Tuition fee fight

I salute the students.

I thought the power to revolt was dead in the water. I thought it had disappeared beneath the oceans of Brittania. Drowned and dead.

Apparently not. The students are out in this filthy weather shouting their slogans, resisting being kettled by the arms of the state (police).

Using the right they have to say 'no' in a peaceful demonstration.

I think they are marvellous.

From the sublime to the ridiculous. From fifty percent of this country's young people being encouraged to go to University now we have anyone whose parents aren't loaded struggling a) to get in and b) not to be encumbered with debt for twenty five years.

Punish the poor and the middle class when they never benefitted from the good years, but, oh yeah, make them pay in the bad years.

I believe that the bankers etc. organised the terrible chaos we're in. How else were they to stop paying savers the rates the savers were owed?

Protest on, my young friends.

"They (the youngsters), like many others from across the country, had just spent the day protesting or lobbying or saying a speech, all in the hope the government would listen."

They don't listen, darlings. They only listen when you agree with them, when you're one of them. They aren't there for you, my children. We, home educators, could tell you how deaf they can be, how frustrated you all would be.

Protest on, even though you think you may have lost. You will carry the day.

Life is stirring in all of us. The knowledge of fairness is raising its head. The sense of something wrong is dawning.

"There were shouts of 'I can't breathe' and calls for medics for those with bleeding heads who had been hit by baton-wielding police. Ian Dillets, a student from SOAS said:

"Everyone is cold and hungry and would like to go home, but we're not allowed to go home. There are a lot of people now standing around saying if they're not going to let us out we might as well go and get angry.""

Are our children to be treated like criminals? Who are the police protecting? The rights of the state to do whatever it damn well pleases. We are more than the state. We are greater than any Parliament.

Times are indeed a'changin'.

"Tim Mortimer, Leeds University Union Activities Officer, said he had great trouble seeing Simon Burns, his local MP for Chemsford yesterday:

"I rang and emailed him several times but he managed to wrangle his way out of it saying as he was a minister he didn't have time to meet with his constituent. It's a bit upsetting. MPs are condemning any kind of violent action but were not allowing people legitimate means to get their point across.""

Maybe he doesn't represent you, Tim. Who does he represent then? Who are these people? What is this system? These are questions that Tim might be asking himself tonight. The questions we all should be asking. Don't we deserve better than this? Don't our children deserve better than this?

Quotes from

http://www.guardian.co.uk/leeds/2010/dec/10/student-tuition-fees-protests-leeds-view

Police abuse children

Yes, I meant to say that because I'm angry. Are police allowed to abuse children? Only if those children are protesting which - I really thought, I really did think - that any citizens of this damned country could do. March peacefully. Carry banners. Protest. Disagree. You know that kind of thing.

But I should have remembered the miners. I should have recalled that square in China where the tanks rolled in. We thought we had the right to say no to something that affected us.

Well, we were sadly mistaken, weren't we?

"It's the coldest day of the year, and I've just spent seven hours being kettled in Westminster. That sounds jolly, doesn't it? It sounds a bit like I went and had a lovely cup of tea with the Queen, rather than being trapped into a freezing pen of frightened teenagers and watching baton-wielding police kidney-punching children, six months into a government that ran an election campaign on a platform of fairness. So before we go any further, let's remind ourselves precisely what kettling is, and what it's for."

That is from here:
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/laurie-penny/2010/11/children-police-kettle-protest

My children weren't there, but they might have been because they think that you can protest, you can carry banners here and that the police just stay on the sidelines making sure that everything is OK.

They'll know different when they read Laurie Penny's feature.

They'll know that abuse only happens when social workers say that your parents are abusing you. They'll know it's one big CON that government cares for you. Any government. They care only for corporations. The little guy can go get kettled.

I hate this country. I've never said that to you, my dearly once-loved, beautiful country. I hate you.