To Protect and to Serve

Now, as regular readers will know, I'm not the world's biggest fan of the occupy movement. I think there is much wrong in this world and much to protest about; trying to stigmatise the banking industry through spurious and clearly false claims to be representing the 99% strikes me as a pretty crass basis for a global protest movement, though. That said, those carrying out these protests should be allowed to do so. They certainly shouldn't be pepper sprayed in the face by a bovine, corpulent cop who either is too stupid to know or too ignorant to care that he is clearly going to be filmed by someone.

There's international outcry over this; and legtimately so in my not at all humble opinon. But there are a couple of points to make here. Firstly, let's tone down the hyperbole - this isn't, as I saw someone on Facebook stating, the moment when the revolution starts. Kent State - a far more terrifying example of police brutality - went past without provoking a revolution, as have similar actions by police on both sides of the Atlantic, so the actions of this pot-bellied pig are unlikely to provoke anything more than a very vocal but equally very fleeting furore. The second point is that the police across the world need to remember that their actions need to be proportional; thus, sitting back and letting rioting mobs tear up shitty parts of London is not an appropriate police response; nor is pepper spraying seated protestors in the face. And this sort of brutal, disportionate response does nothing other than increase the sympathies for the protestors among people like myself who are circumspect at best about these protestors.

Shop an Anarchist, say Police

And the police continue their slow transition into the thought police with this sort of illiberal bullshit:

This was the surprising injunction from the Metropolitan Police issued to businesses and members of the public in Westminster last week. There was no warning about other political groups, but next to an image of the anarchist emblem, the City of Westminster police's "counter terrorist focus desk" called for anti-anarchist whistleblowers stating: "Anarchism is a political philosophy which considers the state undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, and instead promotes a stateless society, or anarchy. Any information relating to anarchists should be reported to your local police."

The move angered some anarchists who complained that being an anarchist should not imply criminal behaviour. They said they feel unfairly criminalised for holding a set of political beliefs.

And anarchists should complain because they are being criminalised for their political beliefs if this sort of thing becomes standard practice. But the rest of us should also be very worried. This is a clear point on a very slippery slope to where any non-conformist thoughts is considered a matter for the authorities. Not non-conformist behaviour, mind. No, here we are talking about non-conformist thoughts.

Furthermore, look at the language used to call for whistle-blowers (a term surely being abused here - state snoops would be a better description): anarchists believe that the state is a problem; therefore, they need to be reported to the state. The unspoken, unquestioning devotion to the concept of the state is inherent within these words. The implication is that questioning or resisting the state should be reported to the police; therefore, such behaviour is criminal.

We live in a world where all sorts of groups aspire to commit terrorist atrocities, where MPs rob us blind, where the media our invade privacy with police facilitated impunity and mindless violence is the reality on the streets on most Friday and Saturday nights in some cities. But forget all that - the real problem is people holding anarchist beliefs. Yeah, the police should *definitely* focus on that. And you should definitely help the state by snooping on any anarchists.

And the irony is that through such statements the state shows precisely why it is not a benign entity, and should be resisted, reduced in its size and scope if not dismantled completely.

Richard Murphy's Reverence for the Police

Richard Murphy, prize clown, on an example of what he calls "the joy of tax" - our police force:

Sometimes stating the obvious is necessary.

Uh-huh. Allow me to state the obvious - Richard Murphy is a total arse. Moving on:

We need police.

We need laws enforced.

Which assumes (a) that all laws are moral, and therefore should be enforced and (b) the police are capable of enforcing the law in all circumstances. Fellow participants in what I would call reality would dispute both of those assumptions.

And just as much we need their presence in communities – where I suspect they do a lot more simple offering help and direction than they do law enforcement.

What? Where the hell does Murphy live? In an episode of Dixon of Dock Green? I've lived in four cities and a rural village in this country, and I have never, ever seen the police do anything relating to "help and direction". Most of the time it is a bastard struggle to get them to do anything relating to law enforcement.

I am well aware that there are those on the right who think the police – and even law – can be privatised.

