There They Are Now

at | 41 Replies


This afternoon.

Government Buildings, Dublin 2

Extinction Rebellion launches a ‘Budget for Climate Justice ‘ with activist Patrick O Connor (above centre) holding the ‘budget book’.


Earlier: Pity The Fuel

Leah Farrell/Rollingnews


Extinction Rebellion activists have glued themselves to one government department and to the underside of a lorry outside another on a second day of protests in central London.

Police have made more than 400 arrests, and those camped out in Westminster have been ordered to move on.

The [UK] prime minister has described the activists as “unco-operative crusties”.

Extinction Rebellion: Protesters glue themselves to government building (BBC)

41 thoughts on “There They Are Now

    1. Amy

      There was a good letter in the Irish Times today about the Dublin Extinction protests. It said that Ireland’s effort looked semi-sanctioned by government. They’ve failed to shut down the city and the protest looks like something organized by a PR company.

    1. Nullzero

      I can’t wait to pay carbon taxes while the likes of India and China can buy carbon credits. Penalising the little guy whilst allowing the big polluters off Scott free is the only way to go. Anything else is begrudgery. To hell with a real solution to pollution, carbon taxes for all, all except those who should really be paying them that is.

      1. millie vanilly strikes again

        You are of course welcome to do something to affect real change instead of bitching online like the rest of us schleppers.

          1. millie vanilly strikes again

            Much like your own then?

            I was serious in my reply. Fair play to the people who are getting up and putting action behind their words. It’s refreshing to see a movement that is not just social justice warriors and online petitions, but action and genuine people power – which historically is a powerful tool.

            I may not agree with some of it, but the movement as a whole is positive, surely, if it means that action is finally being taken to address climate change.

            So, in seriousness, if you want to create change, what is stopping you?

          2. Nullzero

            Saying fair play to a group of people looking to impose greater carbon taxes on ordinary people doesn’t cut the mustard I’m afraid.

            This movement is fully supported (read thought up and funded by) the club of Rome.
            A system that further impoverishes the normal man woman or insert gender identity here at your own leisure whilst allowing the biggest polluters to buy carbon credits isn’t something worthy of “fair play”, that most lazy of Irish sayings.

            I’d happily devote my life to fighting this fvckwittery although the family that depend on me to provide for them might feel a trifle let down by a father and husband chasing an unlikely moral victory motivated by a need to prove a point to someone in an online comment section.

          3. millie vanilly strikes again

            A bit pedantic, no? Does ‘well done’ better suit your palette? Or how about, I have admiration for people who are devoting whatever time and energy they have to a cause they believe in, people who are going beyond an online petition or hashtag, people who believe that what they are doing will make a difference? Regardless of phrasing, the sentiment is the same.

            The protests against the Vietnam war started life as a bunch of hippies protesting for peace. It took a good number of years for the movement to grow into something powerful that actually changed opinion and create a societal desire to end the war. I’m obviously oversimplifying here, but who is to say that extinction rebellion or some other group can’t achieve real change, one that penalises countries like India and China for their carbon output? Who’d even heard of extinction rebellion a year or so ago?

            I don’t disagree with what you’re saying about how flawed the solutions are, but I think it’s very easy to sit and pick holes in something from an armchair online, and that was what my initial comment was really saying.

            Basically, if you don’t like it, why not try to change it?

          4. Nigel

            Ah, so you’ll devote your life to fightng action on climate change. Carbon taxes that fail to target the worst polluters is the policy preference of centre right governments, such as ours, not groups like XR. Still, it’s marginally better than far-right governments that ignore climate change or are active denialists, and all agressively pusruse environmentally destructive policies. But sure, devote your life to fighting the guys in the wolf masks.

          5. Nullzero

            Nigel I never said I’d devote my life to fighting anything. But go off on a tangent if you wish, you should find Millie down a dead end somewhere while you’re at it.

          6. millie vanilly strikes again

            Very nice of you to say, I’m sure. I very much enjoyed this civil exchange of views and I can’t express how much it delights me to see that you can leave it on a personal high.

          7. Liam Deliverance

            Maybe I missed a placard or something but I was under the impression that they were protesting over government inaction on climate change, are they actually asking for carbon taxes on the average joe or is that just the governments cute hoor trick. Are there not other approaches to tackling climate change, fossil fiuel consumption, plastic usage etc. If the government is going to push ahead with carbon taxes and “ring fencing” the proceeds for tackling climate change where is the detailed plan and indeed, the contract, to do precisely that. What are these gov strategies to reduce carbon footprints that the carbon taxes will fund and how can we be certain that the carbon taxes, all of them, will go to exactly that.

          8. Nigel

            Well current government strategies don’t seem to involve hedgerow preservation, bog restoration, native reforestation, or large scale national public transport and cycling infrastructure investment, but apparently the people calling for these things, and more, are to blame for the FG carbon tax. I dunno, it’s weird.

          9. Nigel

            ‘Nigel I never said I’d devote my life to fighting anything.’

            Ah, you can’t even commit to that.

  1. jerry_banned

    those are the masks you would get free on the back of rice krispies

    these people are at a loose end between the end of the music festival season and the start of casual labour in the supermarkets ?

  2. Dunno

    These guys are setting back the cause of taking climate change seriously. The protest is a failure. They are not winning any hearts and minds. In fact they are probably losing the common person. Not a true leader among them.

  3. Clampers Outside

    I’m expecting a dude wheeling a cart and swinging a bell while wailing “bring out your dead, bring out your dead”
    …any minute now

  4. Lurch

    Keeping the most important issue ever highlighted in the media.
    Not willing to just sit back and watch disaster unfold.

    Hilarious that the trolls on here slag off their egos. Oh the irony.

  5. Gabby

    Are any of these the wolves that a member of the Greens recently suggested might be released into the Irish wilds in order to enhance animal diversity?

    1. millie vanilly strikes again

      No, you’re thinking of the Leitrim wolves. You know, Nora’s young wan married into them five or so years ago. The priest was only gas at the wedding.

  6. Termagant

    The more craic a gaggle of protesters seem to be having the more likely it is they’re only there for the craic.
    That’s why people take the gilets jaunes a little more seriously, they don’t look like art students doing an installation, they look like a bunch of angry french people out to make some changes.

    This shower can away and poo.

    1. Nigel

      Ah, yes, they can only be taken seriously if they’re more like a movement that opposed action on climate change, with violence.


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