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Just Stop Oil

I think it's worth noting that unsavoury corporate sponsorship of Pride events is already controversial. within the glbt community. has been for a long time.
JSO are adding their contribution to take a side in an existing debate; not just totally barging in to dictate how it should be done.
 
Just got a press release through about this, turns out the disruption is by a subgroup made up entirely of LGBTQ+ people who went after the Coca Cola float. Reading between the lines they're almost certainly queer anarchos doing it under the JSO umbrella (use of pink and black rather than orange).

A group of LGBTQ+ supporters of Just Stop Oil have disrupted the London Pride March. They are demanding an end to new fossil fuel projects in the UK, and are calling on London Pride to issue a statement condemning new oil, gas and coal. They are also calling on London Pride to cease accepting sponsorship money from high polluting industries and stop allowing the inclusion of floats from these organisations in the parade. [1][2]

At around 1:25pm, nine LGBTQ+ Just Stop Oil supporters blocked the Pride parade in front of the Coca-Cola float- the world's worst plastic polluter, accused of numerous human rights abuses. Some supporters blocked the float whilst two others sprayed pink and black paint over the road.
 
And we should support this disruption wherever and whenever it happens, whatever the target? The only concrete thing they've achieved so far is a massive increase in security at public events. Propaganda of the deed, updated here to remove the gun from the powder, inevitably provokes a response from the authorities in the form of a clampdown of one kind or another. But does it produce the intended change? Some here seem to talk as if the answer to that question were obvious. But is it? Historically, when has it ever worked as intended?

It's no surprise to me that it's mostly posh kids doing this. Their threat to Pride, instructing them how to do gay rights, reeks of arrogance and entitlement. Meanwhile, I see no coherent politics behind any of what they do, let alone class politics.

And if you don't cheer them on, somehow you're in denial about climate change?

I think you're misunderstanding what JSO are doing and why. Its not about class politics, it doesn't require your support, and you're the one condemning them for being posh. And they aren't responsible for the government's restrictions on protest.

The entitlement and arrogance of saying "your protest is shit" without any suggestion of what to do instead :thumbs:

"Just Sod Off" .. right?
 
I'll repeat myself here I'm sure, but...

...whatever faults JSO have in terms of their politics, their strategy, their personal failings born out of privilege...none really matter in the seeming complete absence of any better 'rivals'.

The class and community based grassroots mass revolt is not happening. And, here at least, whenever there's a stirring it's quickly snuffed out by the utterly bankrupt detritus of the 20th century Left.

Unless, and until, something better emerges then JSO are - by default - the only game in town.

Don't like 'em? Do something better.
 
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Their statement re Pride

Pride was born from protest. It speaks to how far we’ve come as a community, that high polluting industries and the banks that fund them, now see Pride as a useful vehicle for sanitising their reputations, waving rainbow flags in one hand whilst accelerating social collapse with the other. It is queer people, and particularly queer people of colour in the global south, who are suffering first in this accelerating social breakdown.

Hmmm, millions of 'queer people of colour in the global south' suffer because they live in societies that still criminalise their sexuality. I'm totally with JSO regarding the partnerships with big business, but their wider political analysis of the challenges facing 'queer people of colour in the global south' is bollocks.
 
I think a lot of people who say that they know how bad climate change is actually don't realise how far up shit creek we are.
I was - still am- one of them, the 'age of uncertainty' is over and the future is sadly all too predictable. JSO tactics are needed to broaden the dialogue around adaptation and rub the science in the faces of the very public deniers.
 
Their statement re Pride



Hmmm, millions of 'queer people of colour in the global south' suffer because they live in societies that still criminalise their sexuality. I'm totally with JSO regarding the partnerships with big business, but their wider political analysis of the challenges facing 'queer people of colour in the global south' is bollocks.

I'm sure homeless trans people suffering under record temperatures whilst doing survival sex work in countries like Argentina and Bolivia are grateful for your analysis. Both of those countries have far stronger legal recognition of trans people than the UK, as do many other countries in the global south.
 
I'll repeat myself here I'm sure, but...

...whatever faults JSO have in terms of their politics, their strategy, their personal failings born out of privilege...none really matter in the seeming complete absence of any better 'rivals'.

The class and community based grassroots mass revolt is not happening. And, here at least, whenever there's a stirring it's quickly snuffed out by the utterly bankrupt detritus of the 20th century Left.

Unless, and until, something better emerges then JSO are - by default - the only game in town.

Don't like 'em? Do something better.

This is key. It's silly to argue when have these tactics ever worked, or what are they achieving. Disruptive stunts have been used as a tactic within wider struggles countless times, but they are unlikely to work on their own. JSO do their thing their way and should be just one flank of resistance to climate change. It's our fault not theirs that this is not the case.

Having said that JSO/XR do not seem very open to being part of a movement based on a diversity of tactics and their insistence that their way is the only way is a problem. But it wouldn't be much of a problem if there were loads of people saying whatever, we're doing things this way, we can either co-operate when it's useful or just do our own thing.
 
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I can’t get very far beyond the first word of their slogan ‘just’.
Related to matters of justice it is ok, but in this context ‘just’ is a crap word, like ‘professional’ or ‘obviously’.
Obviously Stop Oil would be a v good name, though.
 
Rishi Sunak admits oil-funded think tank helped write anti-protest laws
opendemocracy 30 June 2023
Rishi Sunak has admitted a right-wing think tank that received funding from US oil giant ExxonMobil helped the government write its draconian anti-protest laws.

It serves as confirmation by the prime minister of openDemocracy’s revelations that last year’s controversial policing bill, which became the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Act, may have originated in a briefing from Policy Exchange.

While Policy Exchange keeps its donors a secret, our investigation found ExxonMobil Corporation donated $30,000 to its American fundraising arm in 2017.

Two years later, a report by the influential think tank titled ‘Extremism Rebellion’ said the government should implement new laws to target environmental protest group Extinction Rebellion (XR).
Not sure if this was already posted? Got them worried at least.
 
ll likely prove a massive own goal with many of the very people who are in their vast majority natural allies of any environmental cause.
Can't see any reason to think that gay people are any more or less likely to be supporters of environmental causes. There are stacks of gay Tory MPs.
 
Can't see any reason to think that gay people are any more or less likely to be supporters of environmental causes. There are stacks of gay Tory MPs.
Sure there are, but the overwhelming majority of those attending a Pride march are very much left-leaning and as far away from climate denying Tories as you can get.
 
We went to Wimbledon today and I remarked to my OH it took much longer to get in than other years. Four security checks: ID, ticket scanning, bag search, and handheld metal detector check, though not everyone was subjected to the last one.

If I were JSO I’d abandon the orange powder part of the stunt from now on and stick to messages on T-shirts if targeting a gated event.
 
We went to Wimbledon today and I remarked to my OH it took much longer to get in than other years. Four security checks: ID, ticket scanning, bag search, and handheld metal detector check, though not everyone was subjected to the last one.

If I were JSO I’d abandon the orange powder part of the stunt from now on and stick to messages on T-shirts if targeting a gated event.
Very clever protest today that partly used the AELTC's own (jigsaw) merch; they didn't even have to carry it in, just bought the tat there. :D :thumbs: Non-violent, non-damaging, inconvenient and gets the pics in the news.

 
Very clever protest today that partly used the AELTC's own (jigsaw) merch; they didn't even have to carry it in, just bought the tat there. :D :thumbs: Non-violent, non-damaging, inconvenient and gets the pics in the news.



Apparently the ball boys and girls were sent out to pick it up.
Doesn't somewhere like Wimbledon have one of those grass hoovers? :D
 
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