Jonathan Meades
Beaten up by the pigs
Authoritarianism breeds authoritarianism. A figure whose flimsy authority derives from the position he holds rather than from his barely human quiddity will, out of fear and self-preservation, appoint and promote in his own likeness whilst feigning to do otherwise and appease the gods of Diversity.
Thus a cabal may include a Token Woman, a Token communicant of the Bovril Eucharist, a Token Hindu Woman (two for the price of one), a Token Muslim, a Token butch former screw from Holloway, a Token Dolt who doesn’t know the geography of the island he lives on, a Token Token who doesn’t realise he/she/it is a Token and believes he/she/it is there On Merit (i.e. went to Harrow not Eton).
What these people share apart from being beholden to their master’s whim, is a conviction that because they are in his image they are beyond the rule of law which, like taxes, is for little people, the millions of potential offenders whom the pigs and the cabal intend to further suppress with a revised Public Order Act. Law made by the pigs is bad law. It gives even more power to the pigs who are in clover without responsibility for anything save their batons and tear gas.
It was 39 years ago that I was beaten up by four plain-clothes pigs in an unmarked van who had pulled over a car I was travelling in. The friend whose car it was was not driving erratically. She had had nothing to drink. Nor had I. The pigs, however, had.
When I remarked that they might act with greater courtesy towards her, Pigs A and B grabbed me and hit my head repeatedly on the car’s boot. They then dragged me into the van and took me to Shepherd’s Bush nick where Pig C, the uniformed desk sergeant, wrestled me to the ground and tried to beat the shit out of me, banging my head on the concrete floor.
I was, risibly, charged with “obstructing the pigs in the prosecution of their
duty”. I talked to a brief I knew. He said that because I had no visible wounds there was bugger-all I could do. He was, however, not surprised: this was a weekly occurrence at Shepherd’s Bush.
The stipe (legalese for failed barrister) at Marylebone Magistrates Court couldn’t even be bothered to listen to what I said. The pigs were, in his opinion, inviolable. Common law does not apply to them.
These creatures are likely to be granted further powers under a proposed revision of the Public Order Act. That is what Top Sow Cressida Dick wants. It is a further affront to democracy and to the right to protest.
Not that the Token Hindu Female Office Warrior posing as home secretary will see it that way. The increasingly illiberal elite’s reactions to just about anything public it disagrees with are Not Allowed or Let’s Ban It or Send In The Pigs To Give Them The Taste Of Some Good Old-Fashioned British Coppering.
The questionably named United Kingdom is not alone in possessing a cadre of aspirant Stasis, totenkopf nostalgics and wannabe tonton macoutes. France is competing to be every bit as draconian and liberty-infringing. Again the police are behind it. In the eyes of the minister of the interior Gérald Darmanin les keufs can do little wrong. Jean-Michel Fauvergue was the head of the elite (or ultra violent) force called RAID. He is now a deputy whose hobby is kung fu. He is “the author” of the Securité Globale project which grants exceptional powers not merely to les keufs but, extraordinarily, to private security agents. Anyone who has seen RAID in action would conclude that they already possess exceptional powers — which are of course required in exceptional circumstances such as the Daesh attack at the Bataclan hall in 2015. The proposed law’s Article 24 has attracted the greatest attention and the greatest public outrage because it targets journalists, photographers and the whole world that owns a camera: as well as being boorishly authoritarian it is laughably tardy.
Its crude purpose is to prevent images of les keufs being diffused and recognised: so no faces or other identifying features may be shown in any media. This measure is obviously intended to suppress any record of state violence. It effectively grants immunity from prosecution to les keufs and, along the way, to fantasist imposters like Macron’s chum Alexandre Benalla who enjoys nothing better than putting on a helmet and protective clothing and attacking harmless tourists.
Much less attention has been paid to two other articles, no doubt because they do not impinge on journalistic practice. Article 23 withdraws the right to early release from prison for anyone who has assaulted les keufs, firemen or elected representatives, making explicit that the life of these persons is worth more than that of Monsieur and Madame Duchmol. What this has to do with equality is anyone’s guess.
Article 25 is another blunder. It gives les keufs the right to carry arms off duty. Given the fondness these people have for showing off their faulty prowess with their shooters, it is asking for trouble.
Macron, drawn in to the affair against his will, is having to sort out the cock-up caused by the headstrong Darmanin. He would prefer to play the statesman, announcing a day of mourning for Giscard, the one-term narcissistic poltroon who was too gutless to eliminate the Ayatollah Khomeini when that disgusting old despot was an indulged guest of the French state, plotting and receiving terrorists at Neauphle-le-Chateau. The consequences of that inaction contaminate the planet indefinitely and supply a useful motive for Darmanin and the Token Hindu Female Office Warrior.
France is competing with the UK to be every bit as draconian and liberty infringing