Ostriig on 22/10/2011 at 11:31
Quote Posted by Dia
I would assume that an order to break up a peaceful demonstration that was considered legal would have to come directly from a judge, not the police.
I had a look on Google and I found what icemann was referring to, I believe - (
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/boot-out-protesters-says-businesses/story-fn7x8me2-1226172294310) the eviction was ordered by the Melbourne City Council after a week-long protest.
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If someone lays hands on you against your will and then proceeds to drag you across the ground, then that is considered assault and battery.
No, it's assault if the person performing it is not legally enabled to do so. It's not when uncomplying demonstrators force the police to perform it to be able to enact an eviction order emitted by an authorised institution. Whether the issuing of that order was lawful or not in the first place - and again, I know too little about the situation to make an assumption one way or the other, so I won't - is an entirely different matter, but it ultimately does not raise culpability on the part of the police.
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I guess I just don't understand why the demonstrators would stay and subject themselves to what was inevitable police action after their demonstration had been deemed by the government as illegal after the 24 hour warning.
Well, I was gonna just say "because FIGHT DA POWAH", but really, I think it's also down to them realising on some level that said inevitable police action, regardless of whether it was lawful or not, stood a good chance of generating indignation and raising sympathy for their cause.
Vernon on 22/10/2011 at 13:08
What a load of old cor blimey. The police shouldn't behave this way
at all. I've met one of the Sydney police commanders a number of times and he is respected even by the far left groups. He reasons people down from the podium, he asks people nicely to move along when they have made their point and are causing obstruction, he lets people demonstrate even if they haven't got their permit. Yet he doesn't seem to be the one in charge of the apelike goons that charge at protesters headlong (sometimes on horses) and (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNTexzIqE00) punch them in (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voGqc-kcnP4) the face.
There seems to be a point where the chain of command totally breaks down and the apemen just do whatever they want. Don't give me this "just normal guys fulfilling their contracts" bullshit. These guys are almost all poorly-trained thug clones and they shouldn't be responsible for enforcing state policy. This is "Smithers, release the hounds" as far as I can see.
I do realise this is a two-way street. These people probably should have moved on when asked. If things get close to the level they did in London, fine --- get out the rubber bullets. I just think sending in the goons to attack a peaceful protest is regressive, police state material. These jumpsuit guys seem barely capable of stringing a sentence together. I met these kinds of people when I was in high school. I'm sure you all did too. They aren't the sharpest knives in the draw and that seems to be pretty important as a thug hiring criterion.
While Sydney/Melbourne police do a reasonable job a lot of the time, when it comes to dealing with protesters they simply
don't appear to have the necessary training, and it is more than clear that some of these guys just can't wait to unleash the hurt. They need to be weeded out, but it doesn't seem to happen due to institutional culture (internal tribunals, not acting on anything until people actually press charges, etc.)
I wouldn't be surprised if we start seeing black blocs popping up soon as a reaction to this enforcement. Then things will get really interesting.
I'll put those links in the OP since most of you seem to be thinking pretty myopically that this thread is just about that one video and that having your face dragged along the ground is part of serve and protect.
Ostriig on 22/10/2011 at 14:42
Quote Posted by Vernon
What a load of old cor blimey. The police shouldn't behave this way
at all. I've met one of the Sydney police commanders a number of times and he is respected even by the far left groups. He reasons people down from the podium, he asks people nicely to move along when they have made their point and are causing obstruction
I'm just curious, let's see if we can get on the same page - if the police had sent in this competent commander you're referring to and even he didn't manage to talk the protesters into leaving, what then? Would it have been acceptable then to forcibly remove them from the area?
Previously, on Battlestar Galactica:
Quote Posted by Ostriig
Again, I'm only going off what you've said and that video.
Moving on.
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These people probably should have moved on when asked.
Why "probably?" This isn't up for debate, they were informed of a legal eviction order and that failure to comply would result in "enforcement proceedings". They should've packed it up and left, and if they felt that the Council had issued the respective order in breach of their rights they should've tackled it in court. If I'm wrong, my apologies, but I don't assume there is no legal recourse for citizens to take their Council to trial in Australia.
