First, I must confess that over the past 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 his 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 cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
- Martin Luther King Jr, Letter from the Birmingham Jail
Edit: I guess the more radical aspects of MLK’s beliefs still upset moderates
very much the vibes in these comments, “how dare you inconvenience us”
Honestly, what is this road glueing good for? You are annoying people who are not the root cause and allowing news sites and trolls to make an enemy of you.
Congratulations, you really showed them.
It’d be much more interesting and impactful to do something like espionage on oil wells or pipelines. Hurt the profits of the companies forcing it rather than everything stuck in a bad system.
They would just raise the prices of the oil they had to make up for it… for about twice as long as necessary. So they’ll make more money, and we’ll likely end up with a giant mess.
But that will decrease oil consumption as people will find more efficient ways to transport things.
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Why no constructive criticism?
If I was, even here is too trackable.
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I have no idea what you mean
Off you go, go do it then. Maybe don’t leave it to someone else.
I’m not in that field right now. We’ll see if I pivot that way later.
In the UK at least, Just Stop Oil did block oil infrastructure initially. The corporations worked with the government to use massive injunctions so people were getting huge penalties for very minimal disruption, and it never got any press coverage either.
The law protects the corporations, and the press doesn’t care unless the public or public figures are involved. That’s why they changed to public disruption.
I’m sorry, but how are daily commuters not a huge part of the cause? I recognize they’re part of a larger system, and may have limited means to fix anything, but they’re still participating in behavior that is destroying the only home we have.
There are two alternatives: activists either do nothing consequential, people like you ignore them and nothing changes, or…
There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part; you can’t even passively take part, and you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop.
- Mario Savio
You’re literally defending the moderate in the meme.
I just don’t see the point. What is “consequential” about shutting down a road? What are you trying to achieve exactly? Are you doing it just because it’s beneficial in and of itself? Shutting down one road out of the millions on Earth for like an hour does practically nothing and you should spend your time more wisely. Are you trying to win hearts and minds? People will do far more than just ignore your cause, they will actively despise it. Or is it just out of spite for commuters? Even though many of them, as you said, have limited means to change anything. Not everyone can afford to just quit their job to get one closer.
It would also kind of go against their own point if public transit was also stopped. Sometimes you can’t just live near absolutely everything. Some people have disabilities and cannot physically ride a bike to get where they need to go. That would maybe also encourage people to take a car or a carpool, where they’re more likely to be able to do a u turn.
They are bringing awareness to the cause. Yes they are annoying the fuck of “innocent bystanders” but if they went on to a street and handed out flyers they would do fuck all, because people would just ignore them.
Plus this is not a “us” vs “them”. It’s not like they want to save “their” planet. There’s only one earth last I checked. So people might be angry about it, many will just laugh and say it’s stupid, others will join the cause and/or demand change.
People think they are so smart to ridicule them for throwing food at some paintings but they just want to feel better about themselves about not doing anything. So they criticize them to hide that discomfort. “If what they are doing is stupid, then I won’t feel bad for not doing it.”
I ask you? What do you suggest they do instead? And then go a check because for sure they did it and either it didn’t do shit or they are still doing it.
They are bringing awareness to the cause
There are countless of ways to to that. I could bring awareness by killing puppies, burning down orphanages, or any number of comically heinous things. The more outlandish the better. So why stop at blocking traffic? Just do the most hateful, awful thing imaginable because “bringing awareness to the cause” is all that matters right? Obviously you have to draw the line somewhere. Not all forms of protest are just automagically valid and effective just from virtue of being protests.
Great examples. Because blocking roads and mildly inconveniencing people that can demand change is almost the same as killing animals and children. Yes the line has to be drawn somewhere, and it’s between those two things and very close to one of them.
But again, what way that hasn’t been tried would be ok in your book? Asking people nicely?
Read the top comment in this post again.
Blocking roads can literally kill people, by stopping emergency vehicles etc from getting to where they need to go
So does climate change…
Also car accidents block roads as well. Should we forbid people from using their cars?
Why the snark? I literally used the term “comically heinous” myself to describe the examples. I am aware they are extreme, it was to demonstrate my point…
So we disagree on where that line should be drawn. And it comes down to the fact that you think blocking traffic is “mildly inconveniencing”. I would say: how the fuck do you know? You don’t know what’s going on in the lives of those people.
- Maybe someone got a call from the hospital that their father is dying and they should come in to see them one last time.
- Maybe a food insecure parent is working hard to support their children and if they are late one more time they could get axed and put their children in danger.
