A 22-year-old woman will face charges for holding up a sign that said “fuck imperialism,” while a man was handcuffed and placed in the back of a police van for asking who elected King Charles III.
Yeah, the kettle was basically the secret weapon of the so called 'policing by consent' philosophy that's supposed to be the guiding philosophy of Britain's modern police forces.
It's technically non-violent (although the view from inside the kettle as horses and riot police tighten it on a bridge where there's no more room looks very different) but forces a situation where protestors are forced to react either to get out or just survive inside the kettle, giving the cops an excuse to drop the act. It's called a kettle because it's designed to boil over.
Now obviously I don't believe that 'policing by consent' is a real principle, because as soon as it doesn't work the state reverts to overt violence as I've seen firsthand myself. And things like the kettle are designed as a technical dodge for that idea entirely.
But as far as I know America has never even given lip service to such philosophies. The question is which is worse; having no pretence of a social contract in policing or using policing by consent as a smokescreen and propaganda tool to disguise the oppressive violence of the state?
This is the propaganda potential of the kettle, when it becomes intolerable or life threatening any action to escape it becomes the thing the police blame for injury and loss of life. Hillsborough was an early example of that, but the repetition of the tactic hasn't always gone unnoticed.
and of course any police line will be credulously and cynically repeated by the media because the media is owned by men who hate the working classes on a fundamental level and would crack the world if they thought a penny might fall out
Good post, and yeah, in a lot of ways America's complete lack of lip service at least lays things out the way they actually are. I think because of supposed 'policing by consent' and the fact that UK cops don't routinely carry guns a lot of people assume that they're actually comparatively wholesome and non-violent (doesn't help that a lot of British media tries to enforce this image - every time I see a post on one of the major UK subreddits about how whacky and approachable cops are I want to scream) but those people have probably never seen British cops like the Territorial Support Group in action.
Exactly, the irony is that despite the fact the US police is supposedly far more 'militarised' it acts more like a vigilante militia. Whereas in the UK they operate with more of a military/intelligence hierarchy.
Units like the TSG and armed response operate are far less visible as specialised units that are targeted through the use of online monitoring, Forward Intelligence Teams, and possibly the most extensive undercover infiltration and surveillance program ever ran. As a result police violence happens more often on raids or behind closed doors in custody, away from phone cameras and prying eyes.
There is of course the usual racist thuggery and things like gun and drug running ops amongst rank and file too (one 20+ year op only came to light after the racist murder of another cop somewhere I used to live) but the deliberate police and state violence is better organised and concealed.
To some degree this has always been true given the closeness between the police, Met, and MI5, but it's also because many of the tactics and organisation used during the occupation of Northern Ireland during the troubles was then directly applied to policing at home.
Yeah, 100% agreed. There are very sinister connections between UK police, the private sector (a lot of the new police tactical teams that sprung up over the last decade or so are trained by private military contractors) and intelligence services (both military and GCHQ) that goes way beyond even your average :frothingfash: cop - not to downplay how harmful even 'average' chud cops can be, of course.
It's one of the many reasons I'm almost dreading Keir Starmer getting in more than the current Tory shitshow, a lot of New Labour types are very 'law and order' focused and are all about this sort of shit - I remember reading about the Blair government wanting to use military intelligence tactics and algorithms to try and identify and contain neighbourhoods they thought would be likely to have high rates of crime or political/religious extremism - Can't help but feel those sorts of tactics were perfected in N Ireland.
Absolutely. Starmer himself is unashamedly a wholecloth tool of the intelligence state and people forget the degree to which Blair cabinets were filled with actual fascists when it came to things like law and order and immigration.
I always found this funny. The Military, even at it's worst, is so much more orderly, professional, and capable than the cops that the comparison is ridiculous. Most police officers barely know how their guns work and shoot much worse than civilian enthusiasts. They don't know the law, they don't know or care what their procedures are, and their whole attitude is basically "There will never be any consequences for me so I'll just do whatever I want and let the courts sort it out later".
They haven't become more militarized. They've become better armed and much, much more independent of any civilian control, operating more like warlords and bandits than military personnel.
as far as I know America has never even given lip service to such philosophies.
Yeah American cops have always ruled through violence and violence alone. the rest of society manufactures legitimacy for them, but they don't give a shit about legitimacy. They've got guns.