Now, look - reading over that report I linked in earlier, it looks like the protesters were informed of the eviction plan "early in the morning" and told that they had to leave by 9AM. So what does "early in the morning" mean? 6-7ish? 8 even? So they weren't given a whole lot of time. And what happened in that intervening period, does anyone know? Did anyone keep talking to them, trying to amiably explain what the order meant for them? Doesn't say. So if you want to say this was mishandled in that they didn't have that intermediary step (if they indeed didn't) where someone tried to peacefully get them to comply with the eviction before moving in for arrests I can get onboard with that. To a point, I don't want to have the police
pleading with citizens to obey the law, but I'm all for trying to reason with them.
However, you kicked this discussion off with a video that I can only assume you thought featured police brutality and then went on about that. And I'm sorry, but that's just not the case. If you actually stop and think for two minutes you'll realise that running in to grab someone and then backpedalling with them out of there as quick as you can is the most effective (and possibly safest) way of performing arrests in a situation like that. For the purpose of arresting those people it wasn't excessive force, what we saw in that first clip.
If you wanna talk about how your riot police is ill-prepared to handle demonstrations of this sort go for it, but that initial video wasn't it.
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I wouldn't be surprised if we start seeing black blocs popping up soon as a reaction to this enforcement. Then things will get really interesting.
Yeah, whoop-dee-do.
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I'll put those links in the OP since most of you seem to be thinking pretty myopically that this thread is just about that one video
You put up a thread titled "Australian police are awesome" liking to a single video and with the full extent of your input being about how you were speechless. So, yes, of course some us thought the subject was police brutality as seen in that video. It's no one else's fault if you didn't more effectively convey what the fuck you wanted to talk about, take it easy.
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and that having your face dragged along the ground is part of serve and protect.
Well
yeah, dude, it occasionally is. When you're not obeying the law and then try to resist being arrested and taken away some dragging
may occur.
Vernon on 22/10/2011 at 15:02
Quote Posted by Ostriig
You put up a thread titled "Australian police are awesome" liking to a single video and with the full extent of your input being about how you were speechless. So, yes, of course some us thought the subject was police brutality as seen in that video. It's no one else's fault if you didn't more effectively convey what the fuck you wanted to talk about, take it easy.
You're right, it was a shit OP and it didn't convey what I was trying to get across. I guess the shock of seeing my tax dollars going towards people getting beaten up by state thugs just never gets old. Looking back over the thread, I see I was mostly just mindlessly ranting. Welp. Glad I'm not in charge of or involved in this
complete fucking chaosdemagogue on 22/10/2011 at 15:23
Quote Posted by raph
(Taking this opportunity to remind US folks that Occupy started in Spain 6 months ago as the Indignados.)
If we're going to give credit where it's really due, Occupy started in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia last December.
rachel on 22/10/2011 at 16:16
Quote Posted by demagogue
If we're going to give credit where it's really due, Occupy started in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia last December.
:thumb:
It was just a friendly jab :) In all seriousness though, it was really shocking and the way the authorities everywhere are trying to shut people down by force or hacks or whatever means necessary is an extremely worrying trend.
I was there during the events of Plaça Catalunya last May, and I could see that the Indignados were absolutely non-violent until the end. They had been extremely well briefed and maintained their hands in the air without responding to the provocations, even when the cop were beating the crap out of them. The Mossos riot police had a field day and there were about 150 injured that day with some pretty badly. They even beat journalists and bystanders, when they had a chance.
Since the movement was totally legal, they came in under the pretense to clean the Plaça because of the upcoming Barça football final. They did clean up very well, taking all the computers and all the gear the guys were using to organize their meetings and stuff. As far as I know, no cop was convicted or disciplined after that, with the president of the Generalitat actually praising them for their restraint under such difficult circumstances... (!)
To see that happening now in the Occupy movements in the US and elsewhere is pretty bad, to say the least.
