No more Protest

I'm another one who thinks "climate change" is nowhere near the massive catastrophe it's made out to be

Weird, the vast majority of scientific opinion is that mankind is destroying the climate, yet you know better.

It is not just them though, isn’t it? National rail, NHS, teachers: they are all pressuring their employer by targeting « ordinary people trying to go to work or hospital appointments »

One time in France, toll road employees were on strike and they were letting everybody use the road for free, now that is a good way to pressure your employer!

the globe has had weird weather patterns for millennia and will continue to do so with or without the human race.

How can you know so little about a subject and be so confident in your opinion on it? It's bizarre.

Plus the prisons are overcrowded. I'd have sentenced them to community service at a wind farm, woofing and curfews etc instead.

Am i the only one wondering why you are having conversations with a cat?

There is help out there.....

The best way to just stop oil is go off grid or buy electric cars etc.
The oil industry has a lot to answer for. Everyone seems to be happy with their kids breathe in pollutants, roads being built through beauty spots and higher temperatures globally so as a soecies we are fucked. We also deserve our date as everyone would rather drive round in SUVs than take public transport etc.

And a lemming follows blindly off the cliff.

Me too. But like OP, I’m disturbed by the vindictive sentences. JSO was just a nuisance. Far more serious offenders get off with less. Protests can be annoying, but essential in a democracy.

Peaceful protest is fine. What isn't fine is disrupting the tax paying public working for a living, endangering life, while our useless police force pander to them, bringing cups of tea etc.
My favourite one was when a bunch of these morons climbed atop a tube train and the fed up to the eyeballs commuters starting pulling them all off. And even better when some protesters in Germany glued themselves to the floor in a car factory. The workforce simply switched off the lights, locked up, and went home for the night 🤣🤣
I'm another one who thinks "climate change" is nowhere near the massive catastrophe it's made out to be. I'm not saying mankind shouldn't change its ways but the globe has had weird weather patterns for millennia and will continue to do so with or without the human race.
Pass me my arse!!

Fortunately we don't need to theorise on this as Stephen Yaxley-Lennon organised a protest just last month.

Given that roads were blocked, balaclava clad men marched the streets, thousands of police had to be deployed to monitor the protest, smoke bombs were set off, drunk and disorderly behaviour was observed, an emergency worker was assaulted and women racially abused, we can expect to see Stephen going down for a significant spell very soon.....

My neighbour’s cat thinks the same.

Fuck the tories and the right wing press. That is all.

Of course they have, thats the view of my Barrister cousin too.

A 5 year sentence is very extreme, pro democracy protestor's in Hongkong have got less.

Protest, by its very nature will be disruptive, now the authorities can charge people under terrorism offences (for peaceful protest) and the courts have the precedent to impose long jail sentences & this will act as a v strong deterrent for anyone thinking of protesting for whatever reason.

A fool and his money are soon parted.

I think this is true who in their right mind would protest now about anything the consequences are too high a risk to be caught up in something. I’m not convinced it’s the best way to change stuff but quite scary to think this is a risky option in a democracy. Also, I find it muddled thinking as I thought the UK was a beacon of democracy and we are advocates of this across the world!

Well if they blocked an ambulance with my relative in it i most certainly would be going to prison for assault so why shouldn't they go to jail?

These sentences do not mean people cannot protest. It does not mean people cannot campaign. We remain free citizens in a free democratic country

Really?

You think anyone is going to protest about anything at all, when they risk a jail term and all that brings? loss of job, financial ruin, family breakup.

A woman climbed onto a train wagon going to a power station, she is expected to get a 2 year jail sentence.

What these sentences do is make sure that the only "campaigning" you can do is write to your MP, though course they could always make that a terrorism offence... the new Labour Govt isn't going to reverse some of the anti protest laws the tories bought in.

@Goldenbear Liberty has a good explainer on how to organise a lawful protest www.libertyhumanrights.org.uk/advice_information/how-to-organise-a-protest/#:~:text=Protest%20marches,least%20six%20days%20in%20advance.

Absolutely 👏👏👏

You just undermine yourself when you make up rubbish like this.

It is very clear that this judgement has not ‘stopped a protest for any reason’ nor has it set a precedent for this.
If you need to lie to make your case, you don’t have a case.

...because the Govt changed the law to make it a "terrorism" offence, anyone like to explain how blocking the M25 is the same as placing a bomb in a public place?

The judge is a complete establishment fool and i very much hope these sentences are overturned.

How anyone can think Prison is the right place to put peaceful protestors is beyond me, these sentences belong in Russia or China, not a mature democracy like the UK.

IF what they did was considered a protest too far, then financial penalties should have been imposed.

But i guess the attitude you and others have towards these protestors is why our Governments gets away with so much.... Macron in France tries to increase pension age to 64, the people riot!!!

UK puts pension age up to 68 (and suggests 71) and the people/you go "oh how reasonable, we are all living soooo much longer"

Do you think organisers of the farmer protests that blocked motorways and streets back in February should be carted off to jail too.

It's also worth remembering that there was a group of activists

It's worth remembering that in 1903 a group of activists in the UK thought they were justified in breaking the law and ignoring democraric process.

25 years later they won women in the right to vote in the UK.

Or “I know someone who was arrested because there was suspicion that they were going to commit a crime”

Hardly outrageous

I was really glad to see the jail sentences. I hope it deters people from future action.

These sentences do not mean people cannot protest. It does not mean people cannot campaign. We remain free citizens in a free democratic country.

It just means people cannot cause serious, large scale disruption which has serious economic and human costs. People missed funerals of loved ones, medical appointments, could not follow loved ones to hospital. It was terrible.

I have now heard, for three different causes, protestors saying their cause is so vitally important that whatever they do is justified. Even targeting individuals.

Its not. And the welfare and wellbeing of individuals and businesses are not collateral damage for your cause.

It’s extreme hubris, and not true, that if you don’t do this particular action, the planet will die. I don’t tolerate this type of hyperbolic emotional manipulation in any part of my life and I don’t accept it from JSO either.

And OP, as for asking people to put aside their prejudice, if this had been Tommy Robinson and the EDL doing this for their cause, would you have posted about how awful the sentences were and posting on MN how we have to put aside our prejudice to oppose these sentences? Thought not.

It’s your bias that is causing you to oppose the justice of these sentences, not my bias that is causing me to support them.