One could be forgiven for thinking that climate groups had been masterfully infiltrated by swathes of fossil fuel merchants. How else are we to make sense of the recent spate of climate protests involving the vandalism of iconic artworks in galleries throughout the Western world? When your marketing strategy mirrors that of an ISIS fighter destroying thousand-year-old artefacts in Mosul’s central museum, you might want to rethink the way you’re going about your business.
While some may make the argument that throwing a can of Heinz soup on van Gogh’s Sunflowers in London or gluing one’s hands to a Picasso in Melbourne is simply an effective method of drawing attention to your cause, most people see it as nothing more than petulant philistinism. You might think that plonking yourself in the middle of the freeway during the morning rush is a sure-fire way to convert the masses to your apocalyptic delusions, but to the average mum or dad trying to get to work or take the kids to school, the only real question in their minds is why on earth you hadn’t been told ‘no’ more in life.
One problem with the latest shenanigans of groups like Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion is that it causes people otherwise sympathetic to climate issues to become cynical and start to wonder if this whole thing is one giant game of cosplay of emotionally stunted social media addicts.
At a time when a broad consensus on the need to curb fossil fuel production and move towards renewable energy is forming across the political divide, it’s clear that those who think the world is ending tomorrow are starting to feel redundant. With voices more tethered to reality now framing the discussion, the eco-zealots have suddenly found themselves out of a job; the adults have turned up and the children are starting to grow restless twiddling their thumbs.
But perhaps their stated raison d’etre was always one big ruse. Maybe their attachment to the cause was never about ‘survival’ or the genuine belief in an impending ‘mass extinction’ but rather about themselves and the need to manufacture some form of meaning for their lives. Less about the dominance of fossil fuel monsters burning the planet and more about the dreariness of nothingness that fills their days; less about creating an inhabitable earth for future generations and more about creating a habitable consciousness for minds devoid of purpose
On this reading, the willingness to destroy cultural masterpieces takes on a different shape: by desecrating examples of human creativity and beauty and claiming that ‘life is worth more than art’, they can show off their towering moral stature. Sure, Picasso and van Gogh were decent artists but what did they ever do to save the earth from destruction? To these enviro-toddlers, art is nothing. Just an arbitrary splattering of paint that can be done away with to prove a point, or if their lucky, go viral.
This level of ignorance would be infuriating if it wasn’t so utterly sad. The behaviour of the green vandals is more a cry of relevance than one of existence. Their attack upon human expression and the triumph of the human spirit masks a deeply sorry defeatism. They’ve given up and decided it’s much easier to destroy the genius of others than it is to create something lasting of their own. Their belief in the impending extinction of the planet unless urgent action is taken isn’t something borne out of a sober analysis of the data, it’s a survival tactic and a justification for abdicating legitimate responsibilities. As much as they would love to dedicate themselves to the cultivation of talent, the learning of new skills, or volunteering to help the less fortunate, they’ve got bigger fish to fry. When you force yourself to believe that your actions may stave off mass extinction, you haven’t got time for trivialities like helping your neighbour, visiting your grandparents, or volunteering at a food shelter.
As much as these people deserve the condemnation, above all they need to be shown that life is beautiful and purposeful, and that throwing mashed potatoes at a Claude Monet painting won’t impact climate change one bit, in fact, it just convinces people you’re unhinged.
