Students attack Leinster house with Mars Bars

Seaneh wrote: »

I have no idea what you are talking about....
As for numbers, I have no idea, odds are the majority of them weren't recorded and there have been no figures reported that I can find, as is usually the case in such instances..

You have no idea of how many "students" were injured but you do know it was many, many more than the gardaí?

The other case was a hilarious example of people who will spout any old shíte to put the blame on the gardaí, even when they have no clue what they are talking about, and secondly that there was video evidence that the injured protestor in question was in fact hit by a second protestor. No, no, Gardaí are thugs, they did it.

Seaneh wrote: »

In my personal experience, no, they don't..

...and in my experience they do.

Seaneh wrote: »

The posted above backed it up fairly well.

One 2-3 second example of dragging someone between garda lines. Yes unfortunate that he seems to have ended up grabbing the lad by the hair for a split second as he was trying to grapple with him. That doesn't even strike me as an excessive use of force tbh.

ya-ba-da-ba-doo wrote: »

What's worse is the attitude shown by the USI and its leadership in blaming peaceful protesters for starting the confrontation.Nothing but a bunch of sell-outs looking to make it in politics.

There vast majority of the marchers weren't involved in that incident whatsoever. The USI were correct in pointing that out.

Seaneh wrote: »

Yes, from the videos you can see several examples of people who have been injured.

Yet you have no idea how they were injured or who by. From the videos you can see several people falling on the road by themselves, and I am sure some of the missiles landed on protestors at the front..

Seaneh wrote: »

Are you suggesting that the gardai only lashed out at those who were attacking them? what about people sitting on the ground who were hit? Attacking people who are sitting down on the road seems fairly excessive to me by the way. pull them out of the way, sure, but why do you need to swing a batton at someone sitting on the ****ing road?

There wasn't the manpower to hold the line, disperse the crowd and remove people safely one by one. Neither was there the time to do this. You swing a baton (most of the time not even making contact) because it encourages people to move back and get off the ground.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

I'm sure there were a lot of protesters who sat down because they were thinking to themselves "No way, I'm not moving, I have a right to protest here". They didn't think along the lines that hindsight allows us to, which is "By sitting down, I am preventing the Gardai from getting at that scum throwing stuff at them"..

Idiocy and immaturity is not a valid defence.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

prinz, in various shots in various videos there were at least four incidents where I heard an ambulance being called for. Undoubtedly the people who got batoned were injured, as was "Vanessa", bleedy-head guy, bleedyhead guy #2 and bleedy nose guy. We're already above Garda injury numbers here, there's no questioning it really...

...and no idea how these injuries were actually caused.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

The threatening, menacing swinging of the baton also looks fairly awful for the Gardai and a fair few of those swings connected with people....

It's called doing their job.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

All of these decent students would have moved on if there'd have been a safety notice "If you don't move back up to Merrion Row to continue your protest we'll use teargas or the watercannon to disperse you. You can't stay here, it's a safety issue. This is nothing to do with your right to protest." I know I'd have moved on if I heard that myself, I'm not looking for trouble or of a "Fu*k the police" mentality, I'd have been looking to protest. It would have thinned out the crowd to just the scumbag element left, and then have at 'em..

You need a someone to tell you that? Any legitimate students who stayed put when they saw what was going on put themselves in that position. The 'scumbag element' don't want to be left, they want to mingle and hide and use real protests like this to cause trouble.

The vast majority of the decent students were well away of where the trouble was engaging in a proper protest unmolested. Anyone who stayed behind was inviting trouble on themselves.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

It's the seemingly "OMG, a person, hit it!" attitude that most have a problem with and worse still there doesn't seem to be any evidence that effort was made to separate them into troublemakers/innocents either before charging/batoning or during it.

Next to impossible while you're holding a line trying to defend State property. As you said earlier it's easy to look back in hindsight and say they should have just grabbed the trouble makers, not so easy in practice. It was textbook stuff from the gardaí tbh, and yes someone people inevitably got injured but there was no real alternative.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

Of course you need people to tell you.. .

They should probably spend more time in college and less time on the streets and learn to think for themselves then. Wasn't this a protest against "the man", "f*ck police brutality" etc. and now you are saying they need the gardaí and "the man" to do their thinking for them?

Of course injuries were caused, that's pretty inevitable in the situation as it was. If the POU were going in with the intent of beating the head off people they wouldn't have been able to walk away.

TouchingVirus wrote: »

The textbook needs changing, as I said to my Garda friends, it appears you skipped a few steps and went from "Ok, that's a bottle in my face, that's grand" to "Come here and I bait the head off ya" in one go.

