Say goodbye to another little bit of your freedom

[muriel_volestrangler]

Protest ban zone 'goes too far'

A ban on noisy protests outside Parliament will cover a half-mile zone as far out as the London Eye, the Home Office has confirmed.
...
But it will also cover St James's Park, much of the South Bank and Charing Cross to Lambeth Bridge from 1 August.
...
Within the zone, police have powers to set time limits on protests and ban loudspeakers and placards.

Police will have to authorise demonstrations and anyone holding a spontaneous protest can be arrested.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4096194.stm

So that looks like it also includes New Scotland Yard, and Whitehall, outside the Downing Street gates. It's bad enough they're doing it in Parliament Square, but now they're just taking the opportunity to shut up anyone who doesn't like them.

[ananda]

1. creeping neofascism

It's insinuating itself into Europe every damm day.

Sue

[NYPagan]

2. Where?

Where was the birthplace of Facism anyways?

[Gildor Inglorion]

3. Welcome to DU!

I believe Fascism was "born" in Italy, but I wouldn't swear to it. The name, anyway; the concept of absolutism has been around forever.

:hi:

[Stand and Fight]

7. You are correct.

See Mussolini, Benito. :)

[politicaholic]

6. Welcome to DU!

:hi:

I thought early facism was begun with the Franco regime in Spain wasn't it?

anyone?

[RaleighNCDUer]

9. No, the Falangists didn't get started until, I believe, '29. By that

time Mousolini had been around for years.

OTOH, the urge toward totalarianism has deep roots and can be seen in Bismark's Germany, France of Napoleon III and, of course, the monarchists who ruled for centuries before them.

ON EDIT:
Just Wiki'd Falange. The Spanish Falange wasn't formed until '33, so it postdates both Italian Fascism and German Nazism.

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Aren't you Brits getting tired of mimicing everything Bush&Co. do?

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. Yeah - they just had a piece on the news

about protests at the meeting of G8 justice ministers in Sheffield, in the leadup to the G8 meeting in Gleaneagles.

The protestors have been limited in numbers, and stuck behind barriers about 400 yards away from the building where the ministers are going to dine. And they've stuck a brass band between the two, just in case the protestors manage to make enough noise to be heard. Welcome to the Free Speech Zone.

[T_i_B]

18. I was in Sheffield yesterday morning

Although I did get out before the road closures started I have seen some of the protests. The Protesters are being kept to Devonshire Green, which is a fairly normal place for protests in Sheffield, but it's further then 400 yards from the ministers. There were also about 5 or so protestors banging drums at the Park Square roundabout yesterday morning, but they left mid morning when it started to rain.

http://www.yorkshiretoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=55&ArticleID=1056138

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=191x4829#5323

[politicaholic]

5. A wholesale giveaway of British citizen rights...

Parliment should be careful or they'll have a little revolution on their hands.

I'll listen to James Whale today (you're 8 hours ahead of me) and see what his callers have to say. Sure, most of them are straight from the pub and drunk, but they seem to give good common man's perspective on these things. That is if he even touches on it. He can be sort of a dim wit sometimes.

[RaleighNCDUer]

8. They're learning from Shrubco's example. nt

[fedsron2us]

11. Dumb move

Blair's government is looking more and more like that of Lord Liverpool's administration from the early 19th century whose repressive policies resulted in the Peterloo massacre.

Peaceful but noisy protests are a good way for a society under stress to release its tension. Suppression will just cause resentments to simmer and increase the pressure. I would not be surprised if this move actually encouraged radicalism. What autocratic governments never seem to realise is that when popular resentment can no longer be contained no amount of policemen, identity cards or CCTV will protect the system.

I suppose this comes under the - Obsession with national security - which Lawrence Britt defined as one of the fourteen defining features of fascism.

http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/britt_23_2.htm

No wonder Blair likes spending so much time in Italy with Berlusconi. When do you think he is going to style himself 'Duce' ?

[bennywhale]

12. How about we spontaneously protest in parliament square against this ban.

This government is obsessed with the control, monitoring and manipulation of information and people. I am a lifelong Labour supporter, but as i write this today i despise them. I despise the New Labour project, i despise the spineless withing the party who have put their personal ambition ahead of their values. (That includes you Hain).

With the most extensive CCTV system in the world, ID cards, Satellite tracking in cars, control of democratic protests , we are sliding into a nightmare.

A seal on peoples anger and feelings of being suffocated won't remain intact forever. It will blow and those authoritarian bastards will have no-one to blame but themselves.

[fedsron2us]

13. New Labour has a worrying taste for autocracy

but their ability to bring their meglomaniac ambitions into reality is hindered by their complete incompetence. This government can not install and operate the most basic of IT systems. Getting a true 'Big Brother' operation up and running is way beyond their pathetic capabilities. All they do is pour endless millions of taxpayers money into the hands of unscrupulous management consultants and devious IT suppliers who willingly play up to their delusional fantasies. These corporations know a sucker when they meet one and Blair's administration certainly falls into that category. If you want a police state then the totalitarian regimes of the 1930s did it more effectively and at a fraction of the cost.

[bennywhale]

14. A file shredding, protest banning, population monitoring,

scare mongering government certainly scares me.

Watch out its the bogeyman, quick let me put this microchip in your head i'll protect you.

The depressing thing is the main complaint most British people have about ID cards for example is the cost.

[Nihil]

15. Sneaky bastards

They got that one through on the quiet didn't they?
It's all very well for "Clarke's opponents" to bleat about it now,
after it has been signed into law, but why didn't they make a noise
at the time, while it was being "reviewed"?

> Police will have to authorise demonstrations

I can see this being a high priority item of paperwork ... :sarcasm:

> anyone holding a spontaneous protest can be arrested.

Don't dare to dissent, boo or think about shouting derogatory comments
at President Blair or his cronies. How long before this applies within
a zone surrounding the *people* rather than the *buildings*?

FFS, talk about a slippery slope ... I'm starting to empathise with
the spider in the bath ...

[D-Notice]

16. But it prevents the terrorists

from taking away our freedom!

[bennywhale]

17. Good point. In Clarky's and Blunkett's words "They want to destroy our

civilisation and our society"

ooooooo. Lets do it for them.

I've never understood how a bomb/plane can destroy a civilisation. They can blow up and kill a shit load of people, but we are the only ones who can dismantle our democracy/civilisation.

Quick the bogeyman, give up your freedom so you can be free from him.

Freedom/slavery freedom/slavery freedom freedom freedom freedom.

What does freedom mean these days.