What REALLY happened on Wednesday in Whitehall? A whole generation of london kids got a crash course in protest politics.

Wednesday wasn't a great victory for the aims of this political movement - I very much doubt there's a government U-turn coming on any time soon. But something else did happen, and it might just be a game-changer. A good number, maybe half of the people protesting in Whitehall were underage - sixthformers to skiving twelve year olds who'd walked out of school, looking for a march, some shouting and maybe to change the world. What they got was a sharp lesson in media manipulation, police thuggery and the politics of protest.

For many it was their first demonstration - and it was a rough one. Cordonned off with no access to food water or toilets for many hours on one of the coldest days of the year, the police were unsympathetic to a level that even surprised me (two portaloos eventually arrived, but you had to fight your way through the crowd for them - similarly a few dozen bottles of water). But instead of anger, the kids were smart and well-behaved. They huddled to keep warm, chanted, danced to drum and bass on a giant sountsystem someone had brought along and even tried to intervene when a few people began attacking That Police Van you'll all have heard about - photos are spreading of schoolgirls encircling the van, making a human shield as even they could understand that it was a photo op for the right-wing media. Those kids were brave, and completely understood the situation - the powers than be are willing to use every dirty trick in the book. Later, some of them questioned the police about it - the answers they got are laughable, and they did laugh.

As darkness fell and the cold became worse, bonfires began - eventually about a dozen small ones and one large. Sitting or standing round them, people talked - about what to do next, and about what had happened. All the placards and litter went on the bonfire - after notebook pages and free papers we ran out of things to burn. The soundsystem moved from dubstep to the beatles and T-Rex - has anything ever looked less threatening than a frozen crowd swaying and singing Hey Jude?

As Edd Mustill says in his excellent blog, "An eight-hour kettle gives you plenty of time to think and talk, believe me". He's not kidding. Bits of information, rumours, ideas, spread through the crowd the whole time. Not long after the kettle began, everyone knew that the news was reporting "police are slowly dispersing the protestors" - totally untrue. They knew that as evening drew on an emergency counter-protest was being called for our release - and that the various police were telling different stories about why we were being held in the first place. Everyone knew, for example, that the police were livid about being humiliated at Millbank two weeks ago, and weren't taking any chances today. Some police said we were being held in one place so all the criminal damage (hah) would be focussed in one place instead of spread round the city - we heard that heavy-handed dispersal of a group in Trafalgar Square (policehorses vs children? Nice) had inspired a couple of broken windows. Some police suggested that the protest was being made as unpleasant as possible to dissuade the kids from doing it again - "if they're going to demonstrate, then we'll give them the real demonstration experience, cold, boring and miserable", a particularly honest copper told me.

Fundamentally, this is what those young people took away with them. They took away the knowledge that in these situations, the police are agents of the enemy. They are willing to hurt you, they are willing to trick you, and they won't have any compassion. These kids will have spread the word to their classmates when they returned to school about freezing cold, thirst, and being shoved about by lines of riot police. About parents who arived at about 6pm, after night fell, pleading for the release of their children. About kids whose parents didn't know where they were, and couldn't get home. These young people are the ones who will have gone home and told their families that the TV reports are wrong, that the newspapers are lying. With any luck, they'll remember not to believe everything they read, everything they hear.

The idea of putting them off protest has backfired spectacularly. This insulting and inhumane treatment of children, this massive indefensible overreaction, has radicalized and educated a generation of ordinary London youth. Next time they'll be back, with thermoses full of soup, winter coats, and a lot to say. I'm delighted.

Jenny Bloom, vampyra1990[at]hotmail.com

Written Thursday 25th November 2010

CROSS POSTED TO MY PERSONAL BLOG AND FACEBOOK: http://vampyrasinkwell.livejournal.com/ http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=594641608

EDD MUSTILL: http://thegreatunrest.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/seeing-by-the-fires-of-whitehall/