Climate Activists Are ‘Fight Back’ by Deflating SUVs

You walk out of your house on a sunny weekend morning, eager to drive your gasoline-powered sports utility vehicle to the local beach. You’re about to turn on the engine and hit the road, when you notice a flier stuck underneath the windshield wiper.

“We have deflated one or more of your tires,” it reads. “You’ll be angry, but don’t take it personally. It’s not you, it’s your car…”

That’s the message from an anonymous collective called Tyre Extinguishers. Since March, the group has deflated the tires of nearly 6,500 SUVs in Austria, Canada, France, Germany, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Sweden, the U.K. and the U.S. Their goal? Drawing attention to gas-guzzling vehicles’ impact on climate change and air pollution. If SUVs were an individual country, they would have ranked sixth in the world for emissions last year, accounting for more than 900 million metric tons of CO₂.

“We are aiming to grow this movement to the point where it becomes impossible to own an SUV in the world’s urban areas,” said a spokesperson for Tyre Extinguishers. “A relatively small number of people can make this happen.”

Tyre Extinguishers isn’t alone. As politicians dither on climate policy that matches what the science demands, some citizens are going beyond peaceful protests to make themselves heard. In July, activists with the group Just Stop Oil glued themselves to frames of paintings in art galleries in the U.K., and breached the track on the first lap of the Formula 1 British Grand Prix. Also in July, the French group Derniere Renovation interrupted the Tour de France cycling race. Last year, the group Insulate Britain disrupted traffic across cities and highways in the U.K.

These activist outfits are all building on tactics popularized by Extinction Rebellion (XR), which was founded in the U.K. in 2018 and now acts as an umbrella organization for a variety of global groups. In July, members of the group Doctors for XR broke glass at the London office of finance giant JPMorgan Chase & Co. In April, activists of Scientist Rebellion chained themselves to the doors of JPMorgan Chase’s office in Los Angeles.

The vast majority of climate protests remain peaceful. This past weekend, activists from Extinction Rebellion, Just Stop Oil and Insulate Britain marched to the U.K. parliament without causing any property damage. But while most political leaders condemn XR’s more aggressive antics, some say they can be effective at moving the politics. Zac Goldsmith, a member of the U.K.’s House of Lords and minister for the Pacific and international environment, told the BBC last week that what these activists do “may be annoying, but it works.”

That’s also the conclusion Andreas Malm, an associate professor of human ecology at Lund University, comes to in his 2021 book “How to Blow Up a Pipeline.” He briefly reviews the history of massive social changes and concludes that peaceful protests alone rarely succeed at the task.

Indeed, although Tyre Extinguishers is a new collective, there have been previous reincarnations dating back to 2007. In Sweden, a group called the “Indians of the Concrete Jungle,” which counted Malm as a member, has deflated 1,500 SUVs. “The ruling classes really will not be talked into action,” Malm writes in “How to Blow Up a Pipeline.” “The movement must learn to disrupt business-as-usual.”

Malm’s message to other climate activists could not be clearer: “Damage and destroy new CO₂-emitting devices. Put them out of commission, pick them apart, demolish them, burn them, blow them up. Let the capitalists who keep on investing in the fire know that their properties will be trashed.”

This thinking is not mainstream for protesters. In fact, he dedicates nearly a third of his book to addressing climate activists who are strict adherents to peaceful protests, an approach backed by some research. One 2018 study found that, when protesters with strong public support for their views turn violent, people may perceive them to be vandals. In other words, the use of violence risks losing allies on climate causes.

For those taking the less-trodden path, however, the goal is to attract attention explicitly because reasonable actions to address the crisis have failed. If you’re not already being affected by climate change — heat waves causing roads to melt, rail lines to buckle and flights to be canceled; floods taking down bridges and crops; hurricanes blowing away buildings and disrupting oil production — these new-age activists want to make sure you cannot ignore the crisis.

The takeaway for both participants in and recipients of this style of reproach is about personal agency. And if you’re looking for a way to fight back, Tyre Extinguishers’ spokesperson says, “we are giving [people] an action they can take.”

Could climate justice be achieved any other way, such as peaceful protest or legislation? “We have to try everything,” the spokesperson says. “However, it’s clear that the climate movement needs to embrace sabotage in a big way. The pollution is not stopping. Emissions are still going up. We’re marching towards death.” Still, the group does not have a good answer when asked about deflating tires that might be needed for a medical emergency, or how targeting SUVs can impact those with disabilities (as happened in California).

Tyre Extinguishers say it currently has 50 groups worldwide, to whom it provides “inspiration” on its website in the form of images to identify SUVs, a video on how to deflate tires and the “It’s your car” leaflet in 10 languages. The group’s ultimate aim is “to see bans on SUVs in urban areas, pollution levies to tax SUVs out of existence, and massive investment in free, comprehensive public transport,” it says. “But until politicians make this a reality, Tyre Extinguishers action will continue.”

Akshat Rathi reports for Bloomberg News.

Copyright 2022 Bloomberg. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.