# Women held for 30 years in Lambeth



## unrepentant85 (