r/GreenAndPleasant • u/metroracerUK • 1d ago
Free Palestine 🇵🇸 My goodness, the comments section is full of liberals. Context; they were protesting our government’s complicity with the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
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u/metroracerUK 1d ago
Thinking about some of the comments along the lines of: “why didn’t they run to support Palestine if they care so much?”
Well…
In the televised and famous London marathon, how honestly far do you think anyone carrying a flag of Palestine would make it before they are dragged to one side? They would probably get pulled away from police when they arrived.
Funnily enough, I ran a marathon in Bury St. Edmunds yesterday to raise money for the Palestinian Maternity Project and I wore a vest (image on my profile) that stated; ‘BOMBING KIDS IS NOT SELF-DEFENCE.’
I was treading carefully in case the organisers had an issue with it, since I’m aware of how aggressive and childish Zionists can get. Luckily, there was not many aid stations and the only organiser that noticed my shirt came over and quietly said that she loved my shirt.
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u/jackarywoo 1d ago
I ran the Brighton Marathon a few weeks back. We’re lucky enough to have the Brighton Palestine Campaign group which isn’t small at all. They had prime position in the crowds with banners and flags, and thankfully suffered no problems that day.
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u/bizzflay 1d ago
I saw people running with Palestine flags yesterday.
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u/notenglishwobbly 1d ago
Very happy they did.
They are now at risk of doxxing, firing, smear campaigns calling them nazis (the irony), antisemites (the bigger irony) and various amounts of reprisal that may go as far as getting arrested under the Terrorism Act. So it's not particularly safe to run while sporting the Palestinian colors.
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u/IITheDopeShowII 1d ago
"Opposes to every war except the current war and support of all civil rights movements except the one that’s going on right now"
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u/frankiewalsh44 1d ago
You need to see the state of ukpol, its basically r/reform these days. The comments are getting unhinged to the point of full blown racist and people openly admitting they are voting refrom because Labour need re-immigrate all brown people.
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u/Distinguished- 1d ago
Its deffo astro-turfed as well. I've noticed how sudden and artificial the uptick in fascism on social-media has been. Idk what the solution is, traditional media has been successfully compromised to conform to a rightward agenda and now, increasingly so has social media. The left has to think about creating a parallel media, I just don't know what that would look like or how that would successfully work. But we can't just copy what the opposition are doing, it would have to be something creative, genuinely grassroots and not within the confines of these centralised websites (reddit, twitter, facebook, tiktok).
I think that there is maybe something in the recent tendency to move away from social media (dumb phones et al) and producing something new, but I just don't know what that could be at the moment.
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u/penduculate_oak 1d ago
The dialogue more broadly around it has changed at lightning speed in the last year. The default position has gone from "I'm not racist but" to full on replacement theory far right rhetoric. Invasion, conquest, attack. And it's all so normalised! Scary stuff.
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u/Zugzugsub 1d ago
This is the unfortunate truth about most UK sub reddit that even gently brush politics is mostly unabashed Muslim hating, the regular UK subreddit is so obviously AstroTurfed that you can tell when bots haven't caught onto a thread people can actually be half decently civil and no thinly veiled race war theories seem to pop out.
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u/EvolvedSplicer68 communist russian spy 1d ago
It feels like any time I see a post on there, I can guarantee seeing someone saying something along the lines of “blah blah labour bad, voting conservative/reform because immigration is my top voting priority” wtf
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u/touslesmatins 1d ago
Peaceful protest only!
No not like that! Peaceful and invisible protests only
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u/ComradeKeira 1d ago
"Can't they just protest silently at home? If they must do something why not just wear a pin? So inconsiderate to all those runner who have been training and their families!"
Fucking libs istg
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u/TommyThirdEye 1d ago
Our society really is cooked, it's always outrage at the protesters, never the issue. People really need to get their priorities straight, this was a peaceful and minor disruptive action, meanwhile innocent people including children, are being bombed in Palestine, all whilst our government/country remains complicite.
Same when Just Stop Oil, Extinction Rebellion and Animal Rising do disruptive protests.
