Forum Topic

Oil protestors

What planet are these people on clearly not this one….we are all aware of the need to change how we abuse the planet but seriously all these people are doing is making life even harder for folk to go about their business, lock them up ha!

Jayne Thorburn ● 1487d29 Comments

Peaceful protest is fine, criminal damage is not.  They could have simply stood in front of all the pumps and blocked access but obviously that would not have got them enough publicity so instead they decided to damage the pumps.I hope that they all face trial and are sentenced appropriately

Justin Stephenson ● 1487d

I agree re peaceful demonstration, don’t agree about standing in front of pumps that would have created potential issues as people get frustrated just trying to fill up their car. Go to parliament square and protest. Right now we need energy we are making progress with renewable energy it was never going to happen overnight.

Jayne Thorburn ● 1487d

Whwn they supaglue themselves in sit-ins on the roads, the coppers should cut big holes out of their trousers in situ and send them on their way bare-arsed.

Roger Talbot ● 1487d

That would be very funny, crazy people behaving badly France are much more aggressive with protestors who endanger other peoples lives e.g. sitting on motorways etc. we are too soft and too PC

Jayne Thorburn ● 1487d

RT: "... the coppers should cut big holes out of their trousers in situ and send them on their way bare-arsed."A double punishment, seeing as these protestors are opposed to all uncontained gas emissions.

Richard Cathcart ● 1487d

There were arrest at The Dome garage in Brentford. The maximum penalty for causing criminal damge under £5000 is three months in prison. The Dome was, lest we forget, the garage that was collecting for the community during the pandemic. I hope these selfish types have the book thrown at them.

N V Brooks ● 1487d

" Peaceful protest is fine, criminal damage is not."
And when exactly has peaceful protest ever achieved, anything ? CND 70 years of marches, sit downs, etc etc Result ? Zilch !
The early suffragettes - "the peaceful stage" Result ? Zero !
The later suffragettes "Deeds nor Words" " The campaign was then escalated, with the suffragettes chaining themselves to railings, setting fire to post box contents, smashing windows and eventually detonating bombs, as part of a wider bombing campaign" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suffragette#WSPU_campaigns Not forgetting slashing paintings in the National Gallery, throwung themselves in front of horses etc Result ? Votes for women and Raving Looney Liz Truss as possibly our next PM
So what's not to like ?
As to the France it seems everybody has forgotten the Gilets Jaunes or Yellow Vest protests which were not exactly peaceful either https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_vests_protests#Adama_Committee_and_Nuit_Debout And the result ? quote :
" Although President Macron had been insisting that the fuel tax increases would go through as planned, on 4 December 2018 the government announced that the tax rises would be put on hold, with Prime Minister Édouard Philippe saying that "no tax deserves to endanger the unity of the nation".[37][259] In early December 2018, the prime minister announced that the price of the Électricité de France blue tariffs would not increase before March 2019.[52] On Sunday, 9 December, the Elysée called trade unions and employers' organizations to invite them to meet on Monday 10 December so Macron could "present the measures" he intended to announce later in the day.[260] On 10 December, Macron condemned the violence but acknowledged the protesters' anger as "deep, and in many ways legitimate".[261] He subsequently promised a minimum wage increase of €100 per month from 2019, cancelled a planned tax increase for low-income pensioners, and made overtime payments as well as end-of-year bonuses tax free.

unquote:

michael adams

Michael Adams ● 1487d

Well at least Michael has nailed his colours to the mast, he supports violent protests, what is not yet clear is whether there is any restriction on the amount or level of violence that Michael thinks is ok to achieve a political goal.He fails to appreciate that CND does not achieve anything after 70 years of peaceful protest because the majority of people in the UK do not agree with their basic philosophy.Michael does not understand that the "Deeds not Words" section of the suffragette movement were far less important that he thinks. It was when the suffragettes enthusiastically supported the war effort from 1914 that support for their cause increased within the British people and it was the National Union of Womens' Suffragette Societies, an organisation which had only ever pursued peaceful and legal means of protest, that brokered a deal with the War time coalition government which led to the women gaining the vote in 1918 (but only some women over 30 who met the property qualification!) - oddly for Michael this is detailed in the wikipedia article which he quoted.The IRA conducted a 30 year violent campaign which achieved nothing until they agreed to set aside violence.Overall the experience in the UK is violent protest tends not to achieve anything, but sitting down and having a cup of tea with the other side and a nice chat often does.  Of course in France things may be different, but that is because the French have a very different history to us

Justin Stephenson ● 1486d

Not sure anyone would have sat down with the IRA if they hadn't been violent to start with - not that I supported their violence as everyday on the tube you felt you might be blown up, but the possibility of ending this gave them leverage.

Vivienne Cox ● 1486d

Oh the irony, that one of the protesters at The Dome garage had travelled up from Swansea.What a bloody hypocrite assuming he hadn't made the journey by bicycle or pogo stick.Before anyone says train, the stock on the Swansea line is Diesel electric.

N V Brooks ● 1486d

Justin Stephensom" Well at least Michael has nailed his colours to the mast, he supports violent protests,"Oh dear.When in fact I simply stated two incontestable historical facts. That both CND and the early sufragettes employed solely peaceful methods, and both were equally ineffective.One can only assume that Justin was never invited to join the debating society at school, for reasons that are fairly obvious, while history ;essons must have been a bit confusing as well.michael adams

Michael Adams ● 1486d

And Pakistan meanwhile declares a state of emergency over worst floods since 2010: https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/26/pakistan-declares-emergency-floods-monsoon-rainsThere's a much bigger picture you need to concentrate on.

