Allow me to wish those who are celebrating Easter a Happy
Easter. And to wish those who are celebrating Passover a Happy Passover. Those
who are celebrating neither are probably not very happy today.
To brighten up our day, the Daily Mail brings us an
on-the-scene report on the latest London demonstration mounted by Extinction
Rebellion. By the way, before proceeding the meat of the report, have you
noticed that the group’s handle, Extinction Rebellion is syntactical gibberish.
What would we do without the Daily Mail?
The author: one Titania McGrath, aka Andrew Doyle.
The opening:
I have always been super worried about the
environment. Climate
change causes erratic weather conditions, which is really bad for
the hedge maze on my estate. And I’m very aware of my carbon footprint. For
instance, I always make sure that at least one of my cars is energy efficient.
Besides, as a social justice activist, I can do an awful lot of good by sending
angry tweets from a ski slope in Val-d’Isère.
But my involvement in the Extinction Rebellion
movement has taken my environmental work to a whole other level. I’ve spent the
last couple of nights camped out in Oxford Circus in London. I
can’t sleep in an actual tent because I’m allergic to nylon, but the hotel I’m
staying in only has a three-star rating, so I feel like I’ve made a genuine
sacrifice.
Many people recognized McGrath
and greeted her appropriately:
One young woman remarked that my arrival
reminded her of Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey.
I told her that if I must be compared to a male historical figure, it should be
Mahatma Gandhi, not some Zionist settler who’d learnt a few conjuring tricks.
Gandhi has provided the inspiration for the
entire modus operandi of Extinction Rebellion, based as it is on the principle
of ‘non-violent resistance’.
Gandhi’s followers used to call this
‘satyagraha’, because they lacked the necessary discipline to learn English
properly.
In many ways I have surpassed Gandhi. He might
have brought the British empire to its knees, but did he ever glue himself to
the Docklands Light Railway, stripped to the waist and smeared in woad? No, he
was too busy mincing around in flip-flops and collecting salt.
What are the tactics of
Extinction Rebellion? McGrath explains them:
Our tactics in Extinction Rebellion are varied
but for the most part we like to chain ourselves to things and strip naked.
Over the past week, we have attached ourselves
to famous landmarks, buses, and even the occasional homeless person. Sometimes
we chain ourselves to things as a sign of affection, such as the fence in front
of Jeremy Corbyn’s house.
He seemed a bit annoyed when he saw a group of
hipsters sitting cross-legged on his begonias but I think deep down he
understands that we are saving the world.
It’s been particularly heartening to see so many
children joining our group. It’s never too early to start being politically
active and, as we saw with the Youth Strike 4 Climate back in February, some
young people are so committed to direct action they’re even prepared to miss
school for it. After all, it’s their future that’s at stake.
As might be expected, many of
McGrath’s fellow wokesters are sorely put out that the crowd is so
overwhelmingly white. She has the perfect response:
Some have criticised the protesters for being
overwhelmingly white and middle class, but this is simply not true. I saw at
least one family who had brought along their Filipino au pair. Besides, this
wasn’t like that pro-Brexit rally where Channel 4’s Jon Snow said that he’d
‘never seen so many white people in one place’. The members of Extinction
Rebellion are not white in any sense other than their skin colour. They are the
good whites. Jon Snow was clearly referring to working-class whites, who tend
to have the wrong opinions.
All told, McGrath had a great
time. Isn’t that what it’s all about?
As for me and my compatriots in Extinction
Rebellion, we had a wonderful time. There was cavorting in the streets, amateur
hemp-weaving competitions, angry teenagers reciting haiku about why we need
more badgers and even an acoustic lesbian quintet performing the songs from Hair.
I myself mounted the pink boat to recite my
shocking and evocative poem Mother Earth Is Not Your Slut, which I performed
naked except for a pashmina fashioned from interlaced earthworms. A number of
people were so moved that they actually had to leave.
There is still so much work to be done. Actor
Jason Momoa, star of the film Aquaman, has just shaved off his beard to raise
awareness about the need to eliminate plastic waste. He’s doing his bit to save
the planet. Why aren’t you?
4 comments:
"Our tactics in Extinction Rebellion are varied but for the most part we like to chain ourselves to things and strip naked." Now THAT's REALLY dumb! It's harder to impossible to strip after you've chained yourself to something. Particularly when you've used short chains (not to be confused with short change). /snark off.
Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm snarking on snark, but I do like snarkling, it being fun, and a nice day, even with no beer in the house.
Andrew Doyle is one of the finest satirists alive, and it is very hard to satire something this stupid, but he has done it. Titania is nearly indistinguishable from the real McCoy--except for the sharp whiff of contempt along the periphery. There has never been a better target for mockery, or more deserving.
Titania is brilliant, yes. I think it was a little better before when you really couldn't tell if it was real or not.
I won't be coming on the hike, I decided Saturday evening. Will miss talking with you.
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