Comment by vintermann
2 hours ago
It's not literally the same of course. But you should wonder, how much of the difference is due just differences in how much they need to do?
If South American dictatorships could have their way with less blood and less noise, don't you think they would prefer that?
I'm reminded of a tragicomic recent admission from Nate Silver of 538 fame. He said Disney almost never interfered in their editorial process, as if that was a good thing. What that really meant, after all, was that Disney was perfectly willing to interfere in their editorial process, but almost never felt the need to. (As you would expect. I mean, why would Disney care about political polling?)
Could it similarly be that the UK government is perfectly willing to engage in brutal political suppression, but rarely has a need to? In that case maybe people are right to sound the alarm even though we haven't reached South American dictatorship levels yet.
I mean, given that is hasn't worked and hundreds of people have continued to stand up and be arrested for supporting Palestine Action, I'd say that's a no?
It still stinks through and through of course.
It hasn't worked in changing policy, or meaningfully changing who's in charge. Currently the government is getting its way with this sufficient level of brutality.
I think it's likely they will get still more scared that they won't, and ramp up the brutality accordingly.
The path forward is clear: Reform gets into power, builds their own paramilitary "immigration enforcement" groups a la ICE, and you get the occasional summary execution in the streets, along with arrests based on UKs unmatched surveillance system.