Lock-on

For other uses, see Lock On (disambiguation).

A protestor locks on to heavy earthmoving equipment.

A lock-on is a technique used by peaceful protesters to make it difficult to remove them from their place of protest. It often involves improvised or specially designed and constructed hardware, although a basic lock-on is the human chain which relies simply on hand grip.

In the United States lock-ons are often referred to as lockdowns.

Objective

In American protest movements dating from the 1960s and 70s, the term lockdown applies to a person's attaching themself to a building, object, fence or other immobile object.

The safe removal of the protesters necessitates the involvement of skilled technicians, and is often time-consuming.

The lock-on chosen by the protester may be the difference between being arrested or not, or may vary the kind or number of charges brought against them by the police. If a protester can remove themselves when asked to by the police, they may stand a better chance of not being arrested. However, if they can remove themselves and they chose not to, they may receive a charge for refusing to remove themselves from the lock-on. If the protester cannot remove themselves, it is likely that potential charges are not as important to them as what they are protesting about.

Locking on is a very successful means of slowing down operations which are perceived by the protesters to be illegal or immoral; it is also often used to allow time for journalists to arrive and record the scene and take statements from the group spokespeople.

Devices

Mother and son enjoy a lock-on together with a V arm tube.

This was originally done with chains and handcuffs, but other devices have been introduced, including tripods and tubes or pipes with handholds built in to link a person to an object or to create chains of people.Other common hardware includes padlocks, U-locks and other bicycle locks, lockboxes and tripods and platforms and other rigging in tree sitting.

More complicated lock-ons involve protesters putting their limbs through pipes containing concrete, or a mixture of steel and concrete and is only limited by the imagination and ingenuity of those making the lock-on. The protester can choose between a type that will allow them to willingly remove themselves or a type that requires machinery to remove them. Devices can be buried as an additional barrier to removal. A car dragon is a car concreted into place after removing the wheels, protestors can then lock-on to a further device fixed to the car.

See also

• Blockade
• Human chain
• Sleeping dragon
• Tree sitting

External links

• locking on to a gate in the UK
• locked on to the gate
• police specialist removing locks
• tubes in series with three people to close one lane
• online article from the Pittsburg Post Gazette