Just Stop Oil protesters have been arrested after smashing the glass covering a Diego Velázquez painting at the National Gallery in London, as police detained dozens of others who blocked Whitehall.
Two activists targeted the glass on the Rokeby Venus painting with safety hammers before they were arrested on suspicion of criminal damage.
The artwork, which was painted by Velázquez in the 1600s, was slashed by the suffragette Mary Richardson in 1914. One of those involved on Monday said: “Women did not get the vote by voting; it is time for deeds not words.”
The Metropolitan police said at least 40 activists who were “slow marching” in Whitehall were also detained and that the road was clear after traffic was stopped for a brief period.
Either way they’re dumb. An awareness campaign for climate change isn’t going to spur anyone to action. Lack of awareness isn’t the issue because everyone knows about “climate change”. The issue is that half the people who know about it don’t believe in it and the people with the means to counter it don’t care because they think it’s a poor people problem that their wealth and status protects them from.
All these protesters are doing is being a nuisance, which is more likely to turn people on the fence away from their cause and make deniers double down even harder.
We need to be nuisances or else we will be ignored. Being disruptive is the best tool we have to pressure the government and the rich into helping to fight climate change.
Being disruptive is the best way to get them to crack down on you. Why would they decide to fight climate change because of disruptions like this?
This isn’t trying to get people to join the cause, it’s a show of force. This is what we’re capable of, and we’re not backing down until we get what we want.
Anyone is capable of sneaking a hammer into an art gallery, if that’s what they’re capable of, the people in power have nothing to fear.
If you start getting into higher capability demonstrations, you very quickly get into terrorism territory.
… By destroying art?
Let’s consider the fact that around 40-50% of carbon emissions are coming from the top 10% of rich people. How the fuck is destroying pieces of art actually related to that fact in any shape or form? The message is known, but like the other poster said, a good chunk of people don’t even believe it, and that rich 10% don’t even give a fuck because they got money.
They didn’t destroy the art though.
Do you think the public owns that painting?
Do you think the rich own that painting? The museum owns that painting. They literally had it for years in their own collection.
Who owns the museum?
The British government. Specifically their Department of Culture, Media, and Sport.
How about actually trying to say something instead of asking questions in an attempt to sound smart like an epic le Redditor?
I hear this a lot, but what does it practically mean? As in, how will fence-sitters act differently in a way that will harm the world more? Genuine question.
If you’re on the fence about an issue and you see the most visible actors of one side acting like idiots, it’s more likely to push you to the other side which means yet more deniers supporting inaction from government and corporations. You don’t bring people to your side by pissing them off. You create more enemies for yourself.
These protests are already causing more people to call for a crackdown on the Just Stop Oil protestors rather than climate policy reform and enforcement. Even people who believe in anthropogenic climate change and want the government and corporations to do more to stop and reverse it hate these morons.