Some STW demo pics.

Doug | 09.10.2007 06:36 | SOCPA | Social Struggles | London

A glimpse of a very successful day.

Part of the large gathering in Trafalagar Square.

FIT photographer in Traflagar Square.

The March enters Parliament Square.

Another FIT clocking the arrivals.

Penned in.

The last of the March enters the Square

The grass area liberated.

A second sit down.

The police seemed to underestimate the numbers involved. Their technique of ushering the March into a pen which was much too small finally broke down. To cap it all demonstrators starting removing the GLA barriers which allowed people onto the grass at Parliament Square.

Doug

Comments

Hide the following 8 comments

And what exactly was so very successfull about it?

09.10.2007 07:44

Another trot led trot controlled A to B waste of time march wow how successfull (did you sell loads of papers?)

@narchist

See below

09.10.2007 09:05

Since when an @narchist ever happy? I was one, now I am bystander.

Jo Bloggs

Hijacked...

09.10.2007 09:26

...by careerist politicians.

I really don't understand the name "Stop the War Coalition", or their tactics. They clearly aren't in the business of effectively stopping wars for a start.

Secondly, I can't stand the hypocrisy of StWC leaders and fellow traveller politicians who spent large chunks of their time travelling to talks and informing people, rightly, about the arrogance of our government's refusal to listen to the population, the undemocratic restrictions on the right to protest and stressing the poignant truth that people are dying RIGHT NOW - and then convert what is thousands of people ready to take action against this into a dull mass that trots around the same area of London on a regular basis then goes home again.

There's no disruption whatsoever - as an ex US president once said, people can march all they like as long as they pay their taxes. Why is it that people involved in StWC rightly stress to us the arrogance and undemocratic nature of the war machine, and then convert that into a course of action that is consistently based on trying to appeal to minister's better nature - not to mention standing on the platform before a peaceful march that had recently been declared illegal, and then having the gall to stand up in front of thousands of people and encourage them to simply obey the police?

It's incredibly disempowering.

O rly

No we...

09.10.2007 09:32

...broke down the fence in two places and held up the traffic for an hour, and that had fuck all to do with the trots who were 500 metres down the road.

Yawn...

what i thought was successful, if you like

09.10.2007 10:22

was that there were thousands of people on the streets of london in the middle of a working day, not marching via ealing or neighbouring countries.

and then it went sheepish

peoples republic of southwark

Better than moaning

09.10.2007 10:35

Of course the StWc were ridiculous all day. Anyway, i was there and although we didnt storm Parliament etc it was better than moaning on the Internet about trots and cops and mps. Did seem like it was many people's first experience of not marching from A to B and deciding to do something else, however token, other than what the stewards and cops wanted. In this respect, it was a good day out.

@-Commie

get a grip anarchoid

10.10.2007 20:03

It was very succesful, to be able to break the ban on the march, to be able to march on parliament through sheer weight of our numbers and unity proved to be a massive victory for our movement, they tried to silence the anti war movement and take away even more of our rights, but through our collective action we defeated them.

It was empowering to be part of the march, and im sure thousands of others felt the same.

Chris Strafford
mail e-mail: chris_strafford@hotmail.com

What Anti-War movement?

10.10.2007 20:57

People talk about the anti-war movement in this country? Where is it? I don't think it makes one ounce of difference to things.
Check out the struggle agaist Dal Molin U.S base in Vicenza, Italy for what a real anti-war movement looks like: