UK to shift anti-terror strategy? - Panorama
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CyberRose
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CyberRose
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Am I reading the same articles as everyone else?! Can somebody post them up again I think I must have followed a broken link or summat cos I have no idea where people are getting their arguments from...
(genuinely)Prince Rhyus
Spokesman of King Antonio
It's because we live in a British democracy. In a British democracy, people have the right to remain ignorant!
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
I never made that claim - I merely pointed out that it had been "used extensively" against protesters.So, we can conclusively see that protesters aren't the major recipients of this legislation!
It's because your reading comprehension is woefully inadequate.Am I reading the same articles as everyone else?! Can somebody post them up again I think I must have followed a broken link or summat cos I have no idea where people are getting their arguments from...
CyberRose
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But I've never doubted that!
No. I have read the article and understood what it said. It quite clearly, imo, is NOT talking about introducing new legislation making it illegal to be against democracy. It is not talking about introducing new legislation full stop (why would it? the government already did introduce anti-terrorism legislation)
It looks quite clear that the "new policy" is saying legislation can only go so far, and that we need a new approach to tackle extremism, eg, challenging the views of extremists, strengthening community projects that do just that
SpookyFrank
Don't swallow the cap
The right not to remain ignorant would be nice.
Ah who am I kidding I'd fucking love to be stupid, then I'd be able to trust the state to look after me and keep the bad guys at bay.
teqniq
DisMembered
LOL yeah, that's about the size of it.
CyberRose
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Ah but then you have the danger of going full circle and entering into conspiraloon territory, then you'd also be stupid...
You have to see this as part of the way that the govt generally works, it's not a statement made purely in isolation. Partly it's an admission that the strategy to date hasn't been working, but then I'm not sure many people expected it to anyway. It's also basically a kite-flying exercise on the part of the government, they fling this stuff out and see which way the wind is blowing, how much public opposition there is to a proposal etc. If it's something that they particularly want or think they can get away with then they legislate pretty quickly. If on the other hand it's something that is going to meet with a fair bit of resistance then they either lengthen the softening-up period or go into the process knowing that they'll have to make some tactical concessions in order to get their own back-bench into line.
It's certainly possible however to discern in these pronouncements an outline of what the legislative policy is going to be. Of course it isn't represented truthfully at this stage, otherwise it would be apparent what a lousy, unworkable idea it is; this is a moderated version to get the CyberRoses of the world on board - this is the bait, and later on they do the switch. It's one of the governments two favourite tricks, the other one being to do unpopular things incrementally so that at any one point it looks like nothing much is happening (so CyberRose can tell everyone they're getting excited over nothing) but eventually you end up with a situation that few people would have agreed to had it been proposed outright. A lot of the time they use a combination of all of this stuff; float a big idea, make a few concessions to look reasonable, then come back later and tweak things a bit so that you get what you want in every important respect.
If you want to see a fine example of anti-democratic behaviour in late capitalist society then you can't do better than a close study of NuLabour in the last decade.
It's certainly possible however to discern in these pronouncements an outline of what the legislative policy is going to be. Of course it isn't represented truthfully at this stage, otherwise it would be apparent what a lousy, unworkable idea it is; this is a moderated version to get the CyberRoses of the world on board - this is the bait, and later on they do the switch. It's one of the governments two favourite tricks, the other one being to do unpopular things incrementally so that at any one point it looks like nothing much is happening (so CyberRose can tell everyone they're getting excited over nothing) but eventually you end up with a situation that few people would have agreed to had it been proposed outright. A lot of the time they use a combination of all of this stuff; float a big idea, make a few concessions to look reasonable, then come back later and tweak things a bit so that you get what you want in every important respect.
If you want to see a fine example of anti-democratic behaviour in late capitalist society then you can't do better than a close study of NuLabour in the last decade.
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Absolutely. And you're right to say that it makes no sense to see each strike against civil liberties in isolation; it's part of a whole.
