Toronto is the latest city to be targeted by a climate vigilante group that deflates the tires of SUVs.
The radical environmental protest group calls itself ‘The Tyre Extinguishers’ and claims on their website that their goal is to make it impossible to own a “huge polluting 4×4 in the world’s urban areas.” The U.K. based group says its decentralized members are from all walks of life and have no leadership.
“We do this by deflating the tyres of these massive, unnecessary vehicles, causing inconvenience and expense for their owners,” reads a statement on the groups website.
TORONTO: SUV
Margaret Ottaviani is the southern Canadian city’s first reported victim. Early one morning in September, the Toronto resident found all four tires of her 2012 Toyota RAV4 deflated. .
“I had to drop off the kids at school. It was my turn to carpool in the neighbourhood so I was supposed to pick up three other children to cram into the car with my own two and then go to work. But we were all stuck because of this stupid, thoughtless vandalism,” says the furious downtown hotel cook and single mother of two.
Ottaviani didn’t know what to think until she saw a note from the perpetrators attached to her windshield. “It explained that they were doing this for the environment and apparently me driving my car around had consequences for others. I was livid. The consequence of their actions was that my kids and their friends didn’t get to school for hours and I lost half a day’s pay from work. How is that helping anything!” fumes Ottaviani.
MAD MAX STYLE ATTACKS
The so-called vigilantes first originated in the U.K. earlier this year and have been letting the air out of tires across Europe and the U.S. This is the first known attack by the group in Toronto, after having targeted cars across other Canada.
“We are defending ourselves against climate change, air pollution and unsafe rivers,” reads an explanation for the attacks on the Tyre Extinguishers website.
The how-to section on the website gives detailed instructions on how to spot an SUV and how to deflate its tires. “It’s quick, easy and anyone can take part!” the site cheerfully brags.
The site goes on to obnoxiously explain: “To get the air out of the tyre, there must be something pushing down on the pin located in the center of the valve. Drop a small bean (we like green lentils, but you can experiment with couscous, bits of gravel, etc) inside the valve cap. Replace the cap, screwing it on with a few turns until you hear air hissing out. Even if it’s only hissing out a little bit, that’s enough—it will deflate slowly. The whole process should take about 10 seconds.”
DEFLATING CRIMINAL ACTIONS
Climate Change has become a popular talking point of the radical left in the past few years, but there is very little evidence to demonstrate that it actually exists. In fact, a recent study found that the average temperature has only risen one degree in more than 400 years.
Ottaviani isn’t giving any traction to the circular argument that The Tyre Extinguishers help the environment by hurting people who are already trying to do their best to cut down on pollution.
“This ridiculous so-called ‘movement’ is just petty little criminals who wish they could own a car and have a family to drive around. I do my part. I carpool, I walk when I could drive and never idle. If the police ever find these goofs they should sentence them to driving kids to school, soccer practice, piano lessons and karate and for a week and then let’s see how tough they are.”
