#Demo2012 - Loud & Proud
Top Noise! | 21.11.2012 16:05 | Education | Policing | Public sector cuts
Great turn-out considering the horrible weather - and, on reaching Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, protestors did a good job of spreading-out their march across Westminster Bridge for as long as possible, maximising the disruption around Parliament and minimising any chance of police kettling on the bridge.
The worst criticism any genuine radical could level at a march like today's would be to say that it didn't happen - and, for any trolls who might post smart-arse comments about how A to B marches don't achieve anything, posting stupid comments on Indymedia doesn't achieve anything, but what protests like #Demo2012 do achieve is to keep the protest movement alive, when expenses-guzzling MPs and the right-wing media are just desperate for the anti-austerity movement to die. Great work!
Obviously there's been criticism of the NUS, often leveled by people who didn't organise anything better, but congratulations also to the National Campaign Against Fees & Cuts for putting the work into organising the feeder marches.
Main criticism would be calls for a "free" education. In terms of pro-active political engagement with the general public, it's important to communicate the fact that that no-one wants "free" public services. We want the public services our taxes, our parents taxes and our grandparents taxes have already and continue to pay for - resources which a manifestly corrupt government are clawing back in order to subsidize the multinationals, the bankers and the super-rich who profit from exploiting the infrastructure our taxes have also paid for.
The worst criticism any genuine radical could level at a march like today's would be to say that it didn't happen - and, for any trolls who might post smart-arse comments about how A to B marches don't achieve anything, posting stupid comments on Indymedia doesn't achieve anything, but what protests like #Demo2012 do achieve is to keep the protest movement alive, when expenses-guzzling MPs and the right-wing media are just desperate for the anti-austerity movement to die. Great work!
Obviously there's been criticism of the NUS, often leveled by people who didn't organise anything better, but congratulations also to the National Campaign Against Fees & Cuts for putting the work into organising the feeder marches.
Main criticism would be calls for a "free" education. In terms of pro-active political engagement with the general public, it's important to communicate the fact that that no-one wants "free" public services. We want the public services our taxes, our parents taxes and our grandparents taxes have already and continue to pay for - resources which a manifestly corrupt government are clawing back in order to subsidize the multinationals, the bankers and the super-rich who profit from exploiting the infrastructure our taxes have also paid for.
Top Noise!
Comments
Hide the following 22 comments
@burn
21.11.2012 16:26
Eric
Clued up?
21.11.2012 16:34
@burn
@indy mods
21.11.2012 17:26
R
well worth the read
21.11.2012 17:34
Parsons
NEXT DEMO DEC 5th !!!!!!!!!!
21.11.2012 17:46
To reply to Parsons, yes the NUS demo took place "in the Pouring Rain", so did NCAFC's. If you'd organised the kind of demo you would have liked, would the rain have held-off just because you wanted it to?!
Locks
Nick Clegg
21.11.2012 17:48
@Nick Clegg
Keys
really check
21.11.2012 19:02
Me
@Me
21.11.2012 19:35
But I think radicals have really got to stop expecting anything from these A-B marches given that are organised and controlled by the likes of the TUC, NUS and STW. Instead, as we say time and again, we need to get out there in our communities, propagandise, and spread alternative forms of resistance. It just ain't really happening, that's the problem. At least not on anywhere near a large enough scale.
A
Response to "me" & to people holding the Smash NUS banner > #Dec5
21.11.2012 19:54
Best of luck
Response
Response to "me" & to people holding the Smash NUS banner > #Dec5
21.11.2012 19:57
That means you've got 2 weeks to get more than 10,000 people on the streets, and do that without any of the financial resources and publicity channels and without any of the organisational support of the careerists you're so quick to condemn within the NUS
Don't get me wrong, I agree alot of NUS activists are careerists and agree it's appalling the NUS sat on their hands for 2 years, but that doesn't mean the onus isn't now on YOU, specifically and personally, to PROVE that you can actually deliver something better
Best of luck
Maybe it'll work properly this time?
