Extinction Rebellion

[Dirk]

The arrogance of these self appointed eco warriors really pees me off.
Causing disruption to ordinary folk, who just want to get on with their lives. Causing untold problems for folk needing to travel to hospital appointments or visiting seriously ill relatives. Causing folk to miss important appointments or interviews.
The protesters then go home to their smug, self satisfied, well funded & comfortable existence to plot their next round of anti social disruption.
I just hope I'm not driving down a road that they are blocking - I fear that the temptation to do something outrageous would be too much.
I don't want to be put into that situation, ever.
Rant over.

 

[matticus]

The arrogance of these self appointed eco warriors really pees me off.
Causing disruption to ordinary folk, who just want to get on with their lives. Causing untold problems for folk needing to travel to hospital appointments or visiting seriously ill relatives. Causing folk to miss important appointments or interviews.

All this due to blockading an Amazon warehouse?

Wow, their tactics are more devious than I'd realised. Hit 'em where it hurts

 

[mudsticks]

As individuals we can only go what we can and, like you, many have being doing something for years.

But we can all do more, however without governments doing more too we will only be having a minimal effect

Agree we can all 'try to do our bit' but that's in a system deliberately created to encourage us into consuming more not less.

Governments hold the keys to tax and grant incentives to enable all of us to go in a 'better direction , create a situation so that ' doing the right thing' is also the easier, and even cheaper thing.

Consumers buying green electricity , and recycling our placcy bags, using public transport, and buying organic veg can only do so much .

The 'official' part of COP was pretty depressing, if inevitable in its outcome.

But almost inevitable, because it is populated by the same people, with the same mindset of endless consumption and exploitation of resources, that got us to where we are now.

What felt far more positive was the massed coalition of civil society groups, largely working together on climate justice, and making changes now.

And keeping up the pressure on government s and multinationals .

In addition to the more direct action activists, such as XR who are keeping the issue front and centre.

I think financial pressure (getting institutions to divest from fossil fuels) and governments to do the same such as this in The Netherlands, will be the next big fronts on all this.

 

[matticus]

Not a huge Amazon fan either but they are not the only company delivering packages big and small ? They gonna blockade them all ?

Perhaps you could offer to help? win-win!

 

[Dirk]

All this due to blockading an Amazon warehouse?......

No.....it's a reaction to their general modus operandi.

 

[MrGrumpy]

Perhaps you could offer to help? win-win!

I get sacked so nope

 

[matticus]

No.....it's a reaction to their general modus operandi.

So you don't like protest? In general, or just when you don't agree with the cause?

 

[nickyboy]

The arrogance of these self appointed eco warriors really pees me off.
Causing disruption to ordinary folk, who just want to get on with their lives. Causing untold problems for folk needing to travel to hospital appointments or visiting seriously ill relatives. Causing folk to miss important appointments or interviews.
The protesters then go home to their smug, self satisfied, well funded & comfortable existence to plot their next round of anti social disruption.
I just hope I'm not driving down a road that they are blocking - I fear that the temptation to do something outrageous would be too much.
I don't want to be put into that situation, ever.
Rant over.

Let's assume that a protest caused disruption to 10,000 vehicles. How few would have to be travelling to hospital, visiting seriously ill relatives etc for this to be, in your opinion, a legitimate and reasonable protest?

Is it nil? So if one vehicle in 10,000 is going to hospital, the other 9,999 are not, does that render the protest illegitimate? Or is it a bigger number than nil?

What if it was a million vehicles...would your hurdle rate still be nil?

 

[Joffey]

The arrogance of these self appointed eco warriors really pees me off.
Causing disruption to ordinary folk, who just want to get on with their lives. Causing untold problems for folk needing to travel to hospital appointments or visiting seriously ill relatives. Causing folk to miss important appointments or interviews.
The protesters then go home to their smug, self satisfied, well funded & comfortable existence to plot their next round of anti social disruption.
I just hope I'm not driving down a road that they are blocking - I fear that the temptation to do something outrageous would be too much.
I don't want to be put into that situation, ever.
Rant over.

Your arrogance as a self appointed champion to the 'ordinary folk' really pees me off.

If you were driving down the road they were blocking and hurled some abuse (or worse) that would really show them.

Then you could go home to your smug, self satisfied, well funded & comfortable existence to plot your next rant soon the CycleChat message board.

Rant over.

 

[Joffey]

Your arrogance as a self appointed champion to the 'ordinary folk' really pees me off.

If you were driving down the road they were blocking and hurled some abuse (or worse) that would really show them.

Then you could go home to your smug, self satisfied, well funded & comfortable existence to plot your next rant soon the CycleChat message board.

Rant over.

It's so easy to sit and hurl abuse at people you don't know isn't it?

I decided to look into why they are protesting and some of the science behind it is quite scary. Carbon lag meaning the temp rise over the next 10 years is already locked in and that meaning we might utterly fail at 1.5ºC is why they think the issue is so urgent.

You know, they might have a point. We need to stop kicking the can down the road.

 

[Brandane]

Without wishing to divert this to a NACA thread.....

Don't worry, the clock is ticking on this thread.
Wasn't there another site opened up specifically for these political discussions?

Edit to add LINK.

 

[Oldhippy]

Sadly it doesn't matter wether people agree with the cause or not. Climate change is happening and some wrongly or rightly inconvenience others to try and make a point whilst those that are currently totally unaffected by climate change will continue their lives of consumption. Whilst climate change is treated as a political conversation and not as a genuine threat to the whole of humanity things will remain unchanged.

 

[mudsticks]

I'm heartened to see that even in the last couple of years, the conversation in mainsteam media has moved on from


"Is climate change really that serious, or even a thing at all.??"

To

"Ok this is a serious issue, what are we going to do about it.?? "

The argument has moved onto the ground of 'what' and 'how'

Not whether its necessary at all .

I know lots of people are a bit suspicious of XR and other active activism groups, but I don't think we'd be where we are, even now, without them keeping this issue in the public eye nearly all the time.

As for the blocking ambulances thing, has that actually happened.??

I dunno I haven't seen an actual report of it , and of course if it has, that's not alright.

But think for a moment how many fewer ambulances we'd need without so many ice cars on the road, and everyone being a bit healthier in the first place because they get to transport themselves actively.

 

[Time Waster]

No fan of rampant consumerism but if everyone on an amazon delivery round got in their cars to go to a shopping centre to buy the same goods. Goods which have been delivered from the manufacturing plant to a distribution centre then to each store by another delivery truck, possibly via a few middle distributors before the customer buys it from store. Or delivered from manufacturer to amazon warehouse then direct to customer via more efficient delivery routes, who hasn't had to make a journey to buy item.

Which is worse?

Assumption is the item would still be wanted if amazon didn't exist.

This query has come about following a move from a town with three supermarkets within walking distance to a village where we needed a car to travel about 20 minutes or so to a supermarket. Due to pandemic we started getting deliveries. Chatting to the driver it seems he's delivering to several houses in the village and surrounding areas. Each house like us have saved a journey.

Isn't it kind of the same argument as taking a bus with others than alone in individual cars? All I know is we have dropped out mileage from well over 15k a year to probably under 6k. At least part of that is online shopping at both supermarkets and other places.

 

[matticus]

This query has come about following a move from a town with three supermarkets within walking distance to a village where we needed a car to travel about 20 minutes or so to a supermarket.

You've lost me here - did the above move increase or decrease food miles, local pollution etc?

(and have you looked at buying more stuff that is grown/made locally? You can live without stuff going to amazon before it comes to you! )