{"id":39135,"date":"2020-11-11T12:05:23","date_gmt":"2020-11-11T12:05:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thevoiceoflondon.co.uk\/?p=39135"},"modified":"2020-11-11T12:05:23","modified_gmt":"2020-11-11T12:05:23","slug":"extinction-rebellion-staged-protest-at-the-cenotaph-on-remembrance-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/extinction-rebellion-staged-protest-at-the-cenotaph-on-remembrance-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Extinction Rebellion staged protest at the Cenotaph on Remembrance Day"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>As the country falls into a two-minute silence to remember those who fought during World War I, Extinction Rebellion has staged a protest at the Cenotaph on Whitehall.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>This morning, several members of Extinction Rebellion protested at the Cenotaph on Armistice Day. The protest started at 8 am, three hours before the national two-minute silence.<\/p>\n<p>The protesters laid a wreath reading \u201cAct Now\u201d at the Cenotaph, whilst holding a banner reading: \u201cHonour their sacrifice &#8211; climate change means war.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The chair of the Defence Select Committee, Tobias Ellwood told the Telegraph that the protesters risk turning the public from their cause.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe importance of what the Cenotaph stands for is that pivotal and iconic representation of the sacrifice that has been given for the freedoms we enjoy today,\u201d Mr Ellwood said.<\/p>\n<p>The stunt has resulted in several negative reactions on Twitter:<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/Brutusmaximus\/status\/1326483811803099137<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/netribution\/status\/1326484087234830339<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/Oh_Owain\/status\/1326485700003377153<\/p>\n<p>At the centre of the protest, a 64-year-old veteran and protester, Donald Bell said he was aware of the backlash he may receive after today\u2019s actions.<\/p>\n<p>He said: \u201cRemembrance Day is never an easy time for veterans and this was not an easy decision for me to make.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut I served this country, I served the people of this country and the action I took today is about just that. Unchecked climate change means a return to a world at war. I cannot stand by and let that happen. It is my duty to act.&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Remembrance should be for remembering. Not for political gesturing. <\/p>\n<p>Absolutely despicable from extinction rebellion&#8230;&#8230;again.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; YorkshirePundit (@YorkshirePundit) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/YorkshirePundit\/status\/1326490336932278273?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">November 11, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>According to the Telegraph, Extinction Rebellion did not plan the protest but a small group of members pulled the stunt.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Words: Sam Tabahriti | Subbing: Leah Trimmer\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As the country falls into a two-minute silence to remember those who fought during World War I, Extinction Rebellion has staged a protest at the Cenotaph on Whitehall. This morning, several members of Extinction Rebellion&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":476,"featured_media":39143,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[2228,5224,6538],"class_list":["post-39135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-extinction-rebellion","tag-remembrance-day","tag-uk"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/476"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/thevoiceoflondon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}