# SMEAR STORIES - the GOOD, the BAD and the BIZARRE



## DaveCinzano (Oct 8, 2013)

Anyone have any notable smear stories from the papers to share?

Would be nice to have a handy list of some of the most brazen ones - like "samurai swords at J18", the now-traditional "packed lunches and petty cash", or the "bussed in agitators" with a hint of racial profiling from riots of yore.

Inspired by today seeing this rather half-hearted attempt from Australia:



> *East West Link leader exposed as serial pest protester*
> 
> *AN East West tunnel protest leader has been exposed as a serial agitator, prompting claims that local opposition to the $8 billion road link has been hijacked.
> *
> ...



Short version: 

People protest against an A$8bn private tunnel/tollway project in Melbourne; politicians and construction company don't like this; police deployed aggressively; politicians cite "serial protesters" as driving force; media digs up a few clippings to try and make the soundbite come to life.


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## silverfish (Oct 8, 2013)

Are you suprised by this?

Surely re posting just strengthens the bullshit


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## DaveCinzano (Oct 8, 2013)

silverfish said:


> Are you suprised by this?



No.


silverfish said:


> Surely re posting just strengthens the bullshit



Not really - clearly this is a thread looking to collect together the proven nonsense.

It would also be handy to pull together the earliest manifestations of old chestnuts, identify serial offending journalists who act as conduits for this sort of nonsense, and see if there are patterns emerging.

Plus some of the stories are quite funny.


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## butchersapron (Oct 8, 2013)

silverfish said:


> Are you suprised by this?
> 
> Surely re posting just strengthens the bullshit


Identifying monsters is a good way of helping people identify other monsters and laugh at them. Bizarre response.


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## Dogsauce (Oct 8, 2013)

I remember after that (peaceable) power station protest on the Thames a few years back the police displaying the arsenal of 'weapons' they'd confiscated during a raid on protestors which included things like tent peg mallets and kitchen cutlery. A laughable smear attempt.


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## DaveCinzano (Oct 8, 2013)

There were some memorable ones around in the RTS/J18/N30 etc days, including the _Sunday Times_' *City anarchists stockpile arms* (which doesn't appear to be on its website anymore, but which has been faithfully C+Ped for posterity elsewhere, eg.



> ANARCHISTS are stockpiling illegal weapons worth thousands of pounds, including tear gas and stun guns, for a planned riot in the City of London on November 30. In two separate transactions in the past six weeks, at least 34 containers of CS gas and four stun guns capable of delivering a 50,000-volt electric shock were purchased by Reclaim the Streets - one of the groups that wrecked property worth £2m in the June 18 "carnival against global capitalism" in the City. Both transactions took place in north London.
> 
> The weapons, which are illegal to buy and possess under the firearms act and carrying a maximum sentence of 10 years' imprisonment, were imported from France and sold by a gang of nightclub doormen working in the Euston and Camden Town areas. On the black market, CS gas canisters cost £35 each and stun guns sell for £200-£300.
> 
> ...



That one was written by Edin Hamzin and Mark Macaskill, the latter who seemed to get quite a knack for this sort of thing.

Another recurring figure was Jonathan Ungoed-Thomas, who kept (ineptly) signing up to various political e-lists trying to get the lowdown on all the latest hip and happening horizontally-organised anti-capitalist shenanigans:

http://www.ntk.net/ungoed/


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## DaveCinzano (Oct 8, 2013)

Here's a brief selection of Macaskill's _Sunday Times_ (£) stories which mention anarchists on the lead up to and protests at the Gleneagles G8 summit in 2005:

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto...Macaskill&offset=0&hits=0&service=searchframe


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## DaveCinzano (Oct 11, 2013)

Related blog post of interest:

*‘Outside elements’ and the 1981 riots: The Thatcher government’s profiling of the British left*


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## TopCat (Oct 15, 2013)

David Rose wrote in the Guardian (1986) that Class War was run by ex leading members of the National Front. 

David Rose is a cunt.

Only one of the above is a smear.


