Activists to take climate crisis message to streets

Police in London, England, are bracing this week for a repeat of the havoc unleashed last spring when the environmental group Extinction Rebellion paralyzed the city to demand urgent action on the climate emergency.

Protesters blocked train lines, glued themselves to the doors of the stock exchange and barricaded Oxford Circus with a boat. More than 1,000 people were arrested and law-enforcement operations cost 16 million pounds ($26.2 million Canadian), according to the Guardian.

Now London Police are redeploying officers from other departments, training specialists in removing protesters, making everyone work 12-hour shifts and preventively arresting 10 activists on the eve of a redux. This is Rebellion Week in cities like London, Paris, Berlin, Sydney — and Montreal.

Activists here say they have a couple of surprises up their sleeve. But will it be anything on the scale of London or even akin to what Montrealers experienced during the Maple Spring?

Extinction Rebellion has been training volunteers willing to risk arrest during non-violent direct action. But Louis Ramirez, the Quebec chapter’s communications coordinator, said much of this week will be festive.

Tuesday they will hand out birthday cake at Place du Canada to “celebrate” one year since the International Panel on Climate Change released a landmark report warning that the devastating consequences of global warming will be felt sooner and at a lower temperature than previously anticipated.

And there will be a series of “slow swarms,” including one in pyjamas. This is when activists congregate in an intersection and cross together on the green light — like a flash mob, but with existential angst. It’s considered a soft action and not meant to be particularly disruptive.

But Extinction Rebellion’s MO is to disrupt — albeit peacefully.

While London activists’ recent attempt to douse the Treasury Department in fake blood sprayed from an old fire truck went spectacularly awry, the Quebec chapter’s most radical action was a die-in back in July. Members laid down in the intersection of McGill College Ave. and Sherbrooke St. on a Saturday afternoon, resulting in 25 arrests.

Extinction Rebellion’s MO is also to be polite, even apologetic, during activities that could annoy the public, especially drivers stuck in traffic.

“We’re prepared to be disruptive, but then we take mitigating actions,” Ramirez said. “We put out flyers right after to say ‘Sorry ... but this is a climate emergency.’ “

The group started in the U.K. a little more than a year ago, adopting messaging previously considered heretical, right down to its name. Whereas scientists and environmentalists once feared scaring people about a grim future in a warmer world, stark realism is Extinction Rebellion’s main ethos.

“You have to draw a fine line between scaring people and lying to them,” Ramirez said.

It’s a strategy that has caught on with other activists, too, during the last year, most notably young Swedish activist Greta Thunberg with her exhortation “to panic.” Local newbie environmental groups like Pacte pour la Transition and La Planète s’invite au Parlement speak in these dire terms. And alarm seems to be getting through to people in a way caution didn’t: Thunberg helped draw 500,000 people to a historic climate march in Montreal on Sept. 27.

Where Extinction Rebellion and its allies part ways is on tactics — although La Planète s’invite au Parlement saluted the

“courage and determination” of those willing to put their bodies on the line. Extinction Rebellion is founded on the theory that if enough people disrupt the system, states are left with two choices: allow or repress.

“As we scale up our civil disobedience in Quebec, we’re trying to toy with this dynamic,” Ramirez said.

London seemed to allow the mayhem back in April. Mayor Sadiq Khan, no climate slouch, met with members of Extinction Rebellion and vowed to do more to fight the climate emergency. Now the city is switching to repress, with Khan accusing the group of diverting police resources from crime and the pre-emptive arrests.

Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante, a champion of the environment, may find herself similarly torn if Rebellion Week gets out of hand here.

Montrealers who poured into the streets by the hundreds of thousands Sept. 27 may also have their patience tested if activists promoting a cause they support inconvenience their daily lives.

Extinction Rebellion doesn’t see alienating the public as a risk.

“Whether or not people are ready doesn’t really matter. This is about what’s necessary,” Ramirez insisted.

But for a movement seeking to foment peaceful civil disobedience on a massive scale, a lot is riding on whether they win over or turn off Montrealers.