Extinction Rebellion

[Svartalf]

I was 13 or 14 that I knew davos, hard to ignore the POS when you watch the info on tv on a daily basis.

[JimC]

We did our vigil on the banks of the Yarra, lining a path taken by people going to the tennis. Lots of banners, street theatre, big Tibetan gongs and singing. At least people had our message delivered. Sometimes it seems futile, but one presses on regardless...

[Brian Peacock]

It's all about starting the conversation and then keeping it going isn't it(?) I'm going to be speaking to a local news outlet later who want to gauge our reaction to Prince Charles and Greta's appearances at DAVOS. Emphasise the positive but don't play down the negative is the media teams advise - but I won't be surprised if it's basically a hostile interview, there's more drama in that.

[JimC]

A well-written message...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-26/ ... s/11901788

[JimC]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-02-02/ ... n/11909806

We need this reminder because the funding challenge posed by these fires goes far beyond raising money for the survivors, who we must continue to support.

While we fight this battle, we need to also focus our attention on winning the war against climate change.

It really is a war

Scientists tell us we have 10 to 12 years at most to turn things around.

I do not use the war analogy lightly. But as a climate campaigner, I see clear parallels with both the impacts of climate change and the required response.Imagine if it was a foreign power that had visited this devastation on our country: killing 33 citizens and more than a billion animals, destroying communities, infrastructure and cultural heritage across three states, undermining our sense of safety — with the promise that this enemy would return again, every summer.

Our Government would mobilise all available resources to deal with the threat, and citizens would too — stepping up with courage and determination to win.

Past generations made sacrifices for the sake of their children. This includes fighting in, and winning, wars.

My late grandfather fought in World War II as a fighter pilot based in Britain. He lost his brother in that war.

During and after the fighting, ordinary people chipped in money to support those who desperately needed it — from Holocaust survivors to the widows and orphans who had been left behind when soldiers were killed.

But money was also required to win the actual war.

Politicians only ever aim as high as citizens demand

From scientists to former fire chiefs, the Australian Government has been clearly warned that climate change would create unprecedented hot and dry conditions — the exact conditions that have made these fires so severe.

In the words of former NSW Fire Commissioner Greg Mullins: "We have to talk about climate change because our bushfire season in Australia has changed forever".

The Morrison Government risks being stranded at the intersection of climate change related disasters and their economic fallout, writes Ian Verrender.
But so few of our politicians are taking this threat seriously — and they need to. Now.

Politicians only ever aim as high as their citizens demand. That's where advocacy and campaigning comes in.

[JimC]

Brian, I don't know what your XR meetings are like, but our small group seems to take forever to get the simplest decision made. Meetings are my least favourite part of XR - I just want to hit the streets and rebel!

[Brian Peacock]

Yeah, I know what you mean. We moved to longer general meetings at more regular intervals, with a break for cake and general chat. General meetings are where things can be talked about without any particular pressure to resolve anything. These meetings have a brief segment for working groups to report on what they've been up to and what they have on the books, and then we'll pick three of four topics for extended discussion - the only proviso being they have to be topics which somehow relate to the Edinburgh cohort as a whole.

This has allowed the working groups themselves to be a lot more task-focused. If for some reason a working group feel that they need the wider membership to sign something off -- because it impacts another working group or the wider group -- there's a slot at the beginning of a general meeting to make a time-limited pitch -- usually no more that two mins -- before asking for a show of hands. If it doesn't get the hands then it's dropped and we move on. This has made meetings large and small far more productive and sociable.

What I've noticed is that some people, bright people with good ideas even, often recently arrived, still look for approval from working group coordinators or the general meeting. It's partly a confidence thing perhaps, partly it's because they're actually in a space where they can express themselves freely, but I think a large part is that everybody is so used to being given tasks or having their ideas endorsed by some kind of authority, from their line-managers, ideas and work which are then appraised and assessed and, ultimately, judged. Not everybody can conceptualise the self-organising sociocracy model can they, or intuit how that modal impacts their relationship to the group and the group's relationship to them and their participation. In my experience it's the ones still holding on to those kind of line structures who can bung up meetings trying to seek everyone's approval or endorsement. If somebody disagrees with me for example I'm quite happy to just say something like, "Thanks for sharing your thinking on that," or whatever. It all goes into the mix and gives people a chance to understand their own views in relation to the views of others.

I'll sometimes use the break to have a chat with people who I feel are struggling with the structural ambiguity of XR and relate my experience of how confusing and opaque I found the meetings when I first started taking part. It takes a while to start trusting in the structure of the group, but when people 'get it' it does take a lot of pressure off one personally. It's not all down to us individually is it? It's down to all of us collectively, and it's fine if the group comes to a different decision to the one you carried into the meeting.

