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Police called to climate camp

Not important | 27.08.2009 17:43

At just after 6pm tonight the police were called to the camp following a robbery.

In an amazing about turn the police that were kept off the site for the past two days were invited onto the Climate Camp today after the theft of a laptop was discovered. Statements were taken and the police were then escorted off the site by members of the legal team.

I'm not sure how to feel about this.

Not important

Comments

Hide the following 22 comments

Well there's a surprise

27.08.2009 17:51

Yeah I heard about this and saw them leave afterwards, felt sick that this was not sorted out by the barrio.

Mike

what?

27.08.2009 18:19

they didn't beat anyone up, shoot anyone.....

Crime is what they get paid to deal with, pity there was no CCTV cos it really helps.

anon

Lord of the Flies

27.08.2009 18:19

If my laptop was stolen i'd want the police there. Im not sure what this "escort them off the site by the legal team" nonsense is. If the legal team are chucking people off then it makes a mockery of the whole thing. Rule by nonsense

tablecloth

Childish...

27.08.2009 18:26

Why is CC advocating such a childish response to the police being their, anyway - that's the sort of attitude that will cause problems.

There obviously are people set to cause trouble - demonstrated by the theft of a laptop - so the police should be allowed to wander around this piece of public land. Stupid comments like "why couldn't they deal with it at the barrier" is a childish mentality.

I was supposed to be going to Climate Camp, but if I'm honest - the twitter reports of how some of the protestors are acting towards the police seems to me like harsher tactics are going to be inevitable & I'm having second thoughts about going.

anon

advice ninjarchist says

27.08.2009 18:28

http://memegenerator.net/188587/fuck-the-police-until-someone-steals-my-laptop-

advice ninjarchist

yawn - non-news

27.08.2009 18:53

My initial thoughts: BFD.

Maybe they needed a crime number for insurance reasons or something. It's hardly important compared to the main issues of the Climate Camp. This story is the sort of trivial dross the Sun would come out with.

anon

CCTV

27.08.2009 19:01

There is a great big crane with CCTV outside the camp. The police can undoubtedly see what is going on inside day and night. So the poster who talked about CCTV is talking out of their backside.

I think asking the police to do their job is fine. Dealing with stolen items is part of their job. Intimidating and attacking campers is not part of their job. Very easy to understand the difference.

A N Other

Oh you!

27.08.2009 19:04

@advice ninjarchist

Get back to Quiggins lad! ;)

Anonymous

Childish...

27.08.2009 19:17

But they've not attacked anyone yet - so maybe give them some credit, and don't act as if you are above the law. They have a right to go onto the Common - the land belongs to everybody.

CC has been hijacked by anti-establishment types with chips on their shoulders.

ANON

and the moral of the story is?

27.08.2009 19:35

Depending on your political conditioning, one of the following statements may appear reasonable:

A) Even climate campaigners are thieves and criminals who steal from each other, so having a repressive state with police violence and harassment is fully justified. Any attempt to defend democracy from repressive policing is mere hypocrisy. Old Thomas Hobbes was right, we would all kill each other in a dreadful war of all against all unless we have have a state leviathan to repress us.

OR:

B) Any passer by or casual thief in London's vast population (with its proportion of social problems and poverty) could enter the camp, which has received much media publicity. People at the camp will get to know each other and the people around them, which will make it more secure (thats the point of the climate camps practice of encouraging neighborhoods or 'barrio's'). But you cannot create a perfect example of a free and equal future society with no cause for theft in the middle of a capitalist society full of inequality and poverty. So someone might come in and nick an unattended laptop. Nevermind, its not the end of the world...

The police wont get your laptop back, they never do (thats not what they are there for) - but you do need to report such thefts to them in order to be able to claim the insurance. I doubt if the police needed to come on site for this, but maybe they insisted. Laptops and camping generally don't mix because tents are insecure - you wouldn't leave a laptop in your tent in Glastonbury or a holiday campsite either. If the climate camp needs laptops, then you should keep them in a special secure area, or a lockable van etc.

