I realise this could be a very sensitive subject but what right did those protestors have to shout abuse at our lads marching home from war??

I couldn't believe what i was seeing on the news tonight and the police knowing they were breaking our laws yet politically powerless to arrest them all on the spot and put them in custody for a while for some brutality ....sorry I meant questioning 

Is it just me or are we losing the plot here?

                                                                                                                                                                             

it seems its not our country anymore !!!!omg don't start me off                                                                                                                                                                               

Haven't caught any news today and all I've brought up in Google is the sentencing given out today to some protesters from last March. Got a link please?

Why wouldn't the Police arrest people for breaking the law? This lot were all arrested last March for breaking the law. What's different about today's protest?

We have a right to protest in this country and that's part of what our armed forces stand up and be counted for. Much though you may disagree with what a protester is saying, he/she has every right within our (relatively) free society (unless he/she does actually break any UK laws, in which case, he/she is rightly arrested).

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." (Quote usually attributed incorrectly to Voltaire, it was actually the "Friends of Voltaire" who coined this phrase )

                                                                                                                                                                             

Wow Lou that was a bit out of my depth! 

I caught the back end of the news so it may have been the incident last March but the sentencing was today and they showed the footage. 5 people were sentenced for breaking the law by shouting abuse and obscenities at our troups as they marched by. At the time the Police could do nothing but film the abuse even though it was obvious they were breaking the law. The fact 5 of them were sentenced proves it!

Why couldn't they treat the offenders as they would if I was standing on the street corner with my mates screaming sh*t at jo public as they pass by I wonder?                                                                                                                                                                              

People do indeed have a right to protest in this country as long its peaceful and democratic. These people are protesting against what is happening in their land. Well then they should go back to their land and fight for what they believe in,but they wont because they are comfortable here. Enough of their bullshit,protesting against the white infidel. Its the white infidel that gives them a very comfortable life in this country. Is this what our forces past and present have/are fighting for? If I remember rightly they did protest at one of the forces marches and none were arrested. When one white British citizen shouts back at them he was arrested for racial abuse. Excuse me? We let them in and i for one will gladly let them out again. This is not a Muslim country,its a Christian country and they must accept the fact. By all means practice any religion but do it peacefully. Our country,our laws. Abide by them or leave.                                                                                                                                                                             

Ah right OK... gotcha... So... Rather than politically motivated, it was more about keeping the peace, containing the situation and making arrests subsequently, while gathering evidence during the protest?

Sounds like sensible policing to me. Not worth kicking off a full scale riot by stomping into a crowd in yer size 10s if the majority are behaving themselves.

It's a no-win situation for the police really. If they stormed in at the time, while the homecoming parade was passing, they'd have been risking an escalation of a "peaceful" organised protest into a full scale riot and they themselves would probably have been criticised for disrespecting those same troops.

It's not a new thing. Even back in the 70s and 80s, they'd do their utmost to keep the e.g. fascists separate from the anti-racism protesters. If it gets violent, they obviously have to leap in, but while everyone's relatively "peaceful" (even if outrageously offensive), they practice crowd control.

If you were standing on the street corner yelling abuse with yer mates, they'd probably lock you up and throw away the key. Unless you had a couple of hundred mates and you'd organised the protest in advance and kept the police fully informed
                                                                                                                                                                             

I don't think we can really say that the UK's a Christian country any longer. Secular, perhaps, but it's far from Christian

Is this what our forces past and present have/are fighting for?

It's not the be-all and end-all of what they fight for, but it's certainly part of it yes.

I'd rather live in a country where we're ALL free to voice our opinions, no matter how disagreeable I might personally find some of them than to live in a country where you're sentenced to the Gulags or to a public flogging/stoning for disagreeing with the dictator, or for whistling on a Tuesday, whilst blatantly being an unaccompanied female

                                                                                                                                                                             

Lou i thought the 'right to protest' and 'freedom of speech' gave us the right to express our opinions not launch a verbal assault against another person. These people were breaking the law and there was only about thirty of them so hardly crowd control tactics!                                                                                                                                                                             

Picture this, you have served probably the hardest 6 month tour in your life and seen things in 6 months no-one should have to see, at times felt fear like most people will never feel in there lives, and commited to acts of heroism without even thinking about it, not just to save lives of your mates but to save locals, friendly and some not so friendly, but we do it with proffessional indifference or as best to that we can.... To come home to a small but, baying mob calling you a rapist, murder and child killer when all you've seen is horrors committed by so called Taliban heroes and not one person (Police, they were granted permission to protest) does anything to stop them...we'll if british troops weren't so proffessional they might have just shown those little misguided ( but free to 'PROTEST') foreign gents 1st or 2nd generation, just how much we disapproved of their words but that would just not be british would it....WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG IN THIS COUNTRY?????????                                                                                                                                                                             

we have lost the will,when the government allow this type of march.
Ricard has the right idea,and I support him in his post,

just a shame Britain is no longer..................

they dont like our ways,get um out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I understand the sentiments here, but the ones involved in the protest who were judged to have broken the law WERE arrested and they were sentenced today.

So they've been handled in accordance with British Law, as it currently stands.

By all means, if you wish to see an end to the freedom we have in this country to protest, lobby your MP for a change to the Law.

A soldier standing/marching silently, head held high, proud of his/her time spent serving and protecting an ungrateful bunch of people, while receiving verbal abuse from a bunch of cowards wins hearts and minds far more than one retaliating. It's far more than "that wouldn't be British", it's the professionalism of our armed forces, it's part of what makes Britain great and it's part of what makes "us" better than "them".

I'd much rather have this form of protest in public, so that everyone can see what a bunch of twats "they" are, including the vast majority of the Moslem population in the UK, who are equally horrified by the things these few say, than to outlaw all public protest and force it underground to fester and grow.