[JimC]

A lot of it is me being impatient...

Senior scientists no longer prepared to be "quiet Australians"...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-02-03/ ... a/11922808

More than 270 scientists have signed an open letter to Australia's leaders calling on them to abandon partisan politics and take action on climate change.

The letter comes as Parliament sits for the first time this year and amid Australia's ongoing bushfire crisis.

The scientists, who have expertise in climate, fire and meteorology, are calling for urgent action to reduce Australia's greenhouse gas emissions and for Canberra to engage constructively in international agreements.

"The thick, choking smoke haze of this summer is nothing compared to the policy smokescreen that continues in Australia," University of NSW climate scientist Katrin Meissner said in a statement on Monday.

"We need a clear, non-partisan path to reduce Australia's total greenhouse gas emissions in line with what the scientific evidence demands, and the commitment from our leaders to push for meaningful global action to combat climate change."
The scientists warned an increase in bushfires was just one part of a deadly equation that suggested the impacts of climate change were coming faster, stronger and more regularly.

[pErvinalia]

The Occupy movement had a direct democracy consensus system. Fuck it took an inordinate amount of work (mostly talking) to get anything done. Very inclusive, though. Also great for civil disobedience in that the cops couldn't pin any charges on any leaders. Two different paradigms.

[Scot Dutchy]

Nice talking to you?

Revealed: quarter of all tweets about climate crisis produced by bots

Draft of Brown study says findings suggest ‘substantial impact of mechanized bots in amplifying denialist messages’

The social media conversation over the climate crisis is being reshaped by an army of automated Twitter bots, with a new analysis finding that a quarter of all tweets about climate on an average day are produced by bots, the Guardian can reveal.

The stunning levels of Twitter bot activity on topics related to global heating and the climate crisis is distorting the online discourse to include far more climate science denialism than it would otherwise.

[Brian Peacock]

Well we've known for a while that a lot of climate denial activity is bot based. You can see it in the sudden, coordinated naysaying when someone posts a news item or research findings etc. Some people use apps that allow you post the same thing across numerous social media platforms simultaneously, but while that might appear botish it doesn't delegitimise the messages in itself. Let's not pretend that the opinions of bots are not real opinions - someone still has to have the intent and ability to program and serve them.

[Cunt]

The tactic of deliberately shutting down city traffic to produce maximum irritation for commuters may not be pragmatically effective, IMO. It has the potential to create a lot of hostility towards the environmental movement; many people without strong views on the matter may now dismiss anything coming from those annoying, feral hippies...

Which is not to say that widespread protests on the issue are wrong, just that these particular tactics may backfire...

When someone is (inevitably, it would seem) injured by a vehicle, is that a bug? Or a feature?

[Cunt]

So the map of blocking traffic seems to have come to Canada. There are some incoherent 'protesters' who couldn't answer basic questions about the pipeline they were opposing, but that's no surprise.

The blockades are supported by government, as evidenced by the enforcement officers actions (which laws/injunctions they are choosing to enforce)

Since these are gov't sponsored blockades, I doubt their clarity of purpose. It's pretty easy to distrust government.

Anyway, just listened to a Dr. Patrick Moore interview. He is more convincing than all the protests I've seen. (even more telling is how people attack him, rather than his ideas)

One funny thing which was pointed out in the interview, is that 'climate scientist' is a popular term which is applied to 'any scientists who agrees'.

I never knew scientists were lauded for their agreeability lol

[Scot Dutchy]

I suppose it had to happen; the right wing's answer to Greta.

Naomi Seibt: 'anti-Greta' activist called white nationalist an inspiration

German teenager spoke at an event at US rightwing conference CPAC

A young campaigner who has been hailed by climate sceptics as the right’s answer to Greta Thunberg has previously described a white nationalist who appeared to promote “white genocide” theories as one of her “inspirations”.

Naomi Seibt, a 19-year-old from Münster, Germany, who styles herself as a “climate realist”, has also had to deny she made remarks that could be seen as antisemitic following an attack on a synagogue last year.

Seibt has been described as the darling of climate change deniers and spoke at a small side event of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) – a high-profile annual meeting of rightwing activists in Washington that will also feature the US president, Donald Trump.

She has been called a young, fresh voice for “free markets and climate realism” for questioning the scientific consensus on the climate crisis, which she has called “ridiculous”.

[pErvinalia]

Cunt will be a fan of her.