Sympathy for the Countryside Alliance?
Gary Jarvis | 23.09.2002 08:21
Despite my ragings at the CA, watching a news report on Channel 4, I have to say that I could identify with some of the issues that some people on the demo were talking about.
Despite my ragings at the CA, watching a news report on Channel 4, I have to say that I could identify with some of the issues that some people on the demo were talking about.
Individuals complained about the village post office closing and the lack of affordable housing with rich sods buying all the property. I can sympathize with that last one - priced out of the housing market as I currently am.
However my problem with them is that I think they're just anti-Labour and will vote Tory at the next election. I think if Blair and the left ignore this we, on the left, could be in real trouble.
The CA's populism will gain support, especially from the likes of the Daily Mail and Telegraph, who were on hand to give out free papers yesterday.
I berated a crowd near Waterloo, "Where were you lot during the miners strike and the poll tax" to which someone replied "in court".
We have similar grievancies.
As I battled through the crowds to get to Leics Sq I said "Watch out, socialist coming through" and asked the cops where were there cameras today. I later found out, from the Channel 4 news piece that the police cameras were out but at the front of the demo. The cameras weren't even aimed at the demo. So who were they aimed at? Anti-hunt activists?
What annoyed me most about the protest is that everyone looked quite well off. But as ever I want to find common ground but still I felt real opposition to their march. Perhaps it's just envy. 300,000 and up is some demo. But then again it's only an annual event. We on the left are out in all weathers all year round.
Gary Jarvis
Individuals complained about the village post office closing and the lack of affordable housing with rich sods buying all the property. I can sympathize with that last one - priced out of the housing market as I currently am.
However my problem with them is that I think they're just anti-Labour and will vote Tory at the next election. I think if Blair and the left ignore this we, on the left, could be in real trouble.
The CA's populism will gain support, especially from the likes of the Daily Mail and Telegraph, who were on hand to give out free papers yesterday.
I berated a crowd near Waterloo, "Where were you lot during the miners strike and the poll tax" to which someone replied "in court".
We have similar grievancies.
As I battled through the crowds to get to Leics Sq I said "Watch out, socialist coming through" and asked the cops where were there cameras today. I later found out, from the Channel 4 news piece that the police cameras were out but at the front of the demo. The cameras weren't even aimed at the demo. So who were they aimed at? Anti-hunt activists?
What annoyed me most about the protest is that everyone looked quite well off. But as ever I want to find common ground but still I felt real opposition to their march. Perhaps it's just envy. 300,000 and up is some demo. But then again it's only an annual event. We on the left are out in all weathers all year round.
Gary Jarvis
Gary Jarvis
e-mail:
yesgaryjarvis@hotmail.com
Comments
Hide the following 7 comments
Game Plan for depopulation
23.09.2002 10:55
This demo, with genuine grievances, (evident by it's numbers) was being manipulated by the government, the 'bio-diverse' pagan Prince Charles supported it and that opposition idiot was there, Ian Duncan Smith, who wants a war in Iraq, so it got plenty media coverage.
The globalists are going to kick us all off the land, coral us into cities and escalate fearmongering and "terror" threats, to take all our civil and human righs away.
BTW - earthquake - 4.8 on the Richter Scale in the UK this morning. Weird!
Gamekeeper
Issues
23.09.2002 11:18
johnny_boy
Liberty and livelihood
23.09.2002 13:20
Dan
Sadism and Subsidies more like.
23.09.2002 14:02
Mick2
class war
23.09.2002 14:27
richy
Media potrayal is, as ever
23.09.2002 15:45
Foxhunting
it is very similar to the coverage received by the left , by making it a secular issue, general society interprets this to mean 300,000 people turned out in support of fox hunting when this is clearly not the case , and that in truth probably less than 5% of that figure were there in defence of foxhunting.
Its the same as when the BBC and co say that Anti globalisation protestors are expected to gather in london today , (cue reference to mayday violence etc) their selective use of imagery and manipulation of words creates an image in the mind of the general population, that the movement is full of troublemakers and anarchists hellbent on chaos and destruction, we know this to be a fabrication, but the general joe public does not, because the issues being raised by the left are screened from the public information spectrum, and thus never up for debate through regulated media channels, general joe public is never made aware of why we are there in the first place,
i think it would be wise to set up groups to counter the CA agenda and catch the countryside fallout , ie , the poor ,
i believe that with a concentrated effort , there are groups within the movement who have a similar manifesto to the small farmer ,
feeding themselves and their communities , cutting out the supermarkets , local produce local people ,good old community values
we need to engage in dialogue and begin our own propoganda offensive against those running the CA and get the message out there to the small countryside farmer and general community that we, the left do care about the countryside, deeply care, and that as environmentalists and conservationists our agendas are not in fact all that misaligned and with a little fine tuning could be one and the same
I dont know how wise it is to go head to head at CA demo's and stuff because i feel that is playing into the hands of the state by turning us against each other ,we forget who the real bad guys are , we must not allow this to happen ,
the anti hunt movement should continue as is, with harrasment campaigns, sabateur action and stuff and maybe other individuals or groups concerned with the land, could go out leafleting houses in the countryside wherever these hunts meet, to try to build up some local support for our campaigns as well as provide an alternative avenue to allow the poorer folk in rural communities to be heard above the fanfare of the CA agenda.
just a thought !
Peace and Love
Nuggett!!
Nuggett
But what great thoughts Nuggett
23.09.2002 22:14
Cheers Gary Jarvis
Gary Jarvis
e-mail: yesgaryjarvis@hotmail.com