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Post by jonjel on Mar 29, 2011 14:46:46 GMT 1
I am sure many here watched in outrage the damage being done by the mindless morons and members of anarchist groups who decided the TUC march was a good cover for their activities.
I don't know how many of those caught will be successfully prosecuted. Some I would quite like to see strung up by their gonads outside the properties they targeted, but that would probably be contrary to their civil rights.
I have suggested this before, but would one good move be to make it a criminal offence to hide ones identity while on a march or demo. Criminal as opposed to civil offence.
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Post by speakertoanimals on Mar 29, 2011 16:29:46 GMT 1
Except do we really want a state where it is the right of the state to be able to see us in public at all times? If you make it illegal at marches or demos, then you just do it NOT at a march or demo! Just turn up in a balaclava, and get your spray can out...................... Plus smacks of the french and their attitude towards the muslim veil, and even though it is a symbol of a patriarchal religion which thinks women should be hidden from the gaze of naughty men unless they get unduly overheated at the site of the female dermis -- I still can't agree to a law that would end up with us agreeing with the french!  Public should not mean -- on public view. I reserve the right to put a bag over my head when I go out of my front door if I so wish! Or a gorilla mask, or whatever other daft item of clothing I choose! |
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Post by speakertoanimals on Mar 29, 2011 16:39:31 GMT 1
Except it's EASY to be outraged, and that is just what they wanted! There are always idiots who will do this stuff, but not all of then ARE idiots, that's the rub. Or mindless. Being an anarchist is okay in my book, its the violence that isn't, and I don't think that the two are necessarily synonymous. Unfortunately, SOME disaffected young men and women will always enjoy the excitement of this sort of street confrontation, I can GUESS it's a terrific buzz. Just this lot do it under a nice-sounding political banner, others do the same stuff under a different banner. But this sort of street-fighting and crowd disorder has always gone on.
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Post by principled on Mar 29, 2011 17:08:28 GMT 1
STA I wear a baseball cap, usually to keep my ever increasing bald spot from over cooling! However, when I return to the UK and present myself at passport control, I am asked to remove it. I don't object. If I did there is an easy way round it, I just don't travel. The same applied to these street urchins who are there not to make any political point but to create damage. Why the graffiti spray? Why the smashing of windows? What does that prove? Nowt. If they have a point to make, then use passive resistance, no destruction needed. But of course, most of these "irate" people are out for no more than the football hooligans, they probably don't even know what Fortnum and Masons is, let alone some of the other buildings they damaged. They aren't anarchists with a genuine dislike of governmental orgainsations (see groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo/message/8096 ), most are there for the ride, for the buzz, the thrill of the chase. Indeed, they probably haven't got a clue what anarchy means. The only thing they have is the herding instinct; please don't endow on them more intelligence than the little they have. P |
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Post by speakertoanimals on Mar 29, 2011 18:46:36 GMT 1
I'm not agreeing with what these people DO, I just don't feel that their naughtiness merits THE REST OF US being required to be visually identifiable in public whenever the powers that be (or some over-zealous chief constable) decide that they will describe what we are doing as a 'demo'. That is the real problem, when measures that would be perhaps permissable when applied to the actual perpetrators have to be applied to the rest of us as well in order to work!
Which is very different from passing through passport control, where I quite understand WHY officials need to see me, and those who want to wear the veil or object to those terahertz body scanners will just have to put up with it!
Because what could be designated as a possible 'demo' site -- anywhere in central london, any city centre, any town centre, anywhere within half a mile of some major installation like a power station, anywhere on some out-of-town site that happens to include major bank or insurance company offices?
SO, we have a (small) but annoying amount of property damage and a bit of a ruck with the police -- I think we can cope with that. They are idiots, but hey, idiots will ALWAYS be with us, and there will always be some bunch who want to break stuff and have a go at the police when there is something else going on that means there will be plenty of police to aim at, and some prospect of getting on the telly.
I don't see that current powers won't allow the police to cope anyway (if we have the numbers to police it). some group in black with masks is breaking stuff, I think they then already have the powers to require that masks be removed from a similarly clad bunch............Which is a different approach to REQUIRING that all members of the public have their faces uncovered in public at all times, or assuming that a whole group dressed as gorillas, say (well, they could always change their costume after all!) are suspicious, hence face-covering fancy-dress no longer allowed in a public place.....................
I guess I just don't get the outrage & mindless morons response, too Daily-Mail for me! I very rarely get outraged, and I think better to save our outrage for real outrages, not a few idiots breaking shop windows.
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Post by rsmith7 on Mar 29, 2011 21:03:17 GMT 1
Didn't notice any of this nonsense at the countryside alliance march.
I wonder how the media would have handled it if there was a little light destruction of property.
I'd love to throw a chair through Labour HQ's window.
Almost as much as I'd like to throw the Labour leader through Labour HQ's window.
