arms fair protests

“There’s 300 ol’ bill and 15 people onna push bike!”

One of them being me, I ended up in the Metro next to a cheesy Oscar Wilde quote. The 15 people onna push bike found ourselves outside the tube station watched by the 300 ol’ bill watching an escalator take arms dealers and traders up a plastic tube towards the Defence and Security Equipment International Fair at the Excel Centre.

Disheartening of course. I read a poem which I’d written for smash EDO in Brighton – a campaign with much more chance of success and thus became a ‘speaker’. You’ve got to be there I suppose, even though I’m sure the British arms dealers probably enjoyed our presence, proving to the world, and their own sordid conscience, that we are a moral country that allows people to express their views. Allows them to express their views out of sight and out of danger. Those who took canoes and tube trains closer to the action were quickly removed. The police protect business. Most passers-by expressed support.

Do you feel empowered, I was asked by someone there? I feel as an individual I have power to express my opinions, move fairly freely; watch and read with liberty; buy a whole number of things ; have a chance to earn money. As a part of a collective, we are almost totally powerless. The majority of people think it’s wrong to manufacture, buy and sell military weapons, but the ECONOMY insists (says Fox) that we should. So that’s that.

Was also featured as part of some Iranian TV channel report – check the video.