Climate Camp (not) in the Media

As I write this more than a hundred activists are winding their way through Edinburgh to a temporary camp set up next to the headquarters of RBS. It is of course, this year’s Camp for Climate Action, aka Climate Camp, who are targeting the taxpayer-owned bank for their funding of tar sands extraction in Canada. Up to a thousand activists are eventually expected to join the camp which will likely act as a springboard for other affinity group demonstrations and actions. I’d be there myself if I wasn’t brassic at the moment.

While the camp is brimming with activists it seems to be lacking in media attention. This time last year newspapers and TV news stations couldn’t get enough of the camp, which then targeted Blackheath for incursions into the City of London. Today, the story is buried in the Guardian’s environment pages, which is surprising considering the attention lavished on Climate Camp last year, while both Sky and BBC neglect to grace the action with any coverage.

So why is there barely a ripple in the media this year? To start with, I was taking part in the camp last year, so maybe my views of its coverage are somewhat skewed compared to this year, but I distinctly remember there being a tangible excitement at the Blackheath camp; the Guardian was even liveblogging it.

Here’s some ideas I’ve had:

Police Brutality

Last year’s camp followed in the wake of the death of Ian Tomlinson and righteous indignation at the behaviour of police during the G20 protests, as well as the arrests at Ratcliffe. Blackheath was to be the first test of the police’s new ‘community’ approach to dealing with large scale demonstrations. All eyes were turned to London to see how the Met would cope and no doubt many in news orgs were hoping for some head bashing to spice up their reports. (Of course, this failed to materialise). On another note, it will be interesting to see how the police do behave this time round, given that media spotlight is focused elsewhere and it’s a different force.

Environmentalism as a Fad

Climate change and other environmental issues were hot topics last year as we built up to Copenhagen in December. Summits, reports, conferences, demonstrations etc. were ten a penny. Since the damp squib that was Copenhagen it’s almost as though such issues have dropped off the radar, perhaps replaced – in the UK at least – by a focus on the new government and their drive to cut everything that moves.

London-centric Media

That bit of the country outside the M25 may as well be somewhere foreign to a media obsessed with the capital. Hell, Scotland practically is foreign to our national newspapers! Making the trek up to Edinburgh to cover a protest is maybe a bit much to ask, but then again there are plenty of people already there for Fringe. Furthermore, last year’s camp was right on the doorstep of most journalists, just a short tube/DLR/bus ride away – it was begging to be covered in as much detail as it was.

A-Level Results Day

This is always top story, maybe it was a bit of a balls up to swoop on the same day lots of pretty young girls flood the press and 24-hour news? But saying that, even the environment pages are giving little coverage to the camp.

Media Mistreatment

The handling of the media at Blackheath was a little authoritarian, as I criticised in a blog post at the time. In one isolated case a photographer was even assaulted by a camper. Saying that though, the media still had freedom to explore the camp and the policies espoused by the camp weren’t rigorously enforced. It would take a journalist with a very thin skin to be put off reporting the camp this year. Moreover, actions like Climate Camp feed on the oxygen of publicity provided by national media. Perhaps a more accurate criticism may be a weak courting of the national media this time around. It’s hard for me to say not being involved this time, but where have the press releases and videos etc. been this year?

Protest as Irrelevant

There may be some weight behind this. For all the protests and demonstrations last year, it would seem very little was achieved at Copenhagen in particular. But on the other hand, Kingsnorth has been ditched and, likewise, the third runway at Heathrow. Furthermore, it was these protest movements that helped draw to people’s attention the behaviour of police, not just at demonstrations but year round as evident in the targeting of ‘domestic extremists’. Climate Camp is also incredibly mediagenic (if that’s a word), being the kind of middle class, ‘good’ protesters that the Guardian and its ilk swoon over.

(Last two ideas via @andyvglnt)

I myself have become somewhat disillusioned with such types of protest lately, especially since Copenhagen and find myself questioning their role in wider environment campaigns. What is certainly true though is that they rely massively on the media for growth and publicity for their causes, and this seems to be lacking this time. I sound like I’m writing the camp off before it’s even begun but it strikes me as strange the current media silence and it would certainly be interesting to compare the media coverage this year to that of 2009 to see what activists can learn from it.

Anyhow, I wish Climate Camp the best of luck!