No it didn't, and no steps were skipped. Uniformed gardaí were pinned down, they were reinforced at the door by the POU, lobby was cleared, POU formed line with uniformed behind them and gradually pushed and area large enough that they could take people behind the line and out of the trouble area. Moved the crowd up the street to a larger open area and dispersed. Well done.

prinz wrote: »

They should probably spend more time in college and less time on the streets and learn to think for themselves then. Wasn't this a protest against "the man", "f*ck police brutality" etc. and now you are saying they need the gardaí and "the man" to do their thinking for them?

Of course injuries were caused, that's pretty inevitable in the situation as it was. If the POU were going in with the intent of beating the head off people they wouldn't have been able to walk away.

If it prevents the real innocents from getting caught in the crossfire then yes, I do think the Gardai need to make at least some effort to defuse the rapidly escalating situation instead of letting it reach boiling point and whatever happens, happens.

I'm not even sure what the intention comment is about to be honest, I never said the POU intended to beat anybody

No it didn't, and no steps were skipped. Uniformed gardaí were pinned down, they were reinforced at the door by the POU, lobby was cleared, POU formed line with uniformed behind them and gradually pushed and area large enough that they could take people behind the line and out of the trouble area. Moved the crowd up the street to a larger open area and dispersed. Well done.

Completely ignores the methods that were used. The problem for me isn't what was done, it was how it was done. The Gardai went with the bashing everybody method which is wrong in my opinion.

ya-ba-da-ba-doo wrote: »

The guards chose to act in an unjustified, aggressive manner towards what was a peaceful protest. This power-tripping ignorance created confrontation..

It would be laughable how badly the Gardaí handled it only a good few people got hurt.

What's worse is the attitude shown by the USI and its leadership in blaming peaceful protesters for starting the confrontation.

Nothing but a bunch of sell-outs looking to make it in politics.

I'm sorry, but this is total poppycock. If you look at any of the videos on youtube, there's maybe one where the gardaí are shown unfavourably. You'll see links to about 30 others where it's the students who are clearly being twáts. I was there and it was completely clear that the force was necessary when the rioting hit a certiain point.
According to a good friend of mine (a class rep in ucd) one of the 'sinn fein types' (i'm not sure exactly which politica org) was up with a microphone shouting "get them lads, get them". Directly encouraging violence towards the guards. Absolutely 100% there to cause trouble, nothing less.

The twáts were firing bottles, eggs, cans - anything - and I actually saw a girl get knocked clean out. Blood everywhere. Saw some scumbag throttling one of the horses too. :mad:

I was watching the news later and it was no surprise to me when I saw and recognised one of the guys who was involved in the 'peaceful' sit in. I'm in 2nd year now but was briefly friends with one of those guys last year. I ditched him pretty soon when I realised he was basically a socialist nutjob. I know his group and his 'type' and believe me, they are not "peaceful".
I attended one of their meetings once (completely naive first year) and they basically had no qualms about using violence to achieve their 'aims' and were all round trouble makers tbh. I remember thinking that all of them were quite nice...(to me) but I swear, their ideas and beliefs of what 'needed to be done' were just remarkable.

As for the SU people, I'd agree somewhat. But it seems to me there was a good intention there for the protest.

I'm not sure if you were there but the atmosphere was great for a good while. Some people messing about with cans in their hand but that was inevitable. It was only when these people came in with their political nonsense and violence that it turned poisonous.
The day was defintely hi-jacked and it's ignorant to say otherwise imo.

Garda watchdog to examine footage of protests

VIDEO footage of the student protests in Dublin earlier this week is to be examined by the garda watchdog after complaints were received about the behaviour of some gardai during the demonstration.

The footage was sent to the Garda Siochana Ombudsman Commission (GSOC), the body which investigates complaints against the gardai.

So far, 10 complaints about the conduct of gardai have been lodged following the rally, which saw violent scenes between some protesters and officers.

Three people were arrested on Wednesday after violent scenes in central Dublin during the march against changes in student funding.

Yesterday, a series of complaints were made about the policing of the event to the GSOC.

A GSOC spokesman said all of the complaints relate to garda behaviour on the day.

Up to 25,000 students from around the country took part in the march. Tensions rose after some of the marchers tried to make their way from Kildare Street to Merrion Square but were stopped by gardai in front of the Department of Finance building on Merrion Row.

Internet

A number of the protesters took video footage during the incident, some of which has ended up on the internet.

It is understood that some of the footage shot during the demonstration is being used as part of complaints made against the gardai.

Staff at the GSOC will now sift through the complaints and decide whether they are valid.

Last night the spokesman said there are various degrees of specific information contained in the complaints.

"The point we would make is that complaints are simply complaints," he said.

"The first thing we have to decide is if they are admissible or inadmissible. And after that we will see what form, if any, the investigation will take."

