Are we really putting the right for a woman to vote, and the right for more cavity wall insulation in the same discussion?
There are clearly parallels.
In 2020, the residential sector emitted 67.7 MtCO2, accounting for 20.8% of all carbon dioxide emissions BTW.
For the record, I think they have got their outward messaging wrong - hence some people think its "just" about cavity wall insulation
They want social housing made more efficient within a few years, and other rented and owner occupied properties by 2030. Importantly they want it backed by legal requirements, rather than just “consumer choice” and the “invisible hand”. We can argue about the dates, but let’s see a plan to make this happen, rather than politicians and the public alike accepting that it needs to happen, but not creating or insisting on a government action plan (rather than vague commitments).
Were the fuel protests which blocked the refineries in 2000 an acceptable form of protest, or was that holding the country to ransom?
Were the fuel protests which blocked the refineries in 2000 an acceptable form of protest
They were by most measures successful.
I am not sure if that counts as acceptable or not but it certainly worked better than hanging around outside downing street.
Did they have a “reason for doing so”… if they did that’s fine, if they didn’t then all consequences are on them, and they get what’s coming to them. And deciding on whether a “reason for doing so” is valid isn’t at all subjective… oh no.
It’s not really about “the right for more cavity wall insulation”, is it now.
But you knew that.
Yes, but throwing in the suffragettes was so broad that I thought an equally obtuse reply was appropriate. I really don’t know how they can be considered together, other than both were protesting.
I read their brief a while ago when they first appeared with their Brexit style logo. IIRC, they were asking the government to immediately agree to deliver and fully fund a £500bn plan (their estimate) within four months, delivered over 30 years, to ‘insulate Britain’ else there’d be consequences.
Is that not hopelessly naive?
Were the suffragettes right to disrupt london and other cities the way they did the way they did?
The suffragettes couldn't vote. If you're denied a vote AFAIC you have every moral right to adopt other methods.
I really see no moral difference. Its a protest to make a political point - and the suffragettes were rather more extreme destroying property not just blocking a few roads for a short period
Interesting the contrasting profiles given of the protesters and the driver on this thread.( two cheeks of an arse in my opinion.)
Its all a tiny drop in the ocean of the millions of tons of co2 the Chinese pump into the atmosphere
Try blocking the roads in Beijing and they will roll out the army.
If the insinuating britain mob wanna get serious then proper snarling up Westminster is going to be more effective.
Deisel soaked disposable bbqs that set the tarmac on fire, dumb stuff that requires road closure even if your not glued down with Sticks Like ####
is a different kettle of fish
No. These people are simply being inconvenienced. Because you are in a car doesn't necessarily make your journey urgent or even necessary. Anyway back to the point. You would run a person over who was "inconveniencing" you as long as you could not be caught and identified. You dont sound like a nice person and you should not have a driving license.
I'd fully support this kind of a tiinnif I thought it would work. But I think it's actually making things worse.
It's nothing like what the Suffragettes did because the context is absolutely 100% different. Their protests had impact because it was new, and they were women and it was part of a long orcheatrated campaign. It was adversarial with half the country potentially on their side against the other. These people are the nth iteration of the same sort of civil disobedience but it's in a completely different time and place on a different issue and I don't think it's going to be anywhere near as effective.
Its all a tiny drop in the ocean of the millions of tons of co2 the Chinese pump into the atmosphere
Don't start this again. It all counts, you can't just give up because someone else isn't doing anything. However bear in mind that the Chinese are doing things to clean themselves up, quite possibly more than us; and that a large amount of their pollution is caused by them making the stuff we buy.
Apart from the critical patient in ambulance who got stuck in the congestion, or the kid walking to school who struggled to cross the road due to congestion, or the person with breathing issues who had an attack due to intensity of exhaust fumes generated by the additional congestion.
As ponds says above, this is complete garbage. Cannot believe you tried to say that it's the fault of the ER person that the kid can't walk to school due to too many cars!
Personality i prefer crossing roads with stationery traffic caused by congestion,
Imagines weaving in and out of massive 4x4s made of glued together protractors and rulers...
