Comments on: Home Secretary to OccupyLondon: you're scaring the tourists

By: Alden

Alden — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 23:24:00 +0000

I misread this as “so that tourists won’t get the wrong idea about the police.” the first time. Yes, stop protesting peacefully! You’re making our police look bad when they have to beat you with their sticks!

By: Alistair Stray

Alistair Stray — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 00:31:00 +0000

Reply isnt working this is for mdhatter03. Move to somewhere nearer the banks ? Somewhere where they could actually hamper ‘business’. Somewhere that actually fits the cause behind the protest.

By: Cowicide

Cowicide — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 23:08:00 +0000

In the interim, write your suggestion on a piece of railroad board and head down to your nearest OWS.

Ok, I’ll do it! Which one are you at, so you can see it? ^-^

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 21:51:00 +0000

Dean says – The sysadmin there is aware of this problem, but he said it might take a little while to get it back up.

In the interim, write your suggestion on a piece of railroad board and head down to your nearest OWS.

By: Cowicide

Cowicide — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 20:54:00 +0000

Antinous, did you guys know the submit form is broken and has been broken for a while now?

boingboing.net/suggest.html

Just gives an error after hitting the submit button that it can’t reach vex.net:
vex.net/~smith/cgi/mailtobbs.cgi

It’s very vexing.

Anyway…

Anonymous calls off outing of cartel after release of kidnapped member

FTA:

Anonymous IberoAmerica, the Latin American collective within the Anonymous hacktivist group, has called off its operation to expose members of the Zetas narcotics cartel after announcing that a kidnapped Anonymous member was released.

The released hostage also reportedly delivered a message: that the Zetas would kill ten people for every name of a Zeta associate released by Anonymous.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 20:09:00 +0000

At least we have the Olympics next year, which will of course do great things for tourism and the local economy.

When we said aspire to the Greek ideal, we meant ancient Greece, not 2011 bankrupt Greece.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 19:54:00 +0000

By the way, why is Theresa May such a terrible example of a human being?

They’ve been using the same Home Secretary robot for decades. They just change the name and the wig whenever government changes.

By: blastocystitis

blastocystitis — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 18:06:00 +0000

This is an interesting take on the occupation: http://i.imgur.com/JWhlK.jpg

By: Guest

Guest — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 17:25:00 +0000

Why are they there, then? I swear it was to stimulate public debate. But of course your right, much better to scurry off to some out of the way place so people can get on with ‘their business’.

By: mesocosm

mesocosm — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 16:39:00 +0000

It’s funny for me to read this, because I just spent three months in Europe, and the single worst experience I had in my travels was being grilled by customs in London, who wanted to make sure I wasn’t trying to sneak into the country to stay illegally. They asked me a lot of very intrusive questions, and typed down all the answers, and poured over my itinerary. What was I going to do, refuse to answer and be stranded in the international terminal?

That was a much more negative experience than traveling in Athens and seeing large strikes every day, and missing a trip to Eleusis because the city transit workers were striking.

I guess it’s a matter of perspective.

By: Pedro Pinheiro

Pedro Pinheiro — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 15:14:00 +0000

So protesters should move to accommodate commercial interests? My, my. Talk about missing the point.

By: Chuck

Chuck — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:59:00 +0000

So I’m guessing that “You’re scaring the children” didn’t work. (It never does. The children always seem to be giggling and pointing when someone tries to use that.)

By: Nathan Hornby

Nathan Hornby — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:44:00 +0000

Given that there’s a starbucks every 2 yards in central London it’s hardly surprising that they’re drinking starbucks.

The funny thing is that in a strange kind of way this highlights some of the problems at hand.

By: Nathan Hornby

Nathan Hornby — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:41:00 +0000

I don’t think it’s counterproductive; if there weren’t more important things going on in the world, then finding out why Theresa May represents ANYONE in this country would be at the top of my priority list.

She doesn’t half spout some idiotic nonsense.

By: Nathan Hornby

Nathan Hornby — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:39:00 +0000

They’re clearly not getting the 99% argument and think that the protest was started by homeless people.

