BP or not BP?

BP is sponsoring the Vikings exhibition at the British Museum. That’s right – those remorseless plunderers of wealth and resources are funding an exhibition about the Vikings.

What you can do:

• Watch and share the video of our invasion of the British Museum with oily vikings and Norse Gods (above)
• Read more about what happened on the action and why we did it
• Sign the petition to the British Museum.
• Watch and share the spoof film about BP sponsorship of the Vikings
• Print out some flyers to hand out at the British Museum, or a cinema near you showing #VikingsLive

“Then it shall come to pass that the earth and the mountains will shake so violently that trees will be torn up by the roots…The sea rushes over the earth, for the Midgard−serpent writhes in giant rage and seeks to gain the land.” – Viking legend from the Prose Edda

British Petroleum: the wolf that will eat the sun?

The Vikings believed that Ragnarok, the end of the world, would see a rising of the oceans and a great burning of the earth.

BP’s business plan relies on such a future. BP admits that continuing to extract and burn oil will lead to disastrous climate change, but according to its own annual report it is hoping to keep on digging up and selling the stuff until we’ve passed the point of no return.

BP: Busily Pillaging

Oil companies like BP are lobbying against environmental laws and blocking clean energy alternatives all over the world, to allow them to keep on looting and pillaging the Earth’s natural resources. Experts tell us that with renewable energy we could power the world without fossil fuels – but that would mean less profit for the likes of BP.

A history of violence

BP isn’t afraid to get its hands dirty. It’s been accused of trampling over Indigenous rights in Canada, failing to properly compensate the victims of its huge Gulf Coast oil spill and colluding with oppressive regimes from Indonesia to Colombia. Despite the Deepwater Horizon tragedy it is pushing to drill in ever-more risky and polluting places, from deep offshore rigs to tar sands to the Arctic.

Trickster gods

It’s deeply ironic that this modern-day plunderer is sponsoring the Vikings exhibition at the British Museum – and it’s shameful that the Museum is letting BP get away with it. By providing a tiny percentage (less than 1%) of the annual income of institutions like the British Museum, BP gets a huge amount of positive publicity in return, helping it to present itself as a responsible member of society rather than the oily berserker it really is.

BP is only sponsoring our history to help it get away with destroying our future.

Help remove the taint of destruction from our national treasures – tell the British Museum to end its sponsorship deal with BP!

• Sign the petition
• Tweet your thoughts @BritishMuseum, using the hashtag #VikingsLive
• Email them on feedback@britishmuseum.org

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