Photos from Civil Liberties Conference at Nottm Uni

Looks like a good conference - nice one!

Regarding the Justice Not Vengeance Anti-ID badges (fourth photo), unfortunately there's a big problem with this "ID cards do not stop terrorism" argument.

While technically "true", in that ID cards don't stop terrorism, it really plays into the government's hands, and should be avoided at all costs.

Quoting from our "Stop Using Their Logic" piece, which we wrote in October 2006 aimed at other anti-ID campaigners - specifically NO2ID - who were using this argument a lot at the time (and still do on occasion):

In asserting that the scheme "won't stop terrorism" we help to perpetuate the inflated sense of terrorism as a major and constant threat to our safety, rather than confronting the climate of fear that the government is happy to foster and manipulate in order to cast itself as a necessary protecting power, and challenging at base the government's attempt to force through repressive legislation under the guise of vital anti-terror action.

So basically, when we say "ID cards won't stop terrorism", we fall at the first hurdle - in effect focussing on a symptom, not a cause. Instead what we need to question the legitimacy of the entire politics-of-fear surrounding all "terrorism" legislation.

You can download our "Stop Using Their Logic" paper as a PDF here.