Non violent protest techniques and tools

[Monsieur Verdoux]

saw an otter with an iPhone the other day

[Kalabi]

Yeah I saw that, really inconsideratly playing "In The Air Tonight" loudly on the bus.

[Shit Good Nose]

I bet it was walking around barefoot as well.  The cunt.

[Buelligan]

Because I can't be bothered.  But I had to correct you about the otters because it was wrong - I even said that I liked the fact otters were back in the wild.

You didn't really mean it though.  Did you.

[garbed_attic]

Couldn't any protest potentially cause problems though? Isn't the purpose of protests often to cause disruption?

Other things that cause disruption and have led to congestion, train delays and missed appointments:

- Football games and fans
- Ed Sheeran concerts
- The Edinburgh Fringe Festival
- St. George's Day parades
- Street fundraising
- Advertising

etc. etc. etc.

[Shit Good Nose]

You didn't really mean it though.  Did you.

Err...yeah.  Otherwise I wouldn't have said it.

In fact just the other week on a daddy duty day when it was nice I took Little Nose to the Bristol Avon at Lacock (where I know there are several families of otters) in the hope of seeing one, and we managed to see two either frolicking or hunting (their den was behind a large overhanging tree, so I couldn't tell which).  Also several kingfishers, swans and a few birds of prey.


I still can't make you out sometimes...


Anyway, this thread is about non violent protesting.

[Shit Good Nose]

Other things that cause disruption and have led to congestion, train delays and missed appointments:

- Football games and fans
- Ed Sheeran concerts
- The Edinburgh Fringe Festival
- St. George's Day parades
- Street fundraising
- Advertising

etc. etc. etc.

Don't forget Raoul Moat.

[garbed_attic]

(in context/to expand - I work in the energy industry on the public sector consumer side(*), and a big part of my job is energy reduction and efficiency projects, so I meet a LOT of people on both sides of the protests, and I've also been involved in both sides of the protests, so everything I'm saying is based on actual knowledge and experience and not just cynical bullshit pulled from the air)

(*) that is also why I know that this planet is fucked and what we're doing now - or trying to do - is way too little way too late

Because work in the energy industry has achieved nowhere near enough everyone should roll over and die so as not to inconvenience people? What argument are you making?

This is getting personal, but, if you believe this, do you just accept that your child only has a decade or so before they starve to death or meet some other wretched fate? How do you invest in their future (much less put them through boring stuff like school) if you firmly believe that they don't have one?

[Shit Good Nose]

Because work in the energy industry has achieved nowhere near enough everyone should roll over and die so as not to inconvenience people?

That's not what I said, nor is it what I think (although this planet - or rather human life - IS pretty much fucked I'm afraid) - if I did I wouldn't still be doing the job I've been doing for the last 11-12 years.


I don't think I'm making an argument either, I'm just trying to point out that the fun non-violent protest is not always as happy and innocent as most people think once you start to look at the bigger picture, and, I know for a fact, that a lot of people involved in those protests don't realise what goes on outside of the protest bubble they're in.

In fact, if you were to press me, I might even come down on the side of proper violent (or at least aggressive) protest over non-violent - kinda like "if you're gonna shoot, shoot, don't talk". 

This is getting personal, but, if you believe this, how do possibly justify having a child?

No one can really justify having a child or two right now.  There is certainly no justification for more than two.

I CAN say we've only had one, and we're sticking at just the one, but I'll also quickly acknowledge that's only because the pregnancy, birth and first three and a half years were an absolute fucking nightmare and put us right off having another one.  We originally planned to have two.  Also Mrs Nose was desperate for a child.  I didn't mind either way.  That's no justification either, but it's the (main) reason.

And not a single day goes by where I don't think about the environmental horrors that Little Nose will potentially/probably face when she's older.  Time was when that would have been after me and Mrs Nose popped our clogs, but right now we're talking catastrafuck pretty imminently (in relative terms).

[garbed_attic]

That's not what I said, nor is it what I think (although this planet - or rather human life - IS pretty much fucked I'm afraid) - if I did I wouldn't still be doing the job I've been doing for the last 11-12 years.


I don't think I'm making an argument either, I'm just trying to point out that the fun non-violent protest is not always as happy and innocent as most people think once you start to look at the bigger picture, and, I know for a fact, that a lot of people involved in those protests don't realise what goes on outside of the protest bubble they're in.

In fact, if you were to press me, I might even come down on the side of proper violent (or at least aggressive) protest over non-violent - kinda like "if you're gonna shoot, shoot, don't talk". 


No one can really justify having a child or two right now.  There is certainly no justification for more than two.

I CAN say we've only had one, and we're sticking at just the one, but I'll also quickly acknowledge that's only because the pregnancy, birth and first three and a half years were an absolute fucking nightmare and put us right off having another one.  We originally planned to have two.  Also Mrs Nose was desperate for a child.  I didn't mind either way.  That's no justification either, but it's the (main) reason.

