I vote everyone watches a Nielsen film tonight.
Airplane for me, without a doubt

"nice beaver"

Jane:
I've heard police work is dangerous.

Frank:
It is. That's why I carry a big gun.

Jane:
Aren't you afraid it might go off accidentally?

Frank:
I used to have that problem.

Jane:
What did you do about it?

Frank:
I just think about baseball.

I have all the Naked Gun films on my parents' Sky+, think I'll watch the 3rd one this afternnoon.

Also, my housemate got bored and bought a full HD 42" TV for the living room on saturday. I knew there was a reason I lived with him.

Fuck me, talk about a hard sell

We also have t-shirts and beermats :D

to be fair, once I've got all my stuff written and recorded, I will be doing the same thing.

indeed, we've already started on our concept album so i'll be whorring it in about 6 months time...

As we're all showing our wares, you guys remember this ol' thing?

[URL]http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=870660&songID=9719022[/URL]

It's nearly done. Will be uploading sometime in the next couple of weeks I think/hope.

[QUOTE=EmbraceRandom;18292149]Leslie Nielsen has died :' ([/QUOTE]

Shirley not.

Yeah it says he died in hospital.
It's a big building with patients but that's not important right now : (








...and don't call me Shirley

btw does anyone listen to/like Kayo Dot?

used to listen to them a lot yeah and maudlin of the well

i love soulseek. Just probed around my incoming folder that i haven't tended to for a couple of weeks and found an album called 'burn your sister' by band called 'horny genius'.

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18291203]the inhumanity doesn't really speak for itself tbh[/QUOTE]

What, making girls piss on the floor isn't inhumane?
[QUOTE]
protests are always within a set physical confine - i might not understand kettling but isn't it just keeping the protesters from too much urban disruption until they tire themselves out?[/QUOTE]

I don't have a problem with telling the protestors "you can't go this way", but these guys were told they couldn't go anywhere
[QUOTE]
i mean i really don't know anything about what's been going on in the last couple of weeks in london so if there has actually been brutality exhibited show me[/QUOTE]

Nothing particularly awful

[QUOTE]also i don't think the purpose of kettling is in any way to give them negative media exposure - i appeal to the consequences here cause i don't think they've been portrayed as monsters. the soundbites and clips i saw on the news just made them seem ignorant and frustrated but everyone looks like that on the news
[/QUOTE]

Having been on the national news once (lunchtime, 6 and 10 o clock no less!), can confirm this

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18291207]also

the police aren't the government, nor are the media

it's not like nick clegg is going 'fucking students, let's ram them together, can we do that? get pc plod on the phone'[/QUOTE]

Does anybody think that?

[QUOTE]it's paranoid to act like the police have a vested interest in discouraging protest; that's not what they're for[/QUOTE]

They do have a vested interest; protests make them look bad and mean they have to stand out taking abuse all day in riot gear

but that's irrelevant, if they're doing things which actively discourage legitimate protest that is a bad thing regardless of intention

[QUOTE=Bruce E Kinesis;18292366]What, making girls piss on the floor isn't inhumane?[/QUOTE]

Of course it isn't. Come up to Newcastle and you can see it in the big market on a friday, saturday and sunday night every week.

[QUOTE=AG;18292518]Of course it isn't. Come up to Newcastle and you can see it in the big market on a friday, saturday and sunday night every week.[/QUOTE]

Is this before or after theyve been slapped around by Andy Carrroll? :naughty:

[QUOTE=Bruce E Kinesis;18292366]What, making girls piss on the floor isn't inhumane?[/QUOTE]

i dunno if girls pissing on the floor is what kettling essentially is - i can envisage a form of kettling in which girls don't have to piss on the floor.

Also i am suspicious of you saying they provide no exits whatsoever for a prolonged period of time... i would actually expect the media to obscure the facts on this particular issue.

[QUOTE]Having been on the national news once (lunchtime, 6 and 10 o clock no less!), can confirm this[/QUOTE]

i didn't quite understand this. you're saying you've personally been on the news and felt ignorant and frustrated?

