London Indymedia

Climate change demo - Grosvenor and Trafalgar Square pics

kriptick | 05.11.2006 10:17 | Climate Chaos | Ecology | London

The largest ever climate change protest march in Britain was just one of many that took place simultaneously around our threatened globe.

Outside the US embassy
Outside the US embassy

The amazing Seize the Day
The amazing Seize the Day

Picadilly filled end to end many times over
Picadilly filled end to end many times over

Much noise from Samba bands
Much noise from Samba bands


Kids learning art of graffiti
Kids learning art of graffiti

We've always known the ubiquitous FIT were stupid
We've always known the ubiquitous FIT were stupid

360 deg wide image - scroll sideways to see it all
360 deg wide image - scroll sideways to see it all


2006 will go down as the year when everyone finally sat up and recognised that climate change is real and that it's not a good thing. With climate change being mentioned on mainstream media on a daily basis, high volume coverage of the recent climate camp,
 http://www.climatecamp.org.uk/
and the recent Stern report
 http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/stern_review_economics_climate_change/sternreview_index.cfm
it was to be expected that today's march would be the largest yet and it certainly was. The Campaign against Climate Change protest started outside the US embassy. It was a master stroke to have the brilliant Seize the Day band
 http://www.seizetheday.org/
play there with some very upbeat and witty songs as the accomanying speaches about impending climate chaos can be pretty gloomy. The band had the crowd perfoming the Guantanamo shackle shuffle.

Grosvenor Square seemed like a tardis. While we were there packed into the embassy side it was crowded but one would guess just a few thousand people were there. It was only when the protesters marched out towards the existing crowd already in Trafalgar Square that one became more aware of the true numbers present. I stood still in Picadilly which was filled end to end watching 10 or 15 protesters march past every second. I did this for half an hour but still didn't see the back of the protest as I became bored and rejoined the march myself. You do the maths. Trafalgar Square was absolutely packed - see the very wide composite photo to see just how. There was a very extravagant multimedia display being shown on a huge video matrix screen. Icebergs lifting themselves out of the sea and rejoining the galcier's snout. Smoke disappearing back into factory chimneys etc. Inspiring? Well maybe but the mainstream MPs present were still speaking about climate change only "moving up" the political agenda. WTF? it should be top of the agenda and should have been there for years now. Until our glorious leaders stop concentrating on putting their hateful sustained economic growth first then they'll achieve far too little change far too late.

I retrieved my bike and when I returned to the square the crowds of people had already been replaced by choking traffic.

kriptick
- Homepage: http://www.campaigncc.org/

Comments

Display the following 13 comments

  1. Campaign against Climate Change organise biggest ever UK demo on Climate Change — Eco-Warrior
  2. So inventive — Rudi
  3. Green tory, tall story — raving_humanist
  4. Nuclear Power? — mike
  5. Credit — Respect Admin
  6. cutting carbon must be law — raving_humanist
  7. nuclear? NO FUCKING THANKS — mujn
  8. Rudi — Rudi
  9. Dear Raving Mad Humanist — james
  10. Energy increase etc — raving_humanist
  11. you can't demand change with out a solution! — james
  12. alternative solutions — raving_humanist
  13. that speaker who talked about nationalising shell — erin

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