Camp for Climate Action 2010 – What’s Hot and What’s Not
Please note: This hot/not list is compiled by an arbitrary, self-selected group of random taste-mongers rather than any sort of official camp representative body. As such, it is intended as a light-hearted, subjective interpretation of what the camp was about. No knicker twisting, please.
HOT
• Location, location, location – In their backyard – best campsite yet – within a molassapult’s throw of the RBS HQ. Beautiful location and wonderful narrative of us and them. At one point at the national gathering at Lewes when RBS was decided on as the target, someone googled the HQ location and read out a lush description of the waterways and leafy surroundings. And everyone went ‘wahey!’ Wahey indeed.
• The molassapult – a giant three-person catapult – Great for smearing oil-like substances high up on the walls of corporate bad guys. And very much in keeping with the medieval siege motifs. Although someone from the media team got asked in a radio interview ‘what did we hope to achieve by flinging faeces on the side of the building’s walls?’
• Molasses in general – It has quickly become a de rigeur objet in the tool box of any climate agitator. Used to great effect in the Trojan pig dumped on the doorstop of arctic-defilers, Cairn Energy, and great to see their reach and impact amplified through the medium of fire-extinguishers.
• The Sunday Herald expose of RBS fossil fuel investments – Front page, three full pages inside, some great camp quotes and a thorough piece that was all about the ishoos. Great stuff.
• De-awrestling – Dearresting your mates is always sizzlingly hot. This year there seemed to be an extra dash of wrestling involved. Well done to the Hulk Hogans and Hoganettes out there who made this possible.
• Difficult discussions dealt with in a respectful and politically mature fashion – The plenary to discuss the disruption of the tar sands workshop started off feeling like it could have been an utter disaster of entrenched positions and ill-feeling, but in the end felt like it was resolved with a lot of understanding and respectful communication.
• The rhino and the siege tower –Why we don’t know, but they were hot. This medieval madness sapped a lot of energy on the day of action, but at least it seems to have provided a lot of hysterically-tinged mirth to an awful lot of people. And dealing with a slowly inching forward, rhino-fronted siege tower was obviously something that had not cropped up in any of the police training manuals.
• Rousers – Technically the whipping-up of a crowd from nowhere, using a sound system, coupled with the distribution of anonymising white biohazard suits. Used to great effect on the oh-so-near mass break-in to RBS HQ the day before the mass action day.
• Not a single shout of ‘Cops on Site’. Joyous.
• “Kent police paid for this” stickers – A light-hearted reference to the inspiring, on-going work by the legal team. What is even scorchingly hotter, is all the people who have received cash for illegal stop and searches at Kingsnorth, who are donating the money to cover the legal costs of people with ongoing, action-related court cases.
NOT HOT
• Cops in jeans – Creepily respectful, lurking in the woods, all evangelical smileyness with their ‘police liason’ jackets and desire ‘not to invade your personal space’. Totes ick.
• Severin Carell – The Guardian Scotland correspondent who was on a one-man mission to make out that poor RBS had been grossly misrepresented and is actually a bastion of renewables finance. People from the Rainforest Action Network did some number crunching to expose the lies that Sevie uncritically regurgitated.
• Lack of cosey dry spaces on site – On the one or two soggier days, it felt like ‘trench-cheeks’ was setting in. It was good to pare down the site structures a bit, but can we have somewhere warm and cosey to recover?
• Critiques of Climate Camp having ‘gone mainstream’. They clearly never saw the day of action, or the rouser the day before.
• 10.30 pm power curfew on the night after the mass action. Many needed to let off steam. Many did so in the shape of a Guns n’ Roses induced moshpit.
• Police lies about the ‘oil slick’ on the road – At Heathrow it was the supposed plans to make bomb threats, at Kingsnorth it was the ‘discovery’ of the weapons cache in the woods. The mystery oil slick that no one actually seems to have seen, nor have any details about, is the latest attempt to discredit the camp. A pity the media seemed to jump all over it too. People are on it with making the necessary challenges and enquiries about this very fishy business.
• EDL twitter stalkers – Lord knows why the Guardian wants to give them a platform.
Seconded about cops in jeans. All four of them wore jeans, as though chinos had also not been invented for the same ‘I’m lovely, normal, and in no way hierachically superior to you’ purpose. Bleurgh. Also, they all looked like they were made out of plastic and kept telling us how great we were. Double bleurgh.
G on August 31, 2010
Also another hot thing was how brilliant the music-making was – storming celidh, Lady Goga, a capella Queen, Diggers’ Songs and, oddly, the Magnetic Fields and Neutral Milk Hotel to charm the hi-vis hordes of the L&B Police. Nice work all.
DISGRACEFULLY you have made no mention of Professor Askim Lebowski, the fittest furry white activist professor rabbit from Betelgeuse that ever graced a patch of (privately-owned, publicly occupied) grass….
G on August 31, 2010
Hot
The sight of a load of damp dejected dole-scroungers leaving…….
Not
The casual mob violence and lame childish antics.
Edinburger on September 1, 2010
If any dole-scroungers want to contribute to my “day in the life of…” column project please send your ideas to
Notts. of Love,
BAD
Bob A. Dole on September 1, 2010
To add to the NOT section:
Those same blue-jeans clad liaison officers piling in fist-blazing during the Rouser.. Didn’t mind invading our ‘personal space’ in the heat of the moment..
S on September 1, 2010
“Rouser” – oh, you mean Breach of the Peace…..
Edinburger on September 1, 2010
Hot
The way the whole camp worked together, green energy, toilets, food preparation etc and those willing to risk a financial loss to ensure this all happened. Well done everybody.
Not
The press, not having any of the predicted ‘riot porn’ to sell their scandal sheets, jumping on the police lies of ‘protesters spreads oil on road’, and wallowing it hook line and sinker.