Philippa Bond ● 1486d

63% of Pakistan's populated area (over 80% in Bangladesh) is built or exists on a flood plain which has been flooding for centuries. There is a far more complex issue involving soil erosion, over densification of population, removal of stabilising vegetation around the Indus basinand the wholesale re-routing of water courses into the Indus basin that the simpletons who vandalise or support the vandalisation of petrol pumps have the bandwidth to accomodate.

N V Brooks ● 1486d

"but sitting down and having a cup of tea with the other side and a nice chat often does"Uh...er...erm.Aside from Michael's example to which I'd add the gay rights movement and BLM just for kicks, I'm wondering how successful the tea and crumpets strategy has been with other matters such as TfL strikes, lawyers strikes, teachers on the way, nurses/NHS. I'm guessing refreshments isn't exactly cutting it.

David Lesniak ● 1486d

Maybe they are momentarily making life a little harder for a few people...but nowhere near as hard as it'll be for all of us if we don't stop climate change with some radical changes very soon.So good for them. They are very brave, and undoubtedly on the right side of history.

Simon Pedley ● 1486d

That's a bit like saying if it rains you get wet but it hasn't rained and flooded anything like as bad as that before and it is not as if we don't have flood plains here that are or have been built on.  There has to be landscaping to mitigate the worst and heaviest of rainfall.A lot of Britain's flood defences are in private hands and many are not being maintained adequately for the increased extremes of weather that comes with climate change.  There's also plenty of lobbying in Parliament including by those Climate Crisis Deniers who've hitched up with the pro oil lobby.  Just because it may cause some inconvenience to you doesn't mean that there is no justification in keeping the important topic of the protest and the importance of the right to protest high on the agenda.

Philippa Bond ● 1486d

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/video/2021/oct/19/the-climate-science-behind-flooding-why-is-it-getting-worse-video-explainer

Philippa Bond ● 1486d

So pleased to see those who support acts of criminal damage outing themselves. Pathetic virtue signalling

N V Brooks ● 1486d

Justin Stephenson explained" The IRA conducted a 30 year violent campaign which achieved nothing until they agreed to set aside violence."Er....doesn't that very fact contradict your whole argument ?Given that in order to set aside violence, its necessary to be violent in the first place ?Womens suffrage had been mooted since the 1860s. With countless meetings, discussions, conferences deputations pamphlets - 40 odd years of getting nowhere. But when World One broke out, they didn't simply stop holding their meetings which nobody was paying any attention to anyway, but abandoned their more militant activities which had continued right up to the outbreak of warquoteIn 1914, at least seven churches were bombed or set on fire across the United Kingdom, including Westminster Abbey, where an explosion aimed at destroying the 700-year-old Coronation Chair, only caused minor damage.  unquotehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suffragettemichael adams

Michael Adams ● 1486d

Well it took a Swedish teenager's weekly School Strikes and the actions of Extinction Rebellion to draw a lot more attention to the problem of Climate Change years after Governments had been meeting regularly to talk about doing something about it.  Scientists have been warning about it for more than 30 years.  Ignorance (in the true sense of the word) and Business as Usual increases the problems as does lack of action.COP1 was held in Berlin in 1995 and COP26 was held in Glasgow in 2021 (delayed from 2020).  Generally they are held each year. 197 countries have signed up. The next one is scheduled to be in Sharm El-Sheikh in November.However there are still some people who seem very keen to ignore the Scientists despite the increases in extreme weather:https://www.lse.ac.uk/granthaminstitute/news/mp-joins-climate-change-deniers-project-fear-on-net-zero/

Philippa Bond ● 1485d

The school strikes however did not involve the criminasl damage that you implicitly condone.

N V Brooks ● 1485d

I have condoned action and not criminal action.  Whatever action was taken it was not at all noticeable the next day when we happened to pass by.Disruption to Business as Usual is sometimes the only way to draw attention to what is an extremely serious situation which some people are trying very hard to ignore dealing with and attempting to keep secret.

Philippa Bond ● 1484d

The action you condoned was criminal action.I hope that those who perpetrated it and indeed those who condone it are made to pay for their actions.

N V Brooks ● 1482d

Who says it was criminal action? Has anyone been convicted?

John Hall ● 1482d

Who says it was criminal action? Has anyone been convicted?

John Hall ● 1482d

Not yet but the video evidence of someone who "unlawfully, and intentionally or recklessly, damages or destroys property belonging to another person" is abundantly clear. Something wrong if convictions cannot be secured.

N V Brooks ● 1482d

Yes but that's your opinion and not that of a jury of their peers. I agree they have risked a conviction for criminal action, but in the cause of tackling criminal inaction on a far bigger scale. In these sort of circumstances juries have shown themselves quite nuanced, which is how the law is designed to work and evolve. Although it's also designed to shield the poweful beneficiaries of greedy and evil behaviours from the little people. 

John Hall ● 1482d

Not sure how video evidence becomes opinion. Seems to fall into that alternative facts category of insanity.

David Lesniak ● 1482d

So, do you condone their actions as proportionate by attacking a local small business? Surely they should have focussed on the HQ buildings of their 'targets'.

N V Brooks ● 1482d