Judge Christopher Hehir told Plummer and Holland they “came within the width of a pane of glass of destroying one of the most valuable artworks in the world”
Meanwhile the people they are protesting are already destroying the planet which includes this artwork. And hey, that “pane of glass” is there to protect the artwork which it successfully did.
The judge’s statement is so disingenuous, designed to deceive rather than to promote a realistic view of actions and consequences. They didn’t throw a can at the painting and luckily the glass held, they splashed some soup, with no chance of piercing the glass and doing no damage to it, and if the pane of glass wasn’t there they wouldn’t have done it.
Damaging the frame is something he can complain about, but the painting was never in danger. There’s definitely some political thrust to these overwrought and deceptive sentences the UK is giving to climate activists.
Poe’s Law here, so I’m just gonna point out that yes, in fact plenty of people have died from climate change. Increasing intensity of storms, widening storm seasons, diminishing water supplies in formerly healthy tables, growing habitats of disease bearing insects, crushing heat waves and worsening cold snaps, elevated ocean levels and acidification, shallower mountain top snow melts, intensifying wildfires, and many more effects have killed people and will continue to kill more people as they continue to be ignored.