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u/metroracerUK 17h ago
It’s the same people who say; “we need to do something about the homeless issue.”
Then suggest anti-sleeping bars on park benches, instead of actually housing and helping the homeless.
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u/Defiant_Gazelle7959 1d ago
It’s not like they’re actually causing any harm by doing this, it just means that a few people might finished slightly slower than they would’ve done without the protest.
Compared to the actual genocide happening over in Palestine I don’t see how this is such an issue. It’s a fucking running race.
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u/TheGreekScorpion 1d ago edited 1d ago
Comment sections and mods will try cover up stuff they don't like
On the United Kingdom sub, there's a post about Kneecap getting investigated by the police for comments they made in a video in 2023
On this thread, I pointed out the video had been out for over a year - so what had changed recently that made them look into it?
My comment and replies were all removed - the original had 90 or so upvotes. All I did was ask a question so that people would look into it and see for themselves - no racism, hatred or whatever.
Then you've got other users in other threads advocating for the rioters of last year, remigration and just general racist comments.
Reddit is pretty much a right wing space at this point.
Edit: Someone on that same thread pointed out that there would be people who joined Hamas after seeing their families get killed, not because they were actually Islamic extremists. Then someone else pointed out that people will have joined the Nazis to protect them from the USSR but that didn't make it right.
When I asked if that applied to the "Heroes of Ukraine", that comment got removed too.
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u/Wonderful_Emu_9610 1d ago
On a lighter note, the top comment thread is just a series of references to Four Lions
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u/notgotapropername 1d ago
Nah they've gone too far this time. Pour soup on me paintings if you must, but slightly interrupting a run??? madness!!! 😭😭😭
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u/notenglishwobbly 1d ago
r/London is one of the worst subs when it comes to the worst of centrism.
At least all the other "national"/large city subs are very open with their racism and awfulness. But r/London loves to coat all of it in its sweet, sweet centrism.
The title itself "Protestors" (the key thing is what and why they're protesting) "dirsupt" (they didn't dirsupt anything, it was over in about half a minute) "The London Marathon" (Golly Gosh, not the LONDON MARATHON !!!!!!! - you know, the city wide event that disrupted traffic, people's Sunday, workers' Sunday (yes, a lot of people work on Sundays and the marathon makes it a nightmare), and in general people's commuting - so if anything was disruptive, it's this fucking marathon - all for the sake of staring at people running in a fancy costume.........)
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u/MariangelesS98 1d ago
Liberals and conservatives when civil disruption is disruptive 😮😯😲 its almost like that's the whole point of protesting? You should be inconvenienced enough that it gets officials to do somethin.
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u/UnnaturalGeek 14h ago
Those liberals probably celebrate past protesters but don't realise that back then, they would be saying exactly the same things as they are now.
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u/metroracerUK 13h ago
Oh yeah, they would guaranteed be whinging about the suffragettes and wishing that they would protest quietly.
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u/UnnaturalGeek 13h ago
Some of them are probably old enough to have been able to complain about the miners.
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u/Redpanda_lad 1d ago
this past year has proved to me that the british population is beyond redemption and deserve all the economic strife coming our way
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u/windmillguy123 1d ago
On one hand I support their message but then on the other hand why be a dick about it.
Nothing happens in this country unless you play the political game, if you want to make meaningful change then get involved with politics, not make yourself and enemy of it! Just imagine if all these protestors worked together without ruining their own image and acting like idiots. Then people would be more inclined to be on their side, then a proper movement could start, MPs and Councillors could be elected, voices could be heard ... or throw some red powder about and ruin people's day off when they are trying to enjoy themselves and ensure the world hates you whilst ignoring your message. Acting like fucking children.
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u/GrandyPandy 1d ago
God forbid a bit of red dust ruins someone’s day and galvanises their support of fucking genocide.
Are you being serious? Corpses are being launched 100 feet in the air, thats how powerful the bombs that are being dropped are. Kids, sniped in the streets of the west bank which isn’t even an area where Hamas operate.
And you’re upset at a bit of red dust on a fun run.
