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

[detective-boy]

That's disingenuous in the extreme.

There is obviously a difference ... but in terms of the amount of force (or "violence") inherent in the tactic there is no difference and that is the context in which I drew the comparison.

I can see no justification for this, none whatever. How is it not unlawful detention without charge of people exercising their democratic right to walk the streets?

The fact that YOU can see no justification is irrelevant. The law can. The Courts can. The ECHR can. The simple fact is that it IS a lawful tactic (so long as it can be justified). If, like any other police action, you think it has been used inappropriately then the way to change how they do things is through the Courts by making complaints / suing them. Fighting will NOT change anything (and, in fact, is far more likely to help the police justify use of the tactic in future).

You might as well say that YOU can see no justification for, say, the police closing the road after a major traffic accident and using that as the basis for fighting with and trying the get through the cordon.

 

[Mr.Bishie]

Please provide ANY example of a situation (a situation as a whole, not on a one-to-one basis) in which there is evidence of the use of violence by the police happening before any use of violence by any of the protestors ...

EDO Brighton May 2009 & October 2010.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Please provide ANY example of a situation (a situation as a whole, not on a one-to-one basis) in which there is evidence of the use of violence by the police happening before any use of violence by any of the protestors ...

Eh?

I'm sure almost everyone on this thread can give you an example. The clearest one I can think of would come from a while ago and the Criminal Justice Act march at which I was right at the front. This was a very 'hippy' march. We were basically ensconced in the street dancing to a rather good sound system. I went to have a piss in a side street to find hundreds of riot police tooling up there. A few minutes later, the police had clearly decided that it was time for us to move, and charged us on horseback. There were kids there. It's very very lucky that they did not kill anyone. Agents provocateurs suddenly appeared behind us ordering us to 'hold our ground'. This was the time before they'd perfected the kettle – I have no doubt that these masked men were coppers. It was a calculated assault on a group of entirely peaceful protesters.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Please provide ANY example of a situation (a situation as a whole, not on a one-to-one basis) in which there is evidence of the use of violence by the police happening before any use of violence by any of the protestors ...

Many many times at football matches during the 1970s and on into the 80s; if you'd prefer examples from political demonstrations I can give those (as I'm sure could lots of other people on here). However, given your clearly stated predisposition re. the infalability of the police, you won't be able to accept any of them as genuine examples; unfourtunately for you, in doing so you'll undermine your own objective...so keep up the good work.

Louis MacNeice

 

[revlon]

There is obviously a difference ... but in terms of the amount of force (or "violence") inherent in the tactic there is no difference and that is the context in which I drew the comparison.


The fact that YOU can see no justification is irrelevant. The law can. The Courts can. The ECHR can. The simple fact is that it IS a lawful tactic (so long as it can be justified). If, like any other police action, you think it has been used inappropriately then the way to change how they do things is through the Courts by making complaints / suing them. Fighting will NOT change anything (and, in fact, is far more likely to help the police justify use of the tactic in future).

You might as well say that YOU can see no justification for, say, the police closing the road after a major traffic accident and using that as the basis for fighting with and trying the get through the cordon.

it's going through the european courts now, so don't hold your breath

 

[detective-boy]

Baton charges, mounted police charges, snatch squads etc are all part of the kettling process.

No. They may be necessary if the use of the tactic is violently resisted. The only use of force required for an actual containment is a bit of pushing (as seen in the boring video clip mentioned earlier). Any further use of force is only needed because of resistance to the tactic.

 

[Mr.Bishie]

Many many times at football matches during the 1970s and on into the 80s; if you'd prefer examples from political demonstrations I can give those (as I'm sure could lots of other people on here). However, given your clearly stated predisposition re. the infalability of the police, you won't be able to accept any of them as genuine examples; unfourtunately for you, in doing so you'll undermine your own objective...so keep up the good work.

Innit.

 

[revlon]

No. They may be necessary if the use of the tactic is violently resisted. The only use of force required for an actual containment is a bit of pushing (as seen in the boring video clip mentioned earlier). Any further use of force is only needed because of resistance to the tactic.

no, they are an integral part of the process - maintaining the police cordons and subduing the crowd. It's a planned strategy from the start.

When we get gold and silver's notes and briefings of the day (and we will) it will become all too apparent.

 

[where to]

Sooner or later someone (police or protestor or even innocent passer-by) will die in a violent protest. And those who encouraged it will be to blame.

Ian Tomlinson.

