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What would you do on a sunny British afternoon to help save the planet? If you are an entitled Just Stop Oil protester, you target something to spray with orange paint – their favorite color.
On June 19th, the chosen target was the historic Stonehenge monument, a prehistoric megalithic structure on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England. Two activists have been arrested on suspicion of damaging some of the stones at the ancient site.
One of the people behind the stunt and arrested earlier today is Niamh Lynch from Birmingham, a 21-year-old Poundland version of Harry Potter and a student at the University of Oxford.
“Stonehenge at solstice is all about celebrating the natural world – but look at the state it’s in! We all have a right to live a life free from suffering, but continued burning of oil, coal and gas is leading to death and suffering on an unparalleled scale,” said the activist in a video posted on the Just Stop Oil Twitter account to inform their cult of followers.
Her partner in crime was Rajan Naidu, 73. Video footage posted on social media showed both of them wearing white shirts with the slogan “Just Stop Oil,” approaching the monoliths with canisters and spraying orange powder paint.
The action may have gained media attention, but the public is far from supporting the actions of Just Stop Oil, a group known for disrupting traffic and attacking artworks in the name of climate change.
“Mandatory psychoanalysis for anyone who feels compelled to throw paint on artworks or at heritage sites,” suggested Nina Power, Senior Editor at Compact Magazine.
Science fiction author C. R. Walton suggested that the disgruntled vandals should find cleverer ways to get their point across: “Defacing shared cultural heritage is shameful. Stonehenge belongs to everyone. It is not a canvas for activism. What might be more effective is convincing people with compelling logical argument and data.”
And Madrid-based Spanish writer Alejandro Suárez Basso didn’t mince his words expressing what would be suitable to punish the activists behind the Stonehenge damages:
“I hope they rot in jail”
The stones at Stonehenge (which are protected under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act) have multiple rare lichen growing on them, which are also protected species.
“At around noon, we responded to a report that orange paint had been sprayed on some of the stones by two suspects.
Officers attended the scene and arrested two people on suspicion of damaging the ancient monument.
Our enquiries are ongoing, and we are working closely with English Heritage,” the Wiltshire Police said in a statement released earlier today.
Some Twitter user shared humoured suggestions about how the Police should deal with the pair caught spraying
Warrington-born Alan Horn tweeted: “Make them clean it up, with tooth brushes,” whereas Royalist Naomi Ripley left a length reply to Naimh:
“Dear Naimh, Personally I would give you a toothbrush and make you stand there and brush it all off. You see child (and you are a child) you have no right to deface those stones. You have an opinion and that is fine but no opinion is able to be given using criminal damage. Grow up and you know what.. GET A JOB. and do something useful for society. I hope your parents are ashamed of you, I would be.”
Twitter/X user Duncan McDonald expressed his views and why he is not supporting Just Stop Oil:
“Well unless Naimh walked naked from Oxford to Stone Henge without anything about her person, I can’t but help think that everything used from the start of the journey to the conclusion of lobbing of orange shit all over the ancient monument involved oil, from the transport, clothes worn, glasses, mobile phone and all the tech to record this vandalism, even the package containing the orange shit and probably the orange shit itself. Until these arseholes supporting this idiotic protest mechanism stop using oil themselves, I won’t take them seriously at all. Only when they live their lives by embracing a policy of not using ANYTHING that has oil in it or used oil in its manufacturing process in any way can anyone take them seriously. Until then it’s just an exceptionally ironic annoyance that they are causing. So come on Just Stop Oil, show the world how to live without using oil, in EVERY aspect of your lives. Come on, eat your own dog food, practice what you preach, I challenge you to do it. And I bet you any money you like, once all your uneducated knuckle dragging followers realise what they would have to give up, they would immediately stop supporting your cause. Which is why I bet you are so economical with the truth to them. Just be honest, explain that all tech uses oil in its manufacturing processes. Manufactured clothing, the same, glasses and lenses, medicines, food, books and paper, the internet, you name it; oil is involved in it somewhere along the line.
This is not the first time that Just Stop Oil has angered the public instead of getting people on their side to fight global warming. The group managed to shut down key roads such as the M25 and Dartford Crossing in November 2022. They also disturbed major sports events, including the Wimbledon tennis championships, and had supporters throw tomato soup over Vincent Van Gogh’s painting “Sunflowers” at the National Gallery. On another controversial occasion, they damaged the case around the Magna Carta at the British Library.
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