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## TopCat (Oct 15, 2013)

This analysis originally appeared in the Anarchist fortnightly Freedom on 15 July 2006. Nearly all of the journalists listed are still ‘in the field’ today. Sightings of further bullshit from these ‘professionals’ will be gratefully received………

*The Land of Make Believe*
For some twenty years any journalist wanting to file exaggerated, lazy or downright slanderous copy has had one staple source for stories – Class War. Sometimes the journalist concerned has been given smears to peddle by Special Branch or MI5, sometimes they are able to come up with an inaccurate article all on their own.

From the hundreds that have appeared, Class War proudly presents ten of the biggest whoppers from our mouldy mound of press cuttings.

And for any journalists reading, before you write your piece please consider whether you can match the following all time classics….

*10. Swedes 2 Turnips 1*
That Class War was behind the rioting in Gothenburg in 2001 at the demonstration against the EU summit (Jason Burke, Kamal Ahmed and Lars Bevanger, The Observer, 17th June 2001). Not one member of Class War, from either the UK or Europe was there. The price of a pint in Scandinavia puts us off travelling there. Some of us did watch the footage on telly though.

*9. Who Do You Think You’re Kidding Mr Hitler!*
Class War is a fascist organisation (David Rose in the Guardian, 30th September 1985) and Union Jack tattooed CW members provoked the 1985 Brixton riots. Handed to the Guardian by self-confessed spook Gerry Gable of Searchlight magazine, the paper was forced into a sorry retraction shortly afterwards.
8. Yuppiecide?
‘Eastenders Stars Targeted by Class War Terrorists’ (News of the World magazine, 5th July 1987). The colour picture of Leslie Grantham in a sniper’s target was the only good thing about this piece, which claimed we planned to assassinate certain actors in the top BBC soap for betraying their class.
7. Gruesome Threesome?
That former Class War national organiser Tim Scargill was an informer for fascist group Combat 18 (Searchlight, April 1993). Gerry Gable again, this time attacking an ex-member of Class War alongside Malcolm Astells of Anti-Fascist Action and independent researcher Larry O’Hara.

This nonsense produced a storm of protest and when Searchlight produced their history of C18 (White Riot by Nick Lowles, Milo 2001) Scargill, Astells and O’Hara did not warrant a single mention between them. All of which begs the question if Searchlight were not willing to stand by their story, why did they print it in the first place?

*6. Class War Vampires!*
Following a ritualistic murder case in Germany, the Evening Standard magazine expressed concern that London is a hotbed of vampire activity (‘In Search of the Urban Vampire’, Nick Compton, 5th April 2002). Compton interviewed the Rt Rev Sean Manchester of Highgate who styles himself as the UK’s leading vampire hunter.

Who could doubt his credentials when he states of vampires:

_“A significant number engage in satanic practices and have contact with established diabolists. Many are anarchists and some support Class War. A handful are neo-Nazis. Some are both”._

Look out for those neo-Nazi anarchist Class War vampires the next time you go to Highgate Cemetry!

*5. International Conference Shame!*
To the Daily Star only one thing could be worse than a Class War member – Class War members who are not even British, meeting – in London! How else to explain the distress the Star went through on 12th September 1991 when its editorial thundered “Instead of holding rallies they should be stuffed and exhibited at the Natural History Museum with the dinosaurs they resemble so closely”.

*4. Marked Men?*
From 1999-2000, the Sunday Times ran a series of ever more ludicrous articles by lanky streak of piss Mark Macaskill. What set Macaskill apart from his contemporaries was the range of groups he targeted with his pen, and his extremely obvious and failed attempt to infiltrate the Sunday Times tea boy into London Class War.
The highlight of his investigation came when he employed a photographer to target Middlesex University academic Jock Young, who Macaskill believed to be the leader of Class War. He is not, and indeed has never even been a member or supporter of the group!

After getting several home addresses of Anarchists (presumably from the police) Macaskill’s eventual expose of Class War (Sunday Times, 14th May 2000) left everybody who knows us scratching their heads).

Macaskill seems to have gone a bit quiet of late – could he have followed the route David Shayler took of working for the Sunday Times first and then formally joining the security services afterwards?