You have a short memory.

 

[dylans]

Please provide ANY example of a situation (a situation as a whole, not on a one-to-one basis) in which there is evidence of the use of violence by the police happening before any use of violence by any of the protestors ...

Battle of the beanfield at stonehenge was totally unprovoked violence entirely caused by police. The most disgraceful scenes of police violence I have ever seen. Buses with children and babies inside attacked. People prostrate on the ground battered.

After a stand-off of several hours, police attacked their procession of vehicles by entering the field where they were being contained, methodically smashing windows, beating people on the head with truncheons and using sledgehammers to damage the interiors of their coaches.The account was supported by all the independent witnesses and upheld by the subsequent court verdicts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beanfield

Orgreave was a situation where pushing and shoving was escalated into full on battle by the use of round shield riot police and horse charges.

Initially the strike played out like most others, and the strikers played football for a while. But as more numbers arrived on both sides, tensions began to rise. There was constant intimidation from the police and unprovoked charges from mounted section of the police forced the miners to take cover where ever possible
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Orgreave

 

[Mr.Bishie]

No. They may be necessary if the use of the tactic is violently resisted. The only use of force required for an actual containment is a bit of pushing (as seen in the boring video clip mentioned earlier). Any further use of force is only needed because of resistance to the tactic.

Bollocks.

Containment is a tactic which is intended to prevent the right to protest.

Containment is a tactic which is intended to provoke an aggressive reaction.

 

[revlon]

Battle of the beanfield at stonehenge was totally unprovoked violence entirely caused by police. The most disgraceful scenes of police violence I have ever seen. Buses with children and babies inside attacked. People prostrate on the ground battered.

Orgreave was a situation where pushing and shoving was escalated into full on battle by the use of round shield riot police and horse charges.

both planned well in advance.

 

[detective-boy]

If you arrest someone or detain them, that is in itself an act of violence, even if they come quietly.

If you use "violence" is an absolutely theoretically way, yes.

99.999% of people talking about "violence" in the context of these demonstrations are using it in it's normal way (and would draw the same distinction as me between a bit of physical contact with no danger of even trivial injury and "proper" violence such as throwing bricks and bottles and batoning someone over the head).

If we were having a debate in which the definition of "violence" was yours, then I (and the police and everyone else) would obviously acknowledge that by using any restrictive preventative measure the police would be the one's using violence first in many situations (but not all, because by the same definition, an aggressive crowd, intent on, say, bursting into a building, smashing windows and terrifying people inside would be being "violent" even if they had not yet done any of those things!).

But it is simply fuckwitted to claim that the debate about who started the "violence" in any public order policing debate is using your absolutely theoretical definition of violence.

 

[detective-boy]

Surely you mean all cases?

No. I would never claim that the police have never fucked up. Only last week I commented about the high-speed mounted branch charge into a seemingly peaceful crowd as being excessive. If that crowd had responded with throwing bricks, etc. (which, to their credit they do not appear to have done) then it would have been plain that, if things were as they appeared from the footage, the police had started the violence (using it's normal meaning) in the context of that particular situation (even if they had not within the operation as a whole).

 

[Louis MacNeice]

No. They may be necessary if the use of the tactic is violently resisted. The only use of force required for an actual containment is a bit of pushing (as seen in the boring video clip mentioned earlier). Any further use of force is only needed because of resistance to the tactic.

This is your 'through the looking glass world' where people refusing to be corralled for hours on end by large numbers of masked and armoured riot officers, instigate baton charges and the use of horses; it has a whiff about of the discredited 'she was asking for it' defence. That's where working from ill informed apriori assumptions gets you DB, sounding like the in denial perpetrator who always tries to blame the victim, not being able to take any responsibility themselves.

Louis MacNeice

 

[littlebabyjesus]

No. They may be necessary if the use of the tactic is violently resisted.

Not true. Crowds need to be broken up so that the police can surround them. This can only be done through charges.

Baton charges, mounted charges etc are the tactic.

 

[where to]

What are the arguments against water cannons from the perspective of Police and protesters?

I've never seen them used in person but I've always assumed them to be preferable to horse charges and baton attacks, at least during the summer months.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

No. I would never claim that the police have never fucked up.

But you claim that they never instigate violence; are you now saying that sometimes they do?

Louis MacNeice

 

[littlebabyjesus]

But you claim that they never instigate violence; are you now saying that sometimes they do?