The GSOC can only investigate complaints against particular members of the force.

After the clashes, a number of students blamed the confrontations on the republican group Eirigi and accused its members of inciting the anger.

It is unknown whether the complaints to the GSOC came from students or Eirigi.

Three gardai were injured after they were hit with objects thrown by demonstrators.

The garda public order unit drew batons during the confrontation and the crowds were eventually dispersed by the mounted officers and garda vans.

It seems everyones question as to who was to blame will be definitively answered soon enough, well, by soon enough I mean eventually, and by that I mean possibly..
I find it interesting that people are drawing a line between students and extremist nutjobs, you will find there is such a thing as student extremist nutjobs (in fact I'm pretty sure a short-term blind allegiance to the left is a stereotypical student phase no?), and that both the media and those with "first hand accounts" are probably right in their labelling of those involved.

wonderfulname wrote: »

It seems everyones question as to who was to blame will be definitively answered soon enough, well, by soon enough I mean eventually, and by that I mean possibly...

Even if a complaint is upheld it relates to an incident and in no way can blame for the whole thing be derived from same.

Would people PLEASE quit using the word "slap"?

A slap does NOT draw blood.
If you're walking around with blood streatimg down your face or spitting blood from your mouth, what was done to you was A LOT worse than "a few slaps"

Feck's sake, how stupid can people get?
Unless a guard is directly threatened with violence, they should never use such force to force compliance. Ever.

Talk about disproportionate.

Words do not merit getting the **** kicked out of you.
Sitting down peacefully, however illegally, does not merit getting the **** kicked out of you.

For the love of God have some proportion. Nobody is arguing the guards had no right to take action. They did NOT have the right to use such extreme violence.

Threads like these make me lose faith in humanity

Also, one other point:
"If you do X, what do you expect?" does NOT justify ANYTHING.
Seriously, if a woman got raped and someone said "you were walking on your own at night in a miniskirt, what do you expect?" does that justify the rape?
NO.
It does indeed make the person foolish, but it does NOT justify the actions of the rapist.
IF someone got burgled when they left their front door unlocked and someone says "what did you expect?", does that justify the robbery? NO. It does indeed mean that the people were stupid, but the actions of the robbers are still their own actions and they still chose to do it.

Just as in this case, the students may have been in a position where they should "expect" to be brutalized, but that's a ridiculous argument in itself. There should, in a real democracy, NEVER be a situation where you can "expect" to be brutalized by the police. They're there to protect the people and should only ever use JUST enough force to do that, protect the people. Not get revenge for having their feelings hurt. Not "teach people to respect authority". Not any other BS people in this thread are spouting.

Their job is to protect the public. Any violence they use which was not 100% absolutely necessary to protect someone's life or body is unjustified. Period.

You are just the people who will literally roll over when the next dictatorship comes. And I do NOT mean that as an insult, I mean it as a warning. Wake up. You're sleepwalking us into a society of compliance and "if the police did something wrong, they were probably justified". If it's wrong, it's NEVER justified.

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

Would people PLEASE quit using the word "slap"?

A slap does NOT draw blood.
If you're walking around with blood streatimg down your face or spitting blood from your mouth, what was done to you was A LOT worse than "a few slaps"

Feck's sake, how stupid can people get?
Unless a guard is directly threatened with violence, they should never use such force to force compliance. Ever.

Talk about disproportionate.

Words do not merit getting the **** kicked out of you.
Sitting down peacefully, however illegally, does not merit getting the **** kicked out of you.

For the love of God have some proportion. Nobody is arguing the guards had no right to take action. They did NOT have the right to use such extreme violence.

Threads like these make me lose faith in humanity

Also, one other point:
"If you do X, what do you expect?" does NOT justify ANYTHING.
Seriously, if a woman got raped and someone said "you were walking on your own at night in a miniskirt, what do you expect?" does that justify the rape?
NO.
It does indeed make the person foolish, but it does NOT justify the actions of the rapist.
IF someone got burgled when they left their front door unlocked and someone says "what did you expect?", does that justify the robbery? NO. It does indeed mean that the people were stupid, but the actions of the robbers are still their own actions and they still chose to do it.

You are just the people who will literally roll over when the next dictatorship comes. And I do NOT mean that as an insult, I mean it as a warning. Wake up. You're sleepwalking us into a society of compliance and "if the police did something wrong, they were probably justified". If it's wrong, it's NEVER justified.

I'm sorry, you were talking about being proportionate?
You call what happened "extreme violence"?
I am sure the guys removed by force by Gardai have a lot in common with rape victims :rolleyes:
A thread in an internet site makes you lose your faith in humanity? :rolleyes:
The next dictatorship? :

You are either a comic genius or I worry about your ability to understand words like proportion, ha