this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2025
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This was a Critical Mass event, which is why the bicyclists are taking up all of the street as a way to reclaim the streets and protest the lack of safety for riders under usual conditions. It's not legal, but protests are never useful if they're fully legal now, are they.

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[–] Lightor@lemmy.world -3 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) (2 children)

Oh look, more brain rot.

I can find images of people not moving. That would go against the argument. My point is, cherry picking one or two instances of something proves only that it can happen. Not that it does.

I mean I Googled "protesters blocking emergency vehicles" and got tons of results. So what we a exactly does that picture prove? It happened once? Cool.

Very first result, incase you need it. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/just-stop-oil-waterloo-bridge-ambulance-b2443700.html

[–] destructdisc@lemmy.world 3 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago) (1 children)

The vehicle, which had its blue lights on, was trapped on Waterloo Bridge on Wednesday morning due to congestion caused by Just Stop Oil, Met Police said. Pictures and footage from the scene shared on social media show queues of traffic in both directions on the busy bridge.

The climate campaigners have hit back at the force’s handling of the incident and claimed it was the Met police blocking the ambulance so they could “blame it on a protest march going in the other direction”.

The protesters weren't the one blocking the ambulance. The cars were, and the cops didn't do anything to alleviate that so the ambulance could get through the cars and to the protesters who would've let it through anyway.

You should read the entire article when you try to do a gotcha.

[–] Lightor@lemmy.world -2 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

And why were the cars blocking the road? Just think for 2 seconds lol. Protesters not moving, means cars can't move. Because despite what people here believe, normal people don't just drive through people.

The irony is you quoted the answer:

trapped on Waterloo Bridge on Wednesday morning due to congestion caused by Just Stop Oil

Congestion doesn't happen if they move out of the way of traffic. What do you think, everyone was just stopping to wave at them?

But lemme get a few more, just to make it clear.

  1. Seattle, Washington – November 2022

During a protest on northbound I-5 in downtown Seattle, an ambulance transporting a critically ill 37-year-old man was delayed due to protesters blocking the highway. Medics reported being stuck in a standstill for about a mile. A Washington State Patrol trooper assisted in creating a lane for the ambulance to reach the hospital. The incident resulted in a 19-minute delay in reaching Harborview Medical Center.

Source: KOMO News https://komonews.com/news/local/downtown-protest-on-i-5-blocks-ambulance-carrying-patient-in-critical-condition-seattle-downtown-washington-state-patrol-harborview


  1. St. Petersburg, Florida – July 2020

Protesters blocked an ambulance outside the St. Petersburg Police Headquarters. The ambulance, which was not on an emergency call, had to reroute due to the demonstration. Police released video footage showing the incident.

Source: EMS1 https://www.ems1.com/protests/articles/video-controversy-stirred-after-protesters-block-fla-ambulance-ERIDfzTYNPzkC3U2


  1. London, UK – October 2022

Just Stop Oil protesters blocked emergency vehicles during a demonstration in west London. Videos showed both a fire engine and an ambulance with blue lights unable to get through traffic. The Metropolitan Police arrested 28 protesters for “wilful obstruction of the highway.”

Source: The Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/just-stop-oil-block-ambulance-b2200208.html


  1. New Haven, Connecticut – 2015

Approximately 100–200 protesters blocked a highway, delaying an ambulance carrying a critically ill patient. Due to the delay, EMTs had to perform an emergency medical procedure in the ambulance instead of at the hospital.

Source: FOX61 https://www.fox61.com/article/news/local/outreach/awareness-months/hundreds-of-protestors-in-new-haven-block-ambulance-carrying-critically-ill-patient-1-arrested/520-cde15049-3446-4039-814a-7505edc43498

[–] jerkface@lemmy.ca 2 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (1 children)

was that so hard?

cherry picking one or two instances of something proves only that it can happen. Not that it does.

close; it proves it DID happen, which necesarily implies it DOES happen. You are right to object that a single genuine datapoint (or as you like to spin it, "anecdote") cannot say anything about frequency, but I really have to steelman what you are saying to get there.

[–] Lightor@lemmy.world -1 points 11 hours ago

was that so hard?

No, it's not hard to spoon feed someone information but I didn't think I had to. Fuck, everyone is just the give it to me now, I don't want to have to look into anything. People just take photos at face value and make judgment calls without even the most topical vetting. God this is depressing.

close; it proves it DID happen, which necesarily implies it DOES happen. You are right to object that a single genuine datapoint (or as you like to spin it, "anecdote") cannot say anything about frequency, but I really have to steelman what you are saying to get there.

Close, it proves it did happen, which only proves it did happen once, that's it. It does not, in any way at all, ever, by any form of logic mean it still DOES happen. You can infer that, but that is not what it proves, at all.

A single data point by itself can easily be classified as an anomaly, meaning not normal. Without context you can't determine if it's the rule or the exception, only that it happened once. It could be a 1 trillion to 1 chance and it just happened to be that picture. We have no idea, it means nothing. Trying to act like it does is nothing short of using an unreliable data point (anecdote) to push a narrative.