London Student protests - Wed 8th Dec+ Thurs 9th

[detective-boy]

Was this the first time kettling was used in the UK?

No. Containment has been a standard part of public order policing since forever. It was absolutely routine at the time of major football related disorder in the 80s.

Just because you have now invented a "cool" new name for it doesn't mean it's anything new.

 

[audiotech]

Thatcher's fucking children.....

Not all are as you suggest.....

 

[claphamboy]

@ BigTom, that’s why I said ‘broadly’ in support.

I’ve had conversations where there’s outrage about the attack on the royals, and about that dickhead Gilmore, but I tend to steer the conversation away from these sideshows and focus more on the main demo. Same applies to those bringing-up the subject of those ‘intent on trouble’, normally easily dealt with by asking if they believe a small minority should prevent the massive majority who want to peacefully protest.

Once you cut through that crap and focus on horse charges against innocent kids, the kettles, the beatings especially on people’s heads, dragging that guy out of the wheelchair, etc., etc., it becomes impossible for reasonable people not to be broadly in support of the students.

Personally I didn’t think the attack on the royals was a very bright idea, although somewhat amusing, because it was clear that would be the main photo on the front page of every newspaper and the main item on the broadcast news.

Had that not happened, the focus would still have been on the demo and the main photos would have been those of the treasury window smashing, which would have avoided the ‘extra outrage’ caused by the royals & Gilmore photos that distracted from the real issues and debate.

 

[detective-boy]

I heard this guy on the radio this morning.

Me too. Hearing his account of the two occasions on which he was pulled from his chair, the first sounds like it might be justifiable (he was with a group and the police were clearing them / pushing them back) but the second doeasn't (he says he was just on the sidelines and an officer from the first incident recognised him, ran over and dragged him out of his chair and across the pavement for 15yds before just being left there). If he wants to hold the officers to account I hope he Or anyone else who witnessed it) is complaining.

What was especially bizarre was that he says he was struck with a baton during the first incident ... but he didn't seem to have any issue with that at all. Assuming he didn't have any weapon, I find it very difficult to see how a baton strike on someone in a wheelchair can ever be justified.

 

[revlon]

No. Containment has been a standard part of public order policing since forever. It was absolutely routine at the time of major football related disorder in the 80s.

Just because you have now invented a "cool" new name for it doesn't mean it's anything new.

no, 'kettling' a very specific logistical operation. Containment is containment, a cordon is a cordon, kettling requires the application of a pre-planned strategy of containment involving police cordons, resulting in a mass of peole being held unlawfully and against their will in an ever tighter pen for a long period of time before being released individually to be photographed and have their details taken.

All this was explained in the judical review of the mayday 2001 kettle by the various gold and silver commanders.

Desk jockeys may be able to deal with drunken assaults and minor staurday night skirmishes but don't pretend you know the workings of your superiors.

 

[revlon]

no, 'kettling' a very specific logistical operation. Containment is containment, a cordon is a cordon, kettling requires the application of a pre-planned strategy of containment involving police cordons, resulting in a mass of peole being held unlawfully and against their will in an ever tighter pen for a long period of time before being released individually to be photographed and have their details taken.

All this was explained in the judical review of the mayday 2001 kettle by the various gold and silver commanders.

Desk jockeys may be able to deal with drunken assaults and minor staurday night skirmishes but don't pretend you know the workings of your superiors.

also it's decidely not about public order it's used for a very specific ideological purpose - stopping protestors coming back to the next demo (this was at a time when summit protests were all the rage).

Despite the obvious crossover kettling footie fans just doesn't serve the same purpose.

 

[detective-boy]

From a very good article posted to Libcom, "On violence against the police - The Commune".

Articles such as that absolutely justify very robust and restrictive policing tactics from the outset of every protest which could be considered as being against the State. If you subscribe to that view then I look forward to you explaining that "Someone has to say it: mass violence against the police inevitably means that the police will use restrictive and robust policing tactics from an early stage, to defend themselves let alone the interests they are defending. We wish it wasn't but it is. The reason is simple: the protestors are intent on attacking the State unconditionally and the police are the only part of the State actually available for physical attack so they attacked without remorse - or even a second thought. Reasonable police officers yearn for a compromise, whereby they facilitate peaceful and lawful protest: but the extremist protestors aren't listening. Neither should the rest.".

 

[detective-boy]

Hotly denied by the est. though...

Mainly because there weren't ...

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I support the students but disagree with the violent attacks by both Police and Protesters on each other.

So basically you wash your hands of responsibility for the consequences of what you do.

