Thousands of activists from Extinction Rebellion are joining forces all over London to make demands to the government about deteriorating state of the environment.
Extinction Rebellion describe themselves as a “non-violent civil disobedience activist movement” who are looking for answers from the government about how they are going to deal with climate crisis. They have activist groups in all 32 boroughs in London and are expanding as we move. Not even a year old and they are demanding the government to take action on this crisis. They have built protest sites all over Central London from Trafalgar Square to Whitehall and City Airport with the total of 12 sites across Central London.
Speaking to Hayden from Extinction Rebellion Hackney he said: “the government are not delivering, we want them to communicate with us to see what action they are going to take and we are not stopping until they listen.” The activist group have only three demands of the UK government. They want the government to tell the truth by declaring a climate and ecological emergency, to stop biodiversity loss and reduce greenhouse emissions by 2025 and create a national citizen assembly on climate and ecological justice.
One of the activist, Mark, 45, has been campaigning to push legislations on climate change for 30 years. He has said: “Nothing has been happening, something needs to happen.” 50 years he has been a non-violent activist and has seen these protest all before. He has mentioned “The rise of Greta Thunberg has brought people together. The public are starting to listen and realise there is a big problem. However, the government keep giving us false hopes. The more people realise, the more people will act and the more the government will have to raise attention to this.”
As well as the biggest protests happening in London, Extinction Rebellion are based in 23 location all over the world and just keep expanding. Greta Thunberg has become the poster girl for this movement and keeps on shining even though she has faced much criticism from famous figures as powerful as world leaders. Only 16, she has created movements such as ‘school strike for climate change’ where she encouraged millions of student to walk out and protest for their future. She’s impacted millions to protest around the world to take action.
Another activist, Grant, 24, has said: “The system is toxic. We’re destroying life as we speak. I was inspired by Greta Thunberg. She has made this movement so fast growing it’s not even a year old. We need to start educating people about this crisis.”