I did manage to get down to the G20 protests though, still scabby and aching from the crash… not much I can say that hasn’t been said already. Yes the police were totally out for a scrap, as were a number of tanked up city boys, but when left to its own accord the protest was breathtaking in its joyfulness and scale.
Press coverage was typically terrible; I got particularly narked with a few columnists at The Guardian, who seemed compelled to complain about how fragmented and unfocused the protest was.
This interested me, as I managed to get to both the very focused CND / Stop The War march and the more organic Bank / Climate Camp actions.
Firstly the age ranges we’re obvious, it seems to me that younger activists are less inclined to channel all their energy into one specific campaign, instead opting for newer, more open and less ideologically and hierarchically structured protest movements. But without the generic placards, spokespeople and famous faces on large platforms the press uniformly opted for a ‘look at this hilarious rabble’ approach.
Tabloids found themselves wrestling between who was worse- Greedy Bankers or Unruly Anarchists (that may even be European?!), broadsheets lamented for the days when it was assumed that everyone at a protest was there for the same reason.
Well personally, I thought the melee of actions, ideas and people who attended
Both the G20 Meltdown and Climate Camp groups showed a serious ability to organise, get things done, deal with nonchalant media and resist abusive riot police, all whilst smack bang in the middle of Central London, with the whole world watching.
Best mention how nice it was to have some faith reaffirmed in The Guardian (as paper de jour of my middle class household!) after their very important campaign on the behalf of Ian Tomlinson and police accountability.
So there’s been a hella lotta news on the nuclear front, as always…
Big two would have to be Obama’s continuing pledge to rid the world of nuclear weapons (see last article for some cynical analysis of that!)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/01/nuclear-disarmament-barack-obama-dmitri-medvedev
So now its about campaigning to uphold and extend these promises, especially in
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7948367.stm
That speech gives a good overview of what we’re up against.
Brown spins the usual rhetoric about civil power for all, weapons for a few, ‘multilateral control of the fuel cycle’ that will of course be ‘lead’ by the
There is also a mention of Sellafield –
‘Since 2003 in the UK we have spent more than £70 million on improving security at our Sellafield site alone - and we are committed to spending a further £220 million on the construction of a state of the art storage facility.’
Which was the other big story this month.
It’s more expensive!
More toxic!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/apr/19/sellafield-nuclear-plant-cumbria-hazards
And yet, less criticised.
This is our so called saviour right here, ten of these in 30 years, crumbling into a glowing, fatal, costly black hole.
Sellafield should be seen as a huge crystal ball. It’s sat there right now, silently screaming “look what happens when you give the nuclear industry the keys, the funds, the freedom to ‘solve’ problems of the future”.
Yet here we go again.
And as for the earlier argument-
More nuclear power stations = less proliferation ?
I was never very good at maths, but you don’t need to be a physicist to see how that equation will never add up…
Next time-
Less news digesting, more action updates and music.
There’s a lot happening in the next few months that we should all be aware of.
