Give us what we demand now or we will break the law until you do.

Very mature.

All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

The mature Edmund Burke

It would be useful to get a focal point for all concerned citizens of the world,where meaningful consolidated action could happen,and to which all concerned organisations would channel people.
Fragmentation is without doubt preventing powerful action[s] from happening,and dissipating concern into side-lines and futility.
This concern is a harnessable resource,but the ngo's all seem to want their constitituents'loyalty rather than going for consolidation.
I would say this is a big barrier[the biggest] to useful and powerful collective action.

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Weakness in all politicians is the prevailing tendency. Too cowardly to face up to corporate lobbying and to weak to provide leadership to the electorate (the nation), only follow populist opinion: the latter becomes a self-reinforcing activity. Without leadership and education, people will follow their greed and selfishness. Shame on Obama and Cameron for failing to provide strong leadership: the US has shown itself to be a selfish nation and the UK is it's perfidious little brother.

I think anybody who listens watches any media is/would be terrified.
Glaciers melting,the North and South polar icecaps melting,sea temperatures rising,corals dying off,fishing stocks depleted,futureless deforestation,increasing extreme weather conditions,increasing desertification,extensive decreasing biodiversity,more species in crisis,depleting resources,increasing population.I practically need anti-depressants to watch any nature programme now,where gloom is writ large.
After our adventure with CFC's and the depletion of the Ozone layer,we should be taking our destructive effect a lot more seriously,especially and particularly[if we take our heads out our arses where they seem to be full-time]it conspiculously involves the lives of imminent generations and beyond.
But we collectively just dont seem to care about any of it at all.
It is a collective form of dehumanisation.We have objectified the future and removed any human consideration or concern from it.
Me and my life-style in the moment.

"Greenpeace" was formed to represent green liberals.

"Green" used to mean natural, but now means "do as I say and give me your money or you will all die a horrible death".

"Liberal" used to mean "supporting the freedoms of the individual" but now means "actively fomenting unilateral resentment of inequality in order to impose a totalitarian statism based upon the beliefs of a minority of vicious minded self-righteous middle class pseudo-intellectuals".

Give us what we demand now or we will break the law until you do.

Very mature

Worked for Rosa Parks.

Am I to assume to are dissing her and Emily Pankhursts use of the same tactics. You seem like the type to oppose those kind of causes.

The problem with Jesus is that he thinks he is Kumi Naidoo.

Perhaps Kumi Naidoo's time might be better spent developing energy saving technology. We already have enough petulant martyrs.

The tragedy is that the environmental movement has scuppered it's credibility by focusing in the past 2 decades on the faux climate change scare. As its dire predictions and tipping points fail to arrive, the public and politicians are deserting the Cry Wolf. We have so many genuine environmental and social concerns to address, but sadly support for all is waining. Chuck out global warming and get on with reality. Those 5000 children dying each day from lack of safe drinking water would be better served.

The usual trolling from the usual suspects.
You can actually listen to a Heartland Institute member instructing deniers to focus on poverty as a rebuke to worrying about climate change just after their latest denialist get together. And lo and behold the denialists here on CiF are suddenly trying to fake an interest in global poverty issues. What a co-incidence.

Sorry this is the link

Good for them for not being docile about it. The South African knows a thing or two about civil disobedience and the moral limits of the law du jour.

Am I to assume to are dissing her and Emily Pankhursts use of the same tactics.

No, you're not.

Greenpeace want many things regulated, legislated, ordered and controlled. Except, it would appear, for themselves.

"I keep thinking of what Mandela said decades ago, which is, this struggle is one that I am prepared to live for and if needs be to die for and that is what the leadership challenge is for us."

You are no Nelson Mandela, Mr Naidoo. Nice try at the comparison, though.

Furious Greenpeace...

The world is trembling.

"We have to ask ourselves what history teaches us in terms of how change happens when humanity has faced a big challenge, such as civil rights, apartheid or slavery,"

This is a good idea. We should apply these lessons from history when faced with the threats from the environmental lobby.

