dr_ghost, posts by tag: anticuts - LiveJournal (original) (raw)
So the day that tuition fees are going to be voted on has been announced for December 9th, that’s a week today.
Between now and then there is going to a huge build up across the country for this day and I will be doing my best to work on raising digital awareness here each day leading up to the 9th.
Today though, I want to talk about the Day of Action on November 30th. Some of you will remember that on November 24th thousands of protesters were kettled in incredibly cold conditions and some nasty tactics were used by the police overall. It was a day of experience, of growing up, and perhaps some were thinking it would be a nice deterrent to the protesters, especially the school kids.
The people who hoped that were proven wrong on November 30th.
It was cold, it snowed, and still some 12,000 of us hit the streets of London for the third day of mass protest.
The protest was supposed to set off from Trafalgar Square at around 1pm, however a spontaneous push from school and FE students saw us heading off at 12noon instead. A line of police were stationed at White Hall, and so we took a detour. The protesters darted around to the right of White Hall and down past The Mall. The march was largely unplanned from there on--people feared being kettled again, and so instead made the streets of London theirs, taking every possible free route when the police attempted to kettle an area we were in, and they tried many times.
This was the “route” that the group I was with roughly took. It was long and tiring in the snow, but I really don’t have words to describe how incredible this event was. We were met with incredible support from on-lookers, the mood was strong and determined, where I was there was no damage to public or private property and certain no violence against other human beings.
My pride grows every day for the FE students, HE students, school students, parents, teachers and supporters of this cause coming together to make their voices heard. It’s inspiring, motivating and moving to be even a tiny part of this.
Kettling didn’t stop us, freezing temperatures didn’t stop us, snow didn’t stop us. This is the fight of our lives. It’s an amazing political time we’re living in and there’s no better time to kick lingering apathy.