CyberRose
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So you genuinely think the Government is going to make it illegal to oppose the state?
And you got this from an article that said Islamic extremist views should be challenged?
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Programme available here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00hq21s/Panorama_Muslim_First_British_Second/
CyberRose
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Did it say anything about making it illegal to be a far left protester?
danny la rouge
Ninja swords for all disabled people
Haven't watched it yet, but when I do I'll let you know.
I think they are going to start using the law to target all sorts of people, some of whom are not muslims, who happen to oppose the state in general or who otherwise get in the way of their political objectives. I doubt there will be one single law that says that anyone who opposes the state will be locked up, more likely there will be a bunch of extensions to existing law around the boundaries of acceptable discourse (like the religious hate-speech law) and the ones concerning surveillance by electronic means and by govt operatives. You can already be put under house arrest more or less indefinitely without ever seeing the evidence against you, and indeed there are already people in this position - the really scary bit is that the laws are so unbalanced in the favour of the state at the moment that they probably don't really need extending very much in order to accomodate these new objectives.
CyberRose
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Actually while we're on the subject of "democracy", what is the answer when the general public are in favour of implementing certain policies that people on here would be against? Weren't the public largely in favour of extending the detention limit to 48 hours? IIRC opinion polls at the time suggested they were. And what about making it illegal to preach hate in Mosques? I don't know any figures, but I'd bet my last quid that the general public are very in favour of making it illegal for somebody to encourage people to kill. Where does democracy come into it then?
Is it democratic to go with the general public or is it democratic to protect our rights against the wishes of the general public?
Is it democratic to go with the general public or is it democratic to protect our rights against the wishes of the general public?
In a democracy the individual needs to be protected from the state and the public. A 'tyranny of the majority' is not desirable.
To be honest I don't trust government statistics, firstly because I just plain don't trust them, but also because if you present people with a solution to a supposed problem then when you control the presentation of the question you can get a lot of people to agree that the solution appears to be one to the problem as you have respresented it, regardless of whether the problem actually pertains in reality in the way that you've described. 42-day detention is a pretty good case in point, in that when presented with these super-technical terrorists whose encryption would require long periods to crack by our highly technically competent boys in blue (despite the fact that as soon as they refused to hand over their encryption keys they would have committed an offence with which they could be charged), some people might allow that under those circumstances there might be an argument for hanging onto them for longer. Was there really a demand from the public for 42- or 90-day detention though? If there was it wasn't obvious from anyone I spoke to.
To be honest I don't trust government statistics, firstly because I just plain don't trust them, but also because if you present people with a solution to a supposed problem then when you control the presentation of the question you can get a lot of people to agree that the solution appears to be one to the problem as you have respresented it, regardless of whether the problem actually pertains in reality in the way that you've described. 42-day detention is a pretty good case in point, in that when presented with these super-technical terrorists whose encryption would require long periods to crack by our highly technically competent boys in blue (despite the fact that as soon as they refused to hand over their encryption keys they would have committed an offence with which they could be charged), some people might allow that under those circumstances there might be an argument for hanging onto them for longer. Was there really a demand from the public for 42- or 90-day detention though? If there was it wasn't obvious from anyone I spoke to.
CyberRose
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Well that's exactly what the government will say when they make it illegal to oppose the state! But it's more likely that "democracy" now simply means allowing people to get their own way. In this case, you're willing to go along with public opinon as long as it is agreeable with your own position, but as soon as your position differs, you throw away all your "democratic" principles
I don't believe they were government statistics. It was either an independent poll or polls carried out by newspapers.
THAT, I do not doubt one bit!
No, the key bit is that the individual needs to be protected from the public at large and the state. At the moment the state is using the fear of terrorism from within the public to take more and more power for itself, and to dismantle the safeguards that have traditionally protected individuals from the arbitrary exercise of state power. I could go into more detail about this but to be honest I think it really is tangential to the main point.
Newspaper surveys are at least as untrustworthy as government ones.