On the other hand, as with the non-campers at St Paul's, we simply need to wait until they move on to their next new fad.

Do you really think that Euan?
I'm not trying to put you down, i'm genuinely interested.
The law is sacrosant in all instances any action that breaks it is immature?
How about when the law is unjust and unreasonable and dialogue has been attempted in good faith?
How about those who stood against enforcing the return of escaped slaves just before the american civil war, or those women breaking the law for voting rights, or those breaking the law for union rights or black civil rights, or catholic voting rights? Surely civil disobedience and being willing to accept the attendant penalties if they can be enforced is one of the only powers those at the lower end of the money scale have? All civil disobedience is wrong or just civil disobedience in this cause?

No, you're not.

So you support violence for political goals

Greenpeace want many things regulated, legislated, ordered and controlled.

What a bizzare argument. You think it is wrong to regulate deforestation and whaling. Except no doubt you will be trying to find a way of admitting that regulation is necessary to prevent the near complete destruction of important ecosystems.

I'm intrigued - do you just genuinely not think that it's in any way important to protect the oceans from pollution and over-fishing? That biodiversity or the protection of wilderness is important? Do you genuinely not think that air pollution is important? What kind of world do you want to live in? Or do you think that if we do nothing and don't talk about it, everything will just be fine?

So which denialists on this thread are willing to get involved in civil dissobediance for the right to more pollution, more deforestation and more hunting of rare spieces, prove your anti Greenpeace creditials now.

What a bizzare argument. You think it is wrong to regulate deforestation and whaling.

No, as should be obvious to most.

I think it wrong that Greenpeace seeks legal restraint on things they don't like, but seems to think they can themselves ignore the law if it is inconvenient.

I think it wrong that Greenpeace seeks legal restraint on things they don't like, but seems to think they can themselves ignore the law if it is inconvenient.

But you have just approved of the suffragettes doing exactly that.

Do you have any real principles other than being antiGreenpeace?

"It would be useful to get a focal point for all concerned citizens of the world,where meaningful consolidated action could happen,and to which all concerned organisations would channel people."

At these large conferences there is, the Peoples' Summit. These are where the real solutions are discussed. They are chaotic, but not as chaotic as the official summit.

Outside these conferences there are plenty of organisations for people to put their energy into.

"This concern is a harnessable resource,but the ngo's all seem to want their constitituents'loyalty rather than going for consolidation."

How much do you know about NGOs? How many do you do more in than just get the newsletter? In the NGOs where I do more than just get the newsletter a lot of time is spent organising with other NGOs, so that we help each other and have a common position on areas we share in common. The consolidation you want already happens, there just isn't one organisation. That's good, one organisation would be at least as bureaucratic and slow to act as the UN and could easily be subverted.

By the way nothing wrong with just getting the newsletter. That is what I do in most of the organisations I belong to.

By his own admission, Mr Naidoo says they are losing a war.

Call me old fashioned, but I would strongly advise against fighting wars that you're going to lose.

For instance, what is the point in causing a load of grief for Shell - if Shell lose market share, some other company will simply step in and take up the slack. It's not Shell who are using oil and gas, it's the residents of this planet, including some of the ranty ones on this CIF using petrochemical-based computers. Greenpeace are effectively declaring war on the majority of the world's population.

Greenpeace support many good causes, but are hopelessly naive on other issues, therefore even some of the battles they win just make the situation worse.

Not sure I'd want to go into a war on the side of a group who seem comitted to losing and causing some additional damage on the way.

Environmental activists 'being killed at rate of one a week'

Death toll of campaigners involved in protection of forests, rivers and land has almost doubled in three years

Brazil – the host of the Rio+20 conference on sustainable development – has the worst record for danger in a decade that has seen the deaths of more than 365 defenders, said the briefing, which was released on the eve of the high-level segment of the Earth Summit.

The group called on the leaders at Rio to set up systems to monitor and counter the rising violence, which in many cases involves governments and foreign corporations, and to reduce the consumption pressures that are driving development into remote areas.

