On 1 February 1960, Ezell Blair Jr, Franklin McCain, Joseph McNeil, and David Richmond sat down at the lunch counter at Woolworth's in Greensboro, North Carolina, and asked for coffee and doughnuts. They were, of course, refused. For the men were black, and the lunch counter, like most facilities in the segregated south, served whites only.
Nevertheless, the activists remained all that day. They came back in the morning, and they asked again to be served. Over the next week, the sit-in — despite organised harassment from the KKK and other racists — grew and spread, sparking a movement across many southern cities, which culminated in the desegregation of many public places and inspired civil rights activism throughout America.
Today, most people regard the Greensboro Four as heroes. But what would Peter Dutton have said to them?
This week, the Home Affairs Minister called for mandatory sentences for climate protesters who broke the law, claimed that activists who inconvenienced others should be 'named and shamed', and declared that those receiving social security should have their payments stripped. Senior Nationals minister David Littleproud agreed. He, too, denounced protesters, urging magistrates to 'slip into them'. 'What this should be is about respect. When they don't, we've got to call them out.'
All the same arguments were made in Greensboro in 1960. Woolworth's was, after all, just going about its business. Segregation was not only legal — it was mandated. By demanding to be served, the Greensboro protesters (who were, incidentally, like the climate strikers very young) were both breaking the law themselves and asking the staff to join them in criminality.
Their sit-in disrupted normal routines, just as much as any Extinction Rebellion stunt does. The Woolworth's lunch counter was a busy facility, providing food for thousands of hungry workers each day. As the protests spread, they inevitably inconvenienced apolitical men and women who were just trying to get on with their lives. That's why, throughout the south, prosecutors generally charged those defying segregation with crimes like 'disturbing the peace' or 'disorderly conduct'.
So would Littleproud have said that the Greensboro Four 'lacked respect'? If not, why not?
"They don't hate the tactic — they hate the goal."
Perhaps the difference lies in the cause. Few today will defend the moral abomination that was racial segregation. By contrast, the rhetoric from politicians about environmental protests suggests they view catastrophic global warming as a matter about which reasonable people can politely disagree. Scott Morrison, for instance, both refused to attend the United Nations Climate Summit and then warned against 'needless anxiety' about the environment.
That seems to be the basis on which he and his ministers present protests as an affectation, a foolish reaction to a problem that doesn't really exist. 'Everyone wants a cause these days,' explained David Littleproud, as if the deteriorating planet were an issue that activists simply plucked from a hat. 'They become angry and they impose their will on the Australian people.'
Unfortunately, climate change isn't a choice. The science doesn't alter according to our willingness to accept it. If Littleproud thinks activists impose themselves on the Australian people, wait until he discovers what the planet will do.
The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change involved more than a hundred scientists from 36 countries summarising almost 7000 peer reviewed studies. It found unprecedented sea level rise that will transform hundred-year extreme flooding events into annual occurrences by the middle of the century. Given that a quarter of the world's population lives on the coast, the rising seas promise rather more inconvenience than a temporarily blocked city intersection. Which is, of course, the point.
Imagine you're sleeping in a house that catches fire at night. Imagine the person next door shouting to wake you up. Now picture Peter Dutton, creeping around outside, threatening your neighbour with jail for causing a disturbance. That's where we're at.
The disruption caused by a few Extinction Rebellion stunts palls into insignificance beside the disruption scientists say we need if we're to decarbonise society. Instead of fretting about the etiquette of protests, we should be discussing that process: the rapid implementation of a zero-carbon economy that would offer real alternatives to those at the sharp end of the transition. It's a huge task we face but we have to start somewhere. And right now, that somewhere is the street.
No-one should be fooled: the politicians and commentators who condemn civil disobedience are the same politicians and commentators who attack the UN for passing resolutions on carbon; who tell scientists to get back to the lab when they speak out on politics; who mock celebrities for supporting environmental action; and who do everything they can to keep climate out of the parliament.
They don't hate the tactic — they hate the goal. Great swathes of the political class remain opposed to the kind of action necessitated by the IPCC reports, and they will do whatever they can to prevent it.
In daily life, politeness might be a virtue, but there comes a time when you need to shout, not whisper. The American south was, after all, legendary for its chivalry, as well as its racism.
Jeff Sparrow is a writer, editor and honorary fellow at Victoria University.
Main image: A woman is arrested by police during the Extinction Rebellion protest in Sydney on 7 October 2019 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Lisa Maree Williams/Getty Images)