Precedents
Nov. 27th, 2010 11:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphiloI can think of two famous occasions in my lifetime when police cavalry were used against demonstrators. The first was at Orgreave in 1984 when Margaret Thatcher defeated the striking miners in a pitched battle. The second (Thatcher again) was during the Poll tax riots of 1989.
Earlier there was Peterloo. The cavalry that charged the demonstration in St. Peter's Fields in 1819 have been described as "younger members of the Tory party in arms". An unknown number of people were killed that day- sabred, shot, trampled by the horses. Among them was a two year old child.
The Tories have an affinity with cavalry charges. Maybe it's in the genes- all that ancestral fox hunting, all that riding down of peasants.
They don't see as us as citizens. They don't know us. We don't count. We don't feature in their world except as annoying noises off. We are the "enemy within" (Thatchers phrase) to be kettled and ridden down. In this latest episode of class warfare the "enemy within" are our students and school children.
Earlier there was Peterloo. The cavalry that charged the demonstration in St. Peter's Fields in 1819 have been described as "younger members of the Tory party in arms". An unknown number of people were killed that day- sabred, shot, trampled by the horses. Among them was a two year old child.
The Tories have an affinity with cavalry charges. Maybe it's in the genes- all that ancestral fox hunting, all that riding down of peasants.
They don't see as us as citizens. They don't know us. We don't count. We don't feature in their world except as annoying noises off. We are the "enemy within" (Thatchers phrase) to be kettled and ridden down. In this latest episode of class warfare the "enemy within" are our students and school children.
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no subject
Date: 2010-11-27 03:08 pm (UTC)Rode the six hundred...
Oh, the British and their cavalry charges. When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn...
(Mind you, back in 1991 or 1992 Copenhagen saw some serious rioting in connection with the referendum on the Edinburgh Agreement, and a famous video recording has a police officer audibly shouting to his men "aim for the legs!"... I guess I'd rather face a horse than a police force with orders to maim me.)
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Date: 2010-11-27 04:08 pm (UTC)