Because the police have violently repressed and harassed previous climate camps and would like to shut the movement down, it is a necessary part of the struggle is to attempt to negotiate a space free from police control. In the space thus created many amazing and beautiful acts of resistance and transformation begin to flower.

Barry Kade

Haha

27.08.2009 19:49

Haha I dont think climate camp has been hijacked by anti-establishment types at all. I was always the anti-establishment types that organised it. It's the liberals that are crashing the party.

Haha

Hijack

27.08.2009 19:50

"CC has been hijacked by anti-establishment types with chips on their shoulders. "

Now THAT is very fucking funny!

Abody

stuphid

27.08.2009 19:54

this is ridiculas
why were the police bought on to site to solve a laptop theft
how can you possibly hope to change anything if u cant even deal with something like that
maybe u should not have taken ure lap top to climate camp dick head!!!
its not even a bigger nuff deal for a barrio to talk about!! fuck it some idiot had to much money bought a useless piece of equipment and then lost it cause they did not look after it. no big deal
maybe bring people in to investigate a rape etc but for a laptop??
ure all morons, all of u and so am i
ahhhh

Ben

Its true, Climate camp has been hijcaked...

27.08.2009 19:59

...but not by anti-establishment types! In case anyone one doesnt remember, climate camp has repeatedly and clearly articulated its anti-capitalist and anti-establishment views in meetings leading up to previous and the current camp. The only people who are hijacking it are the closet reformists, usually officious middle-class types with cushy NGO jobs, who turn up and effectively assume control e.g. tea with police thugs, pandering to the press, and trying to maintain a consistent corporate branding of what is supposed to be an autonomous space.

Wobbly

Season for it

27.08.2009 22:16

Seems to be the season for it. Laptops were stolen from People and Planet's offices too recently.

Ger

yawn

27.08.2009 22:17

whats on the telly? this is going nowhere, a piece of no-news for no-bodys to gloat about or slag the police off.

sigh

more important things perhaps?

LLF?

28.08.2009 00:33

So this event is attended by members of the Laptop Liberation Front? All property is theft....

wonderer

laptop liberation front

28.08.2009 06:04

yeah, they are campaigning for the rights of silicon life, and to free microchips from exploitation from evil humans.

Pixata

Property

28.08.2009 09:32

Laptops disappearing from People & Planet and from Climate Camp may have been stolen by state agents for evidence gathering purposes. These are tools used by individuals; they are not "property" in the sense of the means of production being owned by the employing class. If a stolen laptop is insured then you need a police crime number so, under the present system, it's reasonable to allow police on site for this. You might decide to save money and step outside the system by not buying insurance. This doesn't stop the Barrio (an organisational and geographical group within a larger camp) from dealing with the crime. I wonder how many of the posts on this article are from state agents?

"We see that the richest property owners . . . are precisely those who work the least or who do not work at all." Michael Bakunin

(A)
Homepage: http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bakunin/bakuninwritings.html

Big Brother

28.08.2009 10:34

All you lot can do is demonstrate about "issues". If you really want to demonstrate get to Endemol orifices and DEMAND that Big Brother is kept on air. This cultural programme is being axed because people seem to be taking back control of thier lives and beginning to think for themselves,this is dangerous and can lead to Anarchy and Direct democracy.
Shut up turn on your TV`s and obey. If you can`t sleep,do what I do and watch the B.B. contestants doing it for you.

Orwell

Checked and this is not substantiated.

28.08.2009 11:11

No one at camp knows anything about this. I've checked with legal team, police liaison, security committee and several contacts onsite.

FYI

LLF?

28.08.2009 19:41

I'm pleased to hear that the Laptop liberators have been inactive. Usually they are busier than an mod employee in a used car lot. Or a spook in a pub. Or a Revenue officer posting cd's..... etc, etc..

wonderer