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Post by jonjel on Mar 30, 2011 9:53:48 GMT 1
STA. That is NOT what I said, or meant. I am talking about people on demonstrations deliberately hiding their identity, and we have all seen this. I wold have thought it was pretty easy to differentiate between a group dressed as Smurfs going to the Sevens at Twickenham and a bunch of people walking with banners and placards.
You talk about the 'small' amount of damage. It would not be small if it was your car that was tipped on it's roof and torched, or your windows that were broken, or your garden wall that was pushed over.
Everyone has an absolute right to protest about more or less anything as long as they stay on the right side of the line. And if they do, then to my mind they should also be prepared to do so openly and not deliberately disguise their appearance.
I have been on a couple of marches in the past, and was quite proud of feeling strongly enough about a particular subject to do so quite openly.
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Post by speakertoanimals on Mar 30, 2011 12:26:00 GMT 1
Except if ALL they are doing is being at a demo, who shouldn't they hide their identity if they wish?
IF they then commit a crime, fair enough, but should we really restrict individual freedoms BEFORE the act in order to make life more convenient for the police?
And as I said before, who is to say what a 'demo' is, or to stop groups just congregating and smashing stuff anyway. Hence the unfortunate conclusion would be people not allowed to hide their faces in public IN CASE they were planning to cause trouble.
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Post by jonjel on Mar 30, 2011 12:43:36 GMT 1
If you go into a bank, and some shops you are asked to take your crash helmet off.
Why?
After all you are a law abiding citizen so what right to they have to tell you to reveal who you are? Just because you might be the one in 100,000 who is up to no good? How dare they!
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Post by speakertoanimals on Mar 30, 2011 13:08:47 GMT 1
Except that isn't IN PUBLIC! That's the point. We already have all that CCTV keeping an eye on us in public anyway, why should we have our rights further eroded, might as well just implant us all with a chip and have done with it.................................
Exactly. Or rather, if they want to know, let them come and ask -- what right do they (or anyone else) have to prevent me wearing a gorilla suit in public at all times IF I SO WISH! Else we end up with dfat laws like the french, where no one is supposed to hide their face in public.
I reserve the right to wear a bag over my head in public if I so wish, and bugger the french! If someone has due cause for stopping me in public and enquiring as to what I'm up to, fair enough, but if they don't, then I'll leave the bag on thank you very much!
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Post by jonjel on Mar 30, 2011 14:03:15 GMT 1
STA.
In the vast majority of countries you are required to carry ID, and have to produce it when you are asked to do so. There never was and never is any reason why people are stopped. They just are.
Here there is meant to be a reason why people are stopped, although I would be the first to admit that the reasons can be as varied as 'he looked a bit dodgy guv', or even, 'she was wearing a paper bag on her head'
All I am saying is, at major events where it is blindingly obvious there is going to be trouble, if you are a trouble maker, you can run, but you can't hide.
Why should MY freedom to go shopping, run a business or just go for a walk be threatened by mindless morons who decide to cause mayhem while hiding behind masks.
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Post by speakertoanimals on Mar 30, 2011 14:44:41 GMT 1
Except your freedom to do that is going to be disrupted by even a legal demo!
I don't have a problem them being unmasked when they have done something, or when someone has a really good reason to think they are going equipped to do something in the near future. I just don't want those sensible reasons reduced to -- thou shalt not wear a mask in public if the police decide you look a bit dodgy.
Glad we don't have to then! Let the police ask for some ID when they have good reason to, like they've stopped me for speeding. Not just because, say, I happen to be wearing a bag on my head in a built-up area!
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Post by jonjel on Mar 30, 2011 14:51:00 GMT 1
Well, that would be a good reason to stop you - unable to see through the windscreen.
Or not if full control of your senses.......
(I learned a while back STA that if I had a black cat you would have a white one so methinks this will end without even broad agreement)
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Post by principled on Mar 30, 2011 15:12:54 GMT 1
The bottom line for me STA is straight forward and is based on a thing called Principles (hence my pen neame). If I believe that my actions are valid and legal then I should be proud to show my face and let the World see who I am and take any consequences that arise from my views.
Covering one's face is an indication IMO that:
1) You either know the action you are taking is illegal and don't want to take the consequences that will arise because of it.
or
2) Your beliefs aren't based on any Principles but simply are acts of vandalism and your main aim is to create havoc without paying any price for your actions.
If one believes in something strongly enough, one should have no compunction to demonstrate it openly and that includes your identity.
P
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Post by jonjel on Mar 30, 2011 15:40:29 GMT 1
That gets my vote Principled.
I don't like the 'mission creep' of more CCTV cameras that almost anywhere in the world, but I also don't like people being able to avoid being caught for some pretty nasty behavior because they decide to wear a balaclava (or a paper bag) and depriving them of that headgear somehow infringes their human rights.
That, in your language STA is spherical objects.
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