Tech

The tech side was bit problematic, most of the time I couldn’t get a usable data connection, resorted to sms on old phone so vid and audio and keeping abreast of events via twitter was not so doable. Others on Orange also reported long delays with texts so once the credit is used up unlocking and installing Android 2.2 and going to O2 (as it’s the only network even with a chance of working in my neck of the woods not that it is the best value) will be the order of business. As we threaded out of the city on the coach we finally got some good connections and could start to see what twitter and the media had to say.

Media

Always fun to find out what the MSM version of reality is, as usual it was short term event reporting leaning on official sources and -if it bleeds/smashes/burns it leads- the confusion with UKUncut and anarchist window botherers helped the establishment in their crackdown on uncut when in fact uncut were non-violent non-vandals.

Black Bloc

At this point I think they have to ask themselves if a tactic absent realistic strategy is anything other than an expression of personal animus and a certain amount of arrogance. And ultimately who benefits the most. I know a lot of angry lefties aren’t bothered by a few wrecked shopfronts (I rather like the paintball approach) but if we are to turn the tide of the austerity doctrine we need a large proportion of the population persuaded to our case, in this regard Black Bloc is counterproductive in the media climate we exist in. And given police infiltration some questions have to be asked what really is being achieved and on whose behalf.

Experience

We took children along, they got a truly memorable first trip and sightseeing walking tour of London, it was an entirely benign atmosphere until later around Piccadilly when the cops were getting ordered to interdict UKUncut. We were hugged by sweaty gorillas in Trafalgar Square (wearing those suits is true dedication!), Hyde Park by 4pm was a festival scene. There is space for both, well planned focussed actions and the more celebratory form of protest, cue Emma Goldman ’If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution‘ both convey the message we are not thugs, we are not feckless scum, we are the teachers, doctors, nurses, fire fighters, artists, care workers, students, librarians, the able bodied, the disabled, the healthy and the sick, the young and old, the employed and unemployed. We are the Britain elite millionaires want to break, because our lives are about other human beings, about culture, knowledge, art and science not quarterly profit, commerce has its place in society it does not however possess the totality of qualities required to run a society. We are not lonely selfish robots however much elite bred sociopaths wish to make us such.

Response

#26March was not ignored, while it didn’t get a favourable government response it did provoke one. On Sunday Vince Cable said we won’t let it halt our program and further announced cutting the 50% tax rate for overpaid wankers. So basically if you escalate we escalate back, this does mean they see the threat to their shock treatment as a genuine threat. On the way back I remember us talking about how Theresa May responds will tell us a lot about how they plan to deal with further resistance to shock doctrine and today that response has come. It tells us they intend to go the same route as all other neoliberal elites as they impoverish a nation, increased police powers, increased repression, please do not for a minute ever mistake that at the heart of this ideology is a form a fascism. Left unchecked it ends in an authoritarian state of massive inequality.

The home secretary has “utterly condemned” the behaviour of thugs who attacked police officers and smashed property in London on Saturday. Theresa May told the Commons she expected the number of people charged, currently 149, to increase. She said she had asked the police whether they needed more powers.

Note again the deliberate conflating of the mass of arrests of UKUncut with stopping ‘thugs’. This brings us to the second political reaction, Fortnum & Mason cheats tax and they pay money to the Conservative party, at the same time UKUncut have ignited resistance in the popular imagination. Thus the government planning on many more years of implementing disaster capitalism has to snuff out this fledging movement, this was going to happen sooner or later, mass arrests and trawling of perosnal data to establish better intel on Uncut. So when Tory chums Fortnum’s was occupied it was a golden opportunity for the establishment. I think the police may well have been at first be ok with them leaving, but calls were made a kettle was deployed and police promises not to arrest were reneged upon and everyone was collared. Together with May’s statement it is clear the government know they can only implement their program through authoritarian means and are determined to do so. So we must not cease our opposition, ooh look we are protesting in Bangor this Saturday April 2nd. Come along. Join The Resistance.