End the Lockdown
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Britain’s chilling slide into totalitarianism
The arrest of peaceful anti-lockdown protesters heralds a new era of authoritarianism.
JAMES MCSWEENEY
22nd May 2020
Spiked
Piers Corbyn
On Saturday, Hyde Park’s Speakers’ Corner was host to an unusual scene. As onlookers booed, police officers dragged 19 activists from the scene in handcuffs. Ten people were fined. Their crime? Refusing to disband their small protest in contravention of lockdown measures.
The protesters, who included Piers Corbyn (eccentric sibling of Jeremy Corbyn), were an odd conglomeration of anti-vaxxers and anti-lockdown preachers. Piers, who makes his brother look like a yuppie sell-out, was determined to warn his audience about what he saw as the virus-spreading horrors of 5G. Most people greeted the news of the protest with a mixture of bemusement and irritation. ‘Mad as box badgers’ and ‘The police have enough to do without this extra nonsense’ were typical of the comments on Twitter.
True, the protesters’ assertions that Bill Gates was the mastermind behind this crisis probably have not added much to the public discourse. The weirdness of the display aside, there is something deeply unsettling about non-disruptive peaceful protesters being bundled into police vans. For the first time in my lifetime, a British government has drawn a utilitarian line in the sand and declared that no peaceful protest can be tolerated.
Well, not utilitarian in a strictly calculated sense. We still don’t know what the effect of lockdown has actually been, or exactly how the disease spreads. In New York, for example, 66 per cent of the people hospitalised were ‘sheltering in place’ – that is, obeying the rules of the lockdown – when they caught the disease. Sweden, which never locked down, has just 60 per cent of the confirmed cases per capita of Ireland, which did.
Nor do we know what the ultimate stacking of lives saved versus lives lost due to lockdown will be. Cancer referrals in the UK are down by 76 per cent and there has been an alarming drop in hospitalisations for strokes and heart attacks. Perhaps, then, the British government’s reasoning behind banning protest can be best summed up as: ‘We are not sure it is worth the risk, but we could be wrong.’
This ‘better safe than sorry’ authoritarianism hasn’t been limited to the government. In lieu of a scientific consensus on the merits of any particular policy direction, Facebook has nonetheless decided to stick its neck out and remove posts that contradict official lockdown advice (presumably while crossing its fingers that such dissenters don’t have any valid observations). Facebook has even taken down posts promoting protests against the lockdowns in certain US states.
Unsurprisingly, lots of authoritarian leaders see merit in this approach. President Erdogan of Turkey, for example, is so concerned about the risk of misinformation being spread about the virus that he has taken to going after journalists suspected of spreading it. Ever vigilant of threats to the health of his countrymen, prime minister Hun Sen of Cambodia has awarded himself emergency powers to ban opposition gatherings and declare martial law. Wary of the contagion risk of marches, China’s benevolent central planners have been forced to round up known trouble-makers in Hong Kong. According to Journalists Without Borders, 38 countries have introduced emergency measures to restrict journalistic freedom in the wake of coronavirus.
Is it facetious to make such comparisons? Seen from abroad, probably not. If Britain is to abandon its principles by banning protest on the basis of an uncertain estimation of the potential for infection, on what basis can we condemn authoritarian regimes which do the same?
The truth is, however much self-interest feeds into the calculation, the operators of many authoritarian regimes genuinely believe their actions are needed to avoid catastrophe. If law and order are the overriding concern, then this is not unreasonable. When protests toppled Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak in 2011, the immediate consequence was violence and economic collapse. Last year’s deposition of Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir was followed by a massacre and unchecked pillaging by armed gangs.
Even when, in 1819, British MPs voted through the Six Acts to restrict gatherings following the Peterloo Massacre, most did so in the sincere belief that they were saving their country from a violent French-style revolutionary terror. The nature of principles like freedom of expression is that they are easily diminished if short-term considerations take precedence – that is why they must be principles which we defend regardless.
This brings us back to lockdown Britain. Say it turns out that the government is sticking to the restrictions, even if a consensus was emerging that lockdown could be killing more people than it is saving, would you still be happy that ministers get the final say on your right to protest or that Facebook could be preventing you from organising one?
All of this is worth bearing in mind the next time you find yourself getting angry at an idiot with a placard.
James McSweeney is a freelance writer and videographer. Follow him on Twitter: @maccyjames1
https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/05/22/britains-chilling-slide-into-totalitarianism/
The arrest of peaceful anti-lockdown protesters heralds a new era of authoritarianism.
JAMES MCSWEENEY
22nd May 2020
Spiked
Piers Corbyn
On Saturday, Hyde Park’s Speakers’ Corner was host to an unusual scene. As onlookers booed, police officers dragged 19 activists from the scene in handcuffs. Ten people were fined. Their crime? Refusing to disband their small protest in contravention of lockdown measures.
The protesters, who included Piers Corbyn (eccentric sibling of Jeremy Corbyn), were an odd conglomeration of anti-vaxxers and anti-lockdown preachers. Piers, who makes his brother look like a yuppie sell-out, was determined to warn his audience about what he saw as the virus-spreading horrors of 5G. Most people greeted the news of the protest with a mixture of bemusement and irritation. ‘Mad as box badgers’ and ‘The police have enough to do without this extra nonsense’ were typical of the comments on Twitter.