Chinese are doing things to clean themselves up
Yup. Plus they had a one child policy for decades. The impact of that dwarfs anything anyone else will do.
protesters need to remember that they need to change and influence popular opinion if they want to actually effect change.
People keep talking about 'changing opinion' as if that is the the objective of these protests.
It's not. It's nothing to do with opinion - all the science was proven long ago.
Protest now isn't about 'winning people over' in some nice, soft and friendly way.
It's a desperate, angry, last-ditch attempt at getting governments to do *something* to save the planet.
When your government's response is to propose legislation to make protest itself illegal, you know that, far from not listening, they are actually paying very close attention to the climate protests.
And responding in their own way. You get what you vote for but don't blame all the ordinary, law-abiding and peace-loving citizens who feel compelled to protest for that.
Its all a tiny drop in the ocean of the millions of tons of co2 the Chinese pump into the atmosphere
Ah, the old 'Blame the Chinese for manufacturing all the tat that we in the west buy' chestnut.
Are we really putting the right for a woman to vote, and the right for more cavity wall insulation in the same discussion?
I think I was the first person to mention suffragettes, three pages ago. So yes I am putting them in the same conversation- I’m not saying they are equivalent, but like Suffragettes, the Kinder Scout Tresspass and other “mass protests” the acceptability of an action often seems to depend if you “win”, then you are remembered as “heroes” or lose and are remembered as trouble makers.
The suffragettes couldn’t vote. If you’re denied a vote AFAIC you have every moral right to adopt other methods.
Initially your comment seemed sensible but a moments reflection reminded me that virtually every suffragette had a father, and many had a husband so if they couldn’t convince the two men closest to them to value their opinion and vote accordingly why should their “issue” be so serious the rest of the country should care? The same argument would apply to environmental campaigners who believe that politicians of all flavours are not prioritising what they should. I may have misunderstood the party politics of the early 1900s but the first issue was just to get any party to consider it for their manifesto.
What if you are 16/17 and gluing yourself to roads?
What if you are a European living in this country who didn’t get a vote?
A right to protest is a fairly fundamental human right. Driving your car along a road is not a human right. Little Johnny getting an education is an important right too - although I don’t think the disruption for a few hours will put him at too much of a disadvantage.
… I think it's a sad state of affairs when we all think that blocking a few roads is 'extreme'.
Shows how dull, uninvolved and accepting we've all become.
Probably because we care more about our Range Rovers than about social justice, democracy, climate emergency.
I agree with the message from the protesters but the way they're going about it is ridiculous. We're taught from a young age how to cross a road safely. Sitting in a road like a lemon is not a very safe thing to do.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but shouldn't that Range Rover be equipped with active safety braking etc etc. Probably is, but given the number of electrical faults these have, the woman is lucky she could actually get it off the drive, oh and then to be stopped.
Many of these protesters are hypocrites.
Why block commuter roads, when the protest is about home insulation ? Get thee down to Westminster, by bike !
I agree with the message from the protesters
What are you going to do about it then?
Agreeing with them, and not doing anything, has the same outcome as disagreeing with them.
What are you, personally, going to do to try to make the government act meaningfully on the climate emergency?
If you concede that you're not going to do anything, you're not really in any position to criticise those who are trying, on our behalf.
(Unless you secretly think the climate emergency is fake news.)
active safety braking
I thought that, but it looked to me as though that system was activated - just something about the body language of the vehicle.
My great aunt painted ‘Votes for Women’ on John Burns MP’s garden wall. She escaped arrest when she gave the copper her name which was the same as his. He told her to "bugger off" according to my grandfather.
Initially your comment seemed sensible but a moments reflection reminded me that virtually every suffragette had a father, and many had a husband so if they couldn’t convince the two men closest to them to value their opinion and vote accordingly
How on earth do you know what the fathers and husbands of the suffragettes valued? MPs, peers and many other men supported the suffragette movement. Influential men including Henry Nevinson, Israel Zangwill, Hugh Franklin, Henry Harben, and Gerald Gould, formed the Men’s League for Women’s Suffrage and men like George Lansbury, and other like MPs Frederick Pethick Lawrence, John Stuart Mill, Jacob Bright, Peter McLagan, and Walter McLaren were salso supporters of the movement.
