London’s Metropolitan Police arrested another 492 people over the weekend after a protest Saturday in Trafalgar Square, as the Starmer government accelerated its crackdown on opposition to the Gaza genocide.
The entirely peaceful protest was held to oppose the proscription of Palestine Action. It was organised by Defend Our Juries and attended by over 1,000 people. Of the arrests, 488 were for holding up signs declaring, “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action”.
This is so self defeating… Palestine Action should have never been declared a “terrorist organization” in the same category as Al Qaeda and Daesh. People see right through that and it causes a backlash. Nd the UK government doubling down on the backlash creates even more backlash. I mean anyone can see that at this point that the government has lost the political battle on this one and is just chugging through due to the sunk cost fallacy. This is only paving the way for the Right to do a comeback. Fucking centrist liberals man, god damn.
The sunsetting of a once great empire.
No of course not, Al Qaeda is our great ally in Syria now, or some completely legit and organic offshoot of said group.
In the end, the problem stems from billionaires. They created the right wing propaganda machine that caused this far right authoritarian rise. They did it recklessly only to increase their own power. Billionaires can no longer exist. Capitalism is failing. We need a new path forward.
Reform UK will have a hard time catching up with Labour in the fascism League.
What in the fascist UK fuck.
That’s a funny looking labour government you got there UK.
How did you guys go from Corbyn to this? Is it so hard to have a labour party leader that doesn’t back Israel or Russia?
Starmer is terrified of Reform. So he’s taken the really smart stance of pulling Labour to the right to court a demographic that would never vote Labour anyway, and in the meantime utterly piss off his core base.
Same story, different country
This almost always fails and only ends up moving the country average to right and make extreme right seem more mild.
Also I don’t think right wing voters have that strong an opinion on Israel. This is more likely zionist lobbies pulling some of Starmer’s strings.
UK is a fascist regime. Well done!
Folks who get really up in their feelings about the Trump/Harris election seem to forget that Harris was taking campaign advice from this guy. It’s so easy to forget how absolutely poisoned so-called “Liberal Democracy” has become with a broad strain of fascist tendency.
On the one hand, you’ve got a guy who is looking to literally lay siege to cities in the US that didn’t vote for him. On the opposite side of the pond, they’re doing mass-arrests of anyone with a “Please Stop Killing Brown People” bumper sticker. And in the middle, a sea of smug dipshits posting “You got what you voted for”.
Liberals will ALWAYS end up siding with the Fascists to try to suppress the Left. Happened in Germany in the 1930s, and the dumbass liberals eventually ended up lined up against the same walls the communists and socialists were lined up against. If you’re a liberal today and defending this fascist suppression against Palestine Action: you’re next.
Happened in Germany in the 1930s
Happened in the 1910s, even. Hence the old quip about Bernie Sanders killing Rosa Luxemburg.
dumbass liberals eventually ended up lined up against the same walls the communists and socialists were lined up against
Or marched out into the snows of Russia to seize more Lebensraum for the imperial core. Or just bombed to death in Dresden or Berlin when the front lines collapsed.
If you’re a liberal today and defending this fascist suppression against Palestine Action: you’re next.
The hard math of living in a fascist state is standing up and getting shot today or ducking and hiding in hopes you won’t get shot tomorrow.
Liberals made their bed back in 2009. We’re all just living in the aftermath.
I’d argue that the Liberals are a little farther down the line. This administration isn’t finished bullying women, intellectuals, non-Caucasians and the queer community to death, they’re just getting started.
What about the other 160 or so democracies? How they doin?
Especially the proportional representation ones. FPTP is just a hint of democracy.
What about the other 160 or so democracies?
I’m not sure where you’re getting your numbers, but…
In 2024, just 6.6% of the world population lived in “full democracies”, falling from 12.5% a decade ago. Overall, the vast majority of these countries are in Europe, with notable exceptions—such as Japan, Mauritius, and Costa Rica—across other global regions.
I’m counting far less than 160.
FPTP is just a hint of democracy.
Sure. But then IRV still gave us NYC Eric Adams as mayor of New York. There’s more to democracy than the shape of your ballot.
Calling Japan a full democracy is a stretch. They’ve been ruled by one party for over half a century, and definitely not b/c they’re good at their jobs.
In 2024, just 6.6% of the world population lived in “full democracies”,
I’m counting far less than 160.
Sorry I didn’t make any claims as to what constitutes a “full” democracy, I was going with these guys who put it at about 167 “democracies”.
Sure. But then IRV still gave us
IRV is just FPTP+. Like you say, it isn’t an electoral system so much as a ballot system.
We studied it, in Canada, under the name “Alternative Vote”. It was the only one we could find that was worse than FPTP:
There’s a reason why politicians keep suggesting it, and it’s not for our benefit.
Sorry I didn’t make any claims as to what constitutes a “full” democracy
I’d settle for what defines “democracy” at all. I’ve seen folks claim El Salvador is a democracy while Nicaragua isn’t, entirely because the government of El Salvador is politically aligned with the US and the Nicaraguans are not.
IRV is just FPTP+
I don’t really care what flavor of election system you think is the right one. However you square it, you can have shit candidates win popular mandates. There is no system that’ll keep people you don’t like out of office, shy of a dictatorship that puts you in charge.
There’s a reason why politicians keep suggesting it
Suggesting it? Thirteen states have now banned ranked-choice voting as municipalities decide on whether to adopt it
I don’t really care what flavor of election system you think is the right one.
You’re against logic and reason?
However you square it, you can have shit candidates win popular mandates. There is no system that’ll keep people you don’t like out of office, shy of a dictatorship that puts you in charge.
I’m not interested in a system that will keep people I don’t like out of office. I’m interested in a system that represents the will of the people, rather than the will of a select rich and powerful few.
If you’re willing to care, you might find one.
Suggesting it? Thirteen states have now banned ranked-choice voting as municipalities decide on whether to adopt it
I don’t see the problem here, like I said, it’s worse than FPTP.
Please shoot me.
Sorry, in UK you get stabbed only.
Yeah we are America lite and it’s harder to get guns.
UK is a fascist regime
It’s really not.
https://freedomhouse.org/country/united-kingdom/freedom-world/2025
They need to update it apparently, because I can’t see those rights.
Wow. Fuck that.
I don’t like the way this is being framed.
People aren’t arrested for supporting Palestine.
They are arresting for praising Palestine Action, a UK organization that was banned after breaching into a Royal Airforce military base
Spraying military aircraft with red paint isn’t terrorism by any stretch of the imagination. Who does it terrorize? And supporting an organisation whose members sprayed fighter jets with paint isn’t terrorism either. There’s no justification for the UK government’s use of anti-terrorist legislation against these protesters.
By contrast, supporting a regime that has been openly committing genocide for years and uses torture and murder to intimidate its opponents could well qualify as terrorism.
And runs political interference campaigns at the highest levels of its allies to gain unlimited support. We label other countries foreign actors waging hybrid warfare for a lot less. It’s crazy.
So? I support Palestine Action and all actions they’ve taken to stop the UK’s complicity in genocide. It’s illegal to say this in the UK.
Who gets to declare that the distinction matters? Why do they get to do that?
When Keir Starmer was a solicitor he defended people, successfully, for the same kind of thing. This isn’t terrorism, this is my government taking away our rights to protest.
People are ignoring their proscription to bring attention to the insanity of it and hope to force the government to back down. It’s mainly old people being arrested; including priests. I would do it myself but it’s hard when you’ve got work and being in jail would hinder that.
For what it’s worth I support Palestine Action.
