Three individuals targeted National Gallery paintings an hour after Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland were jailed for similar attack in 2022
Climate activists have thrown tomato soup over two Sunflowers paintings by Vincent van Gogh, just an hour after two others were jailed for a similar protest action in 2022.
Three supporters of Just Stop Oil walked into the National Gallery in London, where an exhibition of Van Gogh’s collected works is on display, at 2.30pm on Friday afternoon, and threw Heinz soup over Sunflowers 1889 and Sunflowers 1888.
The latter was the same work targeted by Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland in 2022. That pair are now among 25 supporters of Just Stop Oil in jail for climate protests.
Evidence suggests that disruptive protests actually help, rather than hinder organisations like JSO:
It’s all about raising awareness and facilitating discussions.
Meanwhile petrol companies are doing everything they can to smother protests: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/26/anti-protest-laws-fossil-fuel-lobby
Consider who gains the most from perpetuating the idea that JSO are the bad guys…
only 30% thought disruptive tactics were effective for issues with high awareness but low support
Nicely cherry-picked.
69% of experts thought that disruptive tactics were effective for issues (like climate change) that have high public awareness and support. For issues with high awareness but low support (like anti-vaccination), only 30% thought disruptive tactics were effective.
Lucky JSO are about the former, not the latter.
If they have such high public support why doesn’t the public vote accordingly?
You’d have to live under a rock to not be aware of climate change. If you do live under a rock, you wouldn’t hear about some dumbasses throwing soup in an art gallery.
If you know about climate change, but don’t care about climate change, a stupid act like this is not going to change their mind. Nothing will.
High profile protests like this keep the matter of climate change in the spotlight. They prevent it being brushed under the rug by other events and ensure it remains on the political radar. Maybe you’re right in that if you don’t care about climate change JSO are unlikely to change your mind, but if they help to convert even a handful of people, or at least encourage conversations on the topic that they weren’t having before, that’s a win.