I think it was Israel Zangwill who declared the League for Women’s Suffrage support for the movement by saying, “The petticoat no longer makes the Suffragette. We are suffragettes – suffragettes in trousers.”
As you wrote, initially your comment seemed sensible but a moments reflection reminded me...
What are you, personally, going to do to try to make the government act meaningfully on the climate emergency?
I’m going to cause some serious disruption and glue myself to the wine aisle at Waitrose
It’s a desperate, angry, last-ditch attempt at getting governments to do *something* to save the planet.
Indeed and it's poorly conceived. Because public opinion will go against them, and that makes it very easy for a populist government to ignore because it will side with the majority public opinion.
As to what I'm doing? Nothing, because I really have no idea what to do. I would be doing stuff like this if I thought it'd work though.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but shouldn’t that Range Rover be equipped with active safety braking etc etc. Probably is, but given the number of electrical faults these have, the woman is lucky she could actually get it off the drive, oh and then to be stopped.
I think there is sometimes a minimum speed required for it to activate, as demonstrated numerous times at press launches when they run over the journalist.
Well I’m going to go against the stw grain and and say I have zero sympathy whatsoever for the daft prick sitting in front of the car.
Having read the initial comments I had assumed she’d driven hard at a protester. I watched the video, it’s a small nudge. No way she’ll get done for dangerous driving , and rightly so.
As for their cause… i agree with it but their methods are doing far more harm than good. They lost me at the point I saw a video of a woman pleading with them to let them through so she could visit their ill mother in hospital. They point blank refused.
Places that wealthy people, typically men, frequented were also burnt and destroyed whilst left unattended so that there was little risk to life, including cricket pavilions, horse-racing pavilions, churches, castles and the second homes
If Insulate Britain switched to those as targets I'm sure their actions would gain more popular support...
I think disrupting the road network as a tactic is a mistake - people don't vent their frustration on the government for not giving in to the reasonable demands of IB, they just vent their frustration at IB and make it easy for the government to divert all the media attention and blame to IB.
That said I don't know what would be effective, years of reasoned debate have proved largely fruitless so some sort of direct action is really the only option left but direct action against government (e.g. disrupting the Houses of Parliament) isn't really an option these days
Nothing, because I really have no idea what to do.
Maybe get an idea, before criticising those who have decided to do *something, anything* while they still can?
protesters need to remember that they need to change and influence popular opinion if they want to actually effect change. I’m not sure how blocking roads actually helps with that objective
Exactly this. Stopping people going about their every day business, isn't really gathering support for the group, even if many people agree with the cause. Not everyone in their car is a lazy entitled person willing to run people over on a school run. Some are missing hospital appointments, medical emergencies and the like. The protestors need to be a little more inventive IMO.
Because public opinion will go against them
You keep saying this, Molgrips, until there are opinion polls it's far from given.
I've been pleasantly surprised by how much popular support there is for protest movements in France and Germany. Opinion polls told Macron which of the gilets jaunes' demands had popular support and those were the ones that were acted on by the government.
The German withdrawal from nuclear was very much driven by protests and popular demand. If Germany goes back into nuclear it will be in response to popular demand not against it.
I watched the video, it’s a small nudge. No way she’ll get done for dangerous driving , and rightly so.
@piha - I’m sure some were to start with; I’m sure others joined the thinking as the issues were discussed and debated. Why were those issues so regularly debated? Because women were chaining themselves to stuff, throwing themselves in front of horses etc. If all these men were ardent supporters of women getting the vote, then why did women not have the vote? The first (?) campaigns for womens votes started in the 1860s. Even when some women got the vote in 1918 it was some ten years later before they were able to vote on equal terms - that doesn’t seem like an issue the every husband and father of a woman had as their no 1 priority!
There are analogies here - people have been politely lobbying for climate action for years and getting lip service. The majority of people agree government should act - but (along with other governments) they do little of substance and show no leadership, credible opposition parties don’t seem to have more substantial proposals. How then do the citizens get this on the agenda? Lobbying? V’s commercial interests? Creating their own political party (in a country who’s politics are biased around a two party system)? Or by making their voices heard in the media? You can of course argue whether that is working or not - but it’s probably at least causing some special advisor or junior minister to take a look… albeit the response seems to be how can we ban these inconvenient people rather than how can we resolve the issue.
