A serious threat to our liberty

[yambabe]

As some of you will know, the Rock & Blues Biker festival (plus a number of other events) have been cancelled this year due to licence objections from the police "in the interest of public safety". This is as a direct result of fear of retaliation for events that took place last summer.

You may wonder what this has to do with you.

Well the latest event to be cancelled due to police pressure is the Welsh National Motorcycle Show, the plug has been pulled by the owners of the site where it was to be held just a week before it was due to take place. The Welsh is a family-orientated event run by a dedicated organisation set up specifically for that purpose. None of the organisers are members of any of the well-known so-called "biker gangs". The so-called "biker gangs" do not usually attend this event. It is a significant event on the calendars of many of the traders and entertainers who go, and will cause some of them severe financial hardship this year. It was welcomed as a friendly, trouble-free event by the locals who also stand to lose significant business now. Each year a large donation would be made to MAG and several charities were also supported by the profits it made. Now look at the statement from Dafyd-Powys police that explains why they put pressure on the site owners to cancel this show:

[and]

...

[G]

Certainly I was thinking very much along the same lines as you babyyam.

However ulthar, while they are not very big in this country as far as public violence goes, various 'one percent' organisations such as the Hell's Angels and Outlaws are very big on public violence and crime in other countries.
It really doesn't help the biker's cause when they put themselves forward as just bike clubs, when often that's far from the case.

[Stelmer]

I'm with you Jo. Something needs to be done.

I bet this is the same reason why this years' Great Yorkshire Bike Show in Cullingworth was cancelled.

NEC Bike Show is set for Nov 28th - Dec 7th 2008. Late again this year, wonder why?

[MarJay]

Lots of people get murdered in nightclubs, but the Police don't seek to stop UK garage events for example...

Facist bastards!
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[ZaphodBeeble]

Lots of people get hurt and some stabbed at major football events but they aren't all cancelled.

There are many situations where gatherings cause violence but why do they feel the need to pick on the motorists so often?

I am really pissed off about this Welsh show being cancelled, I was looking forwards to it. Lots of money and time has already been wasted in preparation for this event and there will be nothing to show for it.
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[Itchy]

Do something like what?,

What do you think we are a democratic free country?.

My only suggestions are snap meets , ie what we used to do down saaf, we had various group leaders, who 2 nights before are given a text message on where the meet will occur.

and we usually had a choice of 10 main locations and lots of smaller ones, at which we would eventually hook up into one still secret meet location. Sort of like last year when everybody met at Rivington with 4 separate staging areas.

EDIT

I have a feeling that the no more than 3 bikes in a pack without a designated leader = racing , is going to be enforced a bit more in the future...

and to think I used to joke about death camps being setup for anti government dissenters ......

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[Annabella]

Likewise there was a news article yesterday stating that Stratford Council were considering not permitting Bulldog Bash to go ahead too....


This is ridiculous - one person (out of the tens of thousands who attended the event) got shot last year who was on their way home from Bulldog.

Bulldog, Rock and Blues and every other bike festival I have been to are always peaceful, safe and have a much lower rate of theft (somewhere near 0?) than normal music festivals.

Makes my blood boil...
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[Endless Nameless]

It's just 'cos we're an easy (ish) target and shows them to be doing something to the non biking public who, with things like like, will think all biker meets are populated by thuggish, violent biker gangs.
I like Itchy's "flash meet" idea, but there must be some way we can get across to the public that we aren't like the sensationalist media puts across at all, and that these meets are friendly social meets, not a meeting of fucking crime lords

Bloody annoying
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[Hetzer]

Suddenly, as the state nazism strikes closer to home, some of you start giving a shit. Funny how that works, eh?
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[Mudskipper]

Find your MP

You have it spot on babyyam. Something has to be done.

Are MAG doing anything about it?

Oh, and I would like to see their evidence to support this:

[G]

[Endless Nameless]

[Mudskipper]

I have just sent this email to the Rock & Blues team.

It's just my starting point, to get a few points down for future letters.

Obviously will be phrased differently with more background for the MP letter.

Any comments welcome, cheers.

[NickD]

[G]

I can quite understand Rock and Blues being cancelled if they decided there was a decent chance of a reasonably sized revenge-attack, presuming it was Outlaws that killed a Hell's Angel.
Much as "One Percent productions" (yes a name directly taken from the way 'outlaw biker gangs' describe themselves) claim they aren't related to the Outlaws, it's obvious that they are the same thing effectively.

The reality also is, it seems to be in the UK, that the majority of the time rival gangs are sensible enough to keep their activities out of the public eye.

[Mudskipper]

[sickpup]

Yes it is a serious threat to peoples liberty. Question is why blame the Police they didn't start it?

Why doesn't someone recite the names of all the dead going back to Battersea?

The violence has to stop and this is the only way the Police see they can do it.

[neatbik]

So thats it then - no Bulldog this year. I would have hoped that the relevent biker gangs could have kept their activities behind closed doors, but there you go.
It makes me think of a recent post on the same subject (cant remember who by though) - Notting hill carnival. How many people have been killed, stabbed, attacked and raped each year there? Yet it is allowed to carry on.
Is it 'cos they is black? Yeah, it is.
Saying that i know im going to get some flak, but i dont care anymore.
Look at the recent rise in stabbings, a few in the past couple of weeks spring to mind. I remember a copper telling me once that it was the police's job to prevent crime - if a crime happened then they had effectively failed at their job...
Once again the government pigs are targeting the easy targets - us.

[Joeb46]

argh
i hope to god the BMF doesnt get cancled, im going on sunday...
surely they would give abit more notice if they were going to cancle it?
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[NickD]

[Stelmer]

Is that bike rally in Helmsley still on?

[NickD]

[Stelmer]

Cheers.

[Kris]