Bank of Montreal building splashed with paint
The Bank of Montreal building on Place d’Armes was splashed with hot pink paint Thursday morning by members of Last Generation Canada protesting the bank’s investment in fossil fuels and demanding the federal government create a climate disaster protection agency.
Ian 06:44 on 2025-06-06 Permalink
Oh no paint, someone call the riot squad
Nicholas 10:33 on 2025-06-06 Permalink
It’s worth activists thinking about what will be effective at changing people’s minds or drawing positive attention to their cause. I’m not disputing people’s right to protest, but spraying paint on art (including architecture) doesn’t seem to check these boxes for many, but does seem to annoy a lot. Protests often annoy people, that’s the point, but people have a special reverence for art that they don’t for even fellow humans.
Ian 16:58 on 2025-06-06 Permalink
Define “effective”. Handwringing centrists fear violence, hate inconvenience, are dismayed by vandalism, but seem ok with greenwashing. Which of those do you think activists should employ to effect change?
Protest is SUPPOSED to shake things up.
Nicholas 22:01 on 2025-06-06 Permalink
My definition of “effective” in this case is “increases, rather than decreases, the support for your movement, or the likelihood your movement will win material changes.” Some tactics can lead to change. Some lead to people being less sympathetic to change, and identifying with it less. There are lots of examples where mass movements, even violent ones, lead to change. There are also examples where it backfires. The same is true for peaceful protests, and stunts, like this one. Researchers have found it varies a lot, by tactic, by culture and county, by movement. I read as well that infrequent, mass protests show that there’s a big constituency for something, while frequent, small protests that never grow in size show there are only a few hundred people who care.
I’m not saying don’t do this specific protest. But I think it’s worth people thinking about whether something is likely to help or hurt their cause. Maybe they don’t care, and just want to be cathartically angry. Sometimes I feel that too. Maybe they think this will get them positive coverage. Given the reactions I’ve seen, mostly from people on the left side of the spectrum, being associated with the throwing paint on paintings people I’d doubt that, and their upcoming F1 protest seems more likely to help. But with all the researchers and foundation money floating around, and even if not, someone should think about movements that succeeded, what they did, and do more of that. I want the climate movement to be effective.
Ian 11:03 on 2025-06-07 Permalink
I thik what you are looking for is lobbyists, not protestors. With the way our system is set up, lobby groups are way more affective and effective than any rally. This is one of the reasons that organized labour has been far more effective since they started hiring lawyers, supporting candidates, and funding “think tanks”. When it was just street marches the cops would round up the leaders and kill them.