Direct Action

[Stuart Ellaway]

As we all know by now 2 protesters from Fathers 4 Justice pelted Tony Blair with purple flour in the house of commons.

Now asside from the absolutely abysmal security hole this highlighted and the MPs own stupidity in leaving the chamber and dispersing was the action called for?

Direct action is a group that advocates voicing disagreement with government by in your face action like pelting politicians with eggs and flour etc.

Is this a good thing? Or is this a group of dissidents that are too ignorant and stupid to use open democracy properly?

It seems to be popular at the moment to despise Tony Blair and George Bush. If these were any other two leaders would public opinion be any different? Would the world really be a better place if these two were replaced or would they just be 2 more people trying to guide their countries the best way they can?

[Dani]

Tony Blair Has Done Nothing To Help The Working Class Since He Came In Power.

I Think The Purple Flour Was A Good Thing To Make The Government Take A Big Step For Security.

The Protester Even Spoke To Mr. Blair Via Radio And Was Extremly Un-Satisfied With The Results, And I Think The Majority of Us Would Love To Throw Something At The Prime Minister, In MY Opinion - A Brick.

I Would Have Liked To Have Seen Two-Jabs Prescott Get Up The Other Day Though ;D

Cthulhu

[Stuart Ellaway]

I agree that the security hole was well highlighted, and thankfully by harmless protestors and not by extremist terrorists.

However what else does this achive. It got the group in the spotlight but yet again for all the wrong reasons. The first time this group got in the news it was one man on a crane which caused a lot of disruption. They may have a good point but their actions don't seem to be winning them any friends. Instead they seem to be annoying the general public more than getting their message across.

There are ways and means in open democracy to express your point and your concerns. Attacking politicians isn't one of them.

[Helen]

But that's assuming that democracy is the same in practice as it is in theory - which it isn't. Which is why our leaders can get so undemocratic as to take us into a war the majority of us don't support.
When the politicians get so far up their own arses that they can play messiah with their sickening phoney sincerity and their chatshow grins and yet completely ignore the will of the people in favour of pandering to those who are really in power (undemocratically placed there, of course), and get to play Jesus, the proper avenues of democracy are useless.
Then you have to take action. Nobody got hurt, it highlighted the laughable security inadequacies and the pressure group got some attention. And I've heard conflicting media reports as to how much good it may have done their cause. I think it's great to see people taking action like this. I think it's all good.

[Helen]

And by the way, it's lovely to see you all again.

[Stuart Ellaway]

The benefit of playing devil's advocate is that I can see the points on both sides and argue both points. The danger of course is that I end up getting bogged down in my own arguments. (Stu mutters to himself)

I take your point about democracy not working as it does in theory. I started to wonder why this is. In simple theory if you don't like something you lobby your local MP who then lobbies parliament. The trouble is 1 MP wont do anything if they only get one voice lobbying them, unless they see personal gain from it. So you need multiple voices and preferably multiple MPs. But then we've seen how the government can and will smack down dissident back bench MPs.

But if proper avenues don't work, will direct improper avenues work? Will Tony Blair now turn his attention to the plight of fathers seperated from their children because he got struck in parliament. Or is it likely to make him pay less attention to their just cause.

Lets say I was Tony Blair. If I had been hit in parliament by a father protesting against having his kids taken away my 1st thought would be "no wonder you don't have custody you're a violent loony that needs locking up." That then would be in my mind if any other cases were brought to my attention and would hinder my decision should any changes in the law be proposed.

On one hand you have people so passionate about something they're willing to risk life and liberty to make their plight known. On the other hand you have people that are willing to cause disruption and chaos for their own personal agenda. In this case fathers trying to get custody of their kids. Surely their cause isn't aided by outbursts such as these?

[Helen]

My point is that the best thing these guys achieved was to remind Tony Blair that he's not untouchable. It highlighted that he's just a man and that it doesn't matter how well he can use spin, rhetoric and soundbites, when it comes down to it - all that is useless, because in the real world he's vulnerable.
As for what good it does the cause of the fathers' group, I think it is now incidentaland a side issue, because what they did has nothing directly to do with furthering their cause. I don't know if they all got together and decided officially that this was a good idea or if it was just one man venting his frustration. If they decided to do it officially to 'argue' their case then they did themselves no favours. But if they intended to get some attention and teach the PM a lesson they were successful. If it was one man's frustration then I'm completely sympathetic.
But as I say I've heard conflicting reports as to how much good this has done them. I mean if more people then hear about them and sympathise and lobby their MPs on their behalf then it's mission accomplished. Most people in the country probably loved the sight of Tony Blair getting pelted with a condom full of purple self-raising flour, and so I imagine this group have become heroes, at least at cult level. But I think ultimately people will be more concerned with just how vulnerable the PM is and, more importantly, if this is how unguarded the H of C is, how awful must security be in the rest of the UK?
The point they actually made is deeper and more fundamental, politically, than they perhaps intended.

[Stuart Ellaway]

Some good points. But do we really want Tony Blair thinking he's very vulnerable? I'm not sure I wan't to have an extremely paranoid Prime Minister. Whilst I dislike this Labour government I happen to like Tony, and if he were to go I'd hate to think which muppet would replace him.

The thing thats mainly pissing me off about politics at the moment is that we have a set of elections coming up soon and I know nothing about the opposition's plans and policies. All I've seen are the Conservatives tell us the bad things Labour has done or hasn't done and the Liberal Democrats are using the Iraq conflict to gain MEP seats? I don't think I've heard one party tell us why they should be my MEP, only why the others shouldn't.