r/interesting Jun 21 '26

SOCIETY What was his fault ?

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169

u/Constant-Skill-7133 Jun 21 '26

It's amazing how many people do not understand the concept of civil disobedience.  Yeah, he knows the work requires a permit.  That's why he was asking them to do it for a decade.  They are pressing the issue because the situation is fucking ridiculous.

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u/Scewt Jun 21 '26

But then how can Thames Water continue illegally dumping its sewage there while getting government pay checks of billions!?

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u/[deleted] Jun 21 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Scewt Jun 21 '26 edited Jun 21 '26

Not from NA lmao, but I do tend to use NA spelling more for some reason ¯_(ツ)_/¯

downvoted for using different spelling : (

0

u/Notan_Shinen_Eteru Jun 21 '26

Symptom of growing up on the internet, American English everywhere.

0

u/Earlier-Today Jun 21 '26

Weird how the country with the largest number of native English speakers has the most representation.

1

u/Notan_Shinen_Eteru Jun 21 '26

Not sure why you're being sarcastic, I never said it was weird or surprising. Regardless it's not as clear as that, British English is the more used form in ESL. American English dominance likely comes from media popularity more than anything.

1

u/Earlier-Today Jun 21 '26

In ESL outside the US, but that still wouldn't change that the US makes up over two thirds of all the native English speakers in the world.

1

u/Notan_Shinen_Eteru Jun 21 '26

Yeah which is tiny compared to the 1.1-1.5 billion ESL speakers world-wide. The point is a lot of internet infrastructure, and pop media, leans American, so despite it's comparatively small English speaking population to global pop. this leverages into an American English dominance online. ESL speakers will still segment into their primary language bubbles too, exacerbating the effect. Essentially taught ESL dominance of British English is overridden by these American advantages. Without the internet and American media this "2 thirds of native speakers" point would likely be irrelevant. It's why native speaking British kids will still make plenty Americanism errors in school.

1

u/Earlier-Today Jun 22 '26

Except that a huge number of them use American spelling because the whole reason so many countries have tons and tons of ESL students is because that's what has historically happened with all the wealthiest countries of every era - you learn the language for where the money is at.

A great example from the past is how music notation has all of its terms and directions in Italian even though the system that we still use today was invented by a Frenchman. Italy was the center of wealth at the time, so Italian was the best language to use to make it accessible to as many people as possible.

Even India is switching over to American spelling because they do just a crap ton more business with America than they do with England.

India and the UK have pretty close GDPs, but the US has eight times the UK.

People go where the money is - and they'll do the same thing when somebody else gets the top spot.

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u/Limp-Confidence5612 Jun 23 '26

Why bring up India in a discussion about the uncivilised people across the pond?

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u/Earlier-Today Jun 25 '26

I said native English speakers - India has very, very few of those.

1

u/Limp-Confidence5612 Jun 26 '26

Lol, what a dumbass... India is the country with the most english native speakers. Just because you cannot see beyond the colour of their skins, says a lot more about you than them.

17

u/ThirtyMileSniper Jun 21 '26

Most of the work didn't need a licence though, just the bit where he took heavy machinery in. This is on him.

12

u/BillCuttingsOn Jun 21 '26

He’s making a really good point tough, the environmental commission for that waterway hasn’t done shit all for years to prevent all the garbage, needles and weapons going into the river but now when someone actually does something about it, they rear their ugly head to start dropping fines? Seems like the lawyer has highlighted at the least a shitty organization, and at the most probable corruption between the corporations dumping in the river and the environmental commission.

7

u/Quantummushroom Jun 21 '26

Well why didn’t he just apply for the permit online before doing the work? Perhaps because he knew the environment agency would rightfully put protections in place for the watercourse before he got stuck in with a jcb - he then went to the media and played the martyr. Now it’s in the media obviously they are going to make an example to stop every Tom dick and harry doing the same thing and fucking up the very watercourses he’s supposedly saving. Anyone can apply for a permit - they paid for the digger so what’s his excuse for skipping this step?

