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.
These are essentially publicity stunts, right? They don’t think destroying art will decrease carbon emissions somehow?
Those actions show very clearly that our society cares about damage to paintings more than the destruction of the planet.
That’s what they’re supposed to show.
Best comment so far. Very well said.
I don’t necessarily agree that that is what’s displayed here. People care about the environment they do but that’s not the same as saying we don’t want people slashing paintings for no reason we can have both.
It’s a completely ridiculous statement to suggest that you can only have one or the other and that in order to save the planet we have to destroy artwork.
OK, but there’s a big difference in the reaction of the people.
They react with anger and “this needs to be stopped, punish those responsible harshly” to slashing paintings, and with resignation or indifference to the actions that destroy the planet. “Oh well, nothing we can do”
Then maybe a better way to think about it for you would be like this:
Why should we have nice things when we haven’t even done the basics? if you give yior kid dessert before dinner, they probably aren’t even gonna eat their dinner - people are mammals were naturally lazy.
So what can we do to help it? Not have nice things until were not actively killing ourselves
But the planet contains paintings. Seems more like it shows humans are very bad at long term thinking.
No people just realize these people are morons. It has nothing to do with the destruction of the planet.
It is very clearly about publicity. You can’t get any message across unless you get someone’s attention in the first place.
In this case, they are playing on the link back to the suffragettes.
Seems to me like they’re getting a net negative message across since they’re seen more as nuts. But I hope someone there has done the sociology analysis to see if it’s actually a net positive or negative impact on their cause.
There have been studies on this kind of thing. I don’t have the links to hand, but the upshot from the ones that I have seen IIRC is that it doesn’t generally cause many people to actually change their views from positive to negative or vice versa, but it does keep the issue in the news.
Of course, in the wider perspective, no protests of this kind are ever going to work alone, but then that’s not the idea. They are never going to be happening alone either: there are always going to legal challenges, political movements, consumer pressure, boycotts and so on and so on alongside. The question is, which ones drive which others? Which wouldn’t happen without the others?
I would do anything to stop the climate catastrophe at this point. Good for them.
But if what they’re doing has a net negative perception to the cause, they’re hurting our chances of minimizing global warming, not helping it.
Anyone who doesn’t see how bad climate change is at this point is a fool
For real. Willful ignorance is one thing on its own but when the consequence of it is this catastrophic I’m not sure what to even call it.
I recently had a conversation with a rural gentleman who said “we sure seem to be having some crazy weather lately” but calls climate change a liberal hoax. This conversation took place on the bank of a river that had just experienced something worse than a 1000 year flood. There had been 6 more houses within a stones throw of us less than a week ago. Now they were somewhere downstream along with the very ground on which their foundations had rested.
This man is living the consequences of climate change more than most and yet he still refuses to see the problem for what it is. I have no idea what to call that other than lunacy.
Which is not the point that poster is trying to make.
They’re basically asking “is this message effective or is it having a negative impact on the overall goal to the cause?” Whether people (jfc can’t believe I’m about to say this) don’t believe in climate change or not is a completely different conversation than the one being had here, which is talking about whether this group is doing good or not. I would say it’s overall helping because any attention is actually good attention if you’re smart enough to capitalize on it and present an argument or statement in an attempt to change people’s minds.
Can you try contributing instead of being a Redditor and saying general and slightly on-topic shit for some sick upvotes?
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Well, yeah - it’s a statement that any sane person would agree with. Good on you for standing by it.
Next time, actually say something on-topic to the conversation and contribute instead of seemingly mindlessly posting random stuff for internet points.
We still need to convince the fools
But the world is full of a whole lot of fools, and we still need to convince at least some of them.
And that has what to do with destroying art? Fuck those people, they deserve no beauty in their lives, and neither do you if you stand with them.
We are in a net negative situation.
Wdym? An action like this will either help or hurt their cause in aggregate.
As far as I can tell they don’t have a cohesive goal. In theory yeah they are publicity stunts, but so what? No one really disagrees with them. Most members of the public do agree that climate change is a problem, the issue is corporations and governments.
That’s unfair. Our well paid leaders don’t have a cohesive plan. Let’s hold them to that standard and not the protesters who are actually worried about the future.
No art was harmed in the making of this
Depends on the art. I think some, especially the very old ones, can deteriorate just by getting exposed to the air.
Worked for a museum, there is no way they are penetrating that glass
There’s always a risk, art is very delicate.
Honestly the artists would be on their side
Clairvoyant are you?
Correct
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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?
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.
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