Maybe this hypothetical paint analysis could filter out the corn starch in its analysis?
It’s hypothetical anyway so of course it could. Perhaps it could filter out the combustion engine pollution too. And the coal era black rain. Remember how quickly stone buildings turned black from pollution in our cities?
I know it sounds ridiculous to you, but in archaeology we think a lot about future research with hypothetical methods, so we set aside areas and samples and try to anticipate how our current analysis capabilities affect future opportunities. Conservators spend even more time thinking about their methods and how to make them as reversible and low-impact as possible.
I’m not particularly worried about the cornstarch and more about the pigment, since we were specifically talking about analysing colour. Honestly, I don’t think that they were coloured or that someone will test for that in the future, but the point is, we don’t know.
Maybe, maybe not. I know that adding to all that on purpose isn’t going to help.
As for the tunnel, as I said in another place, at this point I think going ahead with it is the least damaging option for the site.
Now this protest I can really get behind
I’d not heard that phrase before… like it!
It’s shit like this that makes me wonder if Just Stop Oil are a psyop. I don’t really think that they are, but some of their actions seem so perfectly calculated to be counterproductive, that it’s hard not to wonder.
Doing this ahead of the solstice, when a mass of people who are probably the most likely to be sympathetic to the Just Stop Oil cause, are about to descend on Stonehenge, is incredibly stupid. especially when there’s a large and extremely controversial roadbuilding project in the viscinity, disruption of which would be a more direct blow against the fossil fuel centrism of our transport infrastructure…it’s just unbelievably stupid.
Almost like democracy and capitalism are contradictory and we are seeing a period of history where neoliberalism dictates a sham democracy between different agents of capital.
I don’t think that the protests you refer to are getting a very swift or direct response from government, but I think there is a long game of changing public opinion going on, of which the protests are a part.
if Gaza protesters daubed paint on Buckingham Palace the result would be similar to this JSO action.
This article also has important additional information about Stonehenge
He said: “Stonehenge is about 5,000 years old, and people in those ancient times were living so sustainably, and the stones are a testament to the desire of people to connect with nature and the Earth and the sun and the moon as well as each other.”
Restorers have managed to clean the orange powder from the stones using blown air to avoid damaging rare lichens on the surface, Merriman said.
He said: “Lichens are very fragile and sensitive indications of climate change, and the lichens on Stonehenge are actually quite rare in southern England. Luckily, our staff moved very quickly to remove the powdered substance from the lichen so it looks like they are OK.”
He said that if conditions had been wet more damage could have been done. “We were very lucky, given that the atrocious weather we’ve had recently, that it wasn’t done in pouring rain, where we fear that there would have been quite some considerable damage to the lichens,” Merriman said.
He added that the site was now open to the public again and for the solstice on Thursday.
Interesting contrast:
He said that if conditions had been wet more damage could have been done. “We were very lucky, given that the atrocious weather we’ve had recently, that it wasn’t done in pouring rain, where we fear that there would have been quite some considerable damage to the lichens,” Merriman said.
and JSO’s statement
“The orange cornflour we used to create an eye-catching spectacle will soon wash away with the rain, but the urgent need for effective government action to mitigate the catastrophic consequences of the climate and ecological crisis will not. Sign the treaty!”
JSO benefits from a strange presumption that their protests won’t damage the underlying artifacts. For instance, if they throw things at a painting, their defenders will point out the glass (and ignore the historically important frame). But their actions are risky, and one day, their luck will run out.
The stones there have some examples of very rare lichens and whichever scientist was on the radio this morning was very concerned about this aspect of the damage.
It’s not just the stones.
I’m not sure we here on the BBS are are anywhere close to JSO’s target audience. I have seen no press reporting a link between the fact it was Stonehenge and the proposed road tunnel beneath it. I would expect people here to make the link. I would not expect the average British journalist to do so.
Does JSO ever out out a press release after it’s vandalism, to actually explain its thinking? Oh, they do - with no mention of the link between the monument, the road tunnel and the increased use of oil it will lead to.