I really don't mean "from an environmental point of view"... or even wholly from an ethical point of view... more from a personal and emotional point of view? i.e. if you truly believe we are fucked and so your kid doesn't have a future (or has a future which is unimaginably awful) how do you interact with them on a daily basis? I guess maybe it's the equivalent to having a kid in hospice care? But then I can't imagine most people having a kid if they believed they didn't have a chance of growing into an adult... ? Maybe I'm wrong on this.

[garbed_attic]

I mean, humans have kids in death camps and prisons. But I feel like they still have some hope for escape?

[Shit Good Nose]

Maybe I'm wrong on this.

I'm not sure that you are...


I dunno, it's difficult to explain.

I know the planet is pretty much fucked regardless of anything we're doing now through my job - for example most people don't know that India and mainland China are putting up new coal powered stations to the equivalent rate of one or two every few months, as they're going through their own developing industrial revolution (side thread - who are we to deprive them of their development when we've already had ours?), so even if we make the UK 100% renewable within the next 15-20 years (which is actually doable), it will be a mere blip compared to the increasing fossil fuel fucking that much much larger countries are doing and will be doing.

But, I guess, you just do the best you can, live day to day, give your kids the best life you can and all the love they deserve, and then just hope for the best in the long run.

Even though it plays on my mind EVERY SINGLE FUCKING DAY, I try not to dwell on it too much, and in the meantime do what I can do both at home and at work to help the environment as much as I can.



Quick acknowledgement that this thread isn't specifically about the climate protests, it's just cos I have the knowledge and experience in that area to feel like I know what I'm talking about...

[garbed_attic]

IDK... I mean, hypocrisy is very irritating. I try pretty hard by virtue of being mostly vegan, buying electronics rarely and second hand (my phone is a very basic one from CeX), not driving, not taking flights, not having kids... but obviously I'm a hypocrite in lots of ways by virtue of living within a society that uses loads of coal-based energy! At the same time, since avoiding hypocrisy is impossible, one might as well take action if it stands a certain chance or slowing down or alleviating mass suffering, even if ultimately it's quite likely too late to avoid human extinction and certainly civilizational collapse. I'm still sceptical that Earth will be anything like Venus within decades and believe that life will arise again - after all, previous Mass Extinction Events did not wipe all 100% all life.

[garbed_attic]

But, I guess, you just do the best you can, live day to day, give your kids the best life you can and all the love they deserve, and then just hope for the best in the long run.

Even though it plays on my mind EVERY SINGLE FUCKING DAY, I try not to dwell on it too much, and in the meantime do what I can do both at home and at work to help the environment as much as I can.

This is good and I very much respect you for this.

I do think more systematic change is possible - in as much as it was all but impossible to imagine that the Berlin Wall would fall even 10 years before it did. Likewise, I can't imagine that many serfs imagined democracy.

Do I think it's too little too late? Well, yes, probably. But civilizational collapse ≠ human extinction ≠ extinction of all life on Earth.

---

More on topic, I think non-violent protests both need to be more entertaining/ funnier for those not involved, but less self-congratulatory from the inside looking out.

[Shit Good Nose]

I'm still sceptical that Earth will be anything like Venus

For some reason that I don't understand, I first read that as you were skeptical the earth is round...


I'm really not enjoying slightly derailing Kalabi's thread and dwelling on something he never raised (apologies for that), but equally I don't want to ignore your (VERY valid) points and insights, but...

It's tricky all over.  As you say, we live in a time and in a society which is impossible to NOT be hypocritical in in one way or another and, frustratingly and sadly, there aren't any easy answers.

I know that the only things that will prevent human extinction are pretty much everyone on the planet drastically changing the way they live NOW - that means everyone installs solar panels on their homes, switches to a vegan/veggie diet, get an electric car (or ditch the car altogether), switch to 100% green renewable energy (and PROPER 100% green renewable, not "renewable, but not really"), stop deforestation, etc etc.  And all of that needs to happen all over the world NOW, not bit by bit in first world countries over the next 20 to 30 years.

But, for reasons of practicality, logistics and other things that is not easily possible for everyone.

Moving away from environment specific, we also need to MASSIVELY reduce the planet's population.  Whilst climate change is a major problem, its worst effects won't be felt by most for 30 to 50 years, possibly as much as 80 years for some.  Population growth on the same current scale, however, will do us all in a LOT sooner than that, not least because water shortages are going to become a big issue - we are going to be fighting wars over water instead of oil in the relatively near future - and food availability.


Ah man, it's all just too fucking depressing.


Detaching myself completely from my personal existence and engaging robot/vulcan brain, most of me thinks that human extinction is probably the best thing that can happen for the planet - we're clearly a disease on it.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I quite like how these lads in Hong Kong have been shining laser pens at the cameras of facial recognition stuff. It's always worth seeing how people are defeating high tech mass surveillance that belongs to authoritarian governments.

[Zetetic]

Is that successfully reliably defeating the tech? I imagine they'll find out in a month or two.