{"id":2056,"date":"2022-12-08T15:38:07","date_gmt":"2022-12-08T15:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/?p=2056"},"modified":"2023-05-05T10:30:34","modified_gmt":"2023-05-05T10:30:34","slug":"sunflowers-soup-and-public-order-bills","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/?p=2056","title":{"rendered":"Sunflowers, Soup, and Public Order Bills"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Some call it a scandal. Some say it was unnecessary. Others say it was a clever political stunt and others aren\u2019t sure what to think.<\/p>\n

The events of October toyed with the minds of many but, on a large scale, what do they show? What would lead someone to do what these two young women did? And how are current events and politics affecting protest?<\/p>\n

On Friday 14th October of this year at London\u2019s National Gallery two members of Just Stop Oil (an environmental activist group aiming to halt the UK government\u2019s production of fossil fuels) entered the gallery and threw tomato soup over Van Gogh\u2019s famous \u2018Sunflowers\u2019 painting. These women then glued themselves to wall behind them and the 21-year-old Phoebe Plummer delivered a speech with the opening line: \u2018What\u2019s more important, art or life?\u2019<\/p>\n

\"p8ic<\/p>\n

The campaigners were arrested by the Met Police for \u2018criminal damage and aggravated trespass\u2019. They were released on bail as the painting itself hadn\u2019t been harmed. According to a spokesperson from the gallery: \u2018There is some minor damage to the frame, but the painting is unharmed\u2019. According to a spokesperson from Just Stop Oil, ensuring that the painting wasn\u2019t marred was considered when choosing which to target.<\/p>\n

So, you could say that no harm was done. However, you could also say that this tactic was ineffectual. Surely, it would just alienate supporters and a non-disruptive protest would mean people would listen. But you could also argue that protesting isn\u2019t to gain friends, it\u2019s to spread a message and gain attention.<\/p>\n

\"pic<\/p>\n

And these people certainly had a message to spread. Earlier this year, our previous prime minister Liz Truss lifted the ban on fracking, which was seen as an \u2018attack on nature\u2019.<\/p>\n

Since 2019, fracking \u2013 a process by which oils and gases are extracted from the ground causing greenhouse gas emissions and earth tremors \u2013 has been banned.<\/p>\n

Due the cost of living crisis, Liz Truss reinstated the process to try and tackle this problem despite opposition from important political figures such as the previous Chancellor of the Exchequer \u2013 Kwasi Kwarteng. He said that \u2018even if we lifted the fracking moratorium tomorrow, it would take up to a decade to extract sufficient volumes \u2013 and it would come at a high cost for communiques and our precious countryside\u2019.<\/p>\n

In my opinion, this is not the only thing that caused people to lash out. Alongside this runs the political push to suppress protest. The Public Order Bill is currently in the works which would illegalise methods of invasive protest (e.g. the obstruction of transport, the attaching of one person to another or an object). The Serious Disruptive Prevent Orders also means that anyone involved in one of these protests could be electronically tagged by the government, limiting their movements and associations with people.<\/p>\n

To me, it almost seems as if when you take away a person\u2019s right to protest disruptively and not listening to those who do protest only persecuting them, the number of disruptive protests only seems to increase.<\/p>\n

For example, following the events at the National Gallery, Italian protestors threw pea-soup at another Van Gogh painting and German protestors threw mashed potatoes at a Monet.<\/p>\n

\"pic<\/p>\n

So what do you think?<\/p>\n

Do you think that the Just Stop Oil <\/em>protestors were wrong?<\/p>\n

Is the prevention of disruptive protest a choice that will actually have the impact it claims to setting out to have?<\/p>\n

And to what extent do you think that the more people\u2019s rights the more they\u2019ll kick back?<\/p>\n

Thank you for reading – Mia Maron<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some call it a scandal. Some say it was unnecessary. Others say it was a clever political stunt and others aren\u2019t sure what to think. The events of October toyed with the minds of many but, on a large scale, what do they show? What would lead someone to do what these two young women […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2057,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issue-4","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2056"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2056\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2314,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2056\/revisions\/2314"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theview.boltonschool.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}