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Watch this.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-15413255

Even though im not a Christian, I think St Pauls is a marvellous building. My brother went to the capital yesterday and rang me to inform me that a huge number of foul smelling miscreants had camped outside the cathedral and forced its closure.

Do you agree with Peter and think that they are perfectly within their rights to stay?

Or do you agree with Matty, and think that the police should stomp on their tents, force them to move, and beat them with sticks for good measure?

I can't believe they would close such an iconic building.

For once I agree with matty.

The church has a tradition of succouring the poor.

Huh Matty my good fellow, we are the same wave length here.

It's all come up from this youtube channel with some lame human being trying to spark a V for Vendetta change against capatilism. One of my mates on Facebook posted up the video, which I cant actually link as it has been removed for copyright infringment It's what you get for using a scene from a flm for the entire video.

Yeah I agree with Matty on this one...

While i have no love for religion or protesters in general, i can appreciate a fancy building. And that St. Pauls is fairly fancy looking. Plus i like beating people with sticks. So im voting for the rozza's on this one.

Kilkrazy wrote:The church has a tradition of succouring the poor.

Yeah they do, so surely the protestors should respect the church, see that it isnt anything to do with the bankers and move so that they can open it again!

Fairs fair old chap!

The camp is blocking the wrong building if they want to occupy the stock exchange.
Still as long as they are stopping tourists enjoy a pretty building they should be hose with fire.

For feth's sake, Matty - have you been at the Jesus Juice?

Kilkrazy wrote:The church has a tradition of succouring the poor.

They also have a tradition of burning people that annoy them...

I couldn't actually watch the video whith Peter in it, but I'm sure it's the same disorganized drivel with little actual basis in the real world. As they are blocking St Pauls from opening and not the LSX. I believe that the bobbies need to start cracking heads, now. The priests cant ask them to do it openly, but by closing are begging them to. Don't even be gentle with it. CS gas, Billy clubs, get stuck in. Leave those plastic shields at home.

Edit: flip flopped saints names.

marv335 wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:The church has a tradition of succouring the poor.

They also have a tradition of burning people that annoy them...

You say that as it's a bad thing...

These brave crusties have struct a blow for us all!

Protesters 1 Capitalism (St. Pauls Cathederal Giftshop) Nil



Silly church let them stay there the night, lazy middle class ne'er do wells actually think they are achieving something by protesting the city their daddies work in.

There are more people at a non league football match!

It costs £10 to go into St Pauls.

So, to make a long story short:

Mattyrm hates hippies more than he does the religious?

When you look at that ariel view, its hard to understand how that tiny camp can be blocking such a huge building from being used. It seems like lame excuses and arguments - the campers stuff is going to catch on fire and burn the church down! People coming in and out may catch on fire if the camp catches fire! The people in the camp may catch on fire, so we're worried about them too! Bollocks.

If it wasn't for the part about the church losing 16k a day (!) I'd guess they closed it to embarrass the protests and turn public opinion against them, but I'll give the church the benefit of the doubt. It's not hard to understand why the protesters chose that site, given it looks like nothing but streets and parking lots everywhere else around there. I've not been to London, so maybe I'm wrong.

Well, are they perfectly within their rights, or what? I'm under the impression there is the freedom to peaceful assembly in the UK. Are they being peaceful? Why does that incite violence in others? You don't like how they look or where they've stopped for awhile, and you don't agree with what they say, so you think they should be boot-stomped and billy-clubbed? Yikes! Didn't hundreds of thousands of Commonwealth and American soldiers die so that kind of thing didn't happen in our societies? Isn't freedom of speech and assembly something we value? What is so scary about them that we have to drive them off like a pack of coyotes?

My favorite is the part about them 'damaging the integrity of their protest', as if 'peacefully disbanding' will help it! The irony of the church complaining about lost revenue while the encamped are protesting corporate greed is... rich!

murdog wrote:When you look at that ariel view, its hard to understand how that tiny camp can be blocking such a huge building from being used. It seems like lame excuses and arguments - the campers stuff is going to catch on fire and burn the church down! People coming in and out may catch on fire if the camp catches fire! The people in the camp may catch on fire, so we're worried about them too! Bollocks.

If it wasn't for the part about the church losing 16k a day (!) I'd guess they closed it to embarrass the protests and turn public opinion against them, but I'll give the church the benefit of the doubt. It's not hard to understand why the protesters chose that site, given it looks like nothing but streets and parking lots everywhere else around there. I've not been to London, so maybe I'm wrong.

Well, are they perfectly within their rights, or what? I'm under the impression there is the freedom to peaceful assembly in the UK. Are they being peaceful? Why does that incite violence in others? You don't like how they look or where they've stopped for awhile, and you don't agree with what they say, so you think they should be boot-stomped and billy-clubbed? Yikes! Didn't hundreds of thousands of Commonwealth and American soldiers die so that kind of thing didn't happen in our societies? Isn't freedom of speech and assembly something we value? What is so scary about them that we have to drive them off like a pack of coyotes?

My favorite is the part about them 'damaging the integrity of their protest', as if 'peacefully disbanding' will help it! The irony of the church complaining about lost revenue while the encamped are protesting corporate greed is... rich!

Because how they're protesting is more of a nuisance than actually contributing to a step in the right direction.

Well that's just it. Alot of people talk about how the protesters have a point, but we just don't like how they're raising it. And we're not sure how we'd raise it either. In fact we probably wouldn't. Ah well, lets go back to our busy lives, things are good enough, those people are just complainers. Let them eat cake! They should be writing letters to their elected representatives, or better yet, just keep (how do the british say it): hanging on in quiet desperation!

