Black Sabbath’s heavy metal bench in Birmingham used during climate protest

The campaigners used the bench during a peaceful protest in Birmingham
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Climate and global debt and protesters decided to use the famous Black Sabbath ‘heavy metal’ bench on Birmingham’s golden mile of Broad Street this week to highlight their campaign.

Activists placed placards around the necks of the metallic images of Geezer Butler and Bill Ward, with the latter reading ‘G7:Turn debt into climate action’.

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The placards were removed by staff from Westside BID, although the peaceful protest was acknowledged as democratic and campaigners were thanked for not causing any damage to the bench.

The bench protest (photos from Westside BID)The bench protest (photos from Westside BID)
The bench protest (photos from Westside BID)

The campaigners, who regularly use the hashtag #debtforclimate on social media, say they want developed nations in the west to cancel the debts of so-called third world countries.

Their approach considers ‘climate debt’ to be a debt owed to developing countries for the global damage caused by developed countries’ disproportionately large contribution to climate change.

What was said about the protests?

Mike Olley, general manager of Westside BID, said: “We fully appreciate that the nature of the protest was careful not to cause any damage. However, as custodians of the Black Sabbath bench we had to remove the protest placards.

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“The irony is that Black Sabbath themselves were initially a protest band … as a group of proud, working class blokes, they got annoyed by the ‘hippie’ culture of peace and love and felt they had to project a more raw and realistic aspect of life – hence heavy metal.

The bench protest (photos from Westside BID)The bench protest (photos from Westside BID)
The bench protest (photos from Westside BID)

“But seriously, if you look carefully at some of Black Sabbath’s song lyrics, you can see that they were deeply mistrustful of world leaders, for instance in their War Pigs song.”

Mr Olley added: “Here on Westside we want people to take care of the Black Sabbath bench but, at the same time, we will always welcome democratic, peaceful protests.”

The protests came as this year’s G7 summit of world leaders met at Schloss Elmau, an historic building near Garmisch-Partenkirchen in the Bavarian Alps in Germany.

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