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Canceling The G8 March: Right or Wrong

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  • 06-07-2005 3:50pm
    #1
    Wheely
    Closed Accounts Posts: 400 ✭✭


    Just saw a poll BBC were running and thought it might be a good idea for a discussion! Were the police right to ban a protest- was it justified or is it just plain undemocratic?


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    #2
    skywalker
    Registered Users Posts: 2,707 ✭✭✭skywalker


    Seems the ban was lifted.

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4654483.stm


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    #3
    Wheely
    Closed Accounts Posts: 400 ✭✭Wheely


    Seems you were right....not a bad move, to be perfectly honest its far too important a message to get across to let a minoity of troublemakers silence it. I ythink out of the thousands there only 53 were arrested....doesn't seem like that much of a "serious security threat"!


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    #4
    DadaKopf
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,731 ✭✭✭DadaKopf


    The police are capitalising on the disruptions to cancel the larger, louder protest. Possibly on orders.


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    #5
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    DadaKopf wrote:
    The police are capitalising on the disruptions to cancel the larger, louder protest. Possibly on orders.
    Thats unsubstantiable conjecture tbh.

    The protest went ahead and from what I saw on sky news , those that were in the 2 or 3000 that marched were quite annoyed with the balaclaved bin and seat throwing mob that nearly put the kibosh on their more reasonable protest.
    At least the guys who werent looking for mahem negotiated their way into having a protest and march where they originally planned to have one.
    Wheely wrote:
    only 53 were arrested
    Which would be a substantial percentage of say a couple of hundred balaclaved hooligans but totally unrepresentative of the few thousand that did march and certainly not represent the ordinary people Geldoff was urging to go to Scotland to campaign for an end to poverty.


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    #6
    Wheely
    Closed Accounts Posts: 400 ✭✭Wheely


    .[/QUOTE]
    Which would be a substantial percentage of say a couple of hundred balaclaved hooligans but totally unrepresentative of the few thousand that did march and certainly not represent the ordinary people Geldoff was urging to go to Scotland to campaign for an end to poverty.[/QUOTE]

    Indeed that was the point I was trying to make-i believe that the reason the police banned it was that it was a "serious security threat" but the fact that when they did let it go ahead only 53 arrests took place and that is unrepresentative of the thousands there. So why ban it in the first place?
    Is it even excusable that they did ban it in the first place? Dont get me wrong-kudos for letting it go ahead, and moreso to the organisers who managed to negociate the revocation of the ban, but it abviously wasn't the security threat the authorities made it out to be.....hopefully now it doesnt erupt in to violence...I hate eating my own words!


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    #7
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    Wheely wrote:
    . but it abviously wasn't the security threat the authorities made it out to be.....hopefully now it doesnt erupt in to violence...I hate eating my own words!
    Given that all the security for these things is planned months in advance and given that this march was factored in,it was never a security threat as such and in principal.
    However I'm sure the police on the ground wanted to make absolutely sure that no troublemakers were going to march and once they were satisfied with that, then it went ahead.
    Without being satisfied with that(and no doubt it took several hours of negotiations by the peacefull protesters to convince the police) then it would have been a security threat-a developing one arising out of what the police had encountered already on the day.
    They couldnt let bin and seat throwing hooligans march down there.
    Operationally they had to be secure on the day that that wouldnt happen.


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