Not if they've seen Robocop. Yup, I know Robocop isn't real, but we're dealing with Mr Murphy here, people, making reality a movable - if not irrelevant - feast.

That’s wrong. A coherent system of law and order underpins a society. Only government can command and direct such a service.

Yeah, because left-wing governments never behave illegaly. Oh, wait... And the police. They'd never do anything illegal. Oh wait...

Only government can pay for it.

Government doesn't pay for it. The taxpayers do through money appropriated from them with menaces by the government. Whether they like it or not.

That’s the Joy of Tax.

Once again; Richard Murphy, what a total arse.

On Raoul Moat

Anyone looking at any of the British news outlets today will probably clock that the story of the meathead gunman Raoul Moat has ended. And it has ended in a deeply predictable way; like many of his monstrous ilk, Moat has not died in a hail of bullets fired by his pursuers, but rather by a self-inflicted gun wound and in a miasma of self-pity.

This part of the BBC news report made me raise my eyebrows though:

A guest-house owner, who did not want to be named, told the BBC: "He actually said, the one thing that sticks in my mind, 'I haven't got a dad'... and he also said that, 'nobody cares about me'."

Clearly Moat hasn't been catching up with the news - the downside, no doubt, to being on the run in a forest - because as far as I can see many people have cared about him this week. Every news outlet has been running multiple stories - about the hunt, about Moat as a person, and about what might have caused his attempted killing spree. Sure, people might not have cared that much about Moat's well-being, but every media outlet in the country did at least seem to care about what was happening.

And for the life of me I struggle to understand why. After all, the constant reports of the hunt for Moat are hardly the most fascinating of stories (we don't where he is, we don't know where he is, still no idea where he is, nope - no news on where he is, police have found him, he's dead). And it isn't really in the national interest either; the only reasons why anyone should have been concerned about Moat's shooty tendencies was if they happened to be a police officer in the Newcastle area or a resident in Rothbury. Otherwise, you were always going to be pretty safe from Moat. Furthermore, for a gunman on the run, Moat was mercifully poor at killing people - he tried three times and only succeeded once. The one successful slaying is a tragedy for the man's friends and family, but compared to the actions of others who go out killing with a gun, Moat's 33% success rate was pretty inept.

So why all the attention on this figure? His handsome good looks? I think we can dismiss that. No, I do believe that the only reason why our media spent so much time on this story is because they believed people wanted to hear about it. Which is utterly depressing. What does it say about a country that they want to revel in the hunt for a lethal, failed human being? Why do we want endless speculation about his motives? Why do we want graphic footage of the aftermath of one of his attacks? Are we really so base and so prurient that we have to see the video on the BBC website of this oaf's death?

The sad thing is that for a lot of the British population, the answer to that last question is "yes". Because while there is something innately brilliant about human potential, there is also a baser, darker side to the way we interact with each other. There is a sense in which we want to revel in the misfortune of others, and smugly note from relative safety that "there but for the grace of God go I". We also want to hear about the monsters - we want to hear about their monstrous acts, and like the reassurance when they've been caught and/or killed. And we want to smugly feel that we are better than the likes of Moat. Whatever our flaws, we're not as bad as this particular man.

To some extent, this tendency has always existed in humanity; it's just with the 24/7 news cycle the tendency becomes impossible to miss. What we've seen over the past week is the tendency of some people to rubber-neck at a car accident magnified on a national scale. It happens; to deny it is to be very naive. But that doesn't make this truth any easier to swallow, and if you're anything like me you'll end up feeling depressed not only that the likes of Moat exist, but also about the way many people respond to something like Moat's killings and the subsequent hunt for him.

The Tories, Britain and The Wire

So, a Tory has created a whole bag of controversy by trying to be a bit hip and referencing highly acclaimed US TV programme The Wire. LabourList asks whether anyone's street really resembles The Wire. I'm guessing that Mr Grayling's street probably doesn't, what with him being an MP and all. As for my street, well, I can't comment on whether it resembles The Wire or not. I would say that sometimes it resembles The Shield. Albeit without the *aggressive* policing.

