Just Stop Oil: behind the scenes with the activists

Growing numbers of young nonviolent climate protesters are willing to face jail. Dorian Lynskey followed them in the weeks leading up to last week’s action

In a flat in east London, on the night of 31 March, two dozen people in their early 20s are packing sleeping bags and energy bars and discussing unorthodox toilet arrangements. There are bowls of vegan curry on the table and a Fontaines DC gig on the television. You might assume that they were going to a music festival, if not for the foldable ladders. In fact, they are all members of the new campaign group Just Stop Oil, which is demanding the cessation of all new oil licences in the UK. Their plan is to bring traffic in and out of the Navigator oil terminal in Thurrock, Essex, to a grinding halt a few hours from now. From the window of the flat they can see Navigator’s vast white silos. “I saw it earlier and my stomach flipped,” says Hannah Hunt, a 23-year-old from Brighton. She calls it “the venue”.

Hunt is a veteran of Just Stop Oil’s precursors, Extinction Rebellion and Insulate Britain. In recent months she has delivered a letter containing Just Stop Oil’s demands to No 10 Downing Street, scaled the Fawley oil refinery in Southampton, and glued herself to the red carpet at the Bafta awards. She experiences anxiety before an action but once it’s happening, she enters “a weird, dreamy, calm mindset. It’s really empowering.”

Another prematurely seasoned activist is Louis McKechnie, who served half of a three-month term in jail for blocking the M25 and recently tied himself to a goalpost during a match between Everton and Newcastle. He’s a confident 21-year-old with curtained hair and large glasses. During his pitch invasion, Twitter users compared him to John Lennon and Paul Dano’s Riddler in The Batman. Most of the activists – members of the Youth Climate Swarm – have never been arrested before. “Today will be arrest number 16 for me,” McKechnie says after a legal briefing, “so if you have any questions, I’ll be here all night.”

Continued at The Guardian