Contrary to most of the opinions in this thread, I think this (and the van gogh incident) is a great and appropriate protest.
It causes a knee-jerk reaction to be mad that they are harming a precious piece of history and culture, which is a perfect juxtaposition to how the climate change harms our precious natural resources and will harm ourselves, and
It achieves this without actually causing permanent damage to the subject artifact, and
It is incendiary enough to remain in our public consciousness long enough for it to affect the discourse.
I only wish there was a more direct way to protest the people most responsible for the worst effects (oil executives, politicians, etc.), but the truth is that the “average middle-class Westerner” (most of the people who have access to enjoy these particular cultural relics) is globally “one of the worst offenders”. While I firmly believe that individuals have less power to enact change than corporations and policymakers, this protest does achieve the goal of causing reflection within people who have the power to make changes.
I’ll disagree. I think these actions only entrench the decided.
As in: if you are of your opinion that damaging artifacts is appropriate, given the protest cause, then you’re already “sold”.
If you feel that these actions are inappropriate, then you have only gotten further away from these actors, and, potentially their message.
I mean that I’m not sure how many undecided or uninformed folks are impressed, convinced or engaged by these destructive protests.
It gets the exact opposite effect. Yes they get attention alright. But the wrong attention.
People don’t think “oh wow yeah stop oil!” They think “wow these stop oil guys are absolute idiots, I don’t want to be associated with them”
That’s the point though. They’ve done other protest work “the proper way” and nobody knows about it because it doesn’t get reported on. They want the message “just stop oil” to be in the news, so they do what gets them in the news.
If they go for the “right” attention, they’re barely reported on by two local outlets. If they go for public outcry, they’re global news in hours. Their goal isn’t to get you to support their organization. It’s to keep you talking about and thinking about and caring about climate change.
Man, I’ve studied history and I still agree with all that they’re doing and even wish they had done permanent damage to all the things these protestors have sprayed. The hypocrisy is incredible.
It’s just like when Notre-Dame burned, billions started coming in while people in Paris are homeless or must choose between eating or paying rent.
These things are objects, living beings are dying due to our inaction and people would rather spend money to admire a fucking painting than think about it? That’s disgusting.
So your argument is that because humans suck and don’t want to help their fellow humans, it’s okay to destroy art and relics?
Really?
Why is it so hard for people these days to understand that two wrongs don’t make a right, and two sides can be wrong or do bad?
Letting people rot in the streets is bad. That is not hard to understand.
Destroying relics and ruins just to call attention is bad too. Why is this so hard to understand?
My point is that we waste so much resources on preserving that stuff while people are fucking dying, sometimes just a few blocks away from where these art pieces are kept.
They’re objects that have no utility in keeping the world habitable and right now you’ve got governments and private interests more busy spending billions preserving them instead of preserving life on this planet.
You go and tell someone from Samoa that you think it’s more important for us to be spending billions preserving Notre-Dame because people would rather release tons of CO2 by taking a plane to travel across the ocean to visit a church no one cared about a two hundreds years ago instead of spending that money for reforestation efforts in France in order to capture CO2 and reduce global warming that will lead to their island disappearing in the ocean.
Basically ringing a bigger bell so people react.
I think it’s the wrong argument.
You don’t need to get rid of world heritage to save the world, it would be throwing out the baby with the bath water.
What we need is politicians who a) actually understand science and b) care enough to push through environmental protection plans that will stop CO2 output and c) the biggest problem, voters that have a and b too.
What we got is loads of career opportunists that happily lie their ass off to become popular, happily dismantle any environmental protections to become popular and they’re voted for by stupid ignorant voters that happily lao up all the crap they’re being fed. World wide governments are making swings to the right, world wide, environmental protections aren’t increased, they’re dismantled.
Do you really believe that destroying art will change any of this for the better?
We don’t need to, but at some point if no one reacts don’t be surprised if some people start figuring out that the only way you’ll get people angry is by showing to the world how hypocritical people are.
But they (probably) didn’t do permanent damage to this or the painting, just enough to cause outrage.
And that’s an issue, they need to cause damage to wake people up. Revolutions don’t happen by painting graffitis that are covered the next day, they happen through acts that put an end to the status quo. Had the Mona Lisa been ruined we would still talk about it today.
What’s happening in the world now is much worse than what lead to the French or American Revolution, but people are more bothered by the fact that people used fake paint on Stonehenge than the fact that close to a thousand have died in Saudi Arabia JUST TODAY because of climate change.
Yeah, the kind of outrage that will push even more people to vote for the kind of politicians that will stop this… The same kind of politicians that also claim that climate change is a hoax.
But they aren’t destroying them, are they? The stones have been standing in the rain and snow for 3,000 years. Some powder paint is just going to wash off the next time it snows. It’s not like they’ve taken a jackhammer to the Heel Stone.
Yeah but you know very well that this is more than “well the stones are fine!”
This is not the first time they try to destroy art or historical sites and maybe this time it’s “not too bad” but in others, painting were damaged.
The point is just that this is NOT helping. This will piss people off and push them to vote for politicians that will stop these assholes. Those politicians with the tough on crime stance are the same that think climate change is a hoax.
You’ve shifted from “destroyed” to “damaged”, I notice. The varnish of The Hay Wain was damaged, but the painting was not. The frames of various other paintings were damaged. The glass of The Rokeby Venus was damaged. Nothing compared to what Mary Richardson did in 1914.