- Maybe someone chopped their finger off and are rushing to the hospital to get it reattached.
Or any number of scenarios. If YOU were in any of these situations, what would you think of the people blocking the road? Somehow I don’t think you would be so understanding when it happens to you personally.
But again, what way that hasn’t been tried would be ok in your book? Asking people nicely?
I think my position is clear. I’m OK with any form of protest that actually advances the cause behind the protest and I am not OK with any form of protest that is counter-productive against the cause of the protest. I started out my comments by saying what standing in a road accomplishes, and so far all you’ve really said is “uh, well nothing else has worked so why not?”. That really isn’t good enough.
And exactly what kind of protest is that? Again you still haven’t answered my question and more and more it seems that there is no such protest so we will all live miserable lives in the future but hey, at least people weren’t bothered those few times.
Also you can block roads and let emergency vehicles through. Accidents happen, roads get blocked for a variety of reasons on a daily basis. If people used cars less they would be less congestioned, do you also use that argument there?
Finally, people do die of climate change. Everyday and it’s not a small amount. Consider that on the other side of the equation whenever you make one.
Either way I’m calling this convo. Have a nice day and weekend. Hope it’s not too hot wherever you are.
Have these protests done anything? For example that due to the lack of public transport people are obliged to use a car, or many workplaces especially office work are put around cities not inside because of tax reasons? In my case I had to use a car for my previous work, for it was 45 minutes instead of 4,5 hours with trains and buses.
These people do nothing, but scream STOP USING OIL, STUPID! and call it a day.
Nobody is oblivious to this problem, but many have few choices.
The method behind the road blocks is: Block road to hold normal people hostage -> normal people get angry and demand change -> government changes it’s policy towards your demands. Yeah everyone knows climate change to be a problem but if nothing is being done despite that you have to apply pressure somewhere, so because Fridays for future moved the needle maybe minimally, by doing normal marches, you start to be the tiniest bit annoying by blocking streets without prior warning.
The very few people getting stuck in traffic from these protest are really just innocent bystanders but, they also need to change, and both the real targets, so politicians and rich people, have enough influence to easily shield themselves from the effect of protests, apart from maybe the private yet stoppages which the same groups also organised.
And at least here in Germany the media coverage about climate change is now much more frequent than before LG started blocking the streets. And the coverage is only interspersed by talking about the protests themselves not singularly about the protests. So there is at least some noticeable change.
These people don’t do nothing, they are fighting for my right to live 60 more years in relative peace and prosperity, protests and civil disobedience is far from doing nothing. The political message that gets told whenever any of them is interviewed is certainly much more nuanced than the slogan as well. And the reason they are on the street to begin with is because they themselves also have few choices, if the people going out to the street had power apart from their time and body they would be and are using it towards that same goal, but obviously their power via other ways is insufficient.
All in all if you think you act efficiently and fairly towards climate change reversal/reduction, but write a comment defending your 45min car commute, you might be missing something.The lack of public transport in your city for example isn’t solved by just continuing to use it without reflection about why it is that way, and honest investment into fixing it.
I’m sorry but your explanation of the method just doesn’t understand human beings. The drivers will get angry and demand change. The change they demand won’t be about the climate. They aren’t sitting in their cars going “hmm, maybe these people have a point”. What they demand will be stopping protests that disrupt traffic.
I’m sorry but you don’t seem to understand human beings either. Just because drivers get angry and demand a crackdown doesn’t mean a crackdown actually is feasible from the governments point of view. The drivers for which this is the reaction fundamentally don’t matter to the protestors. What matters to the protestors is political change, the number of drivers they directly impact is small, the number of people being told climate change is an existential threat is disproportionately large. Which furthers their political goals on the whole, even if everyone hates them.
This entire argument is the same argument against every “civil” and not so civil protest, public disobedience or other dissent. BLM 202x FFF 2019, Antifa since 193x, LGBTQ movement, women’s rights, they all get this same argument against them: Why won’t you just be civil, why won’t you play by the rules, why don’t you try to gain sympathy from your political enemies.
As if that’d work, as if that’d be sufficient to keep your own freedom, live and livelyhood, inside of a system that tries to take it from you. How could you ever trust in the process when you’ve seen it fail time and time again, specifically for the issue that is of concern in your group.
This is the other human you failed to account for, the protestor that isn’t going to stop, because they deeply believe their way of life is threatened in a way where a more direct confrontation is necessary. And they rightly understand that it’s a confrontation with the entire system, not with some commuters on arbitrary streets.