Corporate greed is a nuisance, too (at best - at worst it is literally murderous). Can i just tell it to go away because i don't like how it looks, sounds, or smells?

murdog wrote:Well that's just it. Alot of people talk about how the protesters have a point, but we just don't like how they're raising it. And we're not sure how we'd raise it either. In fact we probably wouldn't. Ah well, lets go back to our busy lives, things are good enough, those people are just complainers. Let them eat cake! They should be writing letters to their elected representatives, or better yet, just keep (how do the british say it): hanging on in quiet desperation!

Corporate greed is a nuisance, too (at best - at worst it is literally murderous). Can i just tell it to go away because i don't like how it looks, sounds, or smells?

Some good points mind you I don't really have anything to add other than I mainly just skimmed over the article as it was a dry read.

murdog wrote:Corporate greed is a nuisance, too (at best - at worst it is literally murderous). Can i just tell it to go away because i don't like how it looks, sounds, or smells?

Well, most of us are probably just going to vote for the type of person that's going to do something about that very issue, though I doubt I have the same level of problem with the "corporations, man!" that you seem to.

It's my way of effecting change without inconveniencing the public at large.

If they're interfering with a religious activity such as going to church service in the Cathedral then don't you brits have some sort of charter or something saying that people can't interfere with that?

Don't get me wrong, MonsterRain. I'm sitting here on a macbook drinking timmys in my nice warm house. I sure don't want to be living in a hippie commune! I don't have any sort of fundamental problem with corporations and industry. That doesn't mean I want them calling the shots with the Arsenal of Democracy! Like a baby with a hammer!

I and others can plainly see the pain and suffering caused by our way of life - both here at home and around the world. (We can say this without being against everything we stand for, are, and have done. We can celebrate the good even as we identify the bad). We could make simple changes to make a world of good. Alot of people realize this. There are vested interests that work to maintain the status quo. If you have, say, two candidates on the ballot, and neither are talking about doing what you want done... how long before people are out in the streets making noise? If we're going to change the system, well - you can expect some inconvenience!

Thank goodness we live in societies where fundamental change is theoretically possible without violence. But I don't think we've figured out how to do it without civil disobedience yet!

halonachos, follow the link to get a look at the situation, the article and comments provide even more context. I'm pretty sure they aren't there to stop people from going to church.

If they are getting in the way of the Christians' hobby, perhaps the parishioners should do something about it.

Monster Rain wrote:So, to make a long story short:

Mattyrm hates hippies more than he does the religious?

Woah.. that's like... deep dude.

Sums it up though! I just hate protesters in general. Whenever I see a gang of people with banners and placards I generally dislike them instantly.




I hate hippies because they are incapable of seeing the big picture. Clearly I am not wealthy, my family are lower middle class and I am a former soldier without a university degree, so what alligence have I to Tories and bankers and stockbrokers?

And yet I sit here when I read some of the absurdly small minded things that the protesters say and just think "how do you think the real world can function?" If we stop all the cuts, don't raise any taxes, give all of the public sector big pensions and pay for everyone's bloody university fee's, then how THE feth are we going to pay our enormous debts off?! If we totally skull feth the wealthy, what incentive have they got to pay any tax at all? Or bother putting any more money into the coffers at all?

I have learned about these things simply by being an adult.

My income is not large, my outgoings are fairly large, every month I tally up my income after tax, subtract the sizeable outgoings in size order (house, council tax, pension contributions, savings, car insurance, cell phone, electricity, gas, water, internet and TV) and then divide the left over by weekends in the month (there was 5 in this month so i had a wee bit less) and voila! Amount of money for booze, food, mini's and general gak... ok but mainly booze.

If this simple process of adult existence has taught me the need to balance the books in order to save some money every month, not go into the red and incur bank charges or have to spend on a credit card, I can only presume that these foul smelling protesters are...

1. Under the age of 15
2. So spoilt by their parents they have never had to pay for anything.
3. Small minded imbeciles whose bizarre hatred or envy of the wealthy/political views/total ignorance impede their ability to think logically.

There IS a happy medium. Sure the wealthy can afford to pay a little more, but raping them in order to throw money at the eternally ungrateful, the unwashed who think they deserve a free ride or those who think that they dont have to put any effort in of their own, reeks of unfairness to me.

So yes, this peasant is siding with his overlords!

warpcrafter wrote: If they are getting in the way of the Christians' hobby, perhaps the parishioners should do something about it.

The great majority of the visitors to St Paul's are tourists.

Kilkrazy wrote:

warpcrafter wrote: If they are getting in the way of the Christians' hobby, perhaps the parishioners should do something about it.

The great majority of the visitors to St Paul's are tourists.

So what? There are some worshippers as well though.

And what's your point exactly?! BOTH groups don't deserve to have their tourism/worship ruined by these fething degenerates.

If some family from abroad, Religious or not, have saved up for a year to visit London, and some of them had the express wish of going into St Pauls, but they arrive and they cant get into the thing, then sue me for thinking that really bloody sucks.

These douchebags arent hurting any bankers, they are hurting normal working class people that for whatever reason want to go to St Pauls, be they tourists, Christians, or merely people that want to walk down the street without tripping over stinking hippies.

I agree that these mongrels should be scoured from the premises.

I disagree with the building, and what it stands for.

Karon wrote:I agree that these mongrels should be scoured from the premises.

I disagree with the building, and what it stands for.

Well, so do I, on both counts!

But disagreeing with the building doesn't give us, or anybody the right to force its closure.

gak, it was moral/legal to do that, Id have bolted the doors shut on every Mosque in England by now...

So what happened to those riot vans with the hoses on the top of them for dealing with this sort of thing, or do they not exist anymore?

Also for a protest against corporate greed, wouldn't a corporate building, bank or government building make a much better place to camp? It's like they chose it out of cowardice since they knew nothing could really be done about it.

Reminds me of this.