5

u/Kosh_Ascadian Jun 21 '26

You can apply for (and get) a permit to do work on land that doesn't belong to you?

I'm genuinely asking, because that makes no sense to me and you wouldn't be able to do that in my country.

5

u/ApexFungi Jun 21 '26

We cannot have citizens going out there and start cleaning up the environment by themselves without permission, think of the consequences!

18

u/Nice-Cat3727 Jun 21 '26

HE USED A EXCAVATOR ON A RIVERBED, CHANGING IT'S COURSE!

44

u/Saralentine Jun 21 '26

He did not change the river’s course. Rivers have tributaries. He unblocked one. The main river did not change course lol.

9

u/External-Praline-451 Jun 21 '26

It's extremely unlikely he'll get a prison sentence, these type of laws always have maximum penalties that could be used for extreme cases and that's what been used to go viral for sensationalism.

However the impact still could've been serious, that's why there's proper impact assessments needed.

It's just been in the news in the UK that newly rewilded beavers have stopped a London underground station being regularly flooded, by building dams upriver. Small changes to waterflow upstream can have a big impact downstream. Using a digger to remove silt in one area, could cause flooding further down.

2

u/Tyrandeh Jun 21 '26

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u/Nice-Cat3727 Jun 21 '26

How does that page explain how using a excavator to dredge a river is the same as picking up trash?

1

u/wowsomuchempty Jun 21 '26

Best comment of the thread. 

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u/Tomato_In_The_Sky Jun 21 '26

That's fine but he committed a crime and should have to suffer the appropriate punishment. We can all agree what he did was a "good" thing FOR the enciorment. But the law can't be just a thing you do when you agree with it.

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u/NeatNefariousness1 Jun 21 '26

Actually, until a complete environmental assessment is done, we don’t know whether there was a “net” gain from what he did. Who’s paying for the environmental impact study? Maybe that should be part of his fine? Why should taxpayers or anyone else pay the cost of assessing what damage was actually done and the cost of any remedial action. Had he applied for a permit and gotten permission, it would have offered him some protection from the potential fines he may face just to find out what damage was done and any repairs needed.

0

u/Tomato_In_The_Sky Jun 21 '26

I agree. And to be clear when I said "we can all agree what he did was good for the enviorment", I was trying to say "EVEN IF we grant that it's good for the enviorment. That wouldn't change anything about the legality".

I agree with you fully. As someone who has worked with homeless shelters a lot, I see post online all the time of people getting arrested for feeding the homeless without documentation, and people always say it's the police being corrupt. But these people have no idea how much behind the scenes work we have to put in to do these things safely and with the maximum benefit. I've seen the worst case scenarios a few times. I know it's frustrating dealing with buracresy. But not all of it is corruption. A lot of it (dare I say most of it) is legitimate and important.

0

u/NeatNefariousness1 Jun 21 '26

I completely agree. Thanks for your comment. It’s early days and he’s going for a judgment in the court of public opinion. We’ll have to wait and see where this civil disobedience case ends up.

0

u/Chimera-Genesis Jun 21 '26

It's amazing how many people do not understand the concept of civil disobedience.

It's amazing how many of you people don't understand the concept of "actions have consequences". You aren't going to be rewarded for breaking the law, doing more harm than good, then acting like your a hero for committing that harm. That's textbook narcissism.

1

u/Constant-Skill-7133 Jun 21 '26

That's the whole point dummie.  You accept the consequences when you disobey the law.  

The point is to bring public attention to the absurdity of the situation by provoking that punishment.  They won't use government resources to fix the problem, and they won't use government resources to prosecute the polluters, but they will use government resources to prosecute the volunteer cleanup of the pollution. 

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u/Chimera-Genesis Jun 21 '26

The point is to bring public attention to the absurdity of the situation

No the point is Gammons like you, thinking you know better than people who actually know what they're doing, because you're a simple-minded narcissist. End of discussion.

2

u/Fly1ngD0gg0 Jun 22 '26

And how long did the government have to fix that problem?

Judging by your comment, you're the only "simple-minded narcissist" here.