2015 Election

[Grey-gear]

There was coverage....of the violent protesters whilst ignoring the peaceful ones.

 

Wait there have been riots?

[localzuk]

There was coverage....of the violent protesters whilst ignoring the peaceful ones.

 

Indeed. Not to mention, they weren't very good with their counting. All the coverage I saw used police numbers - about 100 or so protesters, yet the footage showed a great deal more - well into the thousands.

 

I'm deeply suspicious of the memorial graffiti too - it screams "agent provocateur", and the police/Tories have form back during the miner's strikes.

Edited May 11, 2015 by localzuk

[Garacesh]

There has been plenty, e.g.

Police arrest 15 in anti-austerity protest in London - BBC News

Anti-Tory protesters deface war monument on Whitehall - Telegraph

Nope. As usual, it's covering the few bad eggs that spoil it, and writing in in such a way that it makes it out that the entire protest was like that. The majority of it, as always, has been peaceful.

Just like @CAM said..

There was coverage....of the violent protesters whilst ignoring the peaceful ones.

[elsiegee40]

Fair enough, but what does "Tories Out" achieve? We had an election. The Tories are in. We have to work with it. Personally I think a protest with a more specific and achievable message would be more useful, e.g. No Cuts,

 

Tories out is meaningless

[rich_tech]

BBC were disgusting to ignore it entirely I thought, which they did, it was covered by a lot of non-bbc organisations and they only begrudgingly put a small page towards it.

 

I don't agree with the vandalism at all, but I will wait until the police uncover who did that there, seeing as London is CCTV abound everywhere.

[elsiegee40]

In London there are protests every day about everything, including the government of the day. The BBC did give ot very little coverage, and maybe they should have given it more. However, I am torn between reporting a relatively small protest and giving the trouble makers an excuse to escalate things. I have seen too many protests that have gone too far. There will be more protests, I am sure. And they will be reported. I am expecting wide spread strikes too. I just hope that the message stays peaceful.

 

Protests only seem to become newsworthy when huge numbers turn out and/or there's trouble. I am not saying that is right or wrong.

Edited May 11, 2015 by elsiegee40

[CAM]

I only heard about it from a story appearing on my Twitter feed from the Putin Propaganda Machine of all places! Otherwise I wouldn't have known until today.

[localzuk]

In London there are protests every day about everything, including the government of the day. The BBC did give ot very little coverage, and maybe they should have given it more. However, I am torn between reporting a relatively small protest and giving the trouble makers an excuse to escalate things. I have seen too many protests that have gone too far. There will be more protests, I am sure. And they will be reported. I am expecting wide spread strikes too. I just hope that the message stays peaceful.

 

Controversial question - will the government listen if protests are entirely peaceful? We had a couple of million people on the streets back before the Iraq War and they were ignored.

 

What is the point of quiet, peaceful protests if they get ignored by both the media and the government? Might as well not bother. Or, escalate...

[elsiegee40]

Controversial question - will the government listen if protests are entirely peaceful? We had a couple of million people on the streets back before the Iraq War and they were ignored.

 

What is the point of quiet, peaceful protests if they get ignored by both the media and the government? Might as well not bother. Or, escalate...

 

Protests only seem to become newsworthy when huge numbers turn out and/or there's trouble. I am not saying that is right or wrong. Personally I would prefer it to be when huge numbers turn out... at least that shows the opinion. Violence turns me, and quite alot of others, off the message immediately.

[Garacesh]

I sort of have to agree with @localzuk here, but I must stress I don't condone the violence (nor, I'm sure, does he).

 

But if the protests are entirely peaceful (and thus ignored by the media so the rest of the country doesn't hear about it) then, realistically, the protests will eventually fizzle out due to no action being taken and no headway being gained*. At best, the protests still continue but either way if it's entirely peaceful, the government can just ignore it and go on with their wrecking of the economy. So the question is, "How do we stay peaceful, yet get something done?" - the answer is.. I don't know.

 

For the general populace to create some kind of reform or change, they need to hurt the current government. Maybe not physically, but the only way the government will actually bother to listen is if somehow they are damaged by the actions of the people. Strikes are the obvious candidate for this.. Grind the country to a halt and show them what could happen if everybody just decided "Screw it."... Problem is everyone won't decide "Screw it" for a sustained period of time because we all need to work in order to feed ourselves and our families and to keep a roof over our heads. If we continuously strike, we lose that. The government know that. And they know, and we know, that we won't do it continuously. We could do a day, sure. Maybe two. But even a week? Never gonna happen.