Link

And the antiscience posters are whipping themselves into a lather about the 'threat' of some banner drops or people gluing themselves to windows of pro-pollution firms.

Nothing could give a starker contrast to the denialsts faked concern for law and order than the reality of on the ground activists and the denialists 'concerns'.

Call me old fashioned, but I would strongly advise against fighting wars that you're going to lose.

Lol....

Humans...doomed to extinction because the people controlling society at such a crucial point in their evolution were afflicted with the stupid gene.

Kumi Naidoo, Greenpeace International's executive director, said there were so many fudges in the draft agreement that Greenpeace now had no other option but to change its strategy and start planning waves of civil disobedience.

Perhaps it is time to declare that Greenpeace are a terrorist organisation.

"And the antiscience posters are whipping themselves into a lather about the 'threat' of some banner drops or people gluing themselves to windows of pro-pollution firms."

Denialists repeatedly imply that anyone who protests against something, no matter how they protest, is a criminal. Their tactic is to claim that disrupting someone else's day is criminal.

They don't apply this "logic" to the motorists who disrupt my travels though. I wonder why.

"Nothing could give a starker contrast to the denialsts faked concern for law and order than the reality of on the ground activists and the denialists 'concerns'."

Those involved in campaigning are aware of some of these deaths through articles about them. It makes me realise that things are not as bad here as they are in some other places, dead campaigners being rare in the UK (though there are some).

I am glad the Guardian has bought these deaths to a wider audience.

Perhaps it is time to declare that Greenpeace are a terrorist organisation.

Nope. That would play right into their hands, by suggesting they're way more important and influential than they actually are.

Denialists repeatedly imply that anyone who protests against something, no matter how they protest, is a criminal.

If so-called "denialists" do this "repeatedly", I presume you can supply a list of examples?

Greenpeace is terribly boring and never discloses its sources of funds, what make me suspicious of vested interests!

I'm a passionate environmentalist, but I can't stand Greenpeace (or FotE).

To be honest, I'm not that surprised that nobody listens to them - their constant "holier than thou" rhetoric, automatic anti corporation and (to some extent) anti science attitude is so infantile, you can't help but ignore them - despite the fact they do stand for a few really important issues.

Good planets are hard to find..

"Perhaps it is time to declare that Greenpeace are a terrorist organisation."

In Mrs Thatcher's time Tories called Nelson Mandela a terrorist and the ANC a terrorist organisation. They had an "amusing" response to a polular song called "Free Nelson Mandela". Their response was, "hang Nelson Mandela", sung to the same tune.

Some years later Mr Mandela was one of the many "terrorists" who have sipped tea with He Majesty in Buckingham Palace.

They also called the ANC communists, another claim which history has shown to be false.

The wise learn from past mistakes.

'Furious Greenpeace moves to 'war footing' at Rio+20'

And virtual no one notices and less people actual care.

"I presume you can supply a list of examples?"

I could spend time going through many past discussions here to supply the list you asked for.

I could, but as you want me to waste my time doing so I'm not going to dance to your tune.

"Greenpeace is terribly boring and never discloses its sources of funds,"

Which parts of their annual reports and accounts do you have difficulty understanding?

Like any charity these documents are available to the public. The law in the UK is that a charity must send copies of these to anyone who asks. There are similar laws elsewhere. The charity I work for has them on its web site for anyone to download should they wish, so does Greenpeace.

I have read these documents for Greenpeace International and Greenpeace UK. They were clear on the source of their funds, proud of the source in fact.

You are either ignorant of this, or deliberately trying to spread FUD.

"their constant "holier than thou" rhetoric, automatic anti corporation and (to some extent) anti science attitude"

Three false claims in one sentence.

After being suckered into giving a donation to Greenpeace after they made a claim that the Arctic would be ice free by 2030 and then finding out that they deliberately lied to try and make a political statement, I now have zero respect for what used to be a fantastic environmental pressure group which has turned into just another political entity which seems more concerned about grabbing headlines for revenue raising than for real environmental causes.