Louis MacNeice

d-b speaks like someone with no first-hand experience at all of what he is talking about, tbh. He doesn't understand the police 'tactics' that he is defending.

In fact, I shall stop engaging – it's highjacking the thread, and d-b's arguments are laughable.

 

[detective-boy]

Containment is a tactic which is intended to prevent the right to protest.

No. It is intended to prevent violence, crime and disorder (i.e. unlawful protest). If it were intended to prevent prtest altogether it would be used to contain those gathering at the start of the protest march ...

Containment is a tactic which is intended to provoke an aggressive reaction.

It could be used in that way. I would hope that it is not used in that way. I have seen no evidence that it is ... but there is insufficient information in the public domain to know one way or the other. (The individual comments by individual officers which are reported or caught in camera footage cannot be taken as evidence of the intention of the commanders using the tactic, certainly not unless they become so widespread and if they remain unchallenged by senior officers in public statements - they are evidence of individual fuckwittery by individual officers involved in delivering the tactic but not involved in choosing to use it in any way).

 

[DotCommunist]

Gilmours boy has been nicked

 

[smokedout]

I take no issue with the fact that red mists exists. I take no issue with the fact that soldiers are trained not to let it take them over. And that for the most part their training works, the more so the more highly trained the particular unit and their supervisors.

But I also claim that the police are trained not to let it take them over too. And that for the most part their training works, the more so the more highly trained the particular unit and their supervisors.

well you'd think that wouldn't you, but that smellie twat and the bastards who killed ian tomlinson were highly experienced public order cops - it seems to be a phenomena within the tsg that they turn up hyped up and looking for a ruck - strangely the most highly trained public order specialists in the met

 

[Mr.Bishie]

If it were intended to prevent prtest altogether it would be used to contain those gathering at the start of the protest march ...

Smash EDO Brighton October 2010. Fact.

It could be used in that way. I would hope that it is not used in that way. I have seen no evidence that it is.

It is used in that way. Smash EDO Brighton May 2009 & October 13th.

 

[Mr.Bishie]

well you'd think that wouldn't you, but that smellie twat and the bastards who killed ian tomlinson were highly experienced public order cops

Highly experienced in twatting people yeah.

 

[detective-boy]

The first act in those 'restrictive tactics', the charging of a crowd on horseback, is as clear an act of violence as you could hope to imagine.

Charging a crowd on horseback is patently NOT the first act in the use of containment tactics. The vast majority of uses of containment tactics involve no use of horses at all. Where they are used as part of a containment process they need only be used in a slow, methodical move forward and there is absoloutely no need for a charge at all in any situation related soley to the deployment of a containment tactic.

The police assume that they have the right to tell people where to go, and that they have the right to hit anyone who refuses to go.

The law says that they DO have the right to tell people where to go (provided that they can justify it) and the law says that they DO have the right to use "reasonable and necessary" force on people who refuse (provided that they can justify it). That much is entirely uncontroversial insofar as the law is concerned and it most definitely will NOT be changed by any legal action, here or in Strasbourg, arising out of any challenge to these tactics.

To base your challenge on saying that the police do not have the right to use the tactic at all, or to use any force in enforcing it, is destined to fail.

All else follows from there.

Some (but by no means all) protestors refuse to acknowledge the rule of law and refuse to accept any restriction on their right to do absolutely as they wish. All else follows from there.

 

[revlon]

the thing is kettling was used against 'anti-captalist' protestors who could be usefully disengaged with the general public. They could identify ringleaders/the usual suspects/troublemakers and use enough violence on the day to put off the rest from attending the next big demo. They have simply repeated the formula for the student protests.

Thing is it can't be done with this new generation of students and school kids. This isn't ideologoly as violent protest, this is genuinely pissed off angry people. I only hope enough hold their nerve.

 

[detective-boy]

That was said in 2005.

Factually that is uncontroversial. Your point is?

 

[revlon]

Gilmours boy has been nicked

having an offensive haircut in public?

 

[detective-boy]

Your post was about a 'psychological reluctance' to engage with the enemy, & not engaging with the enemy is far from getting carried away.

But the context in which the point had arisen was all about red mist and getting carried away.

Go back and read the posts which preceded it.

Don't start taking things entirely out of context as you do with monotonous regularity ...

 

[detective-boy]

What you said was that there was definitely a snooker ball there; not maybe, or something that could be, or looked like, or might be. You like your assertions presented as facts don't you.

I've not said I didn't.

You like to miss the fucking point entirely, don't you?