Did POLICE turn Bristol ‘Kill the Bill’ protest into a riot?
Attack: this image from the Bristol Post was captioned “Bridewell police station under siege” but the only violence I see is by a policeman attacking a woman with a truncheon and a stick. What do you see?
It takes only one comment like this to reverse the narrative completely – and here it is, in two tweets:
2/2 Every step of the way police escalated. Every step of way they knew that is what they were doing, but were just perhaps bit surprised at how many of the crowd were willing to go from a sit down protest to fighting back rather than allowing police to attack them with impunity
— Adam Johannes (@DrRoundglasses) March 21, 2021
Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees may find himself on the receiving end of some very sharp reactions after he supported the police without waiting for the other side of the story!
He said: “Smashing buildings in our city centre, vandalising vehicles, attacking our police will do nothing to lessen the likelihood of the Bill going through. On the contrary, the lawlessness on show will be used as evidence and promote the need for the Bill.
“This is a shameful day in an incredible year for Bristol.
“We have had numerous protests. Our police, city representatives and I have been able to point out with pride that we have faced these moments of conflict without the physical conflict that others have experienced. Those who decided to turn today’s protest into a physical confrontation and smash our city have robbed us of this.”
What will he have to say if it turns out to be true that the police are “those who decided to turn [the] protest into a physical confrontation and smash [the] city”?
Considering the way the police in London treated a peaceful vigil on Clapham Common; or the way a drunken policeman assaulted a woman on her way home from work and walked free from court after admitting it; or the fact that a policeman is accused of kidnapping and murdering another woman who was on her way home from work…
Considering all the allegations of racist behaviour notched up against the police – not just last year during the Black Lives Matter protests but going back through the decades…
Considering this…
For those of you condemning the apparent violence in #Bristol and muttering darkly about the #PolicingBill being pushed through, remember Orgreave and how that was reported.
— Buddy Hell 🥤 (@buddy_hell) March 21, 2021
Considering all of the above, it seems far more likely that the police were responsible for the violence in Bristol last night, rather than a few hundred people who were, at the time, sitting down.
If those people defended themselves, this is no reason to condemn them or their protest for descending into violence. Everybody has the right to defend themselves against unprovoked violent attack, no matter whether the attacker is in a uniform or not.
If Bristol’s police were ordered to turn this event into a riot so their political leaders could use it as justification for the draconian Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that will permit them to inflict brutal oppression on innocent people, then the plan appears to have backfired.
The peaceful protest was mostly over by the time they came out from the Bridewell. From a high point of around 3,000 people, their own figures say only around 500 were left when the violence began.
The others, having made their point, had gone home. No matter who started the violence, they have been smeared by the police claims.
And observers elsewhere have demonstrated that they are unimpressed by the protestations of the police and politicians – pointing out the future of protest under the Police Bill:
Let's be clear the mob you should fear isn't the one on the streets of Bristol but running the government. #Bristol
— John Smith (son of Harry Leslie Smith) (@Harryslaststand) March 21, 2021
The Tory bill means peaceful protesters face 10 years in jail.
PEACEFUL. PROTESTERS.
TEN. YEARS.
Yet centrists say people are wrong to get angry about it.
It just beggars belief.
We might never get another chance – yet here they are telling us to just be nice and get along.
— Evolve Politics (@evolvepolitics) March 21, 2021
Protest quietly and be ignored by government.
Protest noisily and spend up to 10 years in prison.
You can be ignored.
Or you can be ignored.
This is the choice Boris government wants to give you.
— Marcus Chown (@marcuschown) March 21, 2021
Bristol
▪️We cannot restrict civil liberties and remove the right to protest without fallouts
▪️The creeping authoritarianism of the state has repercussions
▪️Attempts to silence women grieving has consequences
Wherever there is people there is power
Government must listen
— Claudia Webbe MP (@ClaudiaWebbe) March 21, 2021
Let's be real, nothing would be happening in Bristol were it not for police attacking the vigil for Sarah Everard last weekend, or the government trying to push through a bill which restricts civil liberties.
You don't keep the peace by clamping down on peaceful protest.
— Ash Sarkar (@AyoCaesar) March 21, 2021
At the end of the day, there is a big question to be answered – and it’s one that would not even be considered if the police had not made themselves the puppets of Conservative governments many times in the past:
Or did you organise this in advance in order for the police bill to get through the house. https://t.co/jfpZ7MCv3t
— Carole Hawkins (@hawkins_carole) March 22, 2021
It is impossible to condemn the people for the Bristol ‘Kill the Bill’ riot when we know it is entirely possible that it was engineered by Priti Patel and the police.
Source: Bristol Kill the Bill protest ‘shameful’, says Marvin Rees – BBC News
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The criminal fascist tories will whatever it takes to force their Police Bill through Parliament and I strongly suspect the fascist tory boys ordered the police to instigate male violence against the handful of protesters!
Malestream media gleefully colludes with the fascist tories and promotes their endless lies and we have an ideal situation wherein stupid women and men will hysterically cry ‘wah we need demonstrations to cease because our security and safety is being put at risk!’
Reminds me of the tactics of the nazis when they deliberately burned the Reichstagg building in Germany and then claimed ‘well we need draconian laws because the Communists are threatening our security!’
And remember the miners’ strike in 1984 when fascist Thatcher ordered her male storm troopers – oops I mean the male police boy thugs to physically attack the peaceful miners and then malestream media twisted it around to ‘prove the miners started the violence not the boy police!’
Remember the Poll Tax demonstrations and some of them were violent but fortunately result was Thatcher’s Poll Tax was thrown out – win win for the country and lose lose for fascist tories!
Some demonstrations do become violent but that does not mean we all should meekly say ‘yes to the fascist tories we want you to criminalise all demonstrations/protests because your fascist tory MPs don’t like the noise outside their Houses of Parliament!’
Agreeing with the fascist tories ensures our one party little england fascist state will be fait accompli!
We are many, although at 71 it won’t be long before my body is fit only to stem ammunition on the barricades!
It was noticeable from the video of the police van being shaken up that the troublemakers all appeared to be gathered at the back of the march. That sounds pre-arranged to me. If rioters were in the crowd as individuals and joining at random, they’d be in every row of people. But somehow they all apparently turned out to be at the back. As if someone arranged for all of them to meet there…?
The antifa = under cover police,
The government have been using ‘agent provocateurs’ since at least the late 1700’s with so much success in repeatedly taking our liberties using this method, so why would they stop now???
They haven’t!
Did the people vandalizing statues get arrested?
NO! why because cops don’t arrest under cover cops!
Antifa = UNDERCOVER COPS!!!
I’m not sure you can equate a real movement against fascism with undercover police. Does anyone else have evidence for/against this?
yes they did, they horse charged people who were sitting down peacefully and then there was a w***er with a baton randomly hitting people and things escalated from there. i was watching the live feed for most of the event, and the major trouble makers were likely also police protagonists as well.
Yes, I’ve seen video evidence apparently showing people in plain clothes chatting with uniformed police before going into the crowd and stirring up violence.
I see 4 people in the background not doing anything to back her up!
And do you know everything about the circumstances in which the image was taken? They might not have had time to react. They might have had problems of their own. I don’t know. Do you?
It is extremely interesting that the msm has dropped this story like a hot potato, and haven’t reported police violence, but then, we know who owns and runs the msm. When we have police attacking peaceful protesters, we are well down the road to fascism.