'The protest was defined by inventiveness, humour and boisterous spirit, with solidarity and song...' Photo: by Tom Oldham, courtesy of XR.
‘The printing press that we shut down represents so much that must change.’
Last week XR shut down a news press. Sue Hampton was there
I wrote this piece from a jail cell, following my arrest at the ‘Stop the Press’ Extinction Rebellion (XR) protest. I joined a blockade of the News Corps Printworks, home to The Sun, The Times, and The Daily Mail. I wrote it in case I was interviewed with a solicitor, which I wasn’t. I was charged with obstructing the public highway and released under bail conditions.
The protest was defined by inventiveness, humour and boisterous spirit, with solidarity and song, but it was also an expression of deep, sustained, patient and passionate commitment. Setting aside the excitement and tension, the purpose and its symbolism are profoundly serious.
The printing press that we shut down represents so much that must change if we are to survive, peacefully, as a species on this earth. Some of the newspapers that never reached their usual outlets are more toxic than others but I believe that the most culpable provoke violent crime with violent rhetoric. The domination of the press by their billionaire owners, who abuse the power to shape discourse and public opinion, with no respect for truth, is enormously dangerous and in itself a threat to democracy. This is a malignant oligarchy that sets the news agenda and has, when fact-checked, been exposed repeatedly for presenting a fake but widely-ingested reality.
The newspapers that never went to print because of our blockade celebrate British ‘scorchers’ without reference to global warming, remain silent as the permafrost melts, and pay no attention to the overwhelming scientific consensus that without swift and radical action we face climate catastrophe. These papers fail to acknowledge the suffering and fear of those already experiencing destructive weather.
I believe that it is because of the press we targeted that the UK government continues to pursue policies that hasten climate chaos: financing fossil fuels, building new roads, expanding airports and bailing out airlines. Because of the way these newspapers shape the news, those who have committed to raising the climate alarm are seen as the outliers – nutters, doom-mongers, extremists and even terrorists, threatening the ‘business as usual’ from which these barons profit, along with the fossil fuel industry. Business as usual will ensure the kind of horror that no grandmother wants her grandchild to experience.
In Extinction Rebellion I can try to speak my truth and act on it, in our lives and our activism, in the hope that civil disobedience can awaken people who I think are being deceived by this media’s climate denial. Our blockade was an attempt to highlight the role of five billionaires in a conspiracy to lie and mislead the British people, preventing change that is urgent and essential if we are to survive. I am a Quaker determined to do what love requires of me, and serve the truth. It is my sacred duty to rebel.
Comments
I am glad The Friend accepted my piece, quite heavily edited to exclude references to other reasons to protest against a so-called ‘free’ press that incites hate crimes against vulnerable minorities, demonising refugees and stirring up racism. Also missing is a paragraph about the power of the press to anoint Prime Ministers and dictate political agendas.
Thank you.
By suehampton@btinternet.com on 17th September 2020 - 11:44
I was in a police station cell for 17 hours, so not exactly in prison.
By suehampton@btinternet.com on 17th September 2020 - 11:45
Hello Sue,
I admire your convictions and am just as convinced as you are of the threat to the planet. I’m even published on it; I’ve been involved with the ecological ‘discussion’ in America for a number of years now as a result of my work in process philosophy and theology - though I’m retired now.
I don’t believe that the newspapers are the problem. It’s the people. They are too focused on getting the kids to school, putting food on the table and keeping a roof over their heads. They rather like the idea of temperatures here becoming as hot as the South of France; they like the weather in the South of France. They like the idea of fewer insects in the summer; stops them having to keep cleaning the car windscreen. They like the idea of fewer House Martins and such like; stops them having to clean the bird mess off the windows and the patio. They don’t really care about the plastic oceans and the desertification of the African plains. They do conceptually of course, but not really. They can still watch those places and those creatures on the Yesterday channel.
It’s still all too remote, unreal, over-there!
Thomas Kuhn, he who coined the phrase ‘paradigm shift’, wrote that for such a shift to happen, the older generation has to die out, for the paradigm to become accepted. It actually has to die out! The UN has said as much about climate change. People are too wedded to their cars, their isolated individual’ worldview. The vast majority of those in the older generations are still (even with Covid) having too much of a lovely time ‘lording it’ over Nature. It will be Greta’s generation (I use her as the archetype) who will have to fix it. If it’s not too late by then.
No, the real problem is the education system that still relies on an understanding of science that is still Cartesian (us-them, mind-matter, object-subject, Man-Nature separation) in its premise. We need neo-Naturalism, but it’ll be a long time coming.
On the other hand, would it not be better for the planet - for all the other species on the planet, for Homo Sapiens to die out - or at least suffer a sizeable partial extinction?? Some of my American ecological friends have come to precisely this view. Their argument is that the sooner that happens - the sooner we die out - the sooner the Earth’s ecosystem can recover. And it won’t recover otherwise. The Earth can carry naturally, they say, about 1 billion people. Not 7 billion. Their concern is not our extinction, therefore, it is our survival! (Or, at least, our survival in such numbers as to be able to cause so much dreadful damage.) It is high time, they say, that we became ‘the least of God’s creatures’, for God’s creation to flourish once more. We should stop being so selfish, they argue.
Perhaps they have a point?
Peace and Every Good,
Mark
By markrdibben@gmail.com on 20th September 2020 - 15:13
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