I’m sorry, but how are daily commuters not a huge part of the cause?
But daily commuters aren’t really the problem in itself, it’s the combustion engine cars. Blocking road also blocks people in EVs or even the ones taking the bus.
Keeping everything else the same but switching to EV is still really bad for the environment and bad for people.
It’s less bad than burning gasoline by far, but your argument is only an environmental one on the surface. I just wish people like you would come out and say you’re against individual autonomy already.
Wtf are you talking about? Cobalt is a rare earth blood mineral, so continuing on with our car-centric society will make battery demand unsustainable and kill 1000s of workers. I want human-scale architecture with highly accessible public transit, so people have more choices to travel. Car-centric architecture spreads things out by necessity, which creates unnecessary waste and destruction of wildlife.
Efforts are already underway to remove it from future battery production, and so far they’ve been fairly successful.
You just don’t want people to be able to move on any terms besides those of whoever owns mass transit. Please stop trying to pretend that’s not the case.
There is room for cars to exist. I think most vehicles don’t need to be as large as they are currently, but there’s still a place for them. I just also want highspeed passenger rail, busses, lrt, bikes, and walking to be considered. I also want the government to offer these as a service, I don’t want any corporate involvement with public transit.
“individual autonomy” except riding a bike or walking requires no (government controlled) licence no (corporate provided, and government-mandated in many places) insurance and no (government demanded) road tax.
seems like a bad case of car-brain… seek help
Have you ever tried to move a cello on a bike? It fucking sucks, and I’m absolutely not going to take my most prized instrument for a bike ride in the rain.
Sounds like a bad case of being a bike-humper. Seek help, and while you’re at it, get a fucking clue.
Have you ever tried to move a cello on a bike? It fucking sucks, and I’m absolutely not going to take my most prized instrument for a bike ride in the rain.
honestly, i haven’t.
but i’ve moved heavier and more fragile shit in a bike trailer, and 2 minutes of internetting located this cellist who toured with not only her instrument, but entire-ass gig setup, by bike: https://can.org.nz/article/cyclist-musician-to-tour-with-cello-and-recycled-solar-powered-electric-assist-bicycle-trail
either way, a comically large musical instrument (which let’s be real, those of us with a vision for a post-car future would probably still sign off on as “sure I guess an occasional van is fine for this”) doesn’t address the nonsense take that private car ownership, and widespread car-centric public space, is a core part of, or even compatible with, “individual autonomy”. you’ve been lied to, and you’re now doing free PR work for an industry that’s poisoning our lungs, killing our friends and family (especially older and younger people), and torching the planet.
brb making some “bike-humper” stickers.
The point is to be seen.
It’s generally an issue in children when their developing brains are unable to discern the difference between positive and negative attention.
I guess that explains the right wing
I think the point is to actually cause change.
And I don’t know how you’ll accompish that, when your actions piss of the majority of people that are actually on your side.
You must be a car driving loser. Getting mad sitting in your car stuck in traffic. All of that impotent rage. You are pathetic
That is not what gatekeeping is. Gatekeeping would be saying they aren’t real climate activists or something like that.
Look at this dude here gatekeeping gatekeeping. /s
Gluing yourself to roads (and damaging pieces of art) is the pinnacle of useless or even counterproductive activism.
You annoy everybody including those who agree with you. With a message that is new to nobody.
You bring no new argument or information to the table that could possibly convince those who don’t agree with you.
You are literally sitting around doing nothing.
This is not activism, this is passivism.
It also does not help, when you fly to the maldives on vacation right afterwards or do other similar schizo things.
What do you want them to do instead?
Just Stop Oil aren’t coming with a message, they’re coming with a demand. A very simple one that the science and international bodies are clear on.
They’ve had hundreds of media appearances, are regularly referenced by politicians and have hundreds of people getting involved (and often arrested).
In the short time they’ve been going they’ve achieved more than any orgs like Greenpeace etc.
“This is not activism, this is passivism” What a joke. Putting your body on the line, getting a criminal record is passivism? Do tell us what activism you’re doing if that isn’t.
“when you fly to the maldives on vacation right afterwards” Been hooked in by the right wing media good and proper.
No artwork was harmed.
redox reactions involve large amounts of energy being converted. These reactions can be made to happen at a very high rate. Two options for this would be to increase contact area between reductant and oxidizer, usually environmental oxygen, by grinding the reductant into a fine powder or you increase the temperature, as a rule of thumb, an increase in 10K (=10°C) is said to increase the reaction time by a factor of two. A good way to increase temperature is to confine gases inside a solid container, like a metal pipe, since a gas’ temperature is inversely proportional to its volume.
