AIBU to be shocked at the violence towards women at the Reform conference?

Violence is wrong, whether directed at a peaceful protestor, Nigel Farage, or anyone else.

It's very simple, really.

And very easy to condemn people throwing milkshakes while also condemning people assaulting these protestors.

Wow. I think as we say on MN when people show you what they think and tell you what they are then you need to believe them.

I am sure Nigel will be in touch soon to ask you to contribute your persuasive arguments to the official policy documents.

The murderer of Jo Cox MP was a known far-right supporter. From Jo's entry in Wikipedia.

Thomas Mair, a 52-year-old Batley and Spen constituent and a white supremacist who was obsessed with Nazis and apartheid-era South Africa and had links to the US-based neo-Nazi group National Alliance, shouted "Britain first" as he attacked her

They are disgraceful

She was not violent and was protesting which is, as far as I know, is completely legal in this country and actually a right protected by our laws. She was violently assaulted which is a crime. She received no apology.

"She certainly found it" - ace example of victim blaming.

Heckler can't hijack a conference of any kind. 🙄People are entitled to heckle and protest. Learn to live with that fact.

How is it not clear?!

After reading posts from Nige supporters on this thread I can't see how they can be described as anything other than old school thicko thugs.

Laws exist, not only for "lefties" but also for you, my dears.

Snowflakes are they?

Ive been involved in politics for 41 years, I’ve been spat on, hit, shouted at, chased by dogs, pissed on - a tent at Greenham, …

certainly party conferences are a time of protest and heckling - it’s normal

Never have I violently assaulted or even responded with violence anyone opposing me - there is no excuse

facists do not tolerate decent or anyone questioning them - they respond with violence, they assault the police, burn cars and bins and, in this case , use unwarranted and disproportionate aggression.

I am in no way shocked or surprised

She was not being physically aggressive. She was shouting.

The law is quite clear on this subject. If a person has genuine belief that they are in danger they may use reasonable force to protect themselves.

The reasonable force can only be at the same level as the force being used against them. So in this case all they would have been allowed to do was shout back at her.

Under no circumstances was it acceptable for them to use the level of violence which is shown in the video clips.

Anyone who thinks this sort of behaviour is acceptable has got some serious issues which urgently need to be addressed. Be they left or right.

Reasonable people don't mock women being assaulted.

The condoning of these Women being viciously attacked, from some posters, is alarming, imo.

Infiltrated? Get a grip.

WTF is wrong with you?

Disrupting speech is not censorship, it's politics. Have you never been to any election campaign hustings? The power here was all on Reform's side. They had the microphones and the security. All the hecklers had were their voices.

Seriously alarming!

This

If the protestors actually gate-crashed, the security team weren't doing their job properly.

If that's how they treat women that stand up to them in public, then how badly do they treat women doing the same in private? As long as it's white British men being violent against women then that's ok for Farage and his supporters. If you think things are bad for women and girls now, it's going to get a whole lot worse if Farage ever gets to power.

What definition of fascist is holding up a banner? It was a quiet non-violent protest and she was beaten with a stick and had her hair pulled.

I voted that you are unreasonable purely because I’m past the point of being shocked by violence against females.

God honestly, some of the replies on this thread.

Yes, some people on the left have done bad things. That is wrong. This is also wrong.

The difference here though, I think, is that the entire party is based on rage. Not every member or supporter of it is violent or rageful, but a high proportion are very angry at stuff (we can debate their justification, but not here). That is different to the other parties. Reform is also very much on the authoritarian right, where due process traditionally takes second place to action, some of it violent.

It is no surprise that such a party attracts a higher than average proportion of thugs. Whataboutery doesn't cut it. This was wrong and should be condemned. But they won't, because it means confirming their own and confronting some hard truths about themselves.

You explain the violence then?

I think you're being unreasonable. Reform are the poster boys for violence against women and girls. All those domestic abusers running around not wanting the forriners to abuse women because they want to preserve those rights for themselves. I'm not shocked. Broadly speaking, they are of lower intelligence and less educated. This is how they go about dealing with people who oppose their hate. Just look at any local Facebook page. They are scum.

I wonder if some of them are men?