There follows a guest post by James Delingpole, the Executive Editor of Breitbart London.
I don’t know how many people went on the Freedom March through London at the weekend, but it was definitely a lot more than the “hundreds” initially reported by the BBC and Sky [did they get Neil Ferguson to do their arithmetic?], and probably ran into the tens of thousands.
Professor Neil Ferguson estimated that their were 33 people at the protest march today in London
— Sir Truth Seekerpic.twitter.com/IZXYiTlx6m
(@Truth_S_eeker) March 20, 2021
We gathered beforehand in small ‘bubble’-like groups in Hyde Park and tried to avoid the attentions of the large numbers of police who were trying to find an excuse to disperse us or arrest us. Someone said it felt like being in Occupied Europe during the war. Everyone was slightly tense, keyed up, knowing that the police have shown themselves to be much more brutal and unforgiving towards anti-lockdown protestors than they are with, say, Black Lives Matter or Extinction Rebellion mobs.
At a pre-arranged smoke signal – everything was organised on Telegram and announced at the last minute so as to keep the police guessing – we began to coalesce and marched out of the Marble Arch entrance, up Park Lane then right down Oxford Street.
It was, as always at these events, a good natured crowd. Only a minority, I’m guessing, had been ruined by a university education. These were people that we’d call ‘salt of the earth’ and Hillary Clinton would call ‘Deplorables’. There was a great deal more racial diversity than you’d find at a BLM or an XR rally.
As we weaved through the traffic on Park Lane which had been brought to a standstill I expected hostility from the trapped drivers. What we got, though, was solidarity – especially from the bus drivers. They beeped their horns and accepted fist bumps and flowers through the windows.
I joined London Mayoral candidate Laurence Fox, leader of the Reclaim Party, who got a lot of love from the crowd for his pro-freedom, anti-lockdown, open-up-London-immediately campaign ticket. We snaked with the long conga line the length of Oxford Street heading for Holborn, acutely conscious that any moment the Territorial Support Group vans circling us like hungry wolves could close off the side-streets and kettle us in for hours in order to inflict torture by boredom, claustrophobia and bursting bladder.
On this occasion, however, the police were mostly restrained. Some said it was because the crowd was simply too large to confront; others that the police were taking a softly-softly approach after criticisms that they had been too harsh at the previous weekend’s vigil for Sarah Everard. My own suspicion is that they would have welcomed some aggro in order to discredit the anti-lockdown cause (as the state is very keen to do) but that in the event they opted for the next best thing: denying it the oxygen of publicity.
The compliant media certainly helped here. How often do tens of thousands of people march through London’s main thoroughfares on a Saturday with barely a mention in the Sunday papers? I remember, for example, last year most of the Sundays devoting double-page spreads to the Black Lives Matter march – with huge photographs and swooning copy. But this march – in support of a far less politically tainted cause: quite simply an affirmation of people’s right to work and play free of government oppression – was ignored. Sad.
Stop Press: Read Laura Dodsworth’s account of being on the demo for Spiked.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
James’s podcast with Laura Perrins has been a lifeline for me through this period of media induced mass hysteria. I went on several protests last summer/autumn here in the south west of the UK and saw how brutal the Police can be dealing with anyone protesting their right to inalienable freedom. I salute you sir.
I’m annoyed I didn’t even know it was on! First I knew was when a friend started texting me photos! Oh well – next one
They are much more fun when you can debrief over a couple of pints anyway!
I found the mention of not university educated people forming the majority of the protestors irking me.
This from an university educated person.
I guess it means “educated” people like to sit in their nice homes with gardens, 2 cars, 2 foreign holidays per year, 2 children at private school and think ld is just a hoot, whereas “working class people” have a conscious and are prepared to demonstrate for every persons rights?
Is it a dig at universities?
In Germany, from what footage I see from the demos, it is the older generation (late 40-mid 60) which are very active. Yes, many “ordinary” people who are not university educated, but if they are, I guess they went during a time when one still was taught critical thinking there!
No, it means that the people haven’t been subjected to university indoctrination, which seems to be their main aim in recent years.
It’s also a dig at those who sneer at ordinary people who haven’t gone to uni. Maybe it’s more a UK or US thing. James Delingpole went to university himself, along with quite a few politicians now in power, e.g. Michael Gove, so he’s not having a dig at others out of misplaced jealousy. It’s just a counterpoint to our UK establishment.
Telegram was mentioned as preferred means of communication as police do not have access to it? Oh yes? Of course they know all the plans.
And yet the Chief Constable of Somerset and Avon said they had no intelligence that last night’s protest would turn out to be violent. Intelligence and Police do not go in the same sentence.
There are police informers on Telegram, but that is why the organisers planned it in such a way that it was not clear until the last minute where the protest would start – for example the leaders sent up a naval flare of some kind which could only be seen by people nearby, this meant that there was no radio signal that could be intercepted by police. By the time they were able to radio the location to reinforcements, the crowd had gathered and begun moving. This is in contrast to previous demonstrations which were organised in the ‘old’ way with people arriving in chartered coaches etc, which made them easy targets for the police.
Pity about this sort of manufactured bollocks (given Deligpole’s wealthy public school -Oxbridge background rather undermining the proposition) :
“It was, as always at these events, a good natured crowd. Only a minority, I’m guessing, had been ruined by a university education. These were people that we’d call ‘salt of the earth’ “
It’s amusing to find this sort of Tooting Trot blog rhetoric coming from this source
you missed out the last part of the sentence, which was what he was leading up to. ‘and Hillary Clinton would call ‘Deplorables’.’. There are a lot of non-seaboard people in the States who are University educated and are just as intelligent as their compatriots on the east and west coast states. There are lots who are not university educated who are more intelligent than their coastal compatriots.
This was the point being made, that there are increasing similarities between the chasm being created in the UK and that which exists in the US. And its poison.
I doubt anyone seriously considers Delingpole is a ‘Trot’.
In other words, the crowd was largely composed of plebs – ie the ones not working from home.
Terrific. If there’s another one, how do readers get to hear about it?
Next Demo 24th April, London.