Taking Liberties Showing

Last night was the first documentary of the year shown by OPENMEDIA, Taking Liberties, attended by around 150 people. This year we will be trying to post a blog entry each week after the film. Firstly we want to provoke further debate, and secondly we want to provide people with extra resources - books, articles, other films, websites and campaigns - so they can continue exploring and actively getting engaged in the issues we're talking about. There is an open comments section at the end, but nothing insulting or abusive please. Future events and announcements will be sent out from the Facebook group and the email list (openmedia@umsu.manchester.ac.uk if you want to be put on this), not here. Any suggestions on how this blog may be improved are welcome - we plan to put up a list of our documentaries, useful reading lists etc. but it'll take a bit of time to get it sorted.

So...last night. It was great to see so many people there, but disappointing that so many left straight afterwards. It's really worth sticking around for the discussion and thinking and talking collectively about what we can do. Overall it got a positive response and a number of people seemed pretty angry. It's an excellent introduction to the issue of civil liberties in Britain today and it works well for its target audience. I'd just like to offer a couple of criticisms and points where perhaps the film could have delved a little deeper.

1. There was a very obvious anti-Blair/New Labour thrust to the film. This left the impression that there are a few dangerous individuals in power who are threatening our liberties. However, this is nothing new, but rather a systemic problem. After all, while the Blair government passed all these laws, was there any serious dissent in the corridors of power? Did anyone else feel that the director was a little easy on previous British governments and the other parties? I think the miners involved in the strikes of the '80s might disagree that their freedom of expression and right to protest were protected any better. Constant efforts by the state to restrict civil liberties are far more systemic than simply the whims of a few power-hungry politicians. A brief look at the history of political protest and marginal communities in Britain or anywhere in the world would dispel these illusions pretty quickly.

2. The film had very little coverage of serious police violence. This is something that is likely to become much more prevalent in the near future as the recession hits and people begin to get more angry. The Smash EDO campaign popped up, and here's some more footage of a recent outing to the factory. There were a few people in the room from this year's Climate Camp who will have fond memories of 5am raids and the police's free use of their 'legitimate violence', though what was caught on BBC News was tame. Some of what they did was quite funny.

There are some positives to be had. Recently there have been cases of activists acquitted in court such as the Greenpeace 6 and Raytheon 9. Here's some more footage from Kingsnorth, as environmental protesters refuse to be stopped and searched.

A few other links that you might find interesting related to the film:

• SOCPA, an independent film about the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act.
• The groups No2ID, Amnesty and Liberty, all featured in the film.
• An article on the Forward Intelligence Team (FIT), and the brilliant FITWATCH.
• The Road to Guantanamo, also on the OPENMEDIA shelf.
• Mark Thomas, the comedian who started the mass lone protests has a DVD out called Serious Organised Criminal.
• A piece by Naomi Klein on western companies testing out new surveillance technology in China.
• The website Statewatch, monitoring the state and civil liberties in Europe.
• And finally a documentary and an article by John Pilger on Diego Garcia.

The whole point of this blog is to continue the debates that were started at the film showing, so feel free to let us know what you think...

Hope to see you next week x