Photo claims to show litter in Hyde Park after environmental protests – Fact Check

A photo claiming to show the aftermath of environmental protests in Hyde Park is spreading on social media. The photo shows large amounts of litter including plastic bottles left strewn across the park. Many are attributing the litter to the recent Extinction Rebellion (XR) pro-environmental protests that occurred London during April 2019.

The image was subsequently recirculated in September 2019 after more climate protests.

FALSE

Examples of some of the social media messages can be seen below.

Hyde Park in London today, after all the “environmentalists” had their virtue signaling protests.
Don’t worry, eco-warriors, some commoners will clean that up.

Hyde park this morning, the eco worriers #ExtinctionRebelion have left their plastic rubbish scattered across the park, so much care and concern for the earth is quite touching really!!

However the photo does not show the aftermath of pro-environmental protests. What the photo does show is the aftermath of the annual 420 gathering in Hyde Park in 2019 which is held every year in support of the legalisation of cannabis use. 420 is a number associated with cannabis use, and as such the demonstration occurs on April 20th each year.

The THTC Hemp Trading Company Facebook page – a pro-cannabis legalisation page – were one of the first to upload the photo to social media, clearly stating that the photo was taken directly after the 420 gathering. (We reached out the to admins of that page who told us they found the image on Twitter here.)

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The THTC Hemp Trading Company’s post happened to mention that the anti-climate change Extinction Rebellion protests were happening nearby, and it seems many misconstrued that point and mistakenly concluded that it was the Extinction Rebellion protests that led to the litter being left at Hyde Park. The THTC Facebook page later updated their post to make it clear that it had nothing to do with the environmental protests.

Comments on Twitter also seem to suggest that members from the Extinction Rebellion protests – along with Hyde Park officials – actually helped clean up after the 420 gathering.

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And at least one protester involved in the Extinction Rebellion protests observed that those responsible for the litter “seemed to generally come from attendees who were drinking large amounts of alcohol” and concluded that there was no correlation between cannabis and litter.

Either way, this isn’t the first time the 420 gathering has been criticised for excessive littering. We also found this article from 2016 that detailed the clean-up operation directly after the annual event in time for a military parade being held the next day.

The Royal Parks Twitter feed soon confirmed that it was indeed an “unofficial event” – not the climate protesters – that had caused the litter.

In September 2019, the photo began spreading again across social media after more climate change protests were held in London and elsewhere across the world. Needless to say, in this instance, not only is it false, but now outdated since the photo dates back to April 2019.

UPDATE: The THTC Facebook page who posted the image responded to our request for more information and told us that they are working on creating a litter pick crew for next year’s event.

The National Hemp Service and THTC are leading on a community litter pick crew for next year, along with looking at how we can provide waste reduction infrastructure (water supply/tanks), waste separation and sustainability pledges from the cannabis industry.