g7uk.com: I’m not anti-police. Nor am I one of those people who cries ‘assault’ if someone is touched in the slightest way. But, Jim, would you say that the incidents of the man being hit on the head with the shield and another being punched in the face, were justified in the particular circumstances?

I think there are good and bad on both sides.

Probably this has always happened and it’s only now that the public is seeing it, due to cameras being so widespread. In the same way that photography and film brought back images of the battlefield after they were first invented. That changed warfare and maybe this is going to change policing?

Thursday 2 April 2009

More4 News presenter attacked live on air following G2 protests

After being asked to stop and pulled firmly out of frame the man became quite violent. He pushed the presenter with some force and then turned his aggression onto the camera, causing the live broadcast to go off air.

It’s sad that reporters can’t do their job on the streets of our cities without being subjected to this”.

Yes but God forbid the police, who are subjected to the same thing, and have to police the streets and keep it safe for you to report on, whilst outnumbered sometimes up to700%. A complete media witch hunt over the way those two cops have been treated, for using techniques that forces have been forced to adopt in light of media scrutiny over so called police brutality. Now poor cousins of the police forces we used to have fight crime with two hands behind their backs, ridiculed for failing to cut crime. Yet tabloids and broadsheets and other media denizens who lament for these days are the first to pass condemnation on these cops, forcing their suspension by politically moral nihilistic Chief officers, most likely sacking.

g7uk.com: Not all reporting has been bad and some seems balanced. For instance, The Times reports:

‘it is the story of how the police wilfully criminalised and alienated 4,000 innocent people’

I saw live coverage of the violent minority of protesters at 1pm on BBC News and Sky. At that time the police weren’t wearing riot gear and weren’t reacting to the considerable abuse (one was hit over the head with a 4ft pole).

But if you go to IndyMedia you’ll be hard pressed to find any mention of violence by protestors. It’s all about the police. So who is being selective about the facts?

It isn’t fair to tar all journalists with the same brush and, out of all them, possibly Channel 4 News is the least deserving recipient for any backlash. Also, these days, many technical people are poorly-paid freelancers who own their own equipment. So attacking the camera is especially mean and pointless.

But anyway I don’t accept that the kind of thing that happened in the clip above is justified against anyone who is filming on the street. Whoever they are.