By: Nathan Hornby

Nathan Hornby — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:37:00 +0000

Sounds like that bit in Arrested Development where there’s a protest outside an army camp, but it’s held in a small cage next to a quiet road no where near anything.

I’d lol if it wasn’t real. Certainly doesn’t sound like the Scottish spirit.

By: Nathan Hornby

Nathan Hornby — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:34:00 +0000

Just to give a little context for the non-brits among us.

Our government uses EVERYTHING as an excuse to increase/protect tourism. It’s the only remaining argument for keeping our monarchy (personally I’ve got nothing against them).

At least we have the Olympics next year, which will of course do great things for tourism and the local economy. If it didn’t cost us 400 bagilion pounds to host that is; and piss of every local resident within a 200 mile radius. TOURISM!

By: teafordinner

teafordinner — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:15:00 +0000

Brilliant! Lol

By: Guest

Guest — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:12:00 +0000

If you say so.

By: Howard Dickins

Howard Dickins — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:54:00 +0000

Arguably, it’s the *correct* idea of the place… Simon Jenkins has a good historical perspective here: http://simonjenkins.com/blog/entry/crucible_of_debate_and_dissent/

By: Squeakstar

Squeakstar — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:32:00 +0000

Obviously Apple is like waaaaay more capitalist than other OS’s in the eyes of the tory scourge!

By: scav

scav — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:26:00 +0000

Hey wait, isn’t she the one who wants to scrap that inconvenient “Human Rights Act”? Why yes, I believe she is. Her rationalisation was, IIRC, that it made it too hard to deport terrorists or something, but it’s clear from this latest ill-informed rant that what she really believes is that human rights are worth less than the marginal income from a handful of tourists, or any other made-up and implausible objection she can pull out of her arse.

By: Lobster

Lobster — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:20:00 +0000

Makes sense. After all, the Church has CERTAINLY never oppressed anyone.

By: fett101

fett101 — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:19:00 +0000

It’s that Apple and Starbucks are thought of/known as high expense brands in comparison to a generic Windows PC and Dunkin Donuts. The general idea being that these may be part of the 99% but they’re still more privileged than the other 95%.

Oh, plus that would make them hipsters too. Everyone loves to rag on hipsters.

By: bjacques

bjacques — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:13:00 +0000

I’m waiting for Tory up-and-comer Priti Patel to weigh in. Her tough, no-nonsense opinions concerning the lower orders, delivered in her posh drawl, are sure to persuade the protesters to see reason!

By: Lemoutan

Lemoutan — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:58:00 +0000

By the way, why is Theresa May such a terrible example of a human being? I’m quite sure she doesn’t think of herself as being – well – just awful. I can even imagine she has friends and maybe even people who actually like her. So it’s a genuine mystery. I know that ‘getting personal’ is generally counterproductive, but this really does intrigue me on a technical level. How does somebody get like that? Did somebody hurt her? That’s the usual thing isn’t it?

By: Lemoutan

Lemoutan — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:48:00 +0000

Perhaps the authorities could set aside spaces in various museums as designated protest zones. Tourists, and the generally curious, could then visit such exhibits without being unduly alarmed.

By: Lemoutan

Lemoutan — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:41:00 +0000

But what’s the thinking underneath this? If you’re using a computer at all, it ‘should’ be a windows box? Are the mac-nay-sayers telling us that microsoft is the voice of the downtrodden? Or maybe the street-cred-seekerati should be using linux on a laptop? And drinking tea of course (certainly not bottled water).

By: Squeakstar

Squeakstar — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:30:00 +0000

Theresa May also made the same dumb mistake on Question Time last night as Louise Mensch did on Have I Got News For you last week. It must be a spin doctored scripted dig at protestors, that drinking coffee (from Starbucks) and using a Apple Mac to communicate online invalidates any protestation about the corruption and lack of responsibility at the very top of a capitalist society. Louise Mensch was rightfully ridiculed by the panel on HIGNfYand the floor on Question Time was over-awed with silence at her “funny” that should could be so stupid and short-sighted.

By: uildaan

uildaan — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:17:00 +0000

ah free speech zones, the cornerstone of every modern ‘democratic’ society