess and politicians are not there.
So you protest in the parts of England with the lowest per head car use, not outside schools or other places where people could walk for 15 minutes or less instead of using the car.
So you do not protest near oil or coal powered power stations.
So you do not protest near cattle farms.
So you do not protest in the constituency of the Transport or Environment ministers.

Makes no sense to me.

ForalltheSaints great ideas. How can we join your protest?

I assume you have a protest planned and you're not just criticising while doing nothing yourself?

If you don't have time to organise a protest, I assume you've volunteered to help the protesters online, by sharing your ideas for better tactics and pitching in where you can?

Because if not, then you're another person watching the house burn down while criticising the people shouting "fire".

If you saw a house burning down and you thought the people shouting fire, were shouting in the wrong direction, and wouldn't be heard, what would you do about it?

Either you support urgent measures to tackle climate change or you are content to continue "business as usual". Just be honest and say which it is. Arguing about the short term effects of the only serious challenge to our politicians is irrelevant.

Thank you to those of you who have pointed out how serious this issue is, with actual examples. This is something that will have severe effects within our childrens' lifetimes, not just our grandchildren (as if that's ok) or their children. Extreme effects of climate change are already happening and will get much worse before the end of this century. Surely anyone who thinks the protests are unnecessary, unjustified or too extreme cannot really be aware of the seriousness of the situation.

As for the protests themselves, I have seen them first hand, they have been very peaceful and respectful. People saying that they've left loads of rubbish can't have been there. Protestors have actually been cleaning up rubbish from other events. They've been using solar panels for electricity, they've had plants, they've been serving up what looks like at least vegetarian, if not vegan, food on reuseable plates. As far as practicing what they preach I'd say they're doing pretty well within the confines of what's possible.

As for the methods, everyone focuses on the disruption to public transport. They protested on one line, in Canary Wharf where all the big finance companies are based, who have a big responsibility for the problem. There was very little disruption to public transport. They did, however stop a lot of traffic. It was lovely. We totally take for granted the constant noise, pollution and danger from traffic, we're conditioned to accept it. You really notice when it's not there.

Finally, these are not uneducated jobless people with nothing better to do. This has been planned for a long time. One person who was arrested outside the Shell building has been a prominent environment lawyer who helped negotiate the Paris climate agreement. Her life's work has been trying to do things the so called "right way". Watch her husband tell how proud he is of her for still trying to do more:

Of course that will probably lead to criticism as well. The educated elite telling working class people how to live their lives. But this is definitely not just a middle class problem. It will affect everyone. I think anyone that's trying to do something about it should be thanked. There will be many different methods and approaches but the key thing is that something needs to be done on a large scale and fast.

The problem is that it's very difficult to accelerate change without extreme measures because extreme measures are what is needed.

Looking at a massively extreme example, if we wanted to go zero carbon and I was dictator of the world, I could achieve it tomorrow (stop all ff generation or production, stop all motorised transport, kill all domesticated animals in one lightening bolt from my hand- sorry fido. ban fishing). Unfortunately I would also kill off half the population of the world in about 12 months and end civilised society so the people who were left would be like "thanks. I'd rather have had climate change in 50 years". Obviously, that's a stupid example as no-one would do that (or be able to) but between the status quo plan (not fast enough) and Soul Runner's Zero carbon Armageddon (instant but major collateral damage), there are millions of iterations.

The question is how far do you go before the "now" hardships overtake the "future" benefits, the structure of society changes too much (seen as regression) and people say "actually, no"? I would suspect not far enough. This is especially true as most behavioural nudges are financial and therefore disproportionately impact the poor.

People are generally causing climate change because it's convenient (15 min car journey vs. 45 mins on public transport in the rain with 2 kids in tow, twice a day, on top of your 9 hour working day), fun (long haul flight to dive in the Maldives) or necessary (food/heating/ lighting). The added complication is population growth which makes most vaguely palatable things non-sustainable, so for example I could easily bear a locally sourced, seasonal diet, and I could easily bear a vegan diet, but a locally sourced, seasonal vegan diet would seriously suck. I mean, what would you eat in January? Turnips? I follow quite a few sustainable living activists (because it's interesting and I respect people who put themselves out even if it's only for insta hits) and while I really admire what they're doing, their methods are mainly completely non-scalable and they all live in California.

Anyway, aware I'm coming across as either completely flippant or a total doom monger, so I'm going to wind up, but my point is, yes, I care about climate change (my house is below sea level) , yes, more should be done, but my question to the protestors is what concrete and practically achievable things do you think should be executed now that can go beyond the UK (because UK is largely irrelevant in the scheme of things)?

yes scary teacher you are right. See how they get on there. There is some rubbish talked at the moment. A lot of work in the UK is going on to reduce missions. I assume none of the protesters want to get on a plane, bus or train ever, or car. Wonder how they all got there. Hitting individuals does nothing. They should listen to some of the scientific researchers. Do they have a plan? What exactly do they think will come of it?