Gasland: What the frack?

A recently released documentary is shedding light on the potential dangers of an oil and gas drilling technique called hydraulic fracturing, also known as ‘fracking’.

The process is used extensively in wells across the United States and basically involves pumping vast quantities of chemically treated water deep underground forcing the shales to fracture, thus enabling the extraction of oil and gas.

Questions over its safety have arisen with claims that drinking water has been contaminated in various places across many states close to operations which use the technique. There are also accounts of houses exploding following gas leaks and, in one mind-bending example of its potential dangers, as featured in the film and trailer above, water running from a tap is set alight.

Such questions have led the New York State Senate to pass, by a large majority, a bill imposing a moratorium on drilling in the state until next year. According to the text of the bill:

…by far the biggest concern is water safety. The large withdrawals of water required for hydrofracking could disrupt surface and ground water ecosystems, and improper management of drilling and hydrofracking chemicals, drilling waste, and wastewater could pollute surface water and/or groundwater. Given the complexities of the environmental and policy issues under consideration, the need for a one year suspension on the permitting process for development of natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale formation cannot be overstated. This will allow for a thorough, deliberate and unrushed analysis of all factors involved.

The bill is yet to be passed by state Governor Patterson, but in an interview last week he claimed that drilling won’t be allowed until there is overwhelming evidence that it’s safe. A similar moratorium already exists in Santa Fe, New Mexico. In the meantime, the Enviroment Protection Agency is undertaking two simultaneous studies into hydraulic fracturing.

Despite the contention, the practice (pioneered by Halliburton) has long been exempt from many regulatory acts. The 2005 Energy Bill included a loophole preventing it from being regulated by the Clean Water Act. It’s also exempt from numerous other acts including the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and the Clean Air Act.

I’m no expert on the subject, having only found out about it this afternoon (via @caspertk) but it’s certainly a hot topic. In fact, it’s such a big issue in the States that a public hearing in New York has had to be postponed until they can find a bigger venue.

The main questions seem to focus on the risk of gases and/or chemicals from the water used in the fracking process leaking into acquifers and therefore contaminating drinking water. ProPublica have documented numerous cases of methane ‘migrating’ underground, often contaminating drinking water which also brings with it the risk of explosion, as occurred with a house in Ohio.

The report (PDF; see p47) which covered the Ohio explosion concluded that although the fracking process was a contributory factor to the migration of gas, no fluids were found to have leaked from the well. However, numerous other cases have leaked chemicals elsewhere, including benzene being found in the well water drunk by a rancher in Colorado.

Opponents point out though that the composition of the fluids is a closely guarded secret which makes it difficult to track its movement. Halliburton threatened to pull its (lucrative) operations out of Colorado were it forced to reveal which chemicals it uses, though I guess it’s a secret formula they wouldn’t want to share with other companies.

Still, it would appear that serious questions remain over the inherent dangers of hydraulic fracturing and drilling in general, as evident with the numerous cases in Pennslyvania. This appears to be the crux of the problem at the moment, that nobody quite knows what the possible effects are. With little regulation of the industry either, it is hard to be sure that companies are taking the correct procedures to safeguard against risk. Until this can be taken into account and safe practice set out for hydraulic fracturing, opponents argue that such practice should cease and it’s a campaign that seems to be gathering steam if New York is anything to go by.

• Find out more about Gasland at the film’s website.

‘Never’ trust a cop?

Quelle surprise, the officer who shoved Ian Tomlinson to the ground shortly before his death has escaped facing any charges. The CPS have played judge and jury and decided there’s no case to be heard. That decision will likely be discussed on blogs elsewhere and I’ll leave it alone for the time being, but for me personally, it underlines problems with trust and confidence in the system to hold itself to account.

‘Never’ trust a cop was a tad strong. Perhaps I should add: “until they earn it”.

I know there are thousands of good cops and they’re simply being let down by the few bad eggs, I said as much at the time of the G20 last year but institutionally prejudices exist. You only have to look at the treatment of Muslims at the Gaza protests in 2009 or the labeling of protesters as ‘domestic extremists’ to get a glimpse of it.