You can make what you will of this storm in a crackpipe teacup. Old Holborn points out that parts of Britain are worse than Baltimore, which is where The Wire is set. And Guido does something that politicians of both parties seem reluctant to do - actually offer a solution. And his idea - decriminalising drugs - would actually do a great deal to make our streets less like The Wire and more like... oh, I don't know, I don't watch enough US TV to make a valid comparison. But the sort of place where people don't get shot in the face owing to drug-related crime.

Barack and the Beer Summit

Barack Obama loses it:

The meeting, dubbed the "beer summit" by the US media, saw Henry Louis Gates Jr and James Crowley of Cambridge police sit with each other in the presence of Obama and Joe Biden, the vice-president.

Now, for those of you not in the know, Gates Jr was arrested by Crowley for trying to break into his own house. Gates cried racism, and Obama - involving himself when he really should have known better - agreed. Except as it turned out, everyone came across as a bit of a wanker in this scenario, leaving Obama in the position of having to "walk back" his comments. 

And this is how he does it. Through a beer summit in the White House. 

This, truly, is the politics of Gordon Brown. Obama involved himself in a dispute that has bugger all connection to the Presidency. It is like Brown commenting on Jade Goody, or Susan fucking Boyle. And how does Obama try to solve the problem? A beer summit? A crap photo shoot at which no-one - bar Smilin' Joe Biden - looks comfortable at? Jesus Christ, get a grip.

Obama is meant to be the President of the United States of America. The leader of the Free World. And here he is, having beers with people he doesn't give the first fuck about because he stuck his oar into a debate that had nothing to do with him. He has got himself into a dumb situation simply because of his refusal to say "sorry, I should have just kept my mouth shut." It comes across as pretty pathetic. 

Ian Tomlinson and Blogging about Blogging

Reactions on the blogosphere (my oh my, I hate that word) have been inevitably mixed. A lot of people see his treatment at the hands of the police as absolutely shocking, whilst some point that he may have been provoking the police. I'd be in the former camp, but debate is always good and seeing an alternative perspective is part of the point of seeking the opinions of others. 

But one of the more worrying responses to this police attack (and, provoked or otherwise, it was an attack) is the desire of some blogs to criticise others for not shouting about this more promptly or in the *right* way - particularly those on what is referred to as the right of the blogosphere (seriously, who came up with that word? Someone who really, really hates bloggers and wants them to have the worst name ever in the history of the English language?)

Mr Eugenides points out that blogs are not a 24/7 news service, and the content of the blog is very much down to the individual author. Absolutely - the fact that Tim Ireland wants Iain Dale to comment more properly on the Tomlinson case doesn't mean that Iain Dale has to. Besides. with something like the attack on Tomlinson, there is no need for blogs to publicise it. The visuals are so arresting (no pun intended) and so immediately controversial that this story heads up to the top of the news bulletins anyway, and will be endlessly debated whether the blogs pick up on it or not. 

We often seem to forget that whether you have a small blog that attracts a few thousands vews a month (like this one) or one that gets hundreds of thousands a month (like Dale or Fawkes), you are still only tapping into a fraction of this country's circa 60,000,000 people. The majority of this population probably don't know what a blog is and don't care; of those that do, a hefty proportion will probably question who these bloggers are, and why they don't get out more.

Yet people will stray onto blogs, particularly over controversial issues like the police attacking a man on the way home from work. And they may see some big debates over who said what and when. And they would be well within their rights just to not fucking care.

Seriously, read this post back to yourself. What is one of the most boring sentences in this post? What is one of the most boring sentences ever written? Which sentence actually bored the author whilst he was writing it? This one: Absolutely - the fact that Tim Ireland wants Iain Dale to comment more promptly on the Tomlinson case doesn't mean that Iain Dale has to. Even if you know who Ireland and Dale are, that sentence is still pretty fucking boring. If you don't know who the two bloggers in question are, then you'll probably be heading back to The Daily Mail's website for a blow by blow breakdown of the case (pun not intended). 