*3. Pinocchio’s Nose*
‘The Riot Puppeteers’ screamed the Daily Mail of 25th July 1992. It seemed that the riots of the long hot summer of 1992 did not occur because people do not like the police and actually rather enjoy throwing bricks at cops, but because “members of the Class War anarchist organisation are orchestrating the unrest in Burnley and Huddersfield, using CB radios and scanners to monitor police communications.” Whatever next!

*2. Nazis of the Left!*
So screamed Daily Mirror pen-pusher John Merritt (17th February 1987). Our crime? Booing actor Tom Watt, then better known as Lofty in Eastenders, who had opened a yuppie housing development in Hackney. What did he expect – praise?

*1.Digging Up Diana!*
By a distance, the best ever story about Class War was by Tim Luckett in the Daily Mirror of 27th August 2000. Class War were apparently planning to dig up the body of Princess Diana from her island grave at Althorp, Northamptonshire. Thankfully for the Spencer family we had been thwarted in this dastardly deed by an undercover TV reporter. The worms of Althorp could carry on eating.

Luckett quoted a ‘source’ close to the investigation.

_“The anarchists are highly organised. They have been liaising in code via the pages of the Big Issue and group members contact each other with pagers.”_

Needless to say no such plan, or investigative journalist existed, and no TV programme appeared. The ‘plot’ itself though had already been published in the form of a novel – Anarchist by Class War founder Ian Bone, some two years earlier.

There are lots of good critiques available of the media, Inventing Reality: The Politics of the Mass Media by Michael Parenti being one classic. That the media exercises power without responsibility, that they are easily co-opted by politicians and other powerful figures and that journalism tends to reflect the middle class concerns and interests of middle class journalists is perhaps obvious. The articles above however suggest something more – that many journalists are idle, prejudiced and perhaps more importantly, nowhere near as clever as they actually believe they are.

*Class War Federation*


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## audiotech (Oct 18, 2013)

MI5 during the Wilson era couldn't distinguish between Social Denocrats and Communists. Did a lot of burglaries across London too. Bungled quite a few.


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## Delroy Booth (Oct 19, 2013)

audiotech said:


> MI5 during the Wilson era couldn't distinguish between Social Denocrats and Communists. Did a lot of burglaries across London too. Bungled quite a few.



The confusion the security services of this period had in differentiating between David Owen (right-wing Labour MP) Will Owen (left-wing Labour MP) and Bill Owen (Labour party member better known as Compo from Last of the Summer Wine) tells me everything to know about the competency of the security servies in this era.


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## DaveCinzano (Feb 6, 2014)

Here's a good one from the _Sunday Times_ about J18 (the ‘Carnival Against Capitalism’ on 18 June 1999 in the City of London and elsewhere around the world, marking the G8 summit taking place at the time in Köln) - Kieron Sharp's LOLsome “Thirty quid and a packed lunch” claim:












From 22/6/99 - can't find it on either the _ST_ website of the Wayback Machine. Just as well I printed loads of stuff out!


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## rekil (Feb 6, 2014)

Dublin 2004. PC Mark Kennedy/Stone was there.


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## DaveCinzano (Feb 6, 2014)

Are you sure that's not a PD intervention?


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## ska invita (Feb 6, 2014)

Whos's the stooge at the Evening Standard who likes to post up anarchists ate my hamster stories?


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## DaveCinzano (Feb 6, 2014)

Special Branch planting smears within the press after the first big Grosvenor Square anti-Vietnam War demo of March 1968, but before the one in October (a period during which SB lobbied, entirely coincidentally, of course, for further - and less accountable - cash and the green light to infiltrate the Dreaded Left):



> Meanwhile the press inflamed the febrile atmosphere with lurid but dubious articles about protesters manufacturing and storing Molotov cocktails and attempting to buy small firearms. Privately, Dixon informed a senior officer the press reports were ‘a carefully constructed pastiche of information, gathered from a number of sources and spiced with inspired guesswork’. Brian Cashinella, one of the journalists who reported the claims, says the information had actually come from Special Branch. If the purpose was to discourage people from joining the protest, the strategy appeared to work, as more and more activists distanced themselves from the scheduled march.



