UK Student Protests: Wheelchair-bound student dragged across the road by police officer, BBC defend

[AcrylicHero]

...and on the other side of things http://behindblueeyes.co.uk/2010/12/10/cunts/

Neither side is blameless here. Kettling tactics are known to make things escalate quickly, yet the police continue with their use. Furthermore, troublemakers can be easily identified from the beginning (hiding their faces and acting like a tosser are good clues), so I reckon the police should've excluded them much earlier, and so we might have avoided this.

On the flipside, the students haven't helped their cause here. It's largely seen as a massive temper tantrum because they aren't getting what isn't really theirs anyway. Violence against people other than the police and attempting to desecrate national monuments have set popular opinion largely against them now.

As the link above should indicate, the police are still people too. Some of them even agree with the protestors, but still do their job because, well, it's their job to keep the peace as best they can. It's easy enough to hate on a uniform and what it represents, but they're only upholding the laws ascribed to them from above. In short, not all of them are power-tripping psychos who love cracking heads (though some, sadly, are), the same way that not all students are entitled brats (though, again, some are. That some seem to have some numbers though).

This needs to be read.
Despite the protests being started for a good purpose and despite the majority being started by sensible and peaceful protesters, the extremists on both sides will get the most media coverage no matter what and will ruin everything.
It begins with a few idiots tossing shit at the police, and the police needs to react to this indiscriminately as sadly the idiots are hidden amongst the crowd. Things will escalate and alot of people will make poor judgements, whether due to the heat of the moment (some idiot damaging the godamn cenotaph) or due to other factors.
Kettling and other quite excessive tactics used by the police like the cavalry charge only made things worse.
It was very nice to see many officers keeping their cool and being reluctant to resort to their batons at the protest, and it was very heart warming to see in the previous london protest a group of students trying to protect the abandoned police van from the morons.

 

[SoulIsTheGoal]

This is disgusting but it doesn't surprise me. Look up the Territorial Support Group and their record with violence. Then look at footage of Ian Tomlinson and assess whether you really want them dealing with people in cases such as this.
The Police are the arm of the government that is allowed to use violence against the public. If the army kicked off the Police would have to deal with it. The issue here is not whether the man in the wheelchair deserved to be removed from the situation but whether he deserved to be removed from his chair. I'd say "no".

 

[Undeadenemy]

I just watched the video, and I can say that it looks to me as if the person in the wheelchair was blocking the street and refused to move. This drew the attention of the police who asked him nicely to move from the street. The person refused to move and the police enforced their authority crippled or not. Let this be a lesson to you anarchists, if the cops tell you to do something, do it, or else you'll have it done for you and you won't like it.

It also smells like a setup to me, all these people claiming that the cops are out there trying to bait people to riot doesn't make sense to me. Why would police try to get people to riot so that their lives can be in further danger?

In my opinion after seeing what happened to those royals the other day, the police should start being really brutal to these twats. From now on it should be nothing but tear gas and bean bags, and then deadly force if it continues to escalate. The police have to get the situation under control by any means necessary, anyone out their further provoking them is bringing it on themselves.

Fuck you! we supposedly live in a democracy, if we arnt allowed to protest because politicians have broken promises to us and are making our lives difficult when some of it is unnecessary despite what the people paying the huge salaries want and the fact the government covers up police brutality then we should (and i use this word carefully) REBEL!

have you noticed that government condemns any violence (and to an extent rightly so) and then says rather than civil disorder we should be showing civil disobedience, but when we are peaceful the government completely ignores us!

You are allowed to protest, but you are not allowed to riot. You can wave signs and shout all you want, but you can't torch public Christmas trees, break windows, and block public streets. Martin Luther King and Mahatma Ghandi both used civil disobedience and it worked for them. That kid in the wheelchair smells like a setup to me, like he was purposely there to start trouble and make the news when he got dealt with. For all we know he locked the breaks on his wheelchair and the cops had to pull him out to move him.