You keep saying this, Molgrips, until there are opinion polls it’s far from given.
Of course not, but this is my feeling on the subject.
Protestors need public support. As I said, if you start protesting on something that there is already latent support for OR you can piggyback some other reservoir of support or sentiment then you are already onto a winner. That's why WWF use pandas, leopards, elephants and other cool animals on their posters because people love cool animals and it gets support. People are already wary of nuclear power so you can exploit that if you want to reduce nuclear generation. Even if you are actually secretly promoting coal.
Insulation doesn't have the same emotive content, so when you start doing something that pisses pepole off and gets into the news, and other people read it and sympathise with the motorists instead of the protesters, you're just wasting your time and possibly even setting your cause back, which is the opposite of what we need.
25% of tory party donations are from the construction industry. The explains how they are still getting away with creating shit boxes that leak energy like a sieve, despite insane house prices.
I’m going to cause some serious disruption and glue myself to the wine aisle at Waitrose
You are Ollie Smith and I claim my £5.
watched the video, it’s a small nudge. No way she’ll get done for dangerous driving , and rightly so.
I beg to differ. There’s no way that intentionally driving a vehicle to cause contact with a pedestrian doesn’t meet the legal definition of dangerous driving (all the more so if you are angry at the time and the pedestrian is sitting down and unable to quickly get out your way).
I have no doubt that the law will consider the protestor to be a pedestrian.
Now whether the protestors will be willing to complain and risk possible contempt of court proceedings (I’m unclear exactly what the court order stops them doing) or other charges may be a different issue.
when you start doing something that pisses pepole off and gets into the news, and other people read it and sympathise with the motorists instead of the protesters, you’re just wasting your time and possibly even setting your cause back, which is the opposite of what we need.
Exactly. And this discussion is mainly about the nature of the protests, not the reasons for them, which kind of highlights their failure to communicate their message as effectively as possible.
I have zero sympathy whatsoever for the daft prick sitting in front of the car.
But 'daft pricks' like that are kind of the reason why you enjoy many rights within our society. Such as free speech...
You keep saying this, Molgrips, until there are opinion polls it’s far from given.
Available polling suggest unpopular getting more unpopular. There are very few things you can get more than two thirds to agree on.
Edukator - are you confusing Britain with the functioning democracy of Germany or the emotional passion of France?
protesters need to remember that they need to change and influence popular opinion if they want to actually effect change.
Maybe they consider that they are not at the point of influencing popular opinion and are just trying to get the issue of insulation into peoples' skulls.
As for alternaive tactics, well XR tried singing songs and being nice this summer, and the police targetted their musicians and the Beeb refused to report on their protests, so IB clearly felt they had to be more extreme to get the message out.
Thanks for the poll, Tomd, even if it is YouGouv It's interesting that support has declined. Perhaps an indication about how the media are playing it.
It smacks very much of "gotta support the troops" propaganda in the Iraq war. In that case people against the war were duped into supporting the troops (which meant they were supporting the war they were against). In this case supporters of environmental issues are being duped into objecting to protesters because of the inconvenience they cause (which means they are against Insulate Britain, a cause they are in favour of).
Whatever the methods insulation is now an issue the public is more aware of. A burning tower block because of sub-standard materials has given insulation a bad press, it's a subject that needs a higher profile.
In this case supporters of environmental issues are being duped into objecting to protesters because of the inconvenience they cause
I don't think anyone is being 'duped'. Insulate Britain's actions are just pissing loads of people off, not actually highlighting their cause very effectively. Same as how some XR protests ended up being counter-productive, as I've mentioned earlier. Some people will have lost jobs as a result of XR protestors actions; it's all well and good supporting a 'cause' from a position of privilege or where you aren't personally affected, but if you've lost your job etc, you aren't going to be very sympathetic. As before; people have bills to pay, appointments they need to get to. Hindering them in their progress isn't going to win hearts and minds. So they need to come up with a better solution. I think all such actions will achieve, will be even more clamping down on the right to protest. So we'll all lose. Should we allow a tiny minority to be allowed to damage all our rights?
