No more Protest

[lightinthebox]

Regardless of your views of Just Stop Oil, we should all be worried.

This has gone through easily because people hate Just Stop Oil, it’s an easy target and has fooled people.

We should not be celebrating lengthy jail sentences for planning protests, we should be scared about what this means.

Not just that, but if peaceful protests equal a jail sentence then what’s to stop people from going to violence if they know they can’t protest.

People should stop and think, ignore your prejudice and see the bigger picture.

Yes, I’m sure Joe Biden would have them all murdered in cold blood right there on the street. Unfortunately there’s no way to know since right wing extremists never, ever engage in disruptive protests.

Except for that one time an armed mob of them stormed the seat of government itself with the stated intention of killing the Vice President, and government forces killed a grand total of…one person. Or the time they marched into the gallery of the Michigan state senate carrying AR-15 rifles, and were neither harmed nor arrested by anybody.

Only in your fevered imagination are right-wing thugs the persecuted party.

While they appear extreme, what exactly do you think WILL work given that most governments in the world are doing fuck all meaningful about climate change (and if ONE person whinges that “it’s not our fault China is doing it all” then I swear I will scream)

These ridiculous claims that all life on earth is at risk. Our current temperatures are far, far, below the previous (completely natural) interglacial highs. Guess what - life is still here!

I'm really not convinced there is any 'emergency' or that we're really outside of any normal natural variation.

But don’t they do these things to get a reaction which could include jail time. I think a couple of them have had prison sentences before? So this sends us all a powerful message that they are willing to risk a long jail sentence for it. They are serious and mean it. If they just get a slap on the risk it looks more like a middle class hobbie. Now they have put their money where their mouth is. I dunno I thought this is what they would want??

They are pissing in the wind. Blocking traffic and causing all those vehicles to sit idling making pollution is hardly very helpful. Other countries using coal fired power plants are a lot worse go and protest there.
Our tiny country isn't really the big problem they would like us to think.

But even if you don’t agree with the science it’s about the legislation in place that doesn’t allow protests which is a tenet of democracy! Why has this you try become so right wing. My parents went on marches in the 1960s and we had the Tuition fee marches late 90s, lots of marches which presumably we would be facing a prison sentence now. Common sense needs to come into this and 5 years is ridiculous!

@IllMetByMoonlight the rant displayed absolutely no ability to understand the law and what constitutes a defence. The judge described them as fanatics, and that seems correct to me.

If they know the law and the consequences then why are they whinging about the outcome?

If their purpose is to engage the wider public in concern about climate change it is failing dismally. They seem entitled and obsessive and not rational

I would fully support the jail for any groups protesting in this manner too. Peaceful protest is allowed, it happens daily.

I read some of the notes from court, they prevented a woman getting to a cancer appointment, she had to wait an extra 2 months to be able to access that appointment again. Protesting is one thing but they were preventing people from moving around, the consequences could be devastating for individuals.

Mass disruption has always attracted long sentences. The public nuisance and economic damage is so great that the law and the courts rightly treat this sort of criminality as very serious.

I can’t see any difference in principle between the sort of disruption that JSO has caused and the sort of disruption that bomb hoaxers cause. In fact in terms of scale JSO’s actions are worse. The maximum sentence for bomb hoaxing is seven years.

There’s nothing new here.

It's disingenuous to describe JSO actions as "peaceful", they were disruptive and weren't legal..

If anything JSO actions have damaged the perception of protesting and getting support for a "different point of view".

As a comparison, take the river sewage scandal, it's be come a major issue with huge support, and was all started with a private member bill.

I think the judge summed it up well

'You have appointed yourselves as the sole arbiters of what should be done about climate change, bound by neither the principles of democracy or the rule of law',

It's worth remembering there was a group of "activists" in Germany in 1924, who thought were justified in breaking the law and ignoring the democratic process.

Nine years later they were democratically elected in 1933, their leader was well known for his small moustache....

You're graph only tells half a story, here's one that overlays atmospheric CO2 levels with average global temperatures.

Notice anything interesting about it? What do you think that massive spike in CO2 at the end is going to do?

And the issue has never been that all life is at risk, the issue is that the vast majority of life, include virtually all the flora, fauna, ecosystems and weather systems that humans have depended since homosapiens first emerged, have existed and evolved under conditions present in a atmosphere with 180ppm to 300ppm of CO2. Now that we're way outside that range and increasing it at an unprecedented rate we don't how they will react.