From my own experiences with the police, which include being kettled, harassed, stopped and searched, demonised and, in Copenhagen, arrested in an unwarranted raid, I can’t personally trust an officer from the outset. Given the dim view they – as an establishment – take to people like me (ie, those who have the audacity to go to a protest) I think I’d be pretty naive to place faith in an unknown officer.

We’ve seen time and again officers get away with, well, murder. And on a lesser level, there are many tales of officers taking the law into their own hands regarding street photography despite clarifications from the Met and the Home Office. So it’s no surprise that many people, myself included, feel we currently live in a period where there is little faith in the system to hold the police to account. If I find myself in a situation with a police officer and am somehow wronged by them, I fear the chances of me righting that wrong are slim to none. It’s unfortunate, but that’s how it is at the moment. In my opinion therefore, I think it would be pragmatic of me to treat an unknown officer with some caution and to hold off placing my trust in them until they’ve earned it.

This doesn’t mean I’ll be belligerent and obstructive with every new officer I meet. Of course not; I’ll behave with a basic level of courtesy and civility. But in terms of entrusting them, at the moment, I just can’t do that, not until this culture of impunity disappears.

• See also: Confidence and the police

Rules shmules

So in London, the US embassy continue to avoid paying the congestion charge (the total now stands at £3,821,880 in unpaid fines) with the Russians also getting in on the act having refused to pay a further £3,204,990 to Transport for London.

Further, dozens more diplomats have escaped prosecution or investigation for a number of serious offences including drink driving and allegations of human trafficking, respectively. All thanks to ‘diplomatic immunity’.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, where governments are convening to discuss how best to screw us over at their self-elected cabal known as the G20, more than 500 protesters and non-protesters have been arrested, including two National Post journalists trying to document the police operation.

I can’t help but think something has gone awry…

New film about activism in the UK

Just received an interesting email about a new documentary on activism in the UK which is looking for help with funding.

Left Field Films is producing an exciting new documentary film on climate change and is asking for your help to get it completed. Just Do It looks into the mischievous and risky world of UK climate activists. The story follows Climate Camp, Plane Stupid and Climate Rush through 2009 as they take on the combined forces of global capitalism, run away climate change and those pesky metropolitan police.

The film is currently being produced by a crew of volunteers, film professionals, and award-winning Director Emily James. Emily is well known for her innovative style, prompting the Guardian to write, “Emily James is a genius,… and will in time be revered as a television innovator”, and the Broadcast magazine called her “One of the ‘Hottest Talents in Town’”.

What is really special about this film is that it is completely non-commercial. Rather than selling it to broadcasters and cinemas, the plan is to give the film away for free under a Creative Commons license. In this way the film’s production and release will reflect the culture and spirit of the movement it portrays, and ensures that as many people as possible can see it and be inspired to take action on climate change.

The obvious implication of this model is that the production costs need to be raised in advance, as there wont be an income from sales. So, if this is the kind of film you would like to see, put your money where your mouth is and help to make it a reality.

After BP, new attitudes will be tested by Chevron ruling

_{Photo by 350.org}

‘Poor’ BP is getting it in the neck right now with the US Senate announcing its intention to fine the oil company way more than first estimated for the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe.

Leaving aside questions over whether the US is trying to squeeze BP until the pips squeak or if the bill simply represents real costs, it certainly seems that American politicians have woken up to the grim realities of “Drill, Baby Drill!”.

So much so, in fact, that Obama has compared the spill’s impact to that of 9/11. Not in so far as equating BP with Islamic extremists, as some people have somehow grasped, but in terms of the impact the ‘rare’ event will have on particular policy in the US.

Already, further exploration and exploitation has been put on hold, but perhaps one of the key tests of Obama’s new attitude will be the unfolding situation in Ecuador, where iconic American brand Chevron is desperately trying to pull the plug on a multi-billion dollar lawsuit against itself for wreaking havoc in the Amazon.

During the late 20th century oil giant Texaco treated the rainforest like their own waste disposal unit. Now Chevron, who bought Texaco in 2001, are fighting off claims for reparations from thousands of affected Ecuadorians whose lives and environment have been destroyed.

It looks almost certain that Chevron will be hit with a bill for damages that could wipe up to a fifth off of their market value, leading the company to increasingly desperate efforts to weasel out of their impending doom.

But what will American legislators make of any such decision? Efforts by Chevron to undermine the Ecuadorian judicial system by taking the case to international arbitration suggest they seem hellbent on avoiding any kind of compensation deal.

