What’s it all about, Alfie?
There are so many contradictions in the Alfie Meadows story; it is hard to know where to begin.
Alfie was ‘a gentle Philosophy student’ who told his Mother before the demonstration began that ‘somebody was going to get killed’. Why would a gentle philosophy student be attracted to an event where they thought somebody was gong to be killed? Does the study of philosophy teach them nothing about Ghandi?
Having found yourself, unwittingly, having ignored all the advertising that it would be ‘a riot’, in the centre of a very violent protest, why would you push yourself to the front of the police lines? Surely the philosophical reaction would be to stay away from the action and obey the law? Even in a ‘kettled’ situation, you don’t have to be at the front line – it is quite possible to stay in the centre of the crowd. Is this not the same syndrome that found wheel-chair bound Jody Mcintyre unaccountably at the centre of the action, right at the police lines?
Then we are told – by Alfie’s Mother, (who was also at the event and managed to leave the ‘kettle’ without being hit over the head) that Alfie was close enough to the action to be ‘hit on the head by a police truncheon’. She is quite sure of that; the violence which resulted in Alfie’s brain injury could only have been caused by the Police.
To whom do we attribute the injuries to the other Policemen? Were ‘out of control police’ going around injuring each other? We know that other policemen were injured from that impeccable source, Alfie’s Mother, for she initially claimed that Alfie was refused treatment at the Westminster Hospital because ‘that was where the injured police officers were being treated’. Is it just possible that one or two in this crowd of gentle philosophy students could have been a tad violent themselves?
I am constantly amazed at the way in which the police manage to select as ‘victims for their uncontrolled violence’ entirely innocent passers by who just happen to live in the same block as wanted terrorists; children who may look like 6’ 6” thugs with a scowl on their face, but who inevitably prove to be 17 year olds making their way to university, with school friends to vouch for the fact that they ‘wouldn’t hurt a fly’, Mother’s who attest to their passive nature, insulin dependency, weak hearts and all manner of things that you would imagine might make a university educated student bolt in the opposite direction from the thugs that have caused the police to be massed in the first place.
Cannot the Police, just once, manage to shoot; ‘smash over the head’; violently disarm; or otherwise infringe the human rights of a genuine, dyed in the wool, sociopath, who doesn’t have a 250,000 strong Facebook group prepared to swear blind that he may go round shooting policemen, he may beat up his girlfriend every Friday night, but in truth he is a gentle giant who was only trying to smother them with kisses.
Had Moat survived being ‘tazered’ by those out of control police, (and not have pointed his own gun at himself) do you think he should not have been charged with shooting P. C Rathbone, on the grounds that he had suffered enough from the police injuries?
That does seem to be the general consensus of opinion in the blogosphere this morning, that regardless of what Alfie may or may not have done whilst in that crowd, irrespective of whether he was injured by a police truncheon or a lump of flying concrete, his subsequent illness makes it ‘obscene’ that the CPS should consider they have enough evidence against him to charge him with ‘violent disorder’.
Why too, do we hear nothing from Alfie? According to his Mother, soon after his hospitalisation he was “Smiling, he’s chatting and he’s just Alfie. He’s all there.” Could it be that powerful forces would prefer not to hear any more from Alfie? That it is in their interests to allow the second hand story that he was brutalised by out of control policemen to run and run? Is there no national newspaper that wants to run an ‘Alfie Meadow’s’ exclusive?
Curious.
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April 28, 2011 at 13:21 -
“…He’s just Alfie. He’s all there!”
Pretty sure that wasn’t true BEFORE the riot, never mind after…
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April 28, 2011 at 13:30 -
Could it be something to do with the 81 Act?
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April 28, 2011 at 15:12 -
Given the news emanating from Syria and Bahrain, some of the ‘nice, gentle’ Alfie Meadows’ of this country might like to reflect on how a genuinely brutal regime might have reacted to their ‘peaceful demonstrations’, and count their blessings…
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April 28, 2011 at 16:12 -
“I am constantly amazed at the way in which the police manage to select as ‘victims for their uncontrolled violence’ entirely innocent passers by who just happen to live in the same block as wanted terrorists..”
I think you’ll find that approximates to the feelings of Jean Charles de Menezes’ family..
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April 28, 2011 at 16:57 -
I’m afraid I can’t agree with you on this one ana, purely down to the fact that it’s The Met we’re talking about. They scare as much as any organisation on the planet, i’m with Heresy Corner on this one http://heresycorner.blogspot.com/2011/04/charging-alfie-meadows.html
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April 28, 2011 at 18:12 -
The Met, for all it’s faults (and they are many) is not the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, is not the Bahraini security services, is not the Russian successor to the KGB, is not even the French CRS.
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April 28, 2011 at 19:49 -
Well, indeed, no-one would be up in arms if the Met riot squad were denied a drink at lunchtime!
