Student fees protest: Stick-wielding yobs? Not the nice boys I met at the pub | Mail Online

Having failed to predict a riot, we now have a lot of blather about the full force of the law being brought down on these ‘seasoned anarchists’. This from Bullingdon boys who used to leave huge tips because of the damage they caused.

The full force of the law did not look that impressive on the day and is, indeed, itself subject to cuts. Perhaps the police are like the rest of us and have bought the myth that all students are middle-class and the middle class don’t do this.

Perhaps they believe we have been so groomed for austerity that we will go quietly. Perhaps they did actually learn a ­lesson from the G20 protests when a man died after being struck by an officer.

Certainly, since the Tory coup there has been fuzzy talk of unrest. Why is it a shock it should come from students? They are mobile and able to organise as a group unlike, say, defenders of council housing or the ‘workshy’. They could wait until the next Election to show their dismay, but in the meantime they don’t have a lot to lose.

Financial independence, decent housing and employment are being taken away from all but the very privileged. Tertiary education is no longer a right but a purchase. As Labour intro­duced tuition fees and would also have increased them, this leaves little opposition to coalesce around.

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A peaceful demo is a long, slow trudge and these boys were ambivalent but excited about the violence. One told me he had been chanting ‘Idiots’ at those shoving their way into Millbank, and then found himself inside ‘going for it’.

They all felt deeply betrayed by Nick Clegg even though they had not voted for him. They were all concerned about whether they would be on the telly. They are not entirely stupid.

If this protest had not erupted it would not be front-page news and all sides know this, really. Protest is a game of push and shove with the media, as well as the police and the politicians.

The Right are barking on about organised activists and the NUS. Look at the real story. At least ten of those arrested were under 18. Lots of the kids who swelled the numbers were bunking off from the sixth form and have not even got to university.

The removal of the Education Maintenance Allowance and cuts to Further Education actually will do real damage to the life chances of those from poorer families. These are your actual apprentices.

The demonstration was not only about fees for posh kids. It was about a future in which we know only the price of education, not its value. And the protest was made by those who know that education remains the key motor of their own social mobility.

There will be more protests because neither Clegg nor Cameron has the mandate needed to make such huge changes. Their support is tentative. Those in power, who have had the very best start, look ever more distant from those who are asked to bear the brunt of this crisis.

When the demonstrators got near Millbank and the distance closed, the result was anger. Mob violence is neither pretty nor planned: a smash and grab at power. But I ask you to look, properly look, at the faces of some of these 50,000 kids. Do I see a mob infiltrated by evil?

No. I see our children.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1329466/Student-fees-protest-Stick-wielding-yobs-Not-nice-boys-I-met-pub.html#ixzz15HTco7rz

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Comments

[The Mathmos]

The Daily Mail? The usual readers (as we imagine them) must be quite miffed at their cherished publication having been hijacked by such an islamo-soviet crypto-anarchist point of view.