True, the protesters’ assertions that Bill Gates was the mastermind behind this crisis probably have not added much to the public discourse. The weirdness of the display aside, there is something deeply unsettling about non-disruptive peaceful protesters being bundled into police vans. For the first time in my lifetime, a British government has drawn a utilitarian line in the sand and declared that no peaceful protest can be tolerated.
Well, not utilitarian in a strictly calculated sense. We still don’t know what the effect of lockdown has actually been, or exactly how the disease spreads. In New York, for example, 66 per cent of the people hospitalised were ‘sheltering in place’ – that is, obeying the rules of the lockdown – when they caught the disease. Sweden, which never locked down, has just 60 per cent of the confirmed cases per capita of Ireland, which did.
Nor do we know what the ultimate stacking of lives saved versus lives lost due to lockdown will be. Cancer referrals in the UK are down by 76 per cent and there has been an alarming drop in hospitalisations for strokes and heart attacks. Perhaps, then, the British government’s reasoning behind banning protest can be best summed up as: ‘We are not sure it is worth the risk, but we could be wrong.’
This ‘better safe than sorry’ authoritarianism hasn’t been limited to the government. In lieu of a scientific consensus on the merits of any particular policy direction, Facebook has nonetheless decided to stick its neck out and remove posts that contradict official lockdown advice (presumably while crossing its fingers that such dissenters don’t have any valid observations). Facebook has even taken down posts promoting protests against the lockdowns in certain US states.
Unsurprisingly, lots of authoritarian leaders see merit in this approach. President Erdogan of Turkey, for example, is so concerned about the risk of misinformation being spread about the virus that he has taken to going after journalists suspected of spreading it. Ever vigilant of threats to the health of his countrymen, prime minister Hun Sen of Cambodia has awarded himself emergency powers to ban opposition gatherings and declare martial law. Wary of the contagion risk of marches, China’s benevolent central planners have been forced to round up known trouble-makers in Hong Kong. According to Journalists Without Borders, 38 countries have introduced emergency measures to restrict journalistic freedom in the wake of coronavirus.
Is it facetious to make such comparisons? Seen from abroad, probably not. If Britain is to abandon its principles by banning protest on the basis of an uncertain estimation of the potential for infection, on what basis can we condemn authoritarian regimes which do the same?
The truth is, however much self-interest feeds into the calculation, the operators of many authoritarian regimes genuinely believe their actions are needed to avoid catastrophe. If law and order are the overriding concern, then this is not unreasonable. When protests toppled Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak in 2011, the immediate consequence was violence and economic collapse. Last year’s deposition of Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir was followed by a massacre and unchecked pillaging by armed gangs.
Even when, in 1819, British MPs voted through the Six Acts to restrict gatherings following the Peterloo Massacre, most did so in the sincere belief that they were saving their country from a violent French-style revolutionary terror. The nature of principles like freedom of expression is that they are easily diminished if short-term considerations take precedence – that is why they must be principles which we defend regardless.
This brings us back to lockdown Britain. Say it turns out that the government is sticking to the restrictions, even if a consensus was emerging that lockdown could be killing more people than it is saving, would you still be happy that ministers get the final say on your right to protest or that Facebook could be preventing you from organising one?
All of this is worth bearing in mind the next time you find yourself getting angry at an idiot with a placard.
James McSweeney is a freelance writer and videographer. Follow him on Twitter: @maccyjames1
https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/05/22/britains-chilling-slide-into-totalitarianism/
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Yep. Well, if things continue like this for much longer.
The way things are going right now, soon the world's oldest surviving democracy will be Burkina Faso - which is currently the world's youngest democracy.
Even China didn't lock down its citizens for as long as we have.
Oh, well maybe we will end up following totalitarian China's lead again later in the year, like we did this time around.
What other diktats do you want us to adopt from totalitarian China? Being racist towards black people or imposing a cultural genocide upon Muslims, perhaps.
Or is it just authoritarian China's totalitarian lockdown you wish to adopt?
I love this. A group of around 100 freedom-loving youngsters attended an outdoor rave and inhaled "hippy crack", ignoring the lockdown, in the wilds of Lancashire near Barnoldswick on Wednesday in 80F heat.
The large hill in the background with the masts on top is Winter Hill. It looms right over my town Bolton as Vesuvius looms over Naples. Bolton is on the opposite side of the hill.
The large hill in the background with the masts on top is Winter Hill. It looms right over my town Bolton as Vesuvius looms over Naples. Bolton is on the opposite side of the hill.
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Wet Wet Wet frontman Marti Pellow gives us a lockdown session of the band's 1987 hit Angel Eyes:
Here’s another wee Lockdown Session for you, I’m sure you’ll know this one… ANGEL EYES is for the wonderful girls from my hometown of Clydebank who are raising money for PPE for our NHS angels. If you would like to donate that would be amazing, visit https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfundi... Thanks for listening, stay safe love to love Marti x
And here's how it was performed originally:
Here’s another wee Lockdown Session for you, I’m sure you’ll know this one… ANGEL EYES is for the wonderful girls from my hometown of Clydebank who are raising money for PPE for our NHS angels. If you would like to donate that would be amazing, visit https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfundi... Thanks for listening, stay safe love to love Marti x
And here's how it was performed originally:
Of course you would miss the point, whether on purpose or not.
I wonder if there will ever be a day that you are right about something and if you will ever act like a human being instead of the... questionable entity that you are.
Likely not.
I wonder if there will ever be a day when you will stop quoting this ignorant POS.
Probably not.
How many lives did you save by killing your economy ?Don't like it, don't read it, simple
I've a reason to quote him, a moron or not.