People in my social circle defending stuff like this will say “it was worth it for the attention it got” and that’s that. No further inquiry needed.
At that point you have to ask “Who didn’t know about Climate Change, and what did they learn by being made late for work?”
Which is insane, people will turn against the cause instead of joining it.
You have to ask yourself what kind of person you are to turn against the “cause” of preventing societal collapse because you got inconvenienced for 10 minutes.
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You have to ask yourself how you’ll ever convince people to join your cause when you’re being a dick to that specific person.
Which makes it being funded by the Getty Oil heiress more disturbing.
it’s not about convincing anyone anymore. we’re well beyond that point. those who are not convinced can get fucked now. we need drastic action and it’s not happening. disrupting the function of society to demand change is effective.
No it’s not. At least not at that small of a scale.
No, it is activism. It actively draws more attention to these causes, because attention drawing things like gluing yourself to a road attract the media to report on it. Sadly, if everyone just passively protests, it is not enough anymore.
Also, gluing yourself to the road that keeps the machines contributing to global warming from running on it is kind of the point.
Being nice doesn’t work anymore. The world is actively burning. If anything, activists should be even more pissed than this, and angry at their leaders/elders for denying global warming.
“We need to raise awareness about this thing everyone is already incredibly aware of!”
How?
“Hm… How about something that’s low enough stakes people can continue to ignore us, but also in a way that will make people hate us!”
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Oh you find it annoying. Well, let me tell you a surefire way to step them from blocking the streets: just take proper steps to prevent co2 imission. Or you can cry about it on lemmy I suppose.
Liberals have a massive problem with connecting with the general public. They seem to pick all the worst ways to try to further their cause. They picks methods to protest that end up turning off people who would otherwise side with their cause.
You pick rush hour traffic when people are exhausted and simply trying to get home to block entire highways to protest environmental causes?? Really? You thought that would endear your cause to these people who are now stuck there? All you are doing is building anger and resentment. A few months back, there was some guy who needed to meet with his parole officer within a certain amount of time. He was stuck in this intentionally created traffic jam. If he was late for his meeting for any reason, he would be thrown back in prison. He was pleading with the protestors to let him go and they wouldn’t budge.
Similar deal with groups like PETA. They always have this in-your-face attitude that gets under people’s skin. I think most people would consider themselves animal lovers, so how does an organization supposed aimed at the ethical treatment of animals screw up their messaging so badly? That organization always finds the worst ways to spread their message. There was that story months back on how they essentially stole some homeless guy’s dog. The poor guy had no other possessions and clearly cared for his companion, and yet they took the dog away from him because he wasn’t able to give it the home that they felt it deserved. What an absolute douchebag move and if I recall correctly the authorities sided with the guy and he got his dog back. But why would you do that? You cause more harm than good.
Causing more harm than good is a common theme amongst many of these left-leaning organizations. It is very frustrating to watch since to a large degree I, as well as many others, would tend to agree with the general theme of what the organization is trying to do. Just don’t do it that way.
isn’t it pretty well known fact that the group throwing paint and blocking traffic is being funded by Oil?
seems like Astroturfing more than real protest.
No. That’s not well known at all because it’s not the case.
The granddaughter of oil tycoon J. Paul Getty is publicly showing her support for the attention-grabbing protests carried out by Just Stop Oil activists in museums.
Ah, different paint throwers than the ones I thought were being talked about. I thought that was reference to the peta twats that throw paint on people.
Fake news. Trumper thumper.
It still does nothing, just burn down refineries instead
I think that might generate greenhouse gasses
See it as a long term investment
A long term prison sentence. They would build it back somewhere else if needed and jack prices up to offset the costs onto us.
Changing the demand of the product does seem to be the best answer I can see. (Open to suggestions)
Nah you missed the part where you keep burning them
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Reminder that
untilwhile profit is the only metric companies are judged on, they will continue destroying our planet.until profit is the only metric companies are judged on, they will continue destroying our planet.
I think you meant while
yup, thanks! I think I was going for until profit is no longer […], but turned to while profit is […] in the middle of writing.
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Holy fuck the comments. Is it this community or people who came from elsewhere? Jesus what a shit show
yes, in my country’s subreddit this also happens a lot. a lot of carbrains, and maybe paid astroturfers too.
Because yeah, people are either with me or just paid actors.
That’s exactly what a bot would say.