Regarding my own principles, I'm not really an advocate of democracy (in its liberal, capitalistic form) as the solution for anything, so in a sense I don't have a commitment to democracy in the first place. I can however see when the democracy is being managed by a particular group as is the case at the moment and is likely to remain so regardless of who wins the next election. I think a lot of other people from a wide variety of social backgrounds can see it as well, as was detailed in the government's own Power Report, and as I can see from my own personal experience, which is probably rather more varied than you seem to think.
Newspaper surveys are at least as untrustworthy as government ones.
Regarding my own principles, I'm not really an advocate of democracy (in its liberal, capitalistic form) as the solution for anything, so in a sense I don't have a commitment to democracy in the first place. I can however see when the democracy is being managed by a particular group as is the case at the moment and is likely to remain so regardless of who wins the next election. I think a lot of other people from a wide variety of social backgrounds can see it as well, as was detailed in the government's own Power Report, and as I can see from my own personal experience, which is probably rather more varied than you seem to think.
CyberRose
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Well that's pretty much everyone that you need to protect the public from then!
To be perfectly honest, I don't disagree with you re "democracy". Democracy is good for adding legitimacy to a policy, but beyond that, I don't really think it matters a great deal how a policy is implemented, only that it is the right policy. For example, I don't particularly think that progressive policies are that compatible with democracy (women wouldn't have the vote, we'd still have hanging, immigrants would not be welcome, etc, etc)
I also don't think we disagree too much about the "topic" of this thread (altho we have different opinions about what the topic is exactly!). Do I think it would be positive for the government to criminalise any opposition to the state? Of course not. But did I, as you did, interpret the article that started this thread as alluring to that? No. My interpretation was that the government are admitting, or accepting, that legislation and state powers are not enough to combat extremism. That doesn't automatically make me assume they intend for more legislation or powers, but that they need alternatives to legislation and powers. I think the article was trying to say that a new (or complimentary) approach is needed - programmes like strengthening moderate Muslim groups, community projects, etc.
(I guess it's similar to what some opponents of the BNP are saying - it may not be enough to simply give them no platform or stifle their messages - it would probably be necessary to challenge the actual views they have in order to prevent people from accepting them)
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
Possibly. It was the extensions to 28, 42 and 90 days they opposed.
You what?
CyberRose
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Ah! Well spotted my boy! But when you say "they opposed", you actually mean "you opposed", don't you? Because you knew what I meant, and the general public, on that particular issue, were actually quite favourable to 42 days (despite the usual, and perfectly acceptable, arguments that you should be wary of polls)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/jun/08/terrorism.uksecurity
So, let's for a minute assume the poll is correct and the general public have no problem with locking terrorist suspects away without charge - you think that's not right, but how do you account for public opinion?
You also think that someone should have the right to preach in a Mosque about killing non-Muslims and encouraging people to do that, but the general public would think this shouldn't be allowed. Again, how do you account for public opinion?
It's pretty self explanatory, wouldn't you say?
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
I think it's very hard to assess the true extent of public support when there was never a grown-up debate about the measures. What support there has been was due to fear-mongering, a spineless parliament and a compliant media.
I think that? Really?
What, that progressive politics leads to women not having the vote, we'd still have hanging and be anti-immigration?
Are you confusing the word progressive with the word populist, because your statement makes no sense whatsoever?
CyberRose
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Well you seemed pretty clear about what public opinion on 42 days was in your last post until you read an article that said otherwise! But, like I said, these kind of polls should be taken with a pinch of salt, but that's irrelevant, I'm asking you how you would deal with public opinion if it went against your personal position. We're talking about democracy in this thread, and how the government is (supposedly) destroying it, but what if these measures are supported by the public?
So you don't think that preachers should be allowed to do that? You think there should be laws against it?
See what Winjer said...
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
Huh? That article barely mentions the Telegraph poll - it certainly doesn't give you enough about the sampling methodology, question-framing or detailed results. Not that it's difficult to look up the source.