It is literally Just Stop Oil’s point that people will start wringing their handkerchiefs at these actions but they are doing nothing about the climate emergency which threatens all our lives. You think it will make a difference if these people vote for different parties? The current parties are already doing worse than nothing - Sunak is opening up new oil and gas fields.
It is not climate protesters’ responsibility to persuade people to save the planet that we all live on. It is up to everybody, and too many people are not doing their share. Just Stop Oil have a right to be angry. We should all be angry.
They haven’t damaged anything. They just bait the news into writing publicity for the cause and it works because people believing “they damage an artifact” generates clicks.
People have publicly killed themselves to to make people pay attention to the biggest challenge humanity has ever faced.
Such is unaffective because news doesn’t cover it.
The chemicals in our rain from industrial waste that will wash these stones clean, do way more damage. But you don’t know that because not enough people talk about it.
Would agree if this wasn’t the first time, and if it wasn’t that actual art has been damaged to get attention.
Destruction of art or historical sites will NOT save the world. It’ll piss people off and push them to vote for right wing politicians that will dismantle even more environmental protections
You really have to scroll down google results to find Just Stop Oil’s social media due to the incredible publicity this action has generated about climate change resistance. Their Twitter account is https://twitter.com/JustStop_Oil, and they’re smashing their fund-raising targets via chuffed.
After reading the article, and realizing that what they used isn’t “paint” as we usually think of it, makes me feel less of a homicidal rage.
This is besides the point, but I’m curious about the technical aspects. How do you “spray” cornflour? The second picture looks like it’s in some large cylinder. Is it pressurized, like a fire extinguisher?
Stonehenge dosen’t containt oil, are they stupid?
No, but people are ready to burn a shit ton of it to go see it though.
it’s just some rocks, by celts. paintings probably do more damage to the environment than rocks
It’s not about if the object damages the environment, the point they’re making is that society is ready to spend fortunes preserving old objects while everything around them is going to shit. We don’t have our priorities straight, being able to take a plane to travel thousands of km to go see a painting from the 1600s is more important to us than making sure our neighbors are able to eat or keeping some species alive.
At some point we’ll have to wake up and face reality, there’s nothing more important than the incoming climate crisis and if we don’t address it, us preserving these paintings and Stonehenge and so on will all have been for nothing as it will be cockroaches that will be left to enjoy them.
don’t we have cameras? is everyone stupid?
Same as going to see whales or a rhinoceros. Why not spray paint an elephant? Cut down the biggest redwood tree! I mean there are PEOPLE who are starving!
Relics of humanity AND nature AND all the stuff in nature belong to everybody, not just rich assholes. Wrecking these things to draw attention to other topics is peak entitlement.
Please tell me where I said it’s ok to travel to go check out whales and rhinos? I’ll be the first one to tell you airplane traveling should be limited to essential travel and tourism is a major environmental problem.
It’s funny because you used two examples of damaging living things while these people are intentionally “damaging” non living things in order to make us pay attention to all the living things we’re letting suffer.
I picked living things intentionally because there are people who will put more value on heritage and “stuff” than those lives. For example, if I had to choose between the very last rhino and the Great pyramid, I wouldn’t pick the rhino, stonehenge or all of the orangutans is a different discussion. Even any one person weighed against some objects (or other species) is not a cut and dry discussion. It’s totally shitty to think you get to pick what’s more or less important for everyone.
The first time an activist jumps through a plane engine will get a lot more press and is better targeted, and I don’t mean that in a casual / flippant / dismissive way. A spree of vandalism to aircraft engines or supply lines would also do a fine job at a lower cost. People won’t stop traveling because one monument gets defaced temporarily or permanently.
Then I would tell you you’ll be in the wrong side of history because you can save all the stuff you want, once there’s no one to enjoy it it will all have been worthless, saving living things so something survives us is much more important.
You’ve created a false dichotomy. There is no need to trivialize shared treasures or heritage in pursuit of any cause in order to save anything or anyone. You’ve decided in some Machiavellian twist that whatever cause you think is truly just is more important than anything other people might value.
It is absolutely important to protect our future, ourselves, and the life we share the planet with, but not by throwing tantrums with unrelated collateral damage. Fight for the climate by fighting for the climate, not by desecrating churches/monuments/art/nature in some weird plight to accidentally piss off the right people and get more TV time.
Good luck making an omelette without breaking some eggs. You’re just pushing for the status quo, find me a single revolution that achieved major societal changes without collateral damage.
Should rub their noses in it.
In the words of not the mandalorian, this is not the way.
Using water-soluble paint is not the way.
Using soup is not the way.
Using powder that will wash itself away is not the way.
Blocking a street for a couple hours is not the way.
Glueing yourself to a pole is not the way.
What is the way then? Sitting quietly in the corner? Signing a petition on Change.org? Waiting for the politician that takes oil money to have a change of heart?
I don’t claim to have the answer, but this is not the answer. Ruining a unique unsolvable mystery of human past is dumb. Who’s feathers does it ruffle anyway?
But all those actions are exactly same as signing petition. Just louder and in many cases made more about the protesters then the protest. It’s more like doing something so that you feel you tried and media writes about it which males you feel like you did the change. But nature doesn’t give two shits about the protests neither is the current economy of consumption which leads us to the disaster. Being on the internet, discussing this matter right now is contributing to the problem and only shows that our life style, which we are happy with is the problem.
And yeah blocking the street causes much more pollution plus losses off everyone, so not sure what’s the goal there either
More moronic arts and craftsy hippie shit giving the left a shit reputation in the UK
Labour is winning the polls currently.
And they’re right wing af!