If this is the case, then it’s going to take a worldwide effort to force Chevron to cough up, including much needed support in the US where energy industry lobbyists exert strong influences on media and government. Will the shift in environmental policy uphold the will of other nations or will imperialist attitudes prevail?

Clegg’s Constitutional Changes

So Clegg has declared his intention to “shake-up” our democracy with reforms he equates to a “big bang”. Not only do the plans fail to match ‘recent’ obvious reform such as giving women the vote, I struggle to see how they come close to any kind of deep reform worthy of such rhetoric.

Overturning intrusions on our civil liberties such as ID cards and the DNA and Contact Point databases are undoubtedly welcome, but to suggest they are part of some great shake-up of democracy is fallacious. In some cases the reforms merely mean restrictions. Further, they shouldn’t have been introduced in the first place; their removal is nothing more than setting the record straight, a system restore to an earlier date. Their professing of more liberty to the people is also hard to square with Theresa May announcement to give police more powers to press charges.

Nor does a partially-elected second chamber constitute major reform. Indeed, it is a step forward, but hardly one giant leap for British-kind that Clegg’s rhetoric suggests, especially when there appear to be plans afoot to fill the Lords with Tory and Lib Dem peers.

As for electoral reform, we know the AV system is not as sweeping a change as full PR, but neither, in the current context, does it represent “a major step forward that would break decades of deadlock over voting reform”. The hunger for reform following the results of the election surely meant deadlock was going to be non-existent on this particular issue, reform of some description was ‘inevitable’. The 55% rule too is another example of window dressing on Clegg’s behalf. Apart from not being included in either coalition party’s manifestos, making it more difficult for MPs to try and dissolve Parliament is nothing to shout about.

As far as I can tell, what we are actually left with is unclear announcements on reform to donors and the ability to recall corrupt MPs. I’m struggling to understand how we will be given more control over the power of the state. In the same week that the right-to-strike was undermined, trade union powers were absent from his rhetoric, while a transparent government, for example, is not a mechanism to exercise control. It’s not so much a big bang as a damp squib.

Why I Joined the Labour Party

At the weekend I joined the Labour party. For many of you this may come as a shock. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve spat venom about Labour-this and Labour-that as the last government trod all over our civil liberties and disappeared up its own arse on countless other policy occasions. I still have a folder of unpublished blog posts written in exasperation at Labour’s efforts to square capitalism with socialism.

Despite this, they’re perhaps the only major force the left can have any hope in, if that makes sense. I’m more closely allied to the Greens than Labour, but are the former really in any position to oust the Tories anytime soon, especially with firm electoral reform still pretty far away? While I’d love to see this country morph into a giant Zapatista-style commune, it isn’t going to happen anytime soon, so I’m going to have be pragmatic about how I can help fight the right.

Many people have told me to join Labour and try change things from the inside, but most of the time, I can’t stand party politics. Rather than get on with doing right by the people, partisan bickering brinkmanship and sniping clouds debates and discussions. There’s too much politics within parties themselves and power relationships that the autonomist in me feels entirely uncomfortable with, especially when there are other ways to become involved in politics, such as Climate Camp or the Open Rights Group.

So, baring this in mind, why have I joined? To be honest, I’m not quite sure myself, it just sort of happened, but I think it comes down to one thing: fear of the Tories. I can’t stand the thought of society being ruined as we lurch even further to the right. Don’t get me wrong, Labour helped bring us to this point (not that I ignore many of the welcome social policies they implemented) but – please! – we have got to stop this pursuit of unbridled capitalism.

Now, I’m not naive enough to think Labour are a silver bullet. One of my key criticisms of Labour in recent years has been the usurping of the cause by the continued existence of the party. What is the party if it has nothing to believe in or fight for? I see the next few years as an opportunity for the left to find its feet again and reconnect with its core, and herein lies an opportunity for staunch lefties to try and exert some influence on Labour. This links back to what I said at first, that they’re perhaps the only realistic option in putting an end to Tory government.