To me, this only confirms my opinion that JSO is simply not very good at getting its messages over and needs some PR professionalism instilled in its organisation. How could they have missed such an obvious open goal?
How did lunch sit ins work? How did marches work?
Where as destroying the planet is perfectly normal behavior? /s
Over 100 million refugees, many climate refugees. Nearly 1000 people died on the Hajj this year. how many trillions from clean ups on climate disasters…
I guess those don’t mar the view of rich tourists, so…
Apparently, that’s normal and fine… /s
I think it’s just the same old terrorist logic. It doesn’t really matter what the target is, but if you want the bombings to stop, meet our demands. The extra disconnects here make it even less viable here though. Large corporate polluters willing to let the planet burn are going to quiver and cave when you wreck a classic work of art or disrupt a table sport? Anyway, I think that’s how they explain it to themselves, but the real motivation is probably just ego. Reminds me of the saying “An immature man wants to die nobly for a cause. A mature man wants to live humbly for one”
How did lunch sit ins work? How did marches work?
Ok, has defacing property worked? I’m 58 and people have been defacing art since the seventies and I have seen very little changes. Again, I don’t care about the things being defaced, they are just things. If throwing all the paintings in the Louvre into a big pile and setting it on fire would solve the climate crises I would be all for it. What I care about is tactics that work.
Ask the stop cop city people… Protests should be disruptive.
If you value property more than people and the environment… well…
Why do you keep harping on this point: “If you value property more than people and the environment… well” when each time I’ve said that I don’t care about property more than people. If you think I am arguing in bad faith then
Again, burn it all down if it works, but it doesn’t seem to work. Why aren’t things better even though we’ve had decades of this tactic.
Also what is the stop cop city people? If you mean the defund the police protests then I don’t feel that they accomplished anything.
That’s the first time I’ve made that point, actually… I was generally speaking focusing on the point of how protests work. Which is via levels of disruption.
That is happening right now. The world is literally burning down.
Gee, I wonder why we haven’t had change… must be because of the kids, not the ramping up fascism. /s
Also, there have been local reform victories since the George Floyd protests… The top-down, federal government change isn’t the only one that matters… with large social movements like this, it generally starts locally and moves up to the federal level. Again, look at past movements, such as the suffragist movement, where states were allowing women to vote prior to the passage of the 19th…
If you’re expecting nice, polite protests that disrupt nothing, and then all of a sudden, you get wide-spread social/cultural/political transformation… that’s just… not how shit works. There has been positive change, for example on the civil rights front for nearly 2 centuries, and things are better, but the struggle continues. That’s how change works, incremental over time (most times).
Isn’t that what they’re doing?
You could google shit, instead of assuming things don’t have meanings when they clearly do… Not a thing I said is “word salad” and it’s not on me to do your homework for you.
Not sure how using paint, which by the way is full of petroleum distillates, on historic archeological sites fits Stop Oil’s stated goals. Unless one of those goals is to cause public disgust and hatred of their organization. 
Ah yes, things are being destroyed! Let’s destroy more irreplaceable things in protest! Clearly there’s genius at work here. /s
Good job ignoring the part that you quoted where I said that you don’t need to disagree with the general view to disagree with this destructive behaviour.
Which do you think has done more damage to stonehenge, this or the years of cars and tourists?
Sure, but that fact is that this issue more generally is being glossed over and ignored. We’re destroying our planet right now. YOU and I might be aware, but how many people do not give a shit. And that’s why this group is taking these kinds of actions. Just like in the 90s up in the PNW, when environmentalists took drastic steps to get attention on the issue, including acts of vandalism. You disagree, okay… but the point of all this is getting attention on an issue that is impacting all of us right now.
I understand throwing soup in an art gallery; politicians and CEO’s use art to launder money all the time, so it sends a message to them. But an ancient archeological site? Meaningless action. And there are more effective ways to make the world look at you–start a TikTok, for one.
