On October 13th two climate change activists went to London’s National gallery and
created a wild scene. Wearing a shirt that says, “Just stop oil” the two went up to “Sunflowers”
and unleashed a can of tomato soup. While it seems unconventional the whole point of these
stunts is to bring awareness in a nonviolent way.
In her speech about why she did what she did, Phoebe Plummers asked, “What is worth
more food or life?” and went on to say, “Fuel is unaffordable to millions of cold, hungry families.
They can’t even afford to heat up a tin of soup.” This statement made lots of people angry
wondering why if these families can’t afford soup why wouldn’t the activists find a way to give
those families the food? Plummer’s response to those people is, “ People might be angry but
now they are talking about it.”
Both Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland were arrested, went to court and were charged
with criminal damage done to the frame of the painting. This however has not stopped their
work as they kept speaking out stating, “they knew there was a glass covering over the
painting,” and that, “they sat glued to the wall- they wiped it off with a bit of kitchen roll.”
We have to wait till December 13th for their trial and whether the court finds them guilty.
Phoebe Plummer and their partner in crime, Anna Holland, were bailed out with the conditions
of not going to galleries and or museums and they do not have paint or adhesive substances
out in public places.
Being members of the just stop oil activist group means we won’t see the last of these
events or people. For the past two weeks this group has been protesting causing there to be
over 500 hundred arrests. Though soup wasn’t thrown, four people ‘willfully obstructing traffic’
after recreating The Beatles Abbey Crossroad photo and then holding up stop oil banners till
they got carted away. So don’t be surprised if you see more crazy stuff happening across the
water.