So I’ve tentatively joined the party. I don’t feel comfortable with it and I don’t really know what my ‘game plan’ is. I’m not accepting Labour on its current terms; that definitely isn’t why I’ve joined. I have my core principles and ethics which I refuse to sell out or compromise on. I guess I’ll take things as they come and hope I, and many others, can try and nudge Labour back to the left, to less authoritarian and more equitable terms. Hopefully I can help inject some of the introspection and self-criticism into the party which is sorely needed.

At some point maybe I’ll draw together some kind of criteria which I think Labour should satisfy in order for me to remain a member (like Gordon’s economic tests, ha!). And if I feel like these things aren’t possible, that it’s going to be more of the same, then I’ll have absolutely no qualms about canceling my membership.

I guess you could call it a marriage of convenience; I don’t know what to call it. I’m just trying to do right by my principles, trying to help change society for the better and maybe this move will help. I can but only try and I guess I’ll find out soon enough.

Representation in the Cabinet

One of the key talking points of the new coalition government is the lack of women or ethnic minorities in the new cabinet.

While it really is a disgrace, I think ire is perhaps being directed at the wrong target.

The thing is, both the Lib Dems and Conservative parliamentary parties are lacking in female and ethnic minority MPs, which is undoubtedly going to have an effect on the composition of the cabinet.

If the Tories and Lib Dems had better representation across their parties and still Cameron had selected such a cabinet, then quite rightly these selections should be criticised.

But without meaning to sound like an apologist for the two parties, I think this is to take our eye off the ball. That we have a white, middle-class male cabinet is indeed a shitty thing, but calling for more representation in it doesn’t really tackle the root problem, which is this lack of representation at MP level.

Twitter and the election

Twitter has been bothering me the past few days. I can’t quite put my finger on it, so excuse me if the following sounds a bit jumbled, but my feelings go a little something like this…

A few days ago, I tweeted that “If anything, this #ge2010 I’ve learned that twitter is worse than rolling news. Moves too quickly for actual events, can’t sustain itself.”

I saw somebody, I forget who, tweet that the German media, long used to covering coalition negotiations in their own government, were taken aback by the impatience of our media who were making talking points out of nothing. (See the ridiculous helicopter coverage of party leaders being driven around).

It wasn’t just the traditional media that were hankering for something tasty to talk about, so too were many people online.

My thinking was, and still is, that in the absence of actual developments in such a tense situation as a hung parliament, people on twitter only hear what they want to hear and willfully misinterpret or make inferences of other people’s comments. Admittedly, this only comes from the people I was following myself, but these people cut across all political persuasions as did the type of behaviour I’m writing about.

This led to petty and reactionary squabbling over minor points or people simply airing their thoughts and pondering out loud. Reason and rational thought seemed to fly out the window as people struggled to have their voices and opinions heard over everybody else. All the while nothing was happening or actually being constructed in real life, away from the internet.

It was, simply put, a deluge of speculation. People were going round in circles of non-existent opprobrium, contributing to a gigantic mess of ‘debate’. And it was all rather off-putting if truth be told.

That was before negotiations for a new government came to a disappointing close but I still stand by it. Moreover, I still think it’s pertinent even after things came to a conclusion.

Now, my twitter stream is full of people expressing their dismay at the situation in a giant anti-Tory echo chamber. That’s all well and good, I have nothing against that, but after you’ve seen the same sentiment for the 100th time it starts to get boring.

I now find myself in a strange position where I don’t feel like I have anything worthwhile to contribute to the ‘discussion’; much of what I feel has already been said. I tweeted that it was simply “ineffective fury”. By this I mean fury that has no direction, no actual target. OK, the Tories are now in power, but it doesn’t actually mean anything yet as we’re yet to see this power manifest itself.

This differs from occasions such as Trafigura or Jan Moir, where wrongs had clearly been committed and twitter united to right them. Until there are policies and proposals that we can actually physically fight, all we have at the moment is a rather abstract idea of somebody being in power that we don’t like, but with no real idea how to go about fighting it, leaving us with a public sphere in which people may as well just be shouting into an empty room.

I realise I’m making massive generalisations here. There has been the odd nugget of reason with people pointing out logical flaws or bringing others back down to earth. Still, I feel like twitter has become a beacon of impotent rage for the time being. Until this rage calms down, people begin to see the bigger picture and realise that being angry on the internet isn’t always the best prescription, I’m going to resist jumping into the melee and quietly contemplate what can be done offline instead.