Oh, is your complaint now that the Just Stop Oil activists weren’t dressed nicely enough? If they were in their Sunday best would you say “ok, now they’re protesting right”?
Do you really not see that you’re doing exactly what King railed against? The hero of nonviolent protests, the Civil Rights leader so revered after the fact he gets a holiday, was constantly harangued for being too disruptive to the peace of white moderates. “I believe in your cause, but you need to do it in a different way so that no one is bothered.” It’s called concern trolling now, but it’s just the same shit different day.
Same complaint, not new.
“During the civil rights movement, when you look at someone like Malcolm X or Martin Luther King or Ralph Abernathy or John Lewis, all of these figures; Rosa Parks and Coretta Scott King, and all the women who stood right next to the men to help drive a lot of the civil rights movement… they were dressed in a particular way that was traditional to the standards of fashion protocol of the time,” Lisby says. “They wanted their messages to be heard. I think, inherently, there is this idea that what you wear matters, and for those white people who were in power, visually, they needed to be able to receive what was being heard so that we can push the movement forward.”
https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2020/09/9991107/protest-fashion-clothing-uniform-history-blm
No one “hears” Stop Oil (or whatever their name is/are). They’re metaphorically driving a car through the diner’s window and running off. What the fuck is that. That’s a Tourette’s episode, not a protest. That’s a spoiled child’s tantrum, not a plea for action. It’s a random aggression, not a collective call.
What are we supposed to hear them say? Look, they’re going to prison because their genius idea was to . . . throw soup? On a painting?? Okay, that’s. That’s deep, I guess? I don’t get it. I don’t get the meaning. Is the soup supposed to be oil? Why didn’t they just use oil? It - it’s fucking stupid. And I ALREADY AGREE WITH THEM. That’s how stupid an act it is. They really either need to re-think their methods, or just expect to be vilified by all sides for doing stupid stunts.
I don’t respect it, I don’t agree with it, they didn’t even say anything, and now when I argue to cut oil use I get lumped in with these colicky children.
This is literally the white moderates. All these same arguments were made about blocking roads or sit-ins at diners and the “reasonable” moderate of the time dispassionately agreed with their cause but passionately disagreed with their actions. How immature of those negroes to disrupt roadways, don’t they know it makes the moderates angry to be lumped in with them when they offhandedly mention that black people should have voting rights at a barbeque before changing the subject to something less divisive?
https://news.gallup.com/vault/246167/protests-seen-harming-civil-rights-movement-60s.aspx
It is the same argument. It’s not the same thing.
Look, is blowing up a bus an effective protest?