Page 12, _Undercover: The True Story of Britain's Secret Police_ by Rob Evans & Paul Lewis, 2013


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## ska invita (Feb 6, 2014)

ska invita said:


> Whos's the stooge at the Evening Standard who likes to post up anarchists ate my hamster stories?


Justin Davenport and Nigel Rosser ad nauseum


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## free spirit (Feb 7, 2014)

I got 'militant anarchist ringleader' on the front page of the evening chronicle*, and my mum had a phone call from my gran to inform her that the daily telegraph had reported I'd been arrested for possession of cannabis. 

*Tbf I had been nicked and went to court with 'reclaim the streets' sunburned into my face after an unfortunate UV resistant face paint related issue.

The story about several hundred sharpened metal spears being confiscated in Stirling was an interesting interpretation of the hundreds of spigots used at event sites all over the country for fencing off areas, which we'd had to use to fence off the entire river area at the request of the council, and had just packed away when the police searched the site and found them.


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## DaveCinzano (Jun 9, 2020)

Time to revive, surely?

Some great candidates recently:



(Sources: 1, 2)


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## DaveCinzano (Jun 9, 2020)

Some excellent trolling here:









						NYPD warns cops to watch out for concrete-filled tennis balls during protests
					

The NYPD are being pelted with concrete-filled tennis balls during George Floyd protests, the NYPD warned its members Sunday. The two unidentified officers, who were following protestors Thursday a…




					nypost.com
				












						Internal NYPD alert warns of concrete disguised as ‘ice cream’ at NYC protests
					

An internal NYPD alert warned officers of containers of hardened concrete resembling “chocolate chip ice cream” found near the scene of a recent George Floyd protest in Lower Manhattan.…




					nypost.com
				




(Source)



Paging Pickman's model


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## rekil (Jun 18, 2020)

The daily beast has done a round up. Murder bus is a personal fave. And the Venga Boysesque antifa convoy.









						Cops’ Most Deranged Lies and Bizarre Claims About the Protests
					

From glaring falsehoods about straight-up violence to absurd fantasies often involving ice cream, cops have been creative.



					www.thedailybeast.com


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## DaveCinzano (Sep 25, 2020)

The Soros obsessives are going all in at the moment:


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## not-bono-ever (Sep 25, 2020)

dated 2017. hes a financier, not fucking nostradamus


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## Marty1 (Sep 25, 2020)

DaveCinzano said:


> The Soros obsessives are going all in at the moment:




LI is a Fox News reporter.


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## DaveCinzano (Sep 25, 2020)

M1 is a wilful obfuscator.


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## likesfish (Sep 26, 2020)

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | British blamed for Basra badgers 😬 

this has got to be the Maddest British army deny releasing Honey badgers onto the streets of basra
UK military spokesman Major Mike Shearer said: "We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area.


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## two sheds (Sep 26, 2020)

yeh they would say that though wouldn't they, they're hardly going to admit it


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## DaveCinzano (Oct 5, 2020)

likesfish said:


> BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | British blamed for Basra badgers 😬
> 
> this has got to be the Maddest British army deny releasing Honey badgers onto the streets of basra
> UK military spokesman Major Mike Shearer said: "We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area.


But they're not denying that their bloodlusty meline beasts feast on the flesh of _women_, are they..?


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## DaveCinzano (Jun 2, 2021)

Oakland PD cop-boss forced to eat shit publicly over lies he spread at a press conference a mere year ago


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## petee (Jun 2, 2021)

DaveCinzano said:


> Some excellent trolling here:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



NB murdoch (n y post)


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## Riklet (Jun 5, 2021)

I keep seeing this thread and thinking "why isnt this in health, relationships and sexuality"....??


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## DaveCinzano (Jun 23, 2021)

Cop bullshit blowback


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## hitmouse (Aug 23, 2021)

More weirdo US cop stuff, watch out for the antifa buses:








						Revealed: how California police chased a nonexistent ‘antifa bus’
					

Authorities in rural northern counties spread misinformation and launched aircraft surveillance in response to false rumors about antifa ‘infiltrators’, according to records obtained by the Guardian




					www.theguardian.com
				




Wait till they hear about the down with cis bus.


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