Sunday, May 27, 2007

The "speak truth to power" moment

"I'm tired of hearing this nonsense that police treat residents different to students"
"It's not nonsense, it's my experience."
"It's nonsense"
Lewis Brown thought he could bitch-slap me.
A voice pipes up,
"Who here agrees with Alan?"
Half the hands in the room go up.
"There you are, Lewis. We must all be talking nonsense. Don't ever patronise me again!!"
Now he gets bitch slapped
Inspector lewis Brown and some of his pals from Donegall Pass PSNI had come to a residents' meeting. The community had turned out in force. The anger in the room was palpable. Every speaker bar one voiced furious contempt for the police.
I was having a field day,
"Ever since Robert Peel, who at least was explicit about it, you people have existed to protect property privelege and power, and to keep the little people in their place. Well you're certainly good at keeping the little people in their place and making sure students can do whatever they want. They're above the law. Eveyone in this room knows that nobody will be prosecuted for the sexual assauly that took place in Palestine street. Your people refused to arrest the ones that assaulted David Farrell. You have declared every one of us to be fair game for students. They know that they can do whatever they want to us and you'll make sure nothing happens to them"
The hammering went on for an hour and a half. Almost everyone in the room gave them hell.
Gordon Douglas, the man from Queens, made some noise about student's exams being delayed as punishment. I wasn't having it,
"Gordon, I have had exams delayed. I have had academic year after year written off because I have to live among your students. This year has been written off because I suffered intimidation at the hands of a builder, something that your officers, Lewis, refused to investigate properly!!"
I was eyeballing Lewis. We were three feet apart. He was terrified.
Thus it came to pass, the speak truth to power moment. The bottom line, as Chomsky says, Is that power already knows the truth. It just doesn't care.

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