And it is unprecedented, while CO2 levels been higher it naturally takes hundreds of thousands to millions of years to do so. At present rates we'll hit the estimated peak in 400 years or so. The last time CO2 levels hit 420ppm the global average temperature was 3 degrees higher and sea levels around 15m. If those conditions reoccurred then its goodbye coastal communities and global food networks.

I’m not fooled and I’m watching closely. Disagreement with you / agreement with restriction on protest that impacts huge swathes of people not involved doesn’t mean I’m a fool. it may mean I read the legislation for myself and not just the media reports and have no doubt that as it is tested over time case law on the tests it has within it will be built up.

You can still protest. You just can’t block a major artery road system and expect to not have consequence. Rightly so.

Well I sent them some money, plan to send more, and am now looking for ways to protest about climate change too .... so there's that

I know someone who was arrested while sat in a cafe because police suspected they would protest the Royal Wedding. There was no proof but they still spent the night in a jail cell. We shouldn’t be celebrating this.

I was really glad to see the jail sentences. I hope it deters people from future action.

These sentences do not mean people cannot protest. It does not mean people cannot campaign. We remain free citizens in a free democratic country.

It just means people cannot cause serious, large scale disruption which has serious economic and human costs. People missed funerals of loved ones, medical appointments, could not follow loved ones to hospital. It was terrible.

I have now heard, for three different causes, protestors saying their cause is so vitally important that whatever they do is justified. Even targeting individuals.

Its not. And the welfare and wellbeing of individuals and businesses are not collateral damage for your cause.

It’s extreme hubris, and not true, that if you don’t do this particular action, the planet will die. I don’t tolerate this type of hyperbolic emotional manipulation in any part of my life and I don’t accept it from JSO either.

And OP, as for asking people to put aside their prejudice, if this had been Tommy Robinson and the EDL doing this for their cause, would you have posted about how awful the sentences were and posting on MN how we have to put aside our prejudice to oppose these sentences? Thought not.

It’s your bias that is causing you to oppose the justice of these sentences, not my bias that is causing me to support them.

Or “I know someone who was arrested because there was suspicion that they were going to commit a crime”

Hardly outrageous

Do you think organisers of the farmer protests that blocked motorways and streets back in February should be carted off to jail too.

It's also worth remembering that there was a group of activists

It's worth remembering that in 1903 a group of activists in the UK thought they were justified in breaking the law and ignoring democraric process.

25 years later they won women in the right to vote in the UK.

...because the Govt changed the law to make it a "terrorism" offence, anyone like to explain how blocking the M25 is the same as placing a bomb in a public place?

The judge is a complete establishment fool and i very much hope these sentences are overturned.

How anyone can think Prison is the right place to put peaceful protestors is beyond me, these sentences belong in Russia or China, not a mature democracy like the UK.

IF what they did was considered a protest too far, then financial penalties should have been imposed.

But i guess the attitude you and others have towards these protestors is why our Governments gets away with so much.... Macron in France tries to increase pension age to 64, the people riot!!!

UK puts pension age up to 68 (and suggests 71) and the people/you go "oh how reasonable, we are all living soooo much longer"

You just undermine yourself when you make up rubbish like this.

It is very clear that this judgement has not ‘stopped a protest for any reason’ nor has it set a precedent for this.
If you need to lie to make your case, you don’t have a case.

Absolutely 👏👏👏

@Goldenbear Liberty has a good explainer on how to organise a lawful protest www.libertyhumanrights.org.uk/advice_information/how-to-organise-a-protest/#:~:text=Protest%20marches,least%20six%20days%20in%20advance.

These sentences do not mean people cannot protest. It does not mean people cannot campaign. We remain free citizens in a free democratic country

Really?

You think anyone is going to protest about anything at all, when they risk a jail term and all that brings? loss of job, financial ruin, family breakup.

A woman climbed onto a train wagon going to a power station, she is expected to get a 2 year jail sentence.

What these sentences do is make sure that the only "campaigning" you can do is write to your MP, though course they could always make that a terrorism offence... the new Labour Govt isn't going to reverse some of the anti protest laws the tories bought in.

Well if they blocked an ambulance with my relative in it i most certainly would be going to prison for assault so why shouldn't they go to jail?

I think this is true who in their right mind would protest now about anything the consequences are too high a risk to be caught up in something. I’m not convinced it’s the best way to change stuff but quite scary to think this is a risky option in a democracy. Also, I find it muddled thinking as I thought the UK was a beacon of democracy and we are advocates of this across the world!

A fool and his money are soon parted.