Also, the government hasn't raise the tuition because it wants to deny education to people, it raised the tuition because the government is out of money. Maybe they should have cut teacher salaries first or something, but I think that would have probably been a drop in the bucket compared to raising tuition. If school is too expensive, either get a merit based scholarship or do something else with your life.

i should have worded it better, i do think peaceful protests and what not are ideal, but the government hasnt been paying attention except in cases when we are more forceful, that shouldnt be happening

and in terms of the fees, estimates have shown the government is actually going to lose moneyb on all the fees and we had a signed pledge that Clegg would vote against it and he even said he wanted to abolish uni fees, now im gonna be stuck £50,000 in debt for excersising my RIGHT to have education

I hate it for you that you used to get something free that you're going to have to pay for. I have a right to own a gun, if I want one I have to purchase it. You are entitled to a free basic education, once you hit the advanced level, you have to pay for it. Merit based scholarships are available for those who qualify. Work hard and make good grades and you can get one.

Also, I went to look up what the fees were on the web, and I found out Iran has criticized the UK for it's harsh tactics putting down the riot, I loled. Also, they summoned the British ambassador to tell him that, sucks to be him, would have been hard not to be rolling my eyes if I were that guy.

 

[bobknowsall]

Dragging him from his chair was not necessary, and showed that the police at the scene were exercising very poor judgment.

Now this I can agree with. The OP's utterly biased statements are another story.

We don't have all the info, and making these grand sweeping statements gets us nowhere.

Still, what were those officers thinking? From the limited information available, I'd say it was a deeply unwise move, if only for the backlash.

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

I just watched the video, and I can say that it looks to me as if the person in the wheelchair was blocking the street and refused to move. This drew the attention of the police who asked him nicely to move from the street. The person refused to move and the police enforced their authority crippled or not. Let this be a lesson to you anarchists, if the cops tell you to do something, do it, or else you'll have it done for you and you won't like it.

It also smells like a setup to me, all these people claiming that the cops are out there trying to bait people to riot doesn't make sense to me. Why would police try to get people to riot so that their lives can be in further danger?

In my opinion after seeing what happened to those royals the other day, the police should start being really brutal to these twats. From now on it should be nothing but tear gas and bean bags, and then deadly force if it continues to escalate. The police have to get the situation under control by any means necessary, anyone out their further provoking them is bringing it on themselves.

freedom to protest is okay in my books but really come on i hate the Royals for everything they stand for and if you really wanted the police to be more brutal what would happen if more rights got taken away by force i'm sure you wouldn't care much for it but i would.

 

[Dastardly]

Thats pretty fucking bad... I mean, why not just push him wherever they wanted to take him in the wheelchair? Not like a guy with Cerebral Palsy is going to be able to do much to stop them.

Doesn't seem like he actually did anything bad anyway, from the video it looks like the guy at the start says "The guy in the wheelchair just gave a talk about the *something*". Didn't sound like he was trying to incite violence or was shouting abuse.

My question, while you make a very good point, is just how exactly police are supposed to handle these things well? Looking at past examples, I'm sure you can see that no one is ever happy.

1. If the police stand by and wait to react once things get out of hand, people whine that they could have prevented it.

2. If police prevent it by ordering the crowd to disperse, people complain that they're trampling on the rights of the people.

3. If the police order them to leave and the people refuse (It is a protest, after all), what then? If the make them leave, it's brutality. If they don't, it's an impotent police force.

4. If anyone is taping the incident, who do you think it's going to be? Protesters. Who else would be there, generally speaking? Cops and protesters. And cops might be recording, but they've got all kinds of policies and legalities and delays surrounding what footage they can and can't release, so they can't offer up a video defense in a timely manner... and when they can, it's dismissed as fake because they "should've released it sooner."

These sorts of things are always stacked exactly so that they're against the police, who are constantly in a defensive role even when trying to be proactive. I'm not saying the cop was right, though. I'm just saying we need to consider the possibility that what we're seeing is biased coverage of the situation.

 

[Boba Frag]

Prove it. It's a one minute video, you have no proof as to what happened that caused the cop to act this way. For all we know, the cripple deserved it.

The man has a name. And it is not 'the cripple'. What century are you from? Personally, I find your labelling of him as a 'cripple' as offensive.

That BBC interviewer was horrendous- he was so condescending to McIntyre!

 

[CoL0sS]

You have to remember that policeman are human too, so he could have acted unreasonably (which we can't see from the video). But even if the guy was trying to incite a riot, dragging him from his WHEELCHAIR is playing right into his hand, right? Now police will look like the bad guys. I can understand that perhaps intense atmosphere played with his nerves, but using any kind of force against a disabled person is just poor judgment. There were more subtle ways of handling that situation.

