In a photoshoot designed to take a swipe at all those suggesting the protestors were a bunch of ill-informed hippies hell-bent on violence, we stood behind a banner stating "we are armed . . . only with peer-reviewed science" and holding up copies of the Tyndall report on climate change.
I didn't take part in any of the non-violent direct action (NVDA), it all looked a bit scary to me with far too many mounted police and riot shields, and I had a wedding party to get back to in the evening, but I have admiration for those who did.
Interesting for me as a Lewisham councillor, was the number of Lewisham Council black wheelie bins in evidence around the site. They were being used very effectively to seperate reyclables from compost, whereas normally anything in the black wheelie bins is incinerated at SELCHP. Some of the bins were being used in the compost toilets.
A badly-researched article in The Times last week suggested that Lewisham Council had donated the wheelie bins to the camp. The council hastily denied this and there is apparently an internal investigation going on as to where the bins might have come from.
I like to think that Lewisham is a hot-bed of enviromental activism and these wheelie bins were simply 'borrowed' for a few days from the homes of climate campers who will be returning them clean and empty in a few days time. Time will tell. Maybe a bit of waste has even been diverted from the incinerator in the meantime?
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4 comments:
Who are the people whose faces are on those placards? I think any demo about climate issues, or anything other than pro-hunting rallies, are going to suffer the bad press that they're full of smelly hippies and their patchouli-scented ilk, just because it's an easy route for lazy journalists to take and it subtly reinforces the status quo by implying that people who want to change things are smelly social rejects who should be dismissed by the polite members of society.
Hi Howard
I think they are meant to represent everybody on the planet ie everyone will be affected by the consequences of runaway climate change. Hope you're having fun in Edinburgh!
Just last week a van drove up campshill road stopped and put two brand new wheelie bins in the back and drove off....now i have an idea why.
possibly . . . none of the ones I saw looked v new, but they had already been in a muddy field for a week by then. Lots of them had numbers and street names painted on them, suggesting they were mostly from the same area . .
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