The voice of dissent at Gothenburg’s motor show

The year is 2047 and visitors are queuing up to view an historical exhibition of automobiles. This exhibition is a stark reminder of our irresponsible past that very nearly destroyed the planet we live on. Looking at these monstrous lumps of shiny metal and glass it’s hard to believe that as recently as 40 years ago these deadly machines where sold openly to anybody who had the money. I overhear a grandfather telling his grandchild how when he was young he had to run for his life every time he needed to cross the street. How millions of cars choked almost every ally and boulevard in every city around the world. The child looks on, disbelieving.

The sound of a of a car roaring off at full throttle just to screech to a halt 20 meters down the road brought me out of my reverie and reminded me that this isn’t 2047 but 2007. This isn’t an historical exhibition this is a slap in the face to our beleaguered planet. I suddenly remembered what I was doing there.

Saturday afternoon in Gothenburg was meant to be the big day for the Gothenburg motor show. The public turn out was modest and people hardly needed to queue to pay their 130 kronor (15 Euros) to drool over the highly polished environmental time bombs ticking away inside. I must admit that people coughing up 15 Euros to look at cars struck me as totally insane. I mean don’t they get enough of the bloody things.

Amid this tide of insanity a handful of protesters acted responsibly and represented the voice of reason. The intention of this action taken by Gothenburg’s branch of Friends of the Earth and The 4X4 Network was to remind people that the state of our planet is something that needs be taken seriously.

After a half hour we were informed, by a most serious official, that we were standing on private ground and could we please move. Obligingly we moved. Standing two meters further away we continued our action. After further deliberation two colleagues of the serious official conceded that we had every right to stand on the property they protected and hand out flyers and balloons as long as our main display was outside. We made sure that, in the hands of children, two hundred yellow balloons found their way into the motor show.

Did you know that if you could catch the CO2 emissions from a standard car in a standard balloon you’d have to stop and change balloon every 60 meters or so. That was the message on the air filled balloons we gave out to the children visiting the exhibition. “60m by car = this much CO2!” not an entirely ineffective way of infiltrating the motor show’s every corner.

As for the adults we offered them a test in the form of a flyer to check whether or not they were autoholics. Our other flyer was more of a treatment and full of good advice on how to kick the driving habit. All in all the action was a definitive success; I don’t know how many people we persuaded to ditch their cars but hopefully our message didn’t go totally unappreciated. The important thing is that we didn’t let the motor industry get away with its day of reprehensible polished greenwash in peace. The voice of dissent was present.