Your whole post is a feeble self-justification, but this bit is particularly feeble. Who started the violent attacks? Who is in hospital with brain damage after a violent attack? Who has the full protection of the law to stop them from ever being prosecuted for their violent attacks?

Charging a crowd on horseback is a violent attack. Kettling is a violent attack. Yet you say that you 'disagree' with any protesters fighting back after being attacked?

That's a pathetic excuse to try to make yourself feel better. I doubt you really believe it yourself, and I'm certainly not going to accept any of what you've said in this post as justification for what you are doing.

 

[claphamboy]

in an ever tighter pen for a long period of time

These two things, combined with the beatings & use of horses, are what I can’t get my head around.

I can see some logic in containment, but to keep pushing the crowd and shouting ‘go back’ when they know there’s nowhere for them to go because the other end is another load of coppers doing the same. To then start attacking people and moving horses in to achieve something that is clearly impossible just beggars belief.

To quote Shami Chakrabarti, it seems a kettle is just designed to bring the crowd to boiling point.

Whoever thinks that is a good idea is a complete twat IMO.

 

[detective-boy]

For some reason I thought you were suggesting that I was privately educated.

The context of the post, in a series of posts, gave that impression. I had to read it twice to work out it wasn't you that was the alleged posh twat ...

 

[revlon]

Articles such as that absolutely justify very robust and restrictive policing tactics from the outset of every protest which could be considered as being against the State. If you subscribe to that view then I look forward to you explaining that "Someone has to say it: mass violence against the police inevitably means that the police will use restrictive and robust policing tactics from an early stage, to defend themselves let alone the interests they are defending. We wish it wasn't but it is. The reason is simple: the protestors are intent on attacking the State unconditionally and the police are the only part of the State actually available for physical attack so they attacked without remorse - or even a second thought. Reasonable police officers yearn for a compromise, whereby they facilitate peaceful and lawful protest: but the extremist protestors aren't listening. Neither should the rest.".

Someone has to say it: mass violence against the police is necessary as part of any social struggle. We wish it wasn’t but it is. The reason is simple: the police defend the state unconditionally, the state defends capital unconditionally, and capital attacks us without remorse – or even a second thought. Reasonable liberals yearn for a compromise: but the state isn’t listening. Neither should protestors.

 

[detective-boy]

Will make very compelling evidence in any subsiquent court case that the kettle was punative in intent.

No. It won't. It will make very compelling evidence of the fact that there was a containment in place, involving the number of people shown, at the location shown, at about twelve minutes past ten.

It will not be any evidence at all, let alone "compelling evidence" of the purpose for which it was put in place ...

 

[audiotech]

London Student Assembly Press Conference in three parts:

 

[revlon]

No. It won't. It will make very compelling evidence of the fact that there was a containment in place, involving the number of people shown, at the location shown, at about twelve minutes past ten.

It will not be any evidence at all, let alone "compelling evidence" of the purpose for which it was put in place ...

At the judical review at the high court for mayday 2001 the reason the police gave for containing people for such a long period was that there were crowds of protestors outside the kettle who they couldn't get into the kettle therefore were unwilling to let people go home until everybody was kettled.

The mind of police tacticians is is a strange sometimes frightening place.

 

[detective-boy]

NIce pics and account on your blog. Should you maybe blur some of the faces in the pics? If you've got a caption on a photo saying 'protesters launching fence into police lines' and it shows the faces of the protesters - well, from the point of view of the police that's a criminal act and your photos might be used as evidence. I know they probably took all the photos they wanted themselves but still...

Conflating two debates raging on the boards at the moment:

This would be an excellent example of the clash between (a) the right of all to freedom of expression and the "right", suggested to exist under that principle, of photographers to take any picture they like and publish it in any way that they like, without any consideration of any rights of the subject and, if the subject happened to know of the existence of the picture, without any consideration at all of the specific requests of the subject and (b) the right of an individual to privacy and their "right", suggested under that principle by me, of an individual to determine what happens to their image.

As it happens, this incident would fall under a number of exceptions to the general rule I would propose whereby the individual, if they became aware of the picture being taken would by default have the right to request that it be destroyed and / or not published in a particular way ... but it is an interesting example of the clash of the principles and rights / "rights" involved.

(Further discussion on the "What should you do if someone takes your photograph" thread in General to avoid derailing this one)

 

[detective-boy]

Anonymous thug at the protest.

I trust you have made a complaint, with that footage as the evidence.

 

[revlon]

These two things, combined with the beatings & use of horses, are what I can’t get my head around.

I can see some logic in containment, but to keep pushing the crowd and shouting ‘go back’ when they know there’s nowhere for them to go because the other end is another load of coppers doing the same. To then start attacking people and moving horses in to achieve something that is clearly impossible just beggars belief.