 

[spartandude]

david cameron is worth millions and makes more and more money every year aswell as getting uni for free, his generation fucked up and now mine has to pay for it, we were promised the lib dems would vote against any rise, we have a right to be angry.

 

[Joshimodo]

Far too vague, the 'blame the cops' mentality is kind of lame when you don't have the full story guys. I'm going with neutral on this one, I don't know enough about the scenario to comment on it.

I'd normally side with neutrality in cases where all evidence isn't clear, however the extremes that the apprehension/attack was carried out with was ridiculous. The guy clearly can't walk, and wasn't moving towards the police (as if a wheelchair can do much damage to an armoured copper). If he was throwing stuff (again, unlikely, but not confirmed either way) or egging on the rioters, it'd be fair enough to arrest/detain him.

However, what isn't acceptable is pulling him out of his chair and dragging him across the ground. What reasoning COULD there be behind that?

If he WAS doing something illegal/dangerous, arrest him by moving his chair and binding his arms, don't drag him to the ground and pull him across it.

3. If the police order them to leave and the people refuse (It is a protest, after all), what then? If the make them leave, it's brutality. If they don't, it's an impotent police force.

No, only idiots would consider it brutality for the police to do their job. The issue here is that clearly some police officers don't know what that is. Dealing with a riot involves containing, controlling and defusing situations, not actively attacking people without reasonable cause. People resisting arrest? Cause. People armed with weapons/objects? Cause. Attacking police directly? Cause.

Basically, the officers in question overreacted, since there is nothing that an unarmed crippled guy can do that would pose imminent danger enough to warrant being put on the ground and dragged.

 

[Seydaman]

Please... Look up Cerebral Palsy. HOW can he do anything from a wheelchair and loss of motor skills?

You do realize he still has the ability to talk and push buttons right. This could allow him to incite a riot through his words, not all that hard, or possibly to activate a bomb. I doubt he had a bomb or the probably would have just shot him or it would be on the new or something, but you should get the idea. Just cuz he has cerebral palsy, doesn't mean he cant be a threat. I mean, there's a reason tyrannical governments control what thier citizens are allowed to say. words can often be the most powerful weapons of all.

UK Doesn't have freedom of speech?

 

[Gindil]

I am in agreement that he might have been trying to start a riot. This isn't his first time being forcefully removed from his wheelchair by the police and is a political blogger who was described as "cyber radical" and even states in the interview that the fight needs to be taken into the streets.

Hell, in the first video the cameraman even said that he is a martyr. My bet was he was starting something and the police just wanted to get him out of there so they could disband it.

Yep...

And the Tiananmen Square demonstrators were terrorists. Along with Gandhi, Mother Theresa (Psycho Sadistic behind the mask...) and Martin Luther King.

I would be very careful in trying to label someone. Merely labeling someone for differing opinions is a quick way to misjudge their intents and purposes along with not seeing the actions that lead up so a situation.

 

[The_Emperor]

ok lets clear some things up, even if that person was shouting "KILL ALL POLICE! KILL ALL POLICE AND INNOCENT CVILIANS!" it does not warrant him being dragged from his wheelchair across the street, people in this thread acting like he might of deserved it are way out of line.

I'm a tolerant person, jaded and well versed in shades of grey, yet even I cannot condone DRAGGING SOMEONE WITH CEREBRAL PALSY from a wheelchair, even to arrest him. HE CANNOT RESIST, HE WILL NOT RESIST, YOU CAN JUST PUSH HIM AND THERES NOTHING HE CAN DO.

this is seriously fucked up, wrong on so many levels, the fact some people are ok with it is even more fucked up.

 

[Delusibeta]

david cameron is worth millions and makes more and more money every year aswell as getting uni for free, his generation fucked up and now mine has to pay for it, we were promised the lib dems would vote against any rise, we have a right to be angry.

Welcome to life: it's not fair.

 

[captain underpants]

A lot of people here seem to have a lot of faith in the police. They're little more than hired thugs in the employ of a government that can't handle dissent in these situations. They're certainly not 'keeping the peace' or 'serving the public', that's for sure.