Vernon on 22/10/2011 at 16:52
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Now that was police brutality. What happened in the city this week was not.
The only time the word brutality has been used itt is by Vasquez, Ostriig and now you. There's a clear distinction between violence and brutality, at least in my mind. Sure, worse has happened but I am genuinely surprised by how many of you think this is acceptable treatment of civilians. In addition, they hardly need you to apologise for them and let the precedent be set.
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what was shown on the news
This is hardly a choice source of information for a matter like this. During the Wikileaks protests last year, the coalition applied for permits to march and there was no response from the police for nearly a week. On the day before the planned march, the police contacted the group and said you'll need to fill in more forms and wait for them to be processed, otherwise the march will be illegal and you can all be arrested for obstructing traffic. I know a little bit about how these far left groups work (they're fascinating). They are crazy, driven and cutting through red tape is a trifling matter. They jump through all the hoops they need to and then receive a stony silence from the authorities.
So what the news says about this kind of thing is usually a whole load of bollocks, since it is only ever one side of the story. The press will usually just contact the police and city council and based on that information, will run the story. Reporting done. I don't know what news report you saw, but from what the legal observers have written, the police came in at 9am, fenced the crazies into the square and tried keeping the human rights watch and legal guys out. This is eerily similar to what happened at APEC, where we were fenced into Hyde Park by a massive contingent of police with dogs and horses, water cannons and all that shit. Terrifying. I'll never forget when this dude got manhandled by about ten officers for having a wheelie bin with a sound system built into it (It might have had a bomb in it!). Look at the video Alchemist posted. How they just block people into the bank and then send the goons in for the indiscriminatory beat-em-up session. Sometimes looks like people aren't even given a chance to get out of harm's way. Ugh
nickie on 22/10/2011 at 17:04
But it's OK because as someone wrote in a comment for that last link of Vernon's
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I agree the US protests have a valid cause not the australian ones , from what i saw in melbourne most were communists and a few socialists.
I must have missed the C and S stamped on people's foreheads.
Have people here generally not gone in for protesting? It used to be a fairly honourable weekend occupation. Even our hooray henrys got involved with the (
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2274129.stm) Countryside Alliance demonstrations. Because it was 'that' class, protesting briefly became respectable. :)
But all the times I demonstrated, I was never treated with anything other than decency. It seems to me though that nowadays, police are very edgy everywhere.
Vernon on 22/10/2011 at 17:16
That may be true, icemann, but they mostly ignored the Assange/Wikileaks protests last year and what they did cover made it seem like they didn't have anyone on location (though I do remember ABC logos around the place). Of course old pinko commie hippie scumbag Philip Adams weighed in, but somehow the ABC haven't managed to ditch him in the years since the Howard-instigated ABC reformism.
Quote Posted by nickie
I must have missed the C and S stamped on people's foreheads.
Heh, yeah. Admittedly it can be easy to confuse pinko commie hippie scumbag with young, poor students who can barely afford a place to live in (
http://www.citymayors.com/features/cost_survey.html) the world's most expensive cities, let alone afford all the clothes that automagically turn you into a respectable, law-abiding pillar of society
Vasquez on 22/10/2011 at 17:45
Quote Posted by Vernon
Sure, worse has happened but I am genuinely surprised by how many of you think this is acceptable treatment of civilians.
Like was pointed out, you posted a clip with people being dragged and the quickest info to be found was they refused to leave when told to do so by the police. As for the definition of violence, I still don't see dragging as such.
Then, later, you bring out the beatings and officers removing their badges and a deep swamp of other bad stuff, and seem to imply that people who reacted to your first post are somehow condoning blind violence against completely innocent people. Come on, it's not like we're mind-readers here.
Quote Posted by Vernon
Look at the video Alchemist posted. How they just block people into the bank and then send the goons in for the indiscriminatory beat-em-up session.
If
you had originally posted a clip like that, instead of something that looks like a mildish version of mud-wrestling, you would've gotten quite different comments.
