According to scientists, the planet is dying. They are not in dispute about this. They may debate the speed of the decline but they agree on where we’ll end up and it’s not pretty.
It’s pretty ugly, pretty disastrous with profound ecological and economic ramifications for future generations.
Extinction Rebellion or XR has emerged to champion climate change through non violent means. Their strategy calls for civil disobedience which seeks to force the hand of governments throughout the world to take more drastic measures to address the defining issue of our age. And for all that has been said and written over the past few years, that issue is not Brexit.
In Rome an effigy of 16 year old Greta Thunberg hangs from a bridge. She has become the voice and indeed the face of a generation who will feel the effects of climate change in a way that many of her current detractors will not.
Because many people sneer at XR and Thunberg. One Facebook post I commented on during the week wondered whether an XR protest would clean up after themselves. No mention at all of why they were doing what they were doing. Another question people might want to ask before they remonstrate with activists is what am I doing to help?
Now I understand why people have done little or nothing to help reverse the effects of climate change. I have not adopted the vegetarian lifestyle I’d intended to nor do I recycle every single piece of plastic (though I feel terrible when I don’t.) It is easier to turn away from individual responsibility in the 21st century. Consumerism seduces us to do just that.
But do not criticise the people who are making their voices heard, who are raising their heads above the parapet when you are not willing to do the same, if you believe the science and share the beliefs of the protesters.
There has been a tangible shift in the past few years and it has been due to the combined efforts of the scientific community and campaigners such as Greta Thunberg and the XR movement. Their protests have kept climate change on the agenda and have kept the pressure on politicians to acknowledge the need for change, the urgency of the situation and the magnitude of the crisis.
Yet people still struggle with changes to the system. They call protesters hypocrites for driving to protests in cars or for having generators to heat a cardboard city in winter as if somehow they could change a system without working within it. Or if somehow driving to an event somehow diminished the importance of the message. Politicians failing to listen, and a populace failing to act, this is why we have XR.
But interestingly, as I kept up with events last week on Twitter, a story broke which swept climate change and XR of the top of the Twitter agenda.
Coleen Rooney, wife of former England footballer Wayne Rooney put out a tweet accusing fellow WAG Rebekah Vardy of passing stories concerning the Rooneys to the Sun newspaper. Coleen detailed the ruse she created to snare the snitch and then theatrically revealed the perpetrator to be none other than the wife of current England forward Jamie Vardy.
Soon it began trending and the war of the WAGS had inspired thousands to get involved most taking the side of Rooney and painting Vardy to be the pantomime villain. That’s how easy it is to distract the public from the most important issue facing the world today. That is the frightening power of celebrity amplified by social media.
So when people complain about the tactics of XR and others, remember they are fighting for your attention. They don’t want to antagonise you or inconvenience you but if that’s what it takes…
But my feeling is they are on the right side of the issue. They are to be admired for their perseverance and hopefully, one day, they will get the recognition they deserve.