You can passionately care, and rant until you are blue in the face, about the sanctity of blogging and the importance of standards; the reality is that people just don't care. Blogs work best when they are uncovering scandals, expressing controversial opinions and debating the issues of the day. When it comes down to bellyaching about the timings of posts, they are about as interesting as a Latin lesson on a summer's day.

Blogging about blogging is dull, ladies and gents. And with that in mind, I'm going to stop doing it now. 

Police Brutality

Paul King on the footage of the police attacking his father, Ian Tomlinson, prior to his death:

"Whether that was a cause to his death we are not to know... We want answers: why? Ian clearly had his arms in his pockets and back towards the police. There is no need for them to step in towards him. It clearly shows that Ian did have an altercation. Now we can say, yes he did. Up until now it has been 'if'. But now we've seen it, we want answers."

Quite. Whether this attack killed Ian Tomlinson is open to question; but the footage shows an unprovoked attack on an innocent bystander by the police. Let's not forget, Tomlinson was not part of the protests; he was coming back from doing his job as a newspaper vendor. Yet he is kicked and pushed to the ground by the police.

Sure, you argue that the police had a day of provocation from nihilistic protestors - and as regular readers will know, I am no fan of these protestors. The police are human, and maybe they snapped after a day of insults, grief and missiles from the nihilists. But acknowledging they are human does not excuse this behaviour; this was an innocent man, kicked to the ground by those who are meant to uphold the law. It is not acceptable; it is also terrifying and appalling.

The irony is that this unprovoked attack on Tomlinson will probably do far more to undermine the status quo and the state than any amount of protesting ever could. There will be many - myself included - who can see themselves in the place of Mr Tomlinson, and therefore see the police as people to fear.

The Criminal Police

So, some police officers have criminal convictions.

My God, what a great story for the media. It has everything. The hints of hypocrisy, fear of the police, the sudden public laundering of previously hidden dirty secrets. This story is tabloid heaven.

Except that it actually doesn't really matter. The vast majority of the convictions are for things like speeding. Sure, it is more worrying that some police officers have convictions for violent offences. Until you consider what those offences might be. Violence may be attacking someone and beating them to a bloody pulp with a baseball bat. It may also be far more minor. And given these officers were recruited into/kept their jobs in the police force and that they aren't in prison, I'd guess these offences probably were more minor.

There is also the concept of people having paid back to their debts to society, and that people can learn from their mistakes and actually move on. In fact, our justice system is based (in part) of this principle of redemption. Why should the police be treated differently?

In an ideal world, I don't think police officers should have criminal convictions. However, we don't live in an ideal world. And in this very real world, the police struggle to recruit decent police officers. And I'd rather have a police officer with the right skills, demeanour and attitudes and a conviction than have a police officer with no convictions but also lacking the right personality to actually go out and enforce the law.

Death by Dangerous Driving

See, I tend to support the police. I don't know why; maybe it is because I've known some police officers who are good people trying to do a tough job in trying circumstances. Yes, sometimes they fuck up. Sometimes they fuck up really badly. But when they do I think it is about the pressure they are under, rather than any malice or incompetence.

Plus, I wasn't there. So I am judging this story based on the reporting in the media, which is not always the most reliable way to judge an event. You have to look at the bias of the reporters, and tally that with their desire to spin a good yarn.

But, honest to Christ, I can't help but feel that the police fucked up badly with this one.

Look at the facts: a police car travelling at 100 mph. Without any lights on. Said car hits a teenage girl, knocking her 50ft down the road. Tragically, yet inevitably, that girl dies. Her boyfriend is understandably upset. So the police taser him. As you do. Pretty much standard practice, I'd have thought, with grief stricken relatives and friends. Give the whining fuckers a massive electrical blast. That'll make them feel better.

Of course, other facts might emerge. Maybe the police weren't travelling as quickly as the witnesses thought. Maybe there was some sort of mitigating circumstances that meant they needed to be travelling so fast, although I cannot for the life of me work out what they might be. Perhaps there is a reason to help to explain this awful tragedy. Maybe. But as it stands, it seems to be the fault of the police, pure and simple. And unless some pretty fucking radical mitigating circumstances come to light, I hope the police concerned are prosecuted to the full extent of the law.