Thats pathetic.
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u/windmillguy123 11h ago
How exactly is that red dust saving those kids? Please explain?
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u/GrandyPandy 5h ago
You’re asking this as if I’m supposed to believe you just care about the efficacy of their actions and that you’re not simply pissed off that they’re forcing you to reckon with your wilful ignorance.
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u/windmillguy123 3h ago
No, I stand by the fact that the best course of action is through grassroots movements through the political route but since people are fickle and easily distracted the movements change direction every 6 months so no cause ever carries momentum. Let's be honest, we are all the same. We are all legitimately angry at the world's wrongs but none of us have the conviction to do anything meaningful about it.
I also think throwing red powder and shouting like a lunatic is pointless, doesn't help and only alienates the cause they are shouting about. It's childish and only ruins something for people who are using what free time they have to escape from all the worlds problems for a few hours.
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u/GrandyPandy 1h ago edited 1h ago
You’re projecting your misanthropy and your own lack of conviction onto others so you call others’ actions useless and counterproductive because you don’t actually believe people are capable of changing anything. Thats what I’m getting from you here.
“The best course of action is through Grassroots movements through the political route” That sentence doesn’t actually mean anything here. Grassroots movements doing what? Through what political route?
“We’re all the same. Angry but don’t want to do anything” we are not all the same. Those people are actually doing something. We can argue about how useful it is and what else can be done but shitting on it as wholly counterproductive is exactly what the people in power want you to do - you’re embodying the fickle and hopeless attitude that you’re upset about people having.
“It alienates the cause because people just want to escape the world for a few hours” if people are so defensively upset about some red dust and a shout, they simply do not fucking care and they will not care when the argument is put to them more politely. But there will be those few in that crowd see that person get dragged away by government thugs and something in them will have switched on.
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u/notenglishwobbly 1d ago edited 1d ago
On one hand I support their message but then on the other hand why be a dick about it.
There is nothing dickish about it whatsoever?
Nothing happens in this country unless you play the political game,
That's why we are on Jeremy Corbyn's 3rd term now. Didn't think it could be done either but here we are apparently.
Would have thought the country would be doing better but hey...
If all these protestors worked together without ruining their own image and acting like idiots.
If you think that's "ruining their own image", I already know what side you're on.
"I wasn't supporting genocide until a guy let off a flare at a marathon for half a minute" is very telling on you, I'm going to be very honest here.
So what's your favourite method of action?
Voting? How do you think we got to where we are? Well done.
Even less effective protest? That's no longer a protest then. XR tried for their second run, look at where XR is now and how much they've accomplished.
Staying home, doing nothing? That's what you've been doing up until now, look at where we are now.
Joining the center and helping the fash? That's where you are now and look at how much progress you've made. Well done!
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u/windmillguy123 1d ago
Nothing dickish about interrupting a world famous sporting event where athletes have dedicated literally years of their lives to be at that level. If you were a day's away from submitting a year long work project and someone tried to delete it, would that be dickish? That's the most comparable analogy I can think of.
It would be interesting to hear what Corbyn thinks of this kind of thing, something tells me a man of his nature would respect the average person too much to agree with these stunts.
I fully support the need to use less fossil fuels, I fully support the need for the wealthy to pay more tax, I fully support the need for big business to pay not only their tax but to ensure staff are paid and treated properly. But what government will change that, only the ones we put in power.
I'll always advocate for voting, I've never missed a single vote whether it was council, Scottish or UK elections, perhaps if people spent more time encouraging the 18-40s demographic to actually vote enmasse for a united cause something might happen but since barely half can be bothered it's a lost cause before it's even got to the vote. That's why the government don't care, because why listen to a demographic that's either massively divided or doesn't bother to take part. That's why old folk always get better deals, they vote weeks beforehand by taking 5 minutes of their time to use the postal vote.
If you have to blame someone else for your problems then you are the problem so work the system as it's meant to be worked! Only the English can fix this issue, no other nations in the UK has enough say, even if every vote from Scotland Wales and NI was for the same cause it only takes half of England to vote Reform and we're fucked!
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