To quote Shami Chakrabarti, it seems a kettle is just designed to bring the crowd to boiling point.

Whoever thinks that is a good idea is a complete twat IMO.

plus they do it in rotation. The frontline of riot police get replaced by fresh legs every hour or so, meaning they can hold people indefinitely.

It is the perfect police tactic, it's just a shame they have to let people out at all.

 

[butchersapron]

What further info do we have about this London Student Assembly? I see a group of counter-fire COR people and they've already set up a praesidium...if anyone goes to the meeting this afternoon can they let us know their impressions please...

 

[detective-boy]

Shit, hadn't seen that. This stuff needs to be circulated as widely as possible to combat the police story that they were simply defending themselves.

You are confusing two aspects:

(1) : the police (as an organisation) are invariably correct when they say that they (as an organisation) are not the first to act violently and that their use of force (in the form of tactics used by them as an organisation) is invariably in an attempt to prevent disorder, violence and crime and / or to protect themselves (as an organisation).

(2) : it is patently obvious from many of the pieces of footage from any number of disturbances for many years, that an individual police officer, using force as part of the police (as an organisation) deploying a particular tactic, of which they are but one officer, is frequently not defending themselves (as an individual) from the particular individual protestor to whom they individually apply force whilst they are defending themselves (or attempting to prevent disorder, violence and crime) from the protestors (as a crowd).

The law is clear on the use of force at the individual level: an officer using force must be able to justify it's use as against the person to whom it is applied.

It is less clear on the use of force, justifable at the higher level of police (organisation) v protestors (crowd), by an individual officer on an individual protestor. I am not aware of an particular case in which the precise point has been considered by the appeal courts. I have seen lots of lower level cases - magistrates / Crown Court - where the higher level justification appears to have been accepted by the magistrates / jury as making the individual use of force lawful ... but I am not at all sure that that would be the judgment of the appeal courts (where I would expect them to draw some sort of distinction between the inevitable need for the police (as an organisation) to apply force to the protest (as a crowd) as part of their fulfilling their duty to prevent crime and maintain the peace and the level of individual force by an individual officer on an individual protestor which would be permissible simply on that basis (probably restricted to common assault level, and probably based on the principle that by participating in a demonstration you consent to the possibility of that level of force possibly being applied to you by the police (and by other protestors, pushing you around, etc.) in the same way that you consent to common assault as part of any contact sport).

The "debate" being had at the moment about "who started it" and "we only became violent because the police kettled us" is overly simplistic and will get nowhere. The complexities of the situation, and the question of how the group level justifications for the use of force translate into the individual actual uses of force by one member of one group on one member of another need to be acknowledged, considered and, ultimately, tested properly in the higher Courts.

 

[detective-boy]

... and the lies about that bloody van ...

Your evidence that they are "lies" being ...

 

[audiotech]

No. Containment has been a standard part of public order policing since forever. It was absolutely routine at the time of major football related disorder in the 80s.

Just because you have now invented a "cool" new name for it doesn't mean it's anything new.

Thousands of people being 'corralled' by the police, not being able to leave, having to stand in a line for hours and having their faces photographed is.

 

[detective-boy]

they're not supposed to hit anyone on the head in a baton charge are they? just arms and legs?

Arms and legs are meant to be the principal target area. The head is not supposed to be a target unless (a) there is no alternative target available AND (b) the use of fatal force can be justified.

The use of shields to push people back should also avoid using chops with the edge of the shield being applied to heads (for the same reasons and subject to the same exception).

 

[butchersapron]

You are confusing two aspects:

(1) : the police (as an organisation) are invariably correct when they say that they (as an organisation) are not the first to act violently and that their use of force (in the form of tactics used by them as an organisation) is invariably in an attempt to prevent disorder, violence and crime and / or to protect themselves (as an organisation).

(2) : it is patently obvious from many of the pieces of footage from any number of disturbances for many years, that an individual police officer, using force as part of the police (as an organisation) deploying a particular tactic, of which they are but one officer, is frequently not defending themselves (as an individual) from the particular individual protestor to whom they individually apply force whilst they are defending themselves (or attempting to prevent disorder, violence and crime) from the protestors (as a crowd).

The law is clear on the use of force at the individual level: an officer using force must be able to justify it's use as against the person to whom it is applied.