Greenpeace can threaten civil disobedience as much as they want, but they should also remember that its non profit status (which allows it to hide many of its less than savoury business practices) which it has in many countries will be revoked if they continue to make these overtly political and potentially criminal statements.

Perhaps it is time to declare that Greenpeace are a terrorist organisation

Truly you are wise. Anything that gets in the way of the unimpeded smashing of the environment for profit should be declared a terrorist organization.

Your obedience, enthusiasm and unquestioning loyalty to the ultra wealthy is commendable.

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"So which denialists on this thread are willing to get involved in civil dissobediance for the right to more pollution,"

No takers yet. However, I bet many of them were involved in the Fool Protests in the late 1990s. I bet many of them break the law by driving above the speed limit too.

after they made a claim that the Arctic would be ice free by 2030

Here is the arctic sea ice thickness.

Like the other assertions in your post your claim that the arctic will not be free of sea ice by 2030 is not very believable. What is your source?

what used to be a fantastic environmental pressure group which has turned into just another political entity

Greenpeace has always used highly contentious civil disobedience around contentious issues to makes its point. Either a) you know nothing about Greenpeace or b) you are deliberately ignoring their tactics around the anti whaling, anti nuclear testing and attempt to prevent the cutting down of forests.

So perhaps youd care to tell us what actions were "fantastic" and what has changed. ;-)

Here´s what a functioning legal system does :

http://annamiticus.com/2012/06/19/interpol-operation-nets-two-tonnes-illegal-elephant-ivory-200-suspects-arrested/

You may think so, but I am speaking from my experience of Greenpeace - so I stand by my claims.

The minute a human being touches anything it becomes imbued with a political dimension.
There is no such thing as an apolitical pressure group. Maintaining and expressing an opinion
is a political act. Wise up. Humans are at present the biggest single threat to themselves and then
to the planet.
The planet has the capacity to recover. Humans, along with any other life form allowed
to so ruthlessly exploit it's environment is less able to recover.
From the planets perspective (bearing in mind that 99% of all life forms ever evolved are extinct)
this is not such a big deal.

I wasn't thinking necessarily about an organisation,more opportunities for concerted action where numbers or the effects of collective action have a greater impact,even concerted,collective funding where courses of action are seen as useful.
I believe that the new protest organisations are non-hierarchical,'flat',flexible and autonomous but responsive.That sounds good,effective.
Why cant people be smart,fluid and flexible?Methinks they can be!
There is a phenomenon here.I''ll stake my collection of ngo newsletters on it.

Three false claims in one sentence.

I thought Kracatoan made an excellent and accurate post.

The one bit I disagree with him/her about is that many people don't ignore them and see that much of what they stand for is indeed anti-science, anti-corporation and most definitely holier than thou. As a result they damage the credibility of pro-environmental messages, by coming across as bunch of irritating, preachy, far-left luddites.

Unfortunately their various positives are therefore at least balanced (though probably outweighed) by their negatives.

Being so divisive, with a large majority on the other side of the divide, is indeed likely to lead to losing wars, should they be silly enough to enter into them. Time perhaps to look for a better solution than supporting a bunch of aggro-losers.

I could spend time going through many past discussions here to supply the list you asked for.

"I could but I'm not going to" = "I couldn't"

Happy to scatter baseless assertions around; not so happy to support them.

is that many people don't ignore them and see that much of what they stand for is indeed anti-science, anti-corporation and most definitely holier than thou. As a result they damage the credibility of pro-environmental messages, by coming across as bunch of irritating, preachy, far-left luddites.

Tone trolling is one of the denialists favorite tricks. Largely because it involves no science so has the least chance of exploding in their faces. In this example the trolling is to attack the tone of Greenpeace, pretending to be concerned with their lack of civility.

Notably a tactic favored by creationists.

And one that notes that groups like Greenpeace have to say and do things that are unpopular, things like telling France that nuclear weapons testing was unacceptable and violating French territory to make the point.

I am sure that the BunnyFlumlekins and Turning Tides of this world are delighted at the robust French response to such ill mannered, hectoring from Greenpeace.