Omg the scenes from the London protests

[SistemaAddict]

I'm just watching the news and am finding it so frightening to see the crowds, the police, the tension, the horse bolting.
I understand the desire to protest but how is this the right way to do things? I know there will be thousands of peaceful protesters among the ones causing trouble.
I'm concerned about the covid risk to everyone there especially as BAME are more at risk of the virus.

I hate confrontation and get very anxious so wanted to chat to others about this. Yes, I could switch off but I think it's important to watch and learn and understand what and why is happening.

@SoberCurious I'll tell you why I'm disproportionately outraged about the horse -

The police officers and the protests and the rioters and every single human being involved in today's protest made a conscious decision to be there today. Many police perhaps didn't want to be, but they knew what they were signing up to when they joined the metropolitan police.

Those horses are there because they were bred or acquired to do that job. They are a flight animal, police horses endure a career which goes against their every natural instinct to take flight from fear - they don't get a choice to be there.

But what sort of fucking scumbag throws large objects at a horse? The entire point of any of these protests has been completely undermined by the minority who are behaving like fucking lunatics and it's absolutely disgusting.

This is one of the most appalling threads I've seen in MN. I cannot believe that someone has actually said that they basically give zero shits about whether this protest increases the risk of serious harm to people. Vile. Just vile.

You can't get MN to step in if you don't like what you're being told. You agree or disagree as I do.
I don’t want mumsnet HQ to step in because I disagree (I disagree with a LOT on mumsnet); I want them to step in because the covert racism is appalling.

@Betty98
“how inconvenient it is for black people to be angry during a pandemic”

It’s not inconvenient at all, it’s not like they interrupted a shopping trip, or made the trains busier it’s downright dangerous for all of us.

@randomchatter Racists treat people who are BAME as a single entity.

@Betty98 repeating this over and over doesnt make it true, do you realise that?

Apart from being startled the horse looked ok cantering off - probably more than can be said for its poor rider

@Betty98 that's not what I said at all. I was saying the crowds were making me anxious due to feelings about confrontation and I was concerned about the risk of infection. I didn't want this to be a thread about racism. The reason for the protest could be about anything and I'd feel the same about the crowds and confrontation and police presence.

repeating this over and over doesnt make it true, do you realise that? what isn’t true?

I actually feel really opposed to them using animals, as one clip showed the horses get traumatised. Often they get put down.

@Thesispieces

the lack of empathy and sheer racism / double standards and single vision on this thread is abhorrent. I advise BAME individuals to limit their exposure on MN. Or your mental health may suffer. Oh to have the Privilege to worry about the R number; when the sheer existence of your children is under threat for yet another generation.

The “privilege” to worry about the R number? Having a child with cancer which means you have to shield and not leave the house for months or more for a direct risk of them dying is not a fucking “privilege” whatever your skin colour. The particular family I know who this applies to are black, by the way, but it applies to fuckloads of families.

White privilege, which absolutely exists, and fearing for your life during a pandemic, which is not a privilege, are not the same thing.

I have just seen the most horrific videos of people attacking the police, throwing bikes at the police horses, Covid is the leafs of our worries for London right now. It's horrific.

@RoosterPie I agree. Absolutely appalling. A "PRIVILEGE" to watch NHS colleagues die on the front line? Fuck right off PP.

Do those of you shouting that this protest is justified give a toss about the police officer who has almost certainly been injured today?

Or is it "fuck him" because black people have been suffering racism for 400 years.

It's not those disagreeing with the protests who are looking bad here. It's those who don't care about anybody or anything else, so long as the protests happen.

A horse has been attacked, nevermind.
A police officer thrown from his horse, nevermind.
Thousands at risk of coronavirus because these people want to protest, nevermind.

Nothing else matters other than making noise about black lives matter.

Those protesters should all be forced into mandatory quarantine.

@ShutUpaYourFace

Black lives do matter BUT the UK as a nation can go screw itself? It's disgraceful that this allowed. Firstly the death was in America not the UK. Secondly are the officers involved not now arrested? What the Fuck do these protestors expect us to do now? We are is the middle of a serious pandemic and they do not care about the elderly or the vulnerable here in the UK at this CRITICAL point. George Floyd died saying I can't breathe, yes this is a terrible terrible atrocity at the hands of a racist White American Police officer. Now how many elderly and vulnerable people will now repeat these words as they lay dying in UK hospitals unable to breathe due to Covid? It's unlawful and an absolute disgrace.

This is exactly what the protests are about ‘Black lives do matter BUT...’ There is absolutely no excuse or reason that warrants a ‘BUT’. Black lives do matter.

Yes George Floyd died in America but his death isn’t the sole cause of the U.K. protests, more so the trigger. Racism, oppression and police brutality are just as alive in the U.K. as they are in America. A recent study into a U.K. police force found they were 3 times more like to use excessive force against black people, 3.5 times more likely to use a taser and 13 times more likely to execute random stop and search warrants without cause. THIRTEEN!!

Yes the officers relating to George Floyd have been charged but where is the justice for Breonna Taylor? Tamar Rice? Trayvon Martin?

Or if you just want to look at the U.K, what about Rashan Charles? Azelle Rodney? Derek Bennett? Mark Duggan?

People protested because they felt there was no other way to be heard, knowing full well that they were the ones most at risk from COVID. Can you imagine how that must feel? These aren’t acts of selfishness or nativity, they are acts of desperation and exasperation over a system that has systematically oppressed, silenced and killed POC for hundreds of years.

Protests happen out of necessity not convenience. I don’t know what you all expected them to do, wait until another black man gets murdered at a more convenient time and protest then?

I hope you all realise that even being able to have this debate to start with is white privilege in action.

I have just seen the most horrific videos of people attacking the police, throwing bikes at the police horses, Covid is the leafs of our worries for London right now. It's horrific.

A certain 'type' of PP on these threads like to conflate BLM protesters and rioters, we see you, we see what youre trying to do

@Magic Previous posters have made it abundantly clear that they dont, in their words why should anyone from BAME background care about others at this point in time? At least those views are out in the open I guess...

why is it OK to make decisions about the lives of other people though?

From talking to - and listening to - a colleague of mine this week, lectures about ‘making decisions about the lives of other people’ ring somewhat hollow given the impact on BAME lives as a result of decisions made in a country with systemic and ingrained racism.

Which has contributed to, among other things, a disproportionately high death toll from Covid-19.

Democracy has to be prioritised over everything else. Yes, including people's lives.

My father arrived in this country having been tortured in prison in his own country, as a political prisoner under a dictatorship. Some of you have no fucking idea.

Protesting is fine ,throwing bottles etc is not , what if someone is killed from a thrown bottle is that then ok ?
Also risky with no social distancing, protest can be done with social distancing still and wearing of masks to protect as much as possible
Even the family have asked for protests to be peaceful

[quote SimonJT]@randomchatter Racists treat people who are BAME as a single entity.[/quote]
This thread has gone DM nuts very quickly... Some aren't being their usual casual selves when it comes to their erem isms ...

wtaf

I can't understand the protesters.

What happened in the USA is atrocious. And if course rascism needs ending. No one would deny that.
But to protest in those numbers when that virus is killing people, I don't understand it.