[QUOTE]Does anybody think that?[/QUOTE]

you're giving me the impression that you do

[QUOTE]They do have a vested interest; protests make them look bad and mean they have to stand out taking abuse all day in riot gear[/QUOTE]

that doesn't give them a vested interest in discouraging protest rather than managing it better. is it much worse than other police work? i dunno.

[QUOTE]but that's irrelevant, if they're doing things which actively discourage legitimate protest that is a bad thing regardless of intention[/QUOTE]

yes but the crucial part of my argument is this: what if kettling doesn't actively discourage legitimate protest? I'm fairly convinced its intention is to actively discourage illegitimate protest, in the form of violence, vandalism, trespassing, etc. It's effective in that regard, I'm not so sure about the other one.

nah fingers, there's no two ways about it.
1. they kettle people in public places, confined to an 'open' space where there are no toilets/shelter/food/drink etc. That's the point of a 'kettle'; to make those in it feel powerless and helpless, and give less of a shit about their protest and more of shit about the essentials in life, like keeping warm, eating etc etc
2. Again, they don't provide exits otherwise it wouldn't be so effective (inhumanely or otherwise). That's the point. No way to get out until [I]they let you[/I], reinstating their control.
3. They had no reason to disrupt the protest the other day, it was peaceful until they acted and bound everyone within the kettle. That's when they were like 'shit, we kinda left one of our vans in there', at which point the then-trapped students started beating the shit out of it. Which was one of the most prominent images use in the media the next day. So, to the public, student protest = student violence, apparently.
The only reason the police acted so aggressively was because of the events at Millbank. However, I refuse to accept it as reasonable to stereotype all students to that of a minority. With geniune sincerity, if you start stereotyping a race of people, you are a racist. Stereotyping a 'community', if you will, is no different. They might as well start being aggressive to all students in the street "because students got violent at Millbank so you're just as likely to". After all, they did start stopping people of asian heritage in the streets of London after 7/7 because they [i]could[/i] be terrorists... that's racist, is it not?

Like I've said before, I don't like it when people moan and don't offer an alternative; in this case, I can't offer an alternative to the 'a mob needs to be controlled as a whole, not based on the sum of its parts. 95% peacefull, 5% violent is still 100% dangerous', but hey, pay me the wage of a top police boss and I'll find a way. Until then, it's up to them to impress me with something that isn't discriminatory.




also, +1 on maudlin of the well!

i don't think your point about stereotyping makes sense in this particular instance because these protests are sequential and their organisation tends to be carried over on the back of the last one

police had reason to expect there would be violence, not because they're students and students are violent, but because the millbank protest itself was violent.

i dunno, i do take your first two points on board but i don't think the inhumanity of kettling is self-evident to be honest.

also the students who started kicking the shit out of the vans were responsible for their actions, despite the fact that it was fomented by a strategic failure on the part of the police. there seems to be an exculpatory tone to what you and bruce are saying, which i just find weird. How long did the kettle last anyway? I'm pretty sure the vandalism was intended as a gesture of hostility rather than total desperation.

[QUOTE=AG;18292518]Of course it isn't. Come up to Newcastle and you can see it in the big market on a friday, saturday and sunday night every week.[/QUOTE]


i was going to mention pretty much any music festival in the uk as well but the bigg market is quite a fine example.:lol:

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18292671]How long did the kettle last anyway? [/QUOTE]

[quote=Laurie Pennie]It's the coldest day of the year, and I've just spent seven hours being kettled in Westminster.[/quote]

Source: [url]http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/laurie-penny/2010/11/children-police-kettle-protest[/url]

[QUOTE]i got kettled by both the police and the protesters yesterday,,luckily when i showed the police my big issue badge they let me through there police lines.my head aint half sore after one of those protesters threw a socalist workers party placard at the police yesterday and it missed and whacked me on my head,but heh i made plenty of dough yesterday so no bellyaching from me,i am sure laurie penny bought a copy of the big issue of me yesterday,it was you with the red bobble hat and the brown scarf,,or maybe it was somebody else..[/QUOTE]

legend.

