Abstract
We mobilize Sara Childers's concept of “getting in trouble” when studying social movements to argue that researcher decisions that result in unintended consequences provide opportunities for reflection: what happened and why; what ethical issues or risks arose; and how the research can move forward ethically and responsibly. We apply this concept to reflect on an incident when the first author, a scholar-activist undertaking research with an Extinction Rebellion chapter, found himself in conflict with some members of the group following a meeting with a police officer. We argue that understanding the incident as getting in trouble does not disengage researchers from questions around researcher decisions and their effects on participants; the use of this incident extends the ethical dilemmas beyond data collection and into the process of writing; and getting in trouble can raise heretofore invisible issues. We therefore suggest that ‘getting in trouble’ can be of value to social movement scholars, but that it does not extinguish the ethical concerns that are raised.