It is less clear on the use of force, justifable at the higher level of police (organisation) v protestors (crowd), by an individual officer on an individual protestor. I am not aware of an particular case in which the precise point has been considered by the appeal courts. I have seen lots of lower level cases - magistrates / Crown Court - where the higher level justification appears to have been accepted by the magistrates / jury as making the individual use of force lawful ... but I am not at all sure that that would be the judgment of the appeal courts (where I would expect them to draw some sort of distinction between the inevitable need for the police (as an organisation) to apply force to the protest (as a crowd) as part of their fulfilling their duty to prevent crime and maintain the peace and the level of individual force by an individual officer on an individual protestor which would be permissible simply on that basis (probably restricted to common assault level, and probably based on the principle that by participating in a demonstration you consent to the possibility of that level of force possibly being applied to you by the police (and by other protestors, pushing you around, etc.) in the same way that you consent to common assault as part of any contact sport).

The "debate" being had at the moment about "who started it" and "we only became violent because the police kettled us" is overly simplistic and will get nowhere. The complexities of the situation, and the question of how the group level justifications for the use of force translate into the individual actual uses of force by one member of one group on one member of another need to be acknowledged, considered and, ultimately, tested properly in the higher Courts.

What codswallop dressed up as logic - follow point 1 through and there can never be decisions taken above the level of the individual to be violent (of course, you don't extand this same logic to protesters do you?) when i think most of us know full well by know about, or have been involved in situations where violence has been used by the police as an organisation as part of an operation planned out well in advance.

This is fantasy island stuff, it really is.

 

[TopCat]

What was especially bizarre was that he says he was struck with a baton during the first incident ... but he didn't seem to have any issue with that at all. Assuming he didn't have any weapon, I find it very difficult to see how a baton strike on someone in a wheelchair can ever be justified.

I am sure this won't stump you for long...

 

[Pickman's model]

Assuming he didn't have any weapon, I find it very difficult to see how a baton strike on someone in a wheelchair can ever be justified.

just what he was guilty of not one of them can say
but they'll think of something in time

 

[Pickman's model]

You are confusing two aspects:

(1) : the police (as an organisation) are invariably correct when they say that they (as an organisation) are not the first to act violently and that their use of force (in the form of tactics used by them as an organisation) is invariably in an attempt to prevent disorder, violence and crime and / or to protect themselves (as an organisation).

(2) : it is patently obvious from many of the pieces of footage from any number of disturbances for many years, that an individual police officer, using force as part of the police (as an organisation) deploying a particular tactic, of which they are but one officer, is frequently not defending themselves (as an individual) from the particular individual protestor to whom they individually apply force whilst they are defending themselves (or attempting to prevent disorder, violence and crime) from the protestors (as a crowd).

you fucking pedant

 

[suburbia]

Hi - not posted here in ages (well except for couple of minutes ago on the car thread) but I was there in Parliament Square and at the front of the breakway group all the way - anyone else? Going to read as much of this thread today as my eyes can cope with as I'm still pretty knackered from it all.

Don't know if BristleKRS is still on here but saw him on Twitter. I'd not even been using it that much before Thursday but it was thanks to him I was in exactly the right places at the right time and didn't end up on Westminster Bridge! so much respect

 

[detective-boy]

I was just about to post that ymu. Disgusting to think that the hospital would turn away anyone with a brain injury, props to the Ambulance driver for kicking off and getting him treatment. I wouldn't be as angry if it was just a broken wrist or other such none-life-threatening injury but that is obscene.

It is absolutely standard practice for different hospitals to be allocated for casualties from different groups. Usually it would be the two groups involved in protest and counterprotest (e.g. ADL and anti-fascists) or different football supporters but where it is likely to be protestors v police then that would be the categorisation. The idea is that it reduces the potential for things to kick off again in the hospital (between those in the waiting area usually, not the actual patients (though that has happened!))

This should be communicated to all ambulance staff involved in the operation prior to the event at briefings ... but sometimes ambulances from elsewhere get involved by mistake (which may be the case here, where it seems to have been stationary some distance away and, thus, may not have been part of the planned operation and, thus, not aware of the plan).

In such a situation it is absolutely understandable that if a "wrong" casualty turns up at a particular hospital then they should be redirected to the "right" one ... but that if there is a critical medical need then that should be addressed immediately (as seems to have happened here). What you need to know before condemning the action of the hospital is exactly what happened at Chelsea and Westminster and what the person knew about the situation when suggesting they go elsewhere. From what Alfie's mother has said when interviewed on the news, it doesn't sound like it was more than an initial suggestion they were at the wrong place followed by the ambulance crew (robustly!) explaining there was a critical medical need and the hospital then dealing with it.

 

[detective-boy]

That's the number of the other officer thug, not the thug concealing their identity.

Sorry ... the evidence of either of these officers actually using any force has totally escaped me. Could you remind us of the grounds for your confident statements that they are "thugs"?

Or can I assume that the people doing the filming and questioning are "violent protestors"?