I've no idea whats goin on in this thread anymore :)

Politicslod


Sucks

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18292671]i don't think your point about stereotyping makes sense in this particular instance because these protests are sequential and their organisation tends to be carried over on the back of the last one[/quote]
Millbank: crimes committed by an absolute minority of a certain 'community'.
7/7: crimes committed by an absolute minority of a certain race.

Whitehall: all those of that 'community' are stereotyped based on preceding events.
Streets of London: all those of that race are stereotyped by the preceding events.

Organisation is only a minor flaw in the analogy, because otherwise both instances are reflective of the other. But then analogies are not meant to be taken literally.

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18292671]police had reason to expect there would be violence, not because they're students and students are violent, but because the millbank protest itself was violent.[/quote]
Of course they had reason to [I]expect[/I] violence (they were right to be more prepared than they were the previous work), I'm condemning them for acting without present provocation; they acted on the past.
We better march into Germany and shoot all the Nazi bastards before they try to take over Europe again. Oh wait, that would be acting on past information that is therefore irrelevant in a new context :p

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18292671]i dunno, i do take your first two points on board but i don't think the inhumanity of kettling is self-evident to be honest.[/quote]
Everyone has something - known or not - that they would actively protest for. So imagine yourself in that position; you use your civil liberty, your right to protest, and you do so in a peaceful and perfectly legal manner. How would you feel if you were then punished for doing so? I think you'd agree that the inhumanity would speak for itself then, it's clear on two levels (at least in my opinion):
1. Denying people their right to protest.
2. The act of 'kettling' itself, on a (at that point) non-violent group of protesters PLUS it being the coldest day of the year.

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18292671]also the students who started kicking the shit out of the vans were responsible for their actions, despite the fact that it was fomented by a strategic failure on the part of the police. there seems to be an exculpatory tone to what you and bruce are saying, which i just find weird. How long did the kettle last anyway? I'm pretty sure the vandalism was intended as a gesture of hostility rather than total desperation.[/QUOTE]
No no, I'm not strictly defending those who smashed the van up, I just find it unbelievably unfair and typical of the media that the most prominent images used in the news, regarding Whitehall, are of the van being smashed by students. There is no way that was the worst act of the day, yet it is made out to be.



By the way, the new statesman article I posted is probably the most subjective report I've ever read, and it does probably exaggerate things, but I'm not basing all my opinions on a single report. Just wanted to make that clear, because that article could easily be ripped apart.

[QUOTE=The_Mop;18293749]Politicslod


Sucks[/QUOTE]


whereas boobieslod

certainly doesn't

Have all the avatars/images disappeared, or is it just me?

Are we still talking about this pish?

Anyway, did Baz just say boobieslod? Time to be posting some pics of ex-girlfriends ay Baz? :naughty:

[QUOTE=guitarbaz;18293825]whereas boobieslod

certainly doesn't[/QUOTE]

whereas bjlod

certainly would

Am I right?

da dum tish!

ha ha, yeah i still got some pics of the ex kicking about somewhere ;)

bjlod.........sucks. I get it.

Why call it a blowjob anyway? Whos going around blowing on Cocks?

[QUOTE=benfan;18293885]bjlod.........sucks. I get it.

Why call it a blowjob anyway? Whos going around blowing on Cocks?[/QUOTE]

Fags?

I have a new game for the lod. Everyone should give me some money. What do you guys think?

[QUOTE=benfan;18293981]I have a new game for the lod. Everyone should give me some money. What do you guys think?[/QUOTE]

I like it. Got a suggestion though - how about instead of giving the money to you, they give it to me? I think if you make that change, your idea's a winner.

[QUOTE=EmbraceRandom;18293780]Millbank: crimes committed by an absolute minority of a certain 'community'.
7/7: crimes committed by an absolute minority of a certain race.

Whitehall: all those of that 'community' are stereotyped based on preceding events.
Streets of London: all those of that race are stereotyped by the preceding events.

Organisation is only a minor flaw in the analogy, because otherwise both instances are reflective of the other. But then analogies are not meant to be taken literally.[/QUOTE]

that isn't what the word 'stereotype' means mate, i'm sorry, but a stereotype requires a hell of a lot more history behind it than one incident. Plus even if it were a stereotype i think it's arbitrary to say that's 'wrong' when it involves profiling a potential threat: the way you respond to that threat is what matters.

This is the kind of equivocal abuse of inflammatory language that makes the writers for the guardian and new statesman shit. Can we not just accept the fact that probabilistic judgements on the possibility of a threat according to the social dynamics of a particular community are what the police are trained and paid to make?

I consider everything the police do, and the entire function of the legal process to be, inhumane. It certainly isn't an instinctive function of the individual as a responsible member of the community, and it often involves harming members of that community or restricting their freedom according to arbitrary moral standards when the harm caused by their actions could only be repaired by positive encouragement and reconciliation: the likes of which it is entirely 'humane' to facilitate.

I have every reason to believe that the use of kettling in this particular instance was unsuitable, but i think that if it were used in a suitable situation then a few girls having to piss on the floor would be, as it is now, an idiotic metric for the harm caused by the use of such a tactic.

Are we really that entitled as a community that the sight of people being cold, frightened and mildly indignified is a source of grave political vehemence? Their safety was only violated by their own violence and disorder.

Yes, they were denied the right to protest freely, but the statement itself was still made. People who are fully committed to peaceful activism of this sort know that they can just do it another day, and that the political pressure engendered by protest is almost entirely facilitated by media exposure of this type.

It's not images like a few kids panicking and kicking the crap out of a van that damage the public opinion of students: it's poorly thought out rhetoric expressing total conviction in our right to do whatever the fuck we want, when we have a government that subsidises and organises our basic human needs on the grounds that we actually do something for ourselves culturally, economically or otherwise, that really makes people view us as irresponsible, entitled and obstinate. Because we fucking are. We're still children.

As regards your Nazi comparison, I'm not even going to bother to do anything but cite Godwin's Law.

[QUOTE=fingers mccoy;18294003]


Are we really that entitled as a community that the sight of people being cold, frightened and mildly indignified is a source of grave political vehemence? Their safety was only violated by their own violence and disorder.

[/QUOTE]

Largely I agree with a lot of what you posted, but part of the point is that they were kettled not in response to anything they did, but due to the actions of a previous protest. The van was vandalised after it was left in the kettle, rather than the students being kettled for being violent and attacking the van. Granted, it's vandalism either way, but it was, to a greater or lesser extent, a result of the kettling rather than the cause.

I know I'm labouring the point, but it seems as though the police didn't wait for any signs of violence, but merely decided they thought it was likely, regardless of available the evidence, and kettled the shit out of a bunch of young adults and minors.

Also, yeah, I kind of think that (largely) peaceful protesters being made frightened by the police for deigning to protest is a source of, if not political, then certainly personal vehemence.

it is obviously not a good thing to happen and in this particular instance it makes very little sense. I totally understand personal vehemence but i think so much of our morality these days is hyperpoliticised to the point where you being angry that something is happening is supposed to constitute a failure in the government. It's politically inconsequential but because we now communicate in terms introduced by the heavy gestural symbolism of the media we're incapable of seeing the woods for the trees.

It doesn't help that you get culturally prominent figures talking about how anger is great, and you have to be angry to be political and blah blah blah: actually you don't; you just have to do what can be done to increase your liberty, responsibility and respect within society. It has nothing to do with anger. We're all angry all the time.

what i meant by saying their safety was violated by their own violence and disorder was just that the only thing that could've put them at risk was themselves by the time they were corralled, but thankfully that didn't happen. Maybe if there weren't so many children there it might've got a bit more chaotic.

[QUOTE=benfan;18293885]bjlod.........sucks. I get it.

Why call it a blowjob anyway? Whos going around blowing on Cocks?[/QUOTE]

Petition to get blowjobs officially renamed to 'gusty gobble-knobs'

Signatures: 1

Signatures: 2

+1 for Boobieslod

[img]http://randomoverload.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/9d11e6d4c04eff68.jpg[/img]