We've gone too far with the incitement to religious/racial hatred laws IMO, because the only purpose that seems to have served thus far, is to increase the existing racism and actually create racism in people I would never have imagined to ever express a racist view!

Let's keep it out in the open for all to see and ridicule. They'll never increase their support with this behaviour, but they might just win support if we prevent them from voicing their opinions.

A very good and well ballanced post W.  Many good points that are difficult to argue against.  I think you have it bang on.                                                                                                                                                                                 

errr except 1 minor point....  bunch of twats "they" are,   Impossible, not a tassel in sight .......                                                                                                                                                                             

Ooops! My bad 

                                                                                                                                                                             

Being a 'Pads Brat' myself I have quite strong views on things like this & wont put them ...     All I will say is that its strange how some people choose to live by our laws when it suits them & then play the ... cultural difference card ... when it suits them not to abide by UK laws.   Really gets me   A couple of years ago I was in a local shop, it was close to St Georges day & my mother who was with me commented to me at the time she would be hanging out her flag with pride, a comment came from the shop keeper ... you may have your flag but we have your country!   Needless to say he lost a few customers that day.   ***ps, a Pads Brat if you dont know is someone who was born into & raised in Army life ***                                                                                                                                                                             

Pads brat? We used to call em scaley brats in the RAF.   They've now banned Islam4uk under anti-terrorism laws.   Under the Terrorism Act 2000, a group can be banned if it "commits or participates in acts of terrorism, prepares for, promotes or encourages terrorism or is otherwise concerned in terrorism".   Groups can also be outlawed if they "unlawfully glorify the commission or preparation of acts of terrorism.                                                                                                                                                                               

But you should put your views Shell - that's the joy of living in a free society. We're all permitted to hold differing views and to express them, within the existing framework of the law. We're also free to lobby our MPs for a change to that framework.

I just don't get the point of hating every Moslem or demanding that anyone of a slightly different skintone to mine be forced to leave the country. (Most of whom, if you go from place of birth being your "right" to reside in a country, have more "right" to live here than I do!)

I lost family members in Northern Ireland. Both serving in the military and innocent civilians. Does that make me hate every single "Catholic" living in NI? Hell no! I reserve that hatred for those who deserve it, the ones who actually carried out the killings and those who ordered them.

I just can't tar everyone with the same brush. The more hatred "we" express for "them", the more of "them" will grow to also hate "us". I don't want to fuel these groups. I don't want to encourage people to join them and hate the infidel westerners.

If only that was the case Lou ... Look at the woman who stated that EXTREAMEST muslims should be banned from marcing ... she has had death threats & everything levied at her.   As I said in my post ... picking up a law (freedom of speech) when they suits them & dropping it when it doesnt agree with what they say.   Personally the banner at the court of 'Islam will dominate the world, Freedom can go to hell' tells me that thiese people are a very dangerous bunch & although the group has been banned that is not going to stop then, thier views or thier actions                                                                                                                                                                              

No - it's not going to stop them... but neither would banning everyone's right to protest publicly.

If anything, a blanket ban on public protest would only serve to strengthen the position of the dangerous minority and win them more support.

Yes - they ARE a dangerous bunch and that's my whole point. You're not going to stop them being dangerous by forcing them underground and denying them the right to voice their opposition. Keep it public, keep it uppermost in decent people's minds that they're dangerous. If you force it all underground, Joe Public will happily carry on in his ignorance, assuming all is rosy, while it's actually festering unseen.

picking up a law (freedom of speech) when they suits them & dropping it when it doesnt agree with what they say.

But isn't this how all criminals act? It's not special to "Moslem protesters", for want of a better term. If a burglar gets burgled, I'm sure he/she will do their utmost to find out who's ripped them off, possibly preferring to conduct their own style of justice, cos they know the police really can't be arsed and that the punishment is miniscule, but I'm equally sure that it wouldn't stop them carrying out their own burglaries and breaking the very same law.

Legally speaking, this is a free society. If there are death threats levied against someone for exercising their right to free speech, then those levying such threats are breaking the law and should be reported for doing so. (Sorry - I'm not actually familiar with the case you're referring to) It's not society or the UK saying we can't speak our minds, it's close-minded individuals.

Given those circumstances, I say we should speak our minds all the louder and clearer. Let them know that their death threats aren't going to win over the population of our country. Let them know that we stand proud and won't bend to terror tactics, nor will we cower in silence and fear because of them.

                                                                                                                                                                             

There seems to be a lot of use of the 'law' used in this topic but lets not forget that the law is on many occasions abused by the very people it supposed to be used against. Take a look at everyday occurances, knife crimes getting a spank on the wrist, rapist getting of with a deferred scentence, child molestors getting out in 3 years, the law fails every day people in every town and city in the UK.... .........it is however put to good use by criminals and terrorists from other shores not to be returned as it breaches their human rights, what about our rights to live free and happy without the fear of someone blowing themselves up because he wasn't put out of this country as an illegal, instead we sheltered feed and gave priority to them, were they are then indoctrinated in hate filled mosques by other welfare spongers, who have never paid to our system who are capable of working just don't like Abu Coudry £36,000 a year on benefits....I have served 21 years in the Royal Marine Commando's and I don't make that much and have the same overheads as him.....So why are we paying for hate filled wasters such as these to stay in our country if he is so worried about the trials and tribulations in Afghanistan let him live there ...he will be welcome as a friend to the people and Taliban..... oh and incase you think I am racist I'm not I have Muslim friends and black friends the difference is they are happy and contented and work for a living andare proud of the country...lol I used to go out with a french girl before so I can't be too fussy lol (joke)....