What is it about that poll that you find so convincing? And why do you think that polls taken after David Davis resignation over the issue show a different picture?
I don't think you can really judge what public opinion is through opinion polls conducted without any sensible public debate. For example, I don't think there is a majority in favour of capital punishment any more - that's a hoary old chestnut, predating much of the more sensible debate that has been had in the 40 years since we abolished it. (I'm also pretty sure there is no "democratic" majority for the abolition of women's suffrage - you might want to rethink that example!)
These are not issues we've ever put to a referendum. There's never been any attempt to have a balanced open debate - it's only ever one spun through the prism of party politics and media distortion. As shown above - 42 days had a lot more support until Davis opened up the debate.
I think there are limits on free speech, yes.
But we already have laws to deal with that. The recent IJC report on anti-terrorism measures since 2001 conclude that the legal framework in place after WWII was adequate to deal with the threat - and, incidentally, far more effective than the hysterically authoritarian response we've seen to date.
I find the proposals hinted at in the OP very sinister. We have legislation to deal with incitement and hate speech. This seems to be an unlegislated policy of demonisation - not unlike the encouragement to report suspicious behaviour of (brown) neighbours, the PR whirlwind which accompanies anti-terrorism arrests but quietly buries the outcomes, and so on. I don't think these are moves we should be complacent about.
It's not simply an issue of who it will be targeted at - similar tactics will no doubt be used against legitimate protest movements, but I think it's acceptable to be deeply concerned at the (alienating and radicalising) effect on British Muslims as a whole too.
Aye - sorry.
CyberRose
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I agree, of course, as I said above. Polls do have to be taken with a pinch of salt. But they also highlight the problems fruitloop was talking about earlier. We don't really have informed (public) debate on any major issues, but that's not necessarily the Government's fault. Most people in this country, whether you would care to admit it or not, don't care about any politics that doesn't effect them. There's also what I like to call "dictatorship by the media", who convince people to react a certain way about policies.
And that brings me back to my point (I think!) - how do you account for claiming to be defending democracy when you're just s likely to ignore public opinion as the government? What if the public support measures to restrict freedoms?
Well that poll concerns David Davis' popularity, rather than specifically asking people what they think of 42 days (but you argued against such polls above so I guess it's a moot point)
Ok well I think we should look at individual powers and laws and decide whether we need them against a given threat. Personally, if we've been dealing with Irish terrorism for 30 odd years I would have thought we had adequate measures already in place, but perhaps with Islamic terrorism it's a different ball game with the terrorists aiming simply to kill as many people as possible, including themselves, which is very different to the tactics of the IRA.
Well it seems certain type of people like to interpret things a certain type of way (and of course I'm included in that). I personally don't think it hinted at what you and others say it does, but obviously if that is the aim, then it is something to be opposed. However, if the aim is, as I interpreted it to be, to strengthen Muslim communities to defend themselves against being taken over by extremists then I think that is something we should lend our support to (because a lot of Muslim communities are on edge because of extremists and that is something they do not want)
Well my opinion on the protest movement could be a whole other thread! Suffice to say that the only thing more useless than a protest is signing a petition! I think far left protesters shouldn't flatter themselves too much that these laws are actually intended to target them, because believe me, they aren't a threat to the state by a long shot! 2m people marched against the Iraq war, and they were ignored and forgotten in an instant.
I'd also like to point out the hypocrisy of the protest movement - look on the protest forum, half the posts are about ensuring the BNP have no right to protest! They're employing the same tactics against people they don't agree with as the they claim the state is against them!
Well it depends on our interpretation of this new policy. Muslim communities don't actually want extremists in them, and would probably welcome help to get rid. This policy needs to include them, make them feel part of the UK. But I do agree that certain policies, while targeting extremists, will have an effect of colouring non-Muslim British peoples' minds against the whole Muslim population - something the Government needs to work against at all costs
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