Yeah, the kettle was basically the secret weapon of the so called 'policing by consent' philosophy that's supposed to be the guiding philosophy of Britain's modern police forces.
It's technically non-violent (although the view from inside the kettle as horses and riot police tighten it on a bridge where there's no more room looks very different) but forces a situation where protestors are forced to react either to get out or just survive inside the kettle, giving the cops an excuse to drop the act. It's called a kettle because it's designed to boil over.
Now obviously I don't believe that 'policing by consent' is a real principle, because as soon as it doesn't work the state reverts to overt violence as I've seen firsthand myself. And things like the kettle are designed as a technical dodge for that idea entirely.
But as far as I know America has never even given lip service to such philosophies. The question is which is worse; having no pretence of a social contract in policing or using policing by consent as a smokescreen and propaganda tool to disguise the oppressive violence of the state?
Well except for the Hillsborough massacre by police kettling people so they were crushed to death
This is the propaganda potential of the kettle, when it becomes intolerable or life threatening any action to escape it becomes the thing the police blame for injury and loss of life. Hillsborough was an early example of that, but the repetition of the tactic hasn't always gone unnoticed.
and of course any police line will be credulously and cynically repeated by the media because the media is owned by men who hate the working classes on a fundamental level and would crack the world if they thought a penny might fall out
Good post, and yeah, in a lot of ways America's complete lack of lip service at least lays things out the way they actually are. I think because of supposed 'policing by consent' and the fact that UK cops don't routinely carry guns a lot of people assume that they're actually comparatively wholesome and non-violent (doesn't help that a lot of British media tries to enforce this image - every time I see a post on one of the major UK subreddits about how whacky and approachable cops are I want to scream) but those people have probably never seen British cops like the Territorial Support Group in action.
Exactly, the irony is that despite the fact the US police is supposedly far more 'militarised' it acts more like a vigilante militia. Whereas in the UK they operate with more of a military/intelligence hierarchy.
Units like the TSG and armed response operate are far less visible as specialised units that are targeted through the use of online monitoring, Forward Intelligence Teams, and possibly the most extensive undercover infiltration and surveillance program ever ran. As a result police violence happens more often on raids or behind closed doors in custody, away from phone cameras and prying eyes.
There is of course the usual racist thuggery and things like gun and drug running ops amongst rank and file too (one 20+ year op only came to light after the racist murder of another cop somewhere I used to live) but the deliberate police and state violence is better organised and concealed.
To some degree this has always been true given the closeness between the police, Met, and MI5, but it's also because many of the tactics and organisation used during the occupation of Northern Ireland during the troubles was then directly applied to policing at home.
Imperialism abroad etc etc.
Yeah, 100% agreed. There are very sinister connections between UK police, the private sector (a lot of the new police tactical teams that sprung up over the last decade or so are trained by private military contractors) and intelligence services (both military and GCHQ) that goes way beyond even your average :frothingfash: cop - not to downplay how harmful even 'average' chud cops can be, of course.
It's one of the many reasons I'm almost dreading Keir Starmer getting in more than the current Tory shitshow, a lot of New Labour types are very 'law and order' focused and are all about this sort of shit - I remember reading about the Blair government wanting to use military intelligence tactics and algorithms to try and identify and contain neighbourhoods they thought would be likely to have high rates of crime or political/religious extremism - Can't help but feel those sorts of tactics were perfected in N Ireland.
Absolutely. Starmer himself is unashamedly a wholecloth tool of the intelligence state and people forget the degree to which Blair cabinets were filled with actual fascists when it came to things like law and order and immigration.
I always found this funny. The Military, even at it's worst, is so much more orderly, professional, and capable than the cops that the comparison is ridiculous. Most police officers barely know how their guns work and shoot much worse than civilian enthusiasts. They don't know the law, they don't know or care what their procedures are, and their whole attitude is basically "There will never be any consequences for me so I'll just do whatever I want and let the courts sort it out later".
They haven't become more militarized. They've become better armed and much, much more independent of any civilian control, operating more like warlords and bandits than military personnel.
Yeah American cops have always ruled through violence and violence alone. the rest of society manufactures legitimacy for them, but they don't give a shit about legitimacy. They've got guns.