Indy Media Watch

Whilst it's a welcome break from the usual antisemitism cheerfully hosted on Sydney Indymedia, a current article is a textbook case of anti-Police propaganda and appears to be libellous as well.

The article is entitled: "Armed Gang Distrupts [sic] Sydney May Day" and says:

Bored gang-members were seen hanging around at the outskirts of the May Day demonstration yesterday. They were dressed in paramilitary apparel, displaying their "gang colours", possibly waiting for the demonstration to become radical, or violent so they could participate in militant "clashes".

Ha ha, how witty calling Police an armed gang.

One commenter writes:

A good joke, except I expect very true.

Oh really? According to the next paragraph:

A homeless man was quietly passing by the May Day demonstration when the gang members began to intimidate him. He was pushed to the ground. The gang members stood around him, holding him down on when he tried to get up.

No obvious irony or sarcasm was intended here, given the attached photograph, reproduced below.



Another comment observes:

The photograph provides little context.

I see three cops on the right hand side standing around, not even paying attention to the other two.

Were the other two involved in a scuffle, would-be arrest or any other form of tactical engagement, I doubt their colleagues (or the chick with the flag on the left-hand side) would be looking in the other direction.

It looks to me like there was a guy passed out on the pavement and the Police tapped him on the back. Pretty reasonable.

It certainly doesn't appear as though they are "holding him down" as claimed.

"Pretty reasonable" indeed, not that this could be expected of an Indymedia report on the Police of course.

A further comment in case there was any doubt:

Another of the three photos originally published shows the "boys in blue" in a more sympathetic light. http://sydney.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=54872&group=internal


maybe we shouldn't use the features page for cheap jibes (and gross generalisations are not great journalism).

You don't say?

Finally:

Turn your brains on before posting such childish bullshit, and even more so before making it a FEATURE!!!

Homeless people do indeed gat intimidated and harassed, so this mock piece comes at THEIR expense, not the cops. And the cops can use it now to "demonstrate" that the anti-authoritarian left are lunatics.

I am sure any such "demonstrations" will have little problem sourcing evidence...

I have no doubt an apology to the officers in question will be forthcoming.