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> Someone’s freedom to protest is not more important than someone else’s freedom to use that same space to get to work, live their life, etc. Protests have alwa
by Nursie 3y ago
> Someone’s freedom to protest is not more important than someone else’s freedom to use that same space to get to work, live their life, etc. Protests have always needed to be booked in advance and are essentially always approved (with police protection included for neo nazis etc).
UK too, if you want to do something large-scale you negotiate with the police about when is going to work, and try to give them estimates of numbers etc. And at the small-scale end, you've never been allowed to (for instance) block a public path or block entrance to a business you disagreed with.
In the small town I grew up in, in the UK, I remember the police intervening when a local animal rights activist blocked access to a cafe which had put ostrich or emu egg on the menu. She was fine to stand there with a sign and say her piece, but she was not allowed to either block the cafe entrance or the path outside.
I don't like these developments, but the argument I see a lot at the moment that protest has always been and must be about disruption, seems off.
Perhaps effective protest is about disruption, but we're not going to legalise (for example) shutting down of an airport by a handful of people if they claim to have a cause, because we may as well give up on having an airport at that point.
- wolverine876 3y ago> we're not going to legalise (for example) shutting down of an airport by a handful of people if they claim to have a cause, because we may as well give up on having an airport at that point. But the UK has had airports and such protests, without the oppressive laws. It's hardly even a time of much protest or dangerous protest - compare the 1960s or 1970s. People were hijacking planes. Political freedom is not a threat; it's not only compatible with a functioning economy, it's the source of all the highest-functioning economies in human history.
- Nursie 3y agoI agree very much that the new laws are awful. I'm just arguing against the people who are basically saying that protest is a) supposed to be disruptive and b) should not be prosecuted when it is. The worrying part of the new legislation in places like the UK is how it is being used to target people who are not shutting down critical infrastructure, who are not causing property damage etc etc.
- jemmyw 3y agoI don't know why you got down votes, this is largely factually correct. I don't know that these laws will deter protesters anyway, if you want to shut down an airport you're already taking risks.
- Nursie 3y agoYes, doing that sort of thing you're already breaking laws. And presumably at that point you're so committed to the cause that this is a secondary concern. Not that I agree with draconian new powers coming in to deal with those, but the scary parts of the new laws to me are the ones that allow police to do stuff like arrest the anti-monarchist protestors who were not planning on direct action. The ones that directly impact public speech.
- jruohonen 3y agoI am at the mercy of the Guardian here, but I think there are plenty of questionable things in the recent UK laws and in their practical use: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/12/coronation-protest-arrests-police https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/12/corona...