‘Destructive action’ on climate only preaches to the converted

True passion for a cause can lead you to extreme behavior. But if the goal of protesters is to change hearts, minds, and inspire people to take drastic action, then should they be concerned about whether their actions are attracting the admiration and interest of those who remain convinced or just preaching to the converted?

Last week, Blockade Australia, an environmental activist group, held a meeting Protests in Sydney’s Botany Bay, climbing cranes and disrupting peak-hour traffic day after day. The group use what they call “destructive action” to try to disrupt, if only momentarily, the transport infrastructure around the coal industry. Burning coal and gas is the major cause of climate change and the major contributor to our country’s emissions.

I’m a late-in-life climate advocate who both deeply empathises with these protesters but also knows their efforts are largely ineffectual and may well be destructive – but not in a way that will help us move away from coal and gas and address the climate crisis.

Any social movement aiming at political and/or economic change, especially one that is confronted by the barriers and blockers the climate movement faces will not be granted their goals easily.

Protests and strikes are necessary to bring attention to our issues, put pressure on decision-makers, and chip away at the social license of an industry like fossil fuels. These disruptive measures could be the event that convinces people to get involved. Because of the passion and pleas made by the School Strikers, I became interested in the climate movement. I was a child when I realized that our environment was in peril because of the Franklin Dam protest. The news report about the protests by Lock the Gate, an anti-fracking group, was the first time I learned about the destructive effects of coal seam gases.

There are moments, though fleeting, when I have listened carefully to a climate scientist’s detailed account of the trajectory and implications of global warming. Or when I have watched my fellow Australian’s lives transformed by floods and fires. Or when I have heard some of our more powerful politicians talk about coal lasting as long as possible, building new coal and gas infrastructure and using taxpayers’ money to subsidise that. I am so frustrated at the decisions of some people responsible for the prosperity and well-being of our country in those moments that I feel an overwhelming sense frustration and anxiety. I board on desperation and think: I need glue to the Santos building.

Because – and let’s not forget it – if we were doing better on climate change these men and women wouldn’t feel compelled to be hanging from cranes at a port.

My research and other research on public attitudes towards climate change shows that Botany Bay events are not the people the climate movement needs. The survey data shows Australians who are alarmed on climate – who describe it as a crisis and are voting and consuming with climate in mind – are mostly progressive in their politics. Only a tiny percentage of Australians are conservative.