Policing by Consent
Attend a sufficient number of protests or demos and before too long
the opportunity arises to quiz the attending police regarding their
"justification" for doing the job they do.
This becomes a very pertinent issue when the event is, for example,
protesting the government-approved sale of arms by UK weapons manufacturers
to regimes with an atrocious human rights record.
So what you have is the police (the alleged upholders of law and order)
providing protection for these dealers in death, which protection
can easily result in the intimidation and brutalising of those who
have the courage to "stand up and be counted" in their objection to
this obscene trade.
Such an anomaly is particularly bizarre in the context of the present
government's claimed abhorrence of gun crimes.
The sale of arms issue is of course only one example. There are many others. Yet no matter what the event, or how just the cause, the police response always seems to be the same - such that its quite obvious this is what they've been taught as part of their training. Were I less charitable I'd say "indoctrinated" or "brainwashed"; but hey, let's not get too carried away here.
If you accuse them of being lackeys of the government, they'll claim they serve the Crown, not a political master.
Such an answer suggests either they have absolutely no understanding of how the system actually works "on the ground" in this country, or that they assume you're too thick to see the flaws. But I'll save this as a topic for a future tirade.
And if you question their authority in defending the morally indefensible, they'll resort to the "policing by consent" argument.
(This of course is completely ignoring the moronic "I'm only doing my job" answer, trotted out by those few cops who lacked sufficient intellect for their original brainwashing to "take". Had they the wit to realise it, they'd appreciate that such an answer is too uncomfortably reminiscent of the "justification" trotted out by the Nazis that was unconditionally rejected by the international community at the Nuremberg War Crimes trials.)
So, "policing by consent". Now it seems to me that you can either have
"policing by the authority of the Crown" (i.e., that which they claim
to serve) or you can have "policing by consent". Surely they're
mutually exclusive? Aren't they?
But maybe they're not. Ok. So whose consent is it that they're talking
about, specifically? What exactly does the phrase mean? And how, precisely,
has that consent been elicited?
Certainly not by any "democractic" means - not even the sort of "democracy" that put Tony Blair into office for yet another term (whereby he was enabled to govern the country by a minority mandate!).
If you cut to the chase - do away with all the lengthy rambling explanations - what it actually means is that the police are able to do their job by virtue of the co-operation they get from "the public", i.e., us lot.
That might be all well and good if you're considering the case of tracking
down a rabid paedophile. I'm sure the co-operation extended to the
police by any right-thinking person would be complete and unconditional
in such circumstances.
And I don't doubt that the majority of the public in this country
are quite happy to extend such co-operation in the context of what
are conventionally regarded as "criminal activities". (Although even
here I must be a little bit hesitant, for if that co-operation were
as willing and unconditional as the police pretend it to be by their
"policing by consent" argument, then surely there wouldn't be quite
so many crimes that go either unsolved or unpunished?)
However, it is flawed logic to argue that such "context-sensitive" co-operation translates into blanket consent for every form of policing activity. Logically flawed, and not a little disingenuous.
Yeah, I would happily co-operate with the police in helping to bring
to justice a murderer or rapist but that doesn't mean I'm writing
them a blank cheque drawn on the Bank of Co-operation.
And I suspect something similar applies to a lot of other activists.
The waters become very murky indeed when we start thinking about the
whole raft of legislation that's been introduced by successive governments
that deals not with obviously criminal activities, but with activities
that are clearly driven by a concern over political issues.
And once such legislation's been introduced its the job of the police
to enforce it (so much for their "serving the Crown" bullshit, when
we all know only too well how it works in the real world).
So what we've ended up with is two forms of policing. There's your
traditional "bobby on the beat" type stuff, regarding which I'm sure
most people are quite happy to endorse.
But then there's the "political policing", a la Gestapo; the
only people likely to co-operate with this are those whose own political
agendas are being served thereby.
So is this what "policing by consent" means? Policing by the consent
of those whose political agenda happens to be flavour of the month?
This whole issue has been brought home to me very forcefully during some of the protests I've participated in over the past few months.
You've gotta bear in mind that your "average protester" (if in fact
such an animal exists) is not a criminal, or even normally
inclined to "criminal activity". (Indeed, I find myself having more
confidence and trust in the "essential honesty" exhibited within a
typical activist community than that demonstrated by society at large!)
But when all legitimate means of protest fail, what are you left with?
And when those legitimate means of protest are daily becoming increasingly
circumscribed (such that I wouldn't be at all surprised if it soon
becomes illegal to even take Tony Blair's name in vain!), then inevitably
your normal peaceful law-abiding citizen with a social conscience
is overnight turned into a law-breaker.
And this against a background of our "leaders" and legislators riding roughshod over all notions of the rule of law, human rights and the democratic process in their conduct of international affairs.
Bloody hell. "1984" or what?
Yet if the police persist in rejecting the notion that much of their
workload is nothing other than that of a political enforcer, where
is their much-vaunted "policing by consent"?
The only argument left in their sorry repertoire has to be the non-intervention
on the part of the general public when the boys in blue are policing
a protest.
Do they really believe that simply because the public at large
may not actively obstruct them when they're using their bully-boy
tactics then that translates into consent?
Wake up, laddies! Wake up before its too late. Too late to realise
that "consent" implies some sort of positive action; it doesn't mean
you can assume consent simply because a person doesn't vociferously
object.
In reality the "policing by consent" that is so glibly trotted out translates into nothing other than calculatedly stopping just short of provoking bloody revolt such as we witnessed during the Poll Tax riots.
Our once-respected bobbies have got it down to a fine art - for the time being. But how long before a critical mass of us lot decide to put the "United" back into United Kingdom?
Footnote: this outburt has been prompted by the protest I attended
yesterday in Parliament Square, called by the Sack
Parliament campaign.
Perversely Parliament Square, right outside the doors of government,
has now been designated by the government acting through the courts
as a no-go area for protests.
What better, or more appropriate, place is there to stage a protest
than at the very seat of government, the so-called "Mother of Parliaments"
and "home of democracy"? Yet our minority-mandated government has
made law-breakers of those that disagree with them and choose to express
that disagreement by assembling in protest outside Parliament!
So take a look at the pics, snapped at that same protest (just click
on the thumbnails to see full-size images). Note the baton (with which
many officers were equipped), presumably ready to be used against
weaponless and non-violent protesters. Did you consent to that?
Note the perfectly respectable lass being man-handled, with what looks
suspiciously like a smirk from one of the onlooking officers (if we
could only see him full face). Did you consent to that?
Note the young defenceless protester forced to the ground by a half-dozen
or so burly cops (and it looks like the cop in the foreground is already
drawing his baton). Did you consent to that?
Note the snarl on the police photographer's face, elicited in response
to some poor protester seeking to break out of the massive police
cordon blocking them in. Did you consent to that?
And note the sophisticated and expensive camera gear the police employ
to snoop upon and intimidate the conscience-driven protesters. Did
you consent to that?