Also those bigots with minds made up without even visiting CC, who blogged that CC doing so was ‘attempted murder of the innocent. And the references to ‘dole scrounging, unwashed, soap-dodging etc etc Yawn) again with no substantiation. BORING!
Camper on September 2, 2010
If only you all knew what you had caused… As I doubt any of you have jobs at all… not to mention that it has done NOTHING to change the public image especially throwing golf balls at buildings…
NOTHING BUT THUGS WITHOUT JOBS… ENGLISH IN THE MOST OF IT!!!
Every single one of you should have been arrested… the video of the branch where the old man is struggling to get his pension because of you lot is absolutely shocking!!
against Climate Camp on September 2, 2010
against Climate Camp –
You ignorant, foolish creature. Most of us were prepared for arrest in the first place (“if you’re not being arrested, you ain’t doing shit in this world”!). I’d even booked extra time of work (for which I most probably get paid far more than your sorry, illiterate arse) to ensure that I’d be bailed in time. Golf balls, schmolf balls. Utter tosh. If you’d have had any balls of your own you’d have come along to see the camp first hand, instead of idly slinging misinformed insults from the comfort of your armchair. Put down the Sun and read a f*ckin book.
ready for arrest (for the greater good) on September 2, 2010
abercrombie fitch Cloak cloak plus, abercrombie mens this is the last century, abercrombie clothing the typical 20′s style dress coat, this style of dress will be next year’s fashions. One cocoon-shaped jackets, sleeveless design coat, uniform style jackets and shawls are all autumn and winter coat the forefront of style. Exaggerated costumes will come back: mountain-like profile, shawl-like collar, exaggerated jewelry … … If in the future You see this style of clothes shopping Do not be surprised. In addition, abercrombie store bizarre illustration style patterns, plaid will be popular abercrombie usa.
http://www.aberclombie.com/abercrombie-shop.html
aberclombie on September 3, 2010
Our version:
HOT
Location Location Location
Suprising the cops (again and again)
Arousings and white coveralls
The Siege Tower and tin foil armour
Adders and frogs
The Brick Shit House *
Molassess and giant catapults
Oily Gaga
The monday night Mosh Pit
NOT
10:30 power down on monday night!!!
Slugs and midges
*Saw dust blowing up your arse
Single skin tents (pop up)
Mark Vallee, J Warren and other parasites
Vegan Custard Cake
Shitting in the urinals
Stupid bail conditions
Another lot on September 3, 2010
“2008 – Failed”
Kingsnorth was very much going ahead at one time. It was the pressure put on government and Eon by many groups of people, including climate camp, which led to the current situation. The new government are wobbling,so more pressure is being applied.
“2009 – Failed”
This web site lists six events in the UK 2009. Tell us which of them failed and why.
“2010 – Failed”
It doesn’t look like it to me, no matter how loudly people shout otherwise.
John on September 5, 2010
Not one of the ‘Hot’ bits states how you made any difference to climate change or RBS policies.
The piece comes over like the sort of thing that would be printed by a style mag about the summer festivals – What’s hot: Fur-lined wellies, What’s not: mud, errggh!!! (you get my drift).
Where is the line that says ‘forced RBS to reconsider investing in Tar Sands?’ or ‘inspired a major media debate on the need for ethical banking practices’. These aren’t mentioned because they didn’t happen. I’m not against your cause, but you’re putting a lot of effort into something that is not having any impact.
(And before you say it, the Herald is NOT a major national newspaper, it sells about 55k copies, mostly in the West of Scotland, it is generally unavailable South of Carlisle).
Just to point out... on September 5, 2010
If only campaigns ran in Internet time, or problems could be solved as quickly as in films or television programmes. That would be great.
Unfortunately campaigns in the real world take a lot longer. Climate camp put pressure on the bank about tar sands, but this is just part of a whole series of pressures which will, I hope, persuade them to change their minds in the end.
Climate camp never claimed that as soon as they set up the camp the bankers would say, “oh dearie dearie me, we were wrong about tar sands, lets uninvest in them this afteronnon.”
John on September 6, 2010
“Climate camp put pressure on the bank about tar sands, but this is just part of a whole series of pressures which will, I hope, persuade them to change their minds in the end.”
sorry, that’s just not how things work in the real world.
Instead of playing at gween tewwowism, why not purchase some shares in RBS and take part in a democratic process.
Edinburger on September 6, 2010
Hello, I wonder why people are saying here that the 10.30 power down on Monday was not hot. If you mean that it ended at 10.30, and you wanted it to keep going, then you didn’t go to the camp, because it went on until 1am.
If you mean that music going on until 1am on Monday night (ie Tuesday morning) was the problem, I agree. It was turned off at 1am, but then came on again later, albeit at a lower volume.
Tracy on September 7, 2010
“why not purchase some shares in RBS and take part in a democratic process.”
Already done, thank you. Organisations like WDM http://www.wdm.org.uk/scotland and FoES http://foe-scotland.org.uk/cleanupRBS have been doing this for years.
Climate Camp does not exist in a vacuum. It is not the only part of the campaign for living within our means.
Thank you again for your advice, but people thought of the shares approach a long time ago. How democratic shareholders meetings are is another question, especially when 84% of the shareholders are not really represented.
John on September 11, 2010
“Already done, thank you. Organisations like WDM http://www.wdm.org.uk/scotland and FoES http://foe-scotland.org.uk/cleanupRBS have been doing this for years.”
Have they had any influence on RBS policies – no – why not – because they’re just a teensy weeny (but shrill) group, too small to even be counted as a minority.
How many people voted green at the last elections? – about half the number who voted for the BNP!
That’s how relevant the green movement is……
Edinburger on September 17, 2010