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What you don’t seem to grasp is that police brutality in the US is generally a response to actual crime. In Australia police brutality is being used on normal people who are suddenly criminals because of people like you, even though they haven’t done anything justifying the police response.
Did you watch that video I posted?
I didn't see any actual crimes being committed by most of those people. They were just regular people walking down the street, in a lot of cases. Please justify the use of police batons on single people walking down the street, some obviously not involved in any protesting.
And I agree with you that police shouldn't be heavy handed. But please come on, the arrests you see on the video from Melbourne are no where near as violent as those in the US, so why you're singling us out when you have THAT going on is beyond me. The "shock" that you guys are expressing given how protests are handled in your own back yard is pretty ridiculous.
And you miss the point that mass gatherings during a lockdown are breaking the law.
They were warned they could possibly be arrested and fined if they went out and gathered in defiance of public health orders.
Whether you agree that the health orders are right or not or not is not the point, the law needs to be applied equally. If I have to abide by the stay at home orders the restrictions around mass gathering during an outbreak, then so does everybody.
Otherwise, what's the point? You exempt the protestors then you exempt everyone and lift all restrictions.
Breaking the law by mass gathering during stay at home orders is indeed an illegal activity.
You may not agree with the law, but the police are not arresting people for no reason in that capacity.
People were warned that they could be subject to penalty if they did it. They did it anyway. Some of them were fined (the arrests would have been in response to escalation - like not moving on or whatever they would have been asked to do). That's how the law works.
If I have to abide by public health orders then so does everybody. The hospital system in Melbourne is close to collapse already due to Covid cases, ambulances can't get to people in time because they're ferrying Covid patients to the hospital, and that's with people staying at home. Protesters are ending up in the hospital with Covid. It's not a law without context.
Do you give me carte blanche to flout the law in other areas? How about I go get a few vodka tonics in me and jump in the car and drive the wrong way down the freeway? Do I have the right to to do that? That ok with you?
I am from Australia and what has happened is in Melbourne. Melbourne does not represent the rest of Australia just as San Francisco does. With thinking like that, it would mean I should cross the USA off all the places to see before I die because of what I see in San Francisco with a BLM rally?
I hope your right, when I was overseas met some Australians, nice people and cool accent.
BLM protests arent about going back to work, leaving the country, coming back into the country, peacefully socializing...
People are free to protest those things where there aren’t current laws against mass gatherings, and in cities/town with no current restrictions on such, they are able to do so and do.
It’s not the protests that are unlawful under lockdown it’s the gathering of people in numbers.
Those laws apply to all people in those jurisdictions whether you’re protesting or otherwise.
If you make exceptions for the protestors, you need to make exceptions for everyone.
And BLM protests were about police violence. Why are you making a distinction? It’s funny in a thread about supposed tyranny you separate people protesting police violence from people protesting police overreach and other freedom.
I would have thought they were both valid.
And I wonder where the “just comply with the police and you won’t get shot” crowd are. It’s a different story it seems when suburbanite Aussies are the ones causing civil unrest.
One thing to note - there are stay at home orders in place in Melbourne and technically every one of those people are breaking the law. Whether you agree with the law (public health law during a pandemic) or not, that's the case. You can call it tyranny if you like but that's how the law works. The government is not acting outside the bounds of its power when it comes to contagions.
The whole essence of tyranny, is when a government fully legally votes itself extraordinary powers. An extra-legal power grab isn’t tyranny; it’s just abuse. The great depredations of government overreach in recent history, were fully on the basis of parliamentary votes, constitutional amendments, and judicial review. American history is rife with such examples… the US Constitution regarding “persons in condition of servitude” as being less than a full person. Or the Dred Scott decision. Or Prohibition. These were not storm-troopers goose-stepping down Pennsylvania Avenue. These were reasoned, deliberated and deliberate decisions made by educated people exercising their Constitutional office legally. And BTW, the whole bit about the storm-troopers – on Unter den Linden, not on Pennsylvania Avenue – that was the result of legal, constitutional and at least formally democratic process, too. They go there, not because tanks opened fire, but because of the ballot-box.
Even if police respond professionally and measuredly, the very fact, that a democratic government can legally vote itself such powers, is thoroughly disgusting. Just imagine if we had a virus with say a 70% mortality rate. What sort of emergency powers would then be invoked? Suppose that we had a magnitude 9.0 earthquake, obliterating the Melbourne CBD and knocking out electricity, gas, water and so on. What sort of emergency powers would the government then grant itself – fully legally, of course?
The invoking of emergency powers is the cynic’s delight! It implies that citizens retain their rights at the pleasure of the government, rather than the government retaining its legitimacy at the pleasure of the people. It means that governments are ultimately our masters, not our servants. Of course, in dictatorships and oligarchies and so on, this fact is understood. It’s accepted as a reality of life. But in the democracies, we have the luxurious illusion, that we the voters are in control. In normal times, this illusion powerfully holds. In extraordinary times, the lie is brazenly exposed.
Find me a constitution, of any nation or any epoch, that begins thus: “The sovereignty of the individual is paramount and hallowed. No entity, public or private, can assert mastery over the individual. All authority rests in the consent of individuals, and is summarily withdrawn with the withdrawal of said consent. There is no emergency, no crisis or exigency, manmade or natural, that can subvert the sovereign authority of the individual, or elevate government to a level of higher sovereignty, than that of individuals”.
Maybe Elon Musk et al. will have a better go, at forming a new society on Mars. I’d be happy to write their constitution for them. Unfortunately so far, no one’s asked.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RowingFiend
What you don’t seem to grasp is that police brutality in the US is generally a response to actual crime. ...
Nope. Police wield special powers, and don't hesitate to apply those powers, to whoever crosses their path. None of this is peculiar to the US, or Australia, or Russia, or Zimbabwe. All police do this; it's the nature of police.
This is why, as a right-of-center non-woke white-guy, I say "defund the police". After all, what are you second-amendment-people afraid of? Form a posse, and defend your own neighborhood. Why do you need taxpayer-funded motorcycle-rangers to babysit you?
People are free to protest those things where there aren’t current laws against mass gatherings, and in cities/town with no current restrictions on such, they are able to do so and do.
It’s not the protests that are unlawful under lockdown it’s the gathering of people in numbers.
Those laws apply to all people in those jurisdictions whether you’re protesting or otherwise.
If you make exceptions for the protestors, you need to make exceptions for everyone.
And BLM protests were about police violence. Why are you making a distinction? It’s funny in a thread about supposed tyranny you separate people protesting police violence from people protesting police overreach and other freedom.
I would have thought they were both valid.
And I wonder where the “just comply with the police and you won’t get shot” crowd are. It’s a different story it seems when suburbanite Aussies are the ones causing civil unrest.
next you know they'll be wanting to have weddings, funerals, concerts, sporting events...
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