Feeder march
21.11.2012 19:58
Response
@Me etc
21.11.2012 20:12
Sure there are ALWAYS lots of criticisms you can (and should) make of mainstream groups, because no group is ever in any way, shape or form perfect. The fact is students ARE clued up - and I'm talking about the thousands of students holding NUS banners! What they're clued up about is the fact that no matter how much the NUS and TUC fuck-up if Anarchists ran these campaigns they'd be fucked-up 100 times WORSE.
Sniping is always easy when all you've got to do afterwards is put your feet up in front of the TV, crack a lager and moan
And anyone who thinks this was a waste of time, the solution's easy..... next time stay at home
1966
@ 1966
21.11.2012 20:54
Seriously-I come from a time when there was no internet and social networking and we got thousands on demos who did not have to be herded into pens/parks by future cops. How bad does it have to be to get brainwashed morons on the streets?
We really are fucked and these marches are shit so maybe some well deseved revenge is all we can tell our kids about.
me again
Last NUS demo I go on
22.11.2012 01:24
Jon
Anarchists, Toys, Pram... & the student occupation at SOAS
22.11.2012 13:01
If they'd succeeded, that would have taken a big student protest off the main roads, back into a university campus, risking potentially dozens of pointless arrests, preventing the feeder march from joining the main demo, and making sure this march's messages went out to a small group of student radicals in the SOAS occupation, completely ignoring the general public in the surrounding area.
So, were the geniuses who tried to the SOAS occupation the same people who stormed the stage in Kennington? Now tell us who's the best guys to use to kill a protest movement?
@Jon - if that's the last NUS protest you go on - SFW. Sure the NUS were wrong to take the march to Kennington, but they way to respond to that was not NOT to give the Daily Mail EXACTLY what they wanted -
Psy
Who gives a fuck
22.11.2012 17:09
Jon
Flawed Logical Reasoning
22.11.2012 22:34
Or that some misinformed idiot just pulled the 10,000 number out of a hat, and now you are using that as a measure of success/failure. What if they said that they expect a turnout of 1,000? Would that then the protest a massive success using your logic?
>> If your intention of the march was to get a good write up in the Daily Mail then I despair of your politics.
Yeah, but fortunately we aren't living in a dictatorship with you at the helm telling all us plebs what we should be doing with ourselves.
relativity
What?
23.11.2012 00:26
As to your other comment, I don't really get what you're point is? You calling me a wannabe dictator because I don't want to kiss arse the Daily Mail? This debate is quickly descending into a typical Indymedia comment section farce, next I'll be called an agent-provocateur/cop/edl/anarchist/troll/hard left. I'm calling it a day.
Jon
@Jon
23.11.2012 13:05
Try to keep up
The way to undermine the right-wing media is to conduct campaigns in ways which at least stand some chance of crossing-over and engaging the 99.5% of people in this country who have no involvement in radical politics, otherwise you just end up languishing in the eternal self-righteousness of your comfort zone - the radical ghetto... congratulations, obviously you're right about everything, but unfortunately the government are winning because hardly anyone's listening to you
There is no "magic wand" formula for engaging the general public, we need to experiment with different approaches, but people like you havn't even got as far as recognising the need yet
despair of your politics
reaching the people
23.11.2012 21:09
And that is where you are failing to reach the 99.5% of people you speak of.
They do not think you are right. They have a different viewpoint to yours.
Everyone 'thinks' they are right. So stomping around say you are right and that 99.5% of people are wrong aint really going to win you any favours.
i just trumped
Just to clarify
25.11.2012 00:55
Clare
@ burn
30.11.2012 14:03
and in the very unlikely event that you did ever find the courage to try and practice what you preach (rather than just posting online and trying to incite OTHER PEOPLE to take your risks for you), the only thing you'd be likely to achieve is probably first killing the wrong person by mistake, and second probably a very long prison sentence
fantasists like you pretty much sum up Indymedia - one step forward, THREE STEPS BACK
EVERY FUCKING TIME
Bernard