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April 29, 2011 at 10:05 -
“The Met, for all it’s faults (and they are many) is not the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, is not the Bahraini security services, is not the Russian successor to the KGB, is not even the French CRS.”
So we can rest easy then until the Met actually start shooting significant numbers of people dead in the street ? That Ian Tomlinson, well, he was just asking for it with his bloody hands in his pockets.
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April 29, 2011 at 13:01 -
In a way yes. Because the case of Ian Tomlinson and Alfie Meadows are more due to rogue officers than a case of every single policeman doing these actions which they do/did in the forces mentioned. In the case of the MET as an organisation they are only guilty of hiding behind PR and covering their arse rather than properly investigating. Only if it could be proved that an order was issued to all police to attack and maim all protestors are the MET to be blamed. And I’m no supporter of the MET or the police in general.
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May 1, 2011 at 17:41 -
Sorry, but that is a ridiculous suggestion. The Met CAN be blamed if they refuse to dismiss the Constable involved and allow criminal proceedings to ensue. If they do not, then we can only assume that the actions of the so-called “rogue” are seen as acceptable.
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April 28, 2011 at 17:45 -
Yes was the same in Belfast those hit with plastic bullets where always popping out for a pint of milk ! In the middle of a riot with gunfire petrol bombs and burning cars/buses – Me call me a coward – always got my milk delivered hang the expense I wasnt risking it
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April 28, 2011 at 18:44 -
It seems kinda churlish charging the lad though. I love these Police, Camera Action shows and accidents do happen but the lad does seem to have learnt his lesson and there’s no need to get snotty about it. My main question in all of this would be ‘why the fuckety fuck did his mum take him to a riot the stupid bitch?’ I’d charge her out of principle for being a dozy shit for brains; if she took fucking sandwiches she needs her head pummeling. Some people, phhhhw.
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April 28, 2011 at 19:53 -
I have not a shred of sympathy with this cause, but I believe in the right to protest.
Wherever angry crowds gather, there is likely to be trouble. If individuals, (including protestors and police) breaking the law can be identified and arrested, that’s good. The state should never have the right to use violence otherwise.
Inevitably, the innocent will suffer. But not at the hands of the police, who are paid and trained to act professionally. It’s not an easy job, but they chose it.
Criminal damage and violence are wrong. We should prosecute as many culprits as possible. Kettling, unlawful detention of large groups of “suspects”, is wrong too.
Protests are a bloody nuisance, but preventing protest is worse.
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April 28, 2011 at 20:14 -
Its the same principle that says any teenager who meets an early end, be it in a car crash, or perhaps some more illegal pursuit, will always be a lovely warm human being, who loved his or her Mum, was kind to animals, was loved by one and all, wouldn’t hurt a fly, was in fact Ghandi and Mother Teresa personified.
No violent little psychopath-in-training ever meets his maker before at least the age of 25.
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April 28, 2011 at 23:20 -
Well, young Alfie has proved to be a rather “useful idiot” has he not?
Noting his family’s occupations, father-writer and artist, middle-class vocabulary for unemployed, mother-lecturer at Roehampton “university”, oh my, take a look at the non-job subjects available-so basically an over compensated, adult babysitter, and young Alfie-philosopher-in-training, polite way of saying future unemployed. A microcosm of yUK society, but you can see why they would be exercised by future tuition cuts and tuition fee increases for useless degrees.
Alfie attends a riot, but thats OK because he attended London University to “get training” for how to riot (apparently the University of London has too much public money) and ends up with a nasty bump to his head, nobody would wish that, but as Engineer has acutely observed it’s not like the outcomes of protesting in Syria (and by the way why has camoron not bombed Syria yet?) How did it happen? A complete mystery, but the police have seen fit to charge Alfie with violent disorder, so presumably they have have some video proof of that. Time for the marxists to complain bitterly about police brutality, because Alfie is “one of us” (a Guardian-reading student), to hell with the other fifteen-or-so charged, they don’t belong to the NUS and their parents are not teachers, not our-kind-of-people-at-all.
I smell a rat. Or is it just the lingering smell of Andrew Marr and Gordon Brown?
I have no special regard for police these days, they have strayed far from their original mandate laid down by Peel, but in this case I am willing to withhold any judgment until young Alfie appears in court and the details are laid before the public. And on the whole, I believe the restraint they exhibited during the protest was exemplary.
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April 29, 2011 at 00:36 -
Cascadian, you ask why iDave hasn’t bombed Syria yet – the answer is simple NO OIL .
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April 29, 2011 at 04:05 -
Possibly, I think it is more likely that he cannot hide under the USA’s petticoats. Even the USA is wary of Iran.
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April 29, 2011 at 13:14 -
The one thing that made me think something was odd at the time, was the absence of footage from the protesters showing Alfie being hit with a truncheon. They do seem to film the police all the time to demonstrate the relenting brutality of the boys in blue (or should that be dayglo yellow?). Perhaps when the case is heard the footage will appear, but I am not holding my breath.
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