I protest by kicking dogs end starting forest fires. Thanks for supporting me unconditionally as long as we have the same goals.
Be a retard elsewhere
Republican 🚨
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I disagree with many kinds of protests. For example, blowing up federal buildings.
Blocking highways is a bit further down the list, but still on there.
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What other methods of direct action do you propose?
How about protests at the headquarters of the most polluting companies?
And how will that disrupt things to the point of getting their attention?
Go inside and do “stuff”.
Depends on how you protest.
If you won’t care about the issue because it’s too inconvenient to think about it, then the issue must become more inconvenient for you.
Protests are not about quietly holding placards and being easily ignored. They’re about disruption. If you’re not being disrupted, you get to ignore the protest.
That’s why I protest by walking into people’s homes when they are at work and shitting in their kitchen sinks. Then I leave a pamphlet explaining climate change next to it. They think about climate change while they clean it and change their voting patterns the next day I imagine.
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You can spread awareness without assaulting others, which tend to be the route for many activists.
Agression generates defensive reactions. If you question a person, patiently, pick at their knowledge or lack of it, you can create a change.
Approaching someone and calling them monsters because don’t do this or do that is not a good conversation starter.
If you question a person, patiently, pick at their knowledge or lack of it, you can create a change.
In which universe, exactly? Certainly not in the one I inhabit. At least not at any real scale.
If you’re in the US, I’ll agree, wholeheartdly.
Agression generates defensive reactions. If you question a person, patiently, pick at their knowledge or lack of it, you can create a change.
Literally ALL of history disagrees with you.
Are you proposing we implement change via war? No. Enough of that for the last, lets say, 10.000 years. How about we start getting our collective heads out of our asses and force change the right way?
The politians are crooked? Vote them out. No good option? Lets form another partie. Create lobby groups. Well organized, backed by science and data, not neo anarchist/hippie groups that think playing drums is a form of protest. Propose alternatives, force good and true information onto the public. Denounce mal practice, corruption and other bad actors behaviours, file actions against them.
What good violent protest turned out? People arrested by the hundreds, assaulted by police, killed.
It hurts a lot more a company or companies to have good unions and general strikes than violent protests in the streets.
Do you know what, it’s easier to just refer you back to the top comment on this post, since you clearly are the moderate in question, more concerned with the appearance of justice (and your own privileged comfort) than you are with actual justice.
The sad thing is you probably would never consider yourself a bootlicker, yet here you are, vigorously licking that capitalism boot that’s stood on all our necks.
Well done?
(E: and yes, I could provide you with endless links to articles and literature on the topic, but I have better things to do with my time than to waste it on someone who clearly isn’t ready (or capable?) to set their bias aside and actually look these things up for themselves instead of pretending like nothing is real that makes you uncomfortable)
Its good we don’t see eye to eye because as long as you have me to bounce your points of view you have the opportunity to refine them and, hopefully, draw out some of that anger.
Or would you be more satisfied if I aimed for the low street and returned your vitriole?
By acting as you are, you’re demonstrating my original point. I’m actually willing to listen to you.
I don’t care if roads are blocked. I care if the people blocking it get the police crosshairs on their chests. Violence breeds violence. People lose their lives, gunned down or worst.
Want to hurt the system? Use the rule books. The system rules. Malicious compliance. This isn’t a war.
Climate change is killing people now and is going to Kill a lot more later. The violence is packaged up really nicely so you don’t feel bad about it, but it’s violence, and it’s real. The system has failed to take action for 40 years, how long do you suggest people wait before concluding that in system action isn’t going to do anything?
What are we, exactly, proposing? Enlighten me. Because right now I’m eager for fresh solutions. I am painfully aware the shit show this planet is and sick and tired of being called guilty for not doing more, when my humanly available resources are exausted and I clearly can’t garner enough support to create a ripple movement because everybody is too angry to actually think and act in accord to achieve a grander goal.
What do you mean? I primarily see people taking direct action, and then people complain and say “I agree that this is a problem, but don’t protest in this way”.
I bet you have the same problems with blocking roads as you do with welding oil pipeline flow control valves shut or storming a coal plant.
No problem whatsoever with that.
My problem is that usually only foments violence - against the protesters - and distrust against the cause.
Agitation is a requirement for change. Sometimes people get upset over agitation, but that’s their problem. The agitation wouldn’t be necessary if there wasn’t a problem to agitate against.
Protest is not about awareness making, though. You’re apparently confusing it with advertising.
saying “many activists” are “assaulting” others is a great example of the behaviour described in this meme, yes
