Undercover bee causes a buzz at Extinction Rebellion protest
Climate protesters’ hive mentality established exactly who would and would not be arrested on Tuesday, writes Mitchell Van Homrigh, who infiltrated the Extinction Rebellion climate protest dressed in a $50 rented bee outfit.
NSW
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IT was the day Sydney was set to be a-buzz with the bees from the Extinction Rebellion swarming in to demand action for what they have dubbed a global climate emergency.
You see, it’s a “bee-mergency”, as the radical green activist group says.
“If the bees die, we die”.
The group was very welcoming as I rocked up to the protest in my very own rented bee suit but it soon became clear that I wasn’t going to be able to wing it.
A co-ordinator handed me a flag and introduced me to another new-bee by the name of Charlie.
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We bees were going to earn our stripes.
Charlie told me that when he’s not swarming the streets with Extinction Rebellion, he’s a worker bee in a call centre where he’d been working all night.
He was determined not to be a drone, despite his lack of sleep from the night before.
After all, he said, what’s a lack of sleep if the world ends? That stung.
Before long I started to spread my wings.
Soon a co-ordinator would tell me what to do in case the police decided to go the full Mortein on our hive.
She said I only had to give the police my name and address (third hive on the fifth tree on the left would not do, apparently), then explained the “bee code”.
I thought she might have been pollen my leg, but in the world of Extinction Rebellion, there is no such a thing. Red bees, she said, were willing to be arrested. Green bees, not so much.
I quickly told her I was in no uncertain terms a green bee. Though I did wonder if it would take three tiny pairs of handcuffs to arrest a bee.
She took me under her wing, introducing me to other protesters, who loved my $50 bee costume rented off Gumtree, giving me hugs and posing for pictures.
But surprisingly, no one called me “honey”.
At this stage I felt more like an applicant on The Masked Singer, I was humming along to “Let It Be” by The Beatles before a dreadlocked beekeeper told me to get ready for the “die-in”.
BUZZING FOR CHANGE
This was supposed to replicate the mass extinction of bees but it felt more like a bush doof or a Year 9 drama class. And let it be known, I’m not great in either of these environments.
We buzzed about while a beekeeper explained to the quizzical tourists about our impending climate doom.
The majority of us had lost, or not read, the explainer pamphlet we were handed which had our die-in cues.
After a couple of hastily murmured “die, the bees are dead” we began to fall.
As I was lying down, awkwardly slumped on the concrete careful not to damage my giant cartoon bee head, I was told to picture an “alternative vision of everyone”. In my vision, I had a bottle of water and I wasn’t dressed as a cartoon bee, alas.
After our “die in” we were reborn to the sound of an EDM remix of Greta Thunberg’s speech at the UN. A shame, because I thought the Bee-Gees might have been more appropriate.
Surely someone could have asked them to record a tribute version of their hit, “Staying A Hive”?
That, or maybe something by renowned environmentalist, Sting.
Before we knew it, we were on our way to pollinate the consciousness of the country.
POLICE SWARM IN
Bees, beekeepers and assorted protesters chanted at police who blocked their exit.
However after a few minutes the bees surged through.
We were on the march.
This is where I had been tipped off there may bee some altercations with police. Two girls who guided me through the busy footpaths explained that they were arrested yesterday and were not supposed to be arrested again.
Maybe it’s just the way my Queen Bee raised me, but in my hive, we were taught you that shouldn’t get arrested in the first place.
In the meantime, I couldn’t bee-lieve my eyes.
Bees may have legendary vision, but my bee costume did not.
After crossing the road and walking into a garbage bin, another protester pushing a pram (the baby was nowhere to be seen) and a police officer on horseback — a member of Extinction Rebellion took pity on me and put me back next to the worker bees.
No one wanted me to get run over.
Though if I was, I hope they’d make an opera of my life in the key of bee-flat.
One of the girls was heard saying to the other, that she did not care if she was arrested again.
Her friend was pulling her back to the path saying ‘you can’t, you can’t do it again’.
It was a drama for the ages.
At this point a female police officer began screaming move on orders at beekeepers standing in the middle of the road: “obey the traffic conditions, obey the traffic conditions”.
MARCHERS HIVE OFF
The first of the protesters was dragged away by police and the hive was split into two with police stopping half the group from entering an intersection. I hoped the other bees would swarm around me and protect me as the queen.
But this was not the case.
Eventually we reached the end of the march. I was confident I had put out more carbon emissions myself than what this protest had stopped.
I jealously looked at other protesters who drank water out of plastic bottles, while others chatted with members of the Green Left press, a paper which markets itself as the paper for the 99 per cent — it must have some readership. As we heard another round of speeches I knew my time in the hive had come to an end.
I managed to do so with a few waves and a chorus of laughter from police officers who were less than complimentary about my costume.
Maybe they were allergic.
The people I spoke to yesterday were passionate and kind and helpful to this blind little bee. But I kept thinking about how little this protest would help their cause.
Would these people be better off directing their passions towards developing programs and policy that enact their vision?
They all just seemed too caught up in the buzz.
Originally published as Undercover bee causes a buzz at Extinction Rebellion protest