Now that there has been time for things to surface and time to reflect, we can see that whilst the majority of the police were well behaved and went about their business responsibly, but as might be expected a lunatic fringe tried to spoil things by going too far …
- Battering a passer by to the ground because a man walking away from you with his hands in his pockets is just so threatening. Ian Tomlinson was merely on his way home from work when this happened and died from a heart attack a few minutes later around the corner. See the video:
- Giving a woman a back-hander and then using a truncheon against the back of her legs, just because she’s a little in your face. Normally someone who behaves like this towards a woman is condemned for their actions, but it’s perfectly ok if you are the Police and she’s a protestor :
- If you look closely at the video above you will notice that the policeman battering that protester has no identifying numbers on his shoulder. British police are supposed to have identification to stop the anonymous brutality that occurs in police states, but perhaps we are living in one ?
If you look around YouTube, you may well find other examples that make it appear that the police were heavy handed against the protesters. For example :
I’ve seen quite a few video clips of violent protesters over the years – frequently at G20 (or similar) events, and the protesters in this clip don’t look particularly violent to me. I am not saying there wasn’t stuff going on that isn’t coming across too well in the video, but the police response to me looks excessive.
The death of Ian Tomlinson shows why everybody should be concerned with the possibility of police brutality at such protests – it is easy for people to be caught up in these events who have nothing whatsoever to do with the protest. And the police need to be constantly reminded that the protesters have the right to be there, and the right to protest.
And as to how that policeman was allowed to go out without identification, well that should be regarded as the equivalent of a burgular going out “tooled up” for a job … he was prepared to go out and indulge in levels of violence extreme enough that he felt he needed to protect his identity. Who allowed him to go out on the streets in the first place ?
Today it was announced that there will be a review of the police tactics used for dealing with demonstrations. That may well be a good idea, but what would be more helpful is a review of every policeman’s attitude to demonstrators.