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This is a Local Arms Fair for Local People

Dillon Davey | 11.09.2003 14:43 | DSEi 2003 | Anti-militarism | London

Canning Town Casuals Come Out Against Arms Fair

Some of the choicer moments of yesterday's actions around ExCel came when the people who actually live in the estates neighbouring the centre got involved. Whilst these Reebok Classic clad casuals might not have really cared about protesting against the arms industry (although when asked many did agree with the sentiments of the protestors) they were nevertheless up for some aggro with the police. Who for some reason don't seem very popular around Canning Town.

Echoing the Situationist idea that juvenile delinquents are the only true revolutionaries, a gang of lads in their early teens had taken it on themselves to stand shoulder to shoulder with the protestors outside Custom House DLR harranging the arms dealers as 'murderers'. Nearby a gang of high school girls discussed exactly why a protestor who threw a half eaten roll and a paper bag at an arms dealer was being threatened with arrest.

Perhaps the best stand off between locals lads and the boys in blue came when the police were trying to make a way out of their blunder of hemming the core of Reclaim the Streets into the middle of busy Beckton Road. Suddenly instead of being faced merely with a bunch of gaudily atired boys and girls combatting international terror with bongos they were confronted with the raw aggression of a fist of townies.

For a brief time an unspoken alliance developed between the locals and the protestors. Young, baseballed capped geezers mouthed off at the police, looked like turning nasty when the busies tried to push them back, and jeered loudly when a policeman got a bit heavy handed with one protestor. All in all it was brilliant episode, and made the police looked genuniely threatened and at a loss as to how to cope with the unfolding events.

After an initial response of bemusement and bewilderment Canning Town seemed to be genuinely fascinated that a bunch of peace activists should be causing trouble on their doorsteps. Few of them seemed to be aware that a mere spit away people were buying and selling military hardware and when told this they usually became supportive of the action being taken by groups like Reclaim the Streets. One can only wonder why no one tried to inform this community about the Arms Fair before yesterday. Surely most of them would have wanted to come out and say something about what was going on just over the road from the homes where they live and the schools their children attend. After all the local authorities were unlikely to tell them about it.

Dillon Davey

Comments

Hide the following 6 comments

locals

11.09.2003 15:39

my highlight was the local kids on bikes acting as scouts for us and telling up where the police were.

tim


Totally agree

12.09.2003 00:50

I agree that one of the best bits about 10/9 was the reaction of local people. Of those I heard, only one was against us, the rest in favour or just amused. There were wishes of good luck, clenched fists of solidarity, and schoolkids scrambling for our placards. But the best bit for me was when we had been split-up after the roadblocks. A small group of us were trapped in a cul-de-sac, and the pigs were only a street away. A woman came out of her house and told us we could climb over her wall, as "I'd much rather have you lot here than the old bill".

Someone should definitely have leafleted the area beforehand though. I think we could have got double the amount of people if locals had known what was happening in their manor.

Ad Nauseum


locals...

12.09.2003 10:10

indeed, it was excellent to see the school kids out and about and acting with us. on several occasions i was asked why there were protestors around (only to find out that a lot of the time the kids already knew why we were there, and a few regailed me with reasons why the arms fair should be stopped). at one point i witnessed several kids climbing over cars in the traffic jam built up around protestors on the streets. i did see a few examples of local kids throwing stones at us protestors, but more often than not the nike embossed sports wear walked by our sides. several of the kids were particularly vocal when one nameless protestor was wrestled to the floor by police, and the kids ran to his aid, shouting for the police to leave the area as they aren't ever seen any other time of the year in canning town. at this point another officer of the law started to explain to the kids why they were there, only to be angrily talked down by the kids offering a whole string of reasons why the arms fair was utterly wrong.
kids might be more interested in celebrity, tv and david beckham, but as most of the protests were held away from the excel centre (it was virtually impossible to get near) protestors and kids collaborated against a common police enemy.

the peaceful terrorist (oxymoron)


Never see the police on foot in my area either

12.09.2003 13:01

The police are a bunch of dirty stop-outs, they never patrol against violent crime...just come and take details cataloging after its happened. The failure of middle-class people to grow movements is in part due to them being inaccessible to everyone else. Still it seems, mostly men, and groups of people wearing very odd looking clothes, with their own lingo manage to ostracize and fail to attract newcomers. Our country is socially fucked, who ever asked the Canning Town kids what they want...and of course its morally fucked - which is why we manufacture arms. Let us grow! Leaflet the estates and ghetto guys and gals...not just the city centres and lefty-ethnic areas...

On another point - why not wear body armour to demonstrate, it looks like be bloody well need it these days...if protestors dressed as the riot control coppers - and we better organised, it would be a moral victory over violence (perhaps they wouldn't start on us).

Mikey Nike


samba band did some leafletting, but so much more was needed

12.09.2003 16:51

The Samba band did leaflet the area for about a month beforehand, doing performances outside local shops and discussing with locals what was about to happen at Excel. Many who received the leaflets were outraged angry and upset when informed about the arms fair, and some did say theyd be coming out in support. It would have been nice if a few other groups could have helped in publicising the event.

Apart from that, yep, the locals really looked after us. Beautiful.

phatpat


...just to clarify

12.09.2003 17:16

oops! Ok I've been out of the loop, and diddnt want to imply that noone else at all was involved in publicicing DSEI, I just dont know who else was involved in publicity. Anyway, my point still stands that it wasnt well publicised which was shocking. Small activist groups dont have the resourses that groups like f'rinstance the stop the war coalition have. Wonder where all their posters were, eh?

phatpat


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