Man-handling climate change protestors

[Leafyhouse]

Anyone else watch with horror as a climate change protestor was forcefully removed by Mark Field from the Mansion House speech? I mean, I'm no fan of political activism, 'direct action' and so on, but she wasn't presenting him with any direct threat, just shouting and being annoying. AIBU to think that his behaviour was totally unacceptable there?

@curiositycreature But that's half the problem. You, I, any of us, could look at that and say "This didn't look like a knee jerk reaction". Possibly fairly. But that's different from actually BEING there and being in that situation. What "outsiders" see can be very different from what "insiders" experience.

“She could’ve been armed”

Oh do me a favour. What are the fucking chances? Care to show me your workings?

Reasonable force? grabbing someone by the neck is not reasonable.

You can break someone's neck, give them whiplash, cause them to pass out.

There's a reason the police don't employ that as a regular tactic.

Wow I seem to have logged on to the Daily Mails comments page by accident.

We hold our MP's to a higher standard of conduct than the general public and this was disproportionate force by anybody's standards. He would not have tried this with a 6ft 2 bloke, he looked angry ( and was possibly a bit pissed) luckily it was caught on camera so he won't get away with it.

I have seen worse when old men were being forcibly removed by security for heckling during labour party conferences.

So, what would be considered reasonable force if you want to remove someone who does not want to be removed?

I’m inclined to agree @shantnerswig, none of us actually know the context so it’s impossible to say whether it was “justified” or not.

I think I’m generally shocked that more people can watch the video and not be horrified. Simply because it’s a video of man showing physical aggression to a woman. I hate videos of any sort of violence like this (whatever the gender of both parties) but this particular man-on-woman is hard to stomach. Especially with that anger in his face.

pan we aren't discussing those events though. We're discussing this one, so it's irrelevant.

Politically I can't stand the Tories and have every sympathy with the protesters, but he absolutely did the right thing. She was a rowdy trespasser and he used reasonable force to remove her.

You can break someone's neck, give them whiplash, cause them to pass out.

It's amazing her head did not come clean off

We hold our MP's to a higher standard of conduct than the general public

If that were true, half the current crop should have been made to resign, be sacked, whatever. Most of the Tory leadership candidates admitted to breaking drug laws! Boris Johnson is a known liar and adulterer, says undoubtedly racist things, and he's about to become PM! Held to a higher standard of conduct? Do me a favour.

I think his demeanour and expression made it clear he was itching to have a go at her.

I am in two minds about this. She was approaching the top table. I completely understand someone should have taken action to stop her.
He clearly overreacted and used potentially ‘unreasonable force’ - court/cps when deciding whether to charge will take lots of things into account including ‘niceties of force used can’t alwYs be judged in the heat of the moment’ and ‘force used after the threat contained/understood’
It’s awful to watch. I understand his initial reaction but not the level of force used.
Think clapping was probably partly a release of adrenaline by those who did. Can understand that and then thinking it through being critical of what happened.
What a mess. Fully agree with the protest btw. Good on them.

He looks far too controlled for me for it to have been an intuitive, spur of the moment action.

Mark’s a very old friend of mine, and I would say that this behaviour is out of character. I am absolutely not excusing him - what he did was disgraceful.

They were at a meeting / dinner. Quite civilised, and then a member of the public appears. She's somehow bypassed security. She is shouting and behaving aggressively. You know that some of your colleagues / other MPs have been victims of assaults and in the case of Jo Cox, brutally killed. You're stunned, not sure how to react. You've got a table full of colleagues who also feel the same way. Your flight or fight kicks in. For me as I'm a scaredy cat, that would likely have me hiding under the table. For Mark field it was to physically remove the threat

It's easy to sit afterwards and say he should have done X, y or z. We weren't there and we weren't in the moment. In that situation you're not thinking 'shes a woman" 'id best be as gentle as possible and hope she leaves,' or 'ill sit and listen to her shouting and things will calm down.' you're probably thinking 'where the fuck are security?' , remembering recent attacks and acting from a place of instinct and fear

All this calling her a 'poor protester' and sympathising isn't really getting to the point. She stormed in someone , a private function and started behaving aggressively over climate change. If the security had done their job she would have been removed physically by them instead. What exactly did she think was going to happen? Also on a purely logistical level, you are not going to have a calm reasoned discussion and get your points listened to in that situation. It isn't the time or place and quite frankly the MPs will not have listen. Am quite sure none actually listened to her ranting! It's best to have these discussions in a calm, muture way. Not storm in somewhere, insist people listen to you and then kick off when you receive a consequence. Like a toddler

I’m also amazed that security let her get that far.

he had better get lawyered up. if she was to press charges for assault, any bruising etc he would be asked what was his training in restraint, what did he consider reasonable force etc. The YT footage could well be used against him. he is a civil servant not a member of the security team who will have been present and would have handled it differently. She was a noisy protester. I wonder if it had been a 16 stone man if our assailant would have been so keen to handle him.

Good for him, how the hell did they expect to be treated?

You can break someone's neck, give them whiplash, cause them to pass out.

It's amazing her head did not come clean off

bobbin maybe they expected to be treated like we live in a democracy?

pan really? Is it amusing to you? the abuse of women?

The media are reporting there was no security. I think Mark was justified in taking the action he did to protect the men and women present against the intruder. It is the equivalent to a stranger bursting unexpectedly into your home. Would you think your dh unreasonable to eject them by forceable means to protect the family? I certainly wouldn't!

pan really? Is it amusing to you? the abuse of women?

I can't answer for Pan, but really you are making a mockery of the definition of abuse of women!

YABVU - no direct threat? She was invading a private space in an aggressive way and moving quickly towards what may have been her main target to attack. He had no idea if she was armed or not but certainly not unreasonable to think that she may well have been. He initially shoved her back against the pillar whilst he was still seated, then he forcibly escorted her from the room. Good on him. If I had been in the room and she had been approaching me in that manner then I would have been very glad he had intervened. Had he sat there and done nothing then something terrible had happened then people would have been saying what a load of wimps, all those people who sat there and did nothing.

Oh god, do we have to turn this into an “abuse of women” issue? I’ve no doubt he would have done exactly the same thing I’d the protestor had been male. Aren’t we all supposed to be treated equally?

I can totally understand his reaction. When you’re actually in a room that’s being invaded by protestors - even one protestor - it can be really alarming. You don’t sit there and think “oh well, everyone has a right to peaceful protest”. He took action, admittedly a bit heavy-handed, but if she was headed towards the speaker someone had to do something.

And yes, he was angry. So what? I’d have been angry too.