 

So what do we do?

 

* Contrary to, for example, if no action was taken but their numbers continued to increase.

Edited May 11, 2015 by Garacesh

[Andrew_C]

Errr... BBC ignoring protests. Top three items as of 11/5/15.

[Garacesh]

Errr... BBC ignoring protests. Top three items as of 11/5/15.

The only one of which isn't painting the protest like a bunch of nonsense rioters is only four freaking sentences. Hardly decent coverage.

 

No, the BBC, as per the norm, is covering the bad bits and ignoring the actual message. Maybe they could do a couple of interviews with protesters? Get a decent rapport going and get a real feel for what this is about, not just one or two tiny quotes? That would be a nice start.

[CAM]

Also you've had to search for the article, you only found it because you know it is there. Looking at the main news page, there is no sign of the protests unless you drill down to England and again, only spotted in the sea of links on their rubbish BBC news page because I am looking for it.

[elsiegee40]

Also you've had to search for the article, you only found it because you know it is there. Looking at the main news page, there is no sign of the protests unless you drill down to England and again, only spotted in the sea of links on their rubbish BBC news page because I am looking for it.

 

It was there on the main page on the day. Like other stories they drop off the front page pretty quickly

[Andrew_C]

Also you've had to search for the article, you only found it because you know it is there.

Nope. I read it yesterday, but searched to find the link.

 

I agree about the bias though; that said, ALL news reports are of bad news. Good, uplifting resistance against "the man" isn't "news"

[elsiegee40]

And in other news: George Galloway to challenge Bradford West election result

[zag]

Thought this was funny, regarding the "anti Tory" protest by a couple of hundred idealistic students the other day

 

[tmcd35]

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]30474[/ATTACH]

 

Oh, dear god. Please tell me that's a fake account. IDS can't be that much of an idiot, can he? Certainly does nothing for the Tory 'nasty party' image.

[Crumpet]

Controversial question - will the government listen if protests are entirely peaceful? We had a couple of million people on the streets back before the Iraq War and they were ignored.

 

What is the point of quiet, peaceful protests if they get ignored by both the media and the government? Might as well not bother. Or, escalate...

 

The moment people get violent, the government knows how do deal with you and it's usually swiftly and strongly.

[localzuk]

The moment people get violent, the government knows how do deal with you and it's usually swiftly and strongly.

 

History says otherwise though. I'm struggling to think of a protest movement that didn't achieve its aims with at least some violence.

 

Note - I'm pretty much a pacifist, so you'd never catch me out there doing this stuff.

[zag]

Oh, dear god. Please tell me that's a fake account. IDS can't be that much of an idiot, can he? Certainly does nothing for the Tory 'nasty party' image.

 

Haha of course it is a parody account lol. Very funny one too.

 

Didn't see many people over 23 in those protest pictures. Its almost as if it was organized by some extreme left wing student organization... hmmm

[localzuk]

Haha of course it is a parody account lol. Very funny one too.

 

Didn't see many people over 23 in those protest pictures. Its almost as if it was organized by some extreme left wing student organization... hmmm

 

Hahaha. You think the Socialist Worker is a student organisation. You may wish to brush up on your info there. The only person I knew at uni who was anything to do with them was a bloke well into his 60s.

[LeMarchand]

Strikes are the obvious candidate for this.. Grind the country to a halt and show them what could happen if everybody just decided "Screw it."... Problem is everyone won't decide "Screw it" for a sustained period of time because we all need to work in order to feed ourselves and our families and to keep a roof over our heads. If we continuously strike, we lose that. The government know that. And they know, and we know, that we won't do it continuously. We could do a day, sure. Maybe two. But even a week? Never gonna happen.

 

Particularly as successive governments since Thatcher have made striking harder to achieve whilst demonizing the entire idea.

 

Does anyone wonder if Tony Blair gets a bung from the Tories to publicly offer his "advice" to Labour around election time? If there's one thing that would put off even staunch Labour supporters...

[pcstru]

People should remember that the Tory party is quite effective at self destruction. With such a slim majority, Cameron may face a real struggle keeping order.

[elsiegee40]

People should remember that the Tory party is quite effective at self destruction. With such a slim majority, Cameron may face a real struggle keeping order.

 

The EU question on its own is enough to cause the party to implode quite rapidly