Police brutality in the USA does not justify attacking police officer in Britain


The Prime Minister has condemned the violence seen against police officers during protests over the weekend.
  • We are all sickened by George Floyd’s death, and understand the strength of feeling behind these protests.
     
  • But under current rules, designed to control this deadly virus, gathering of more than six people are not allowed. Protesters are putting their lives and the lives of others at risk.
     
  • These demonstrations have been subverted by instances of violence – which are a betrayal of the cause they purport to serve. Those responsible for this violence will be held to account.

I gather that no fewer than 35 police officers were injured by the thugs who hijacked these demonstrations. I read that the Metropolitan Police Federation has called for an apology to those officers and that sounds entirely reasonable to me.

The idea that you can help solve problems of racism and police brutality in the USA by physically attacking and injuring police officers doing their jobs in Britain, or indeed by racially abusing ethnic minority police officers for doing their jobs, is so insane that it would be hysterically funny had nobody been hurt.

I would also probably have more to say about the desecration of statues had nobody been hurt, but statues can be fished out of the water or repaired, pain and injuries are a far more serious matter.

The argument for moving the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol to a museum was stronger than many of the other cases which have been put forward in this country to remove statues of people who are being judged by the standards of our age and not their own, for various reasons including the fact that this particular statue was not erected by Colston's contemporaries but nearly two centuries after his death. However, such decisions should be taken by the community as a whole through the ballot box, not by a mob.

But it is violence against people, not statues, which is the key issue here. Those who injured police officers in Britain in the name of anti-racism have disgraced and discredited the noble cause of opposing racism.

Just as those involved in the death of George Floyed are rightly facing trisl and should be severfely punished if convicted, those responsible for the entirely unjustifiable actions resulting in injury to 35 police officers in Britain who were just doing their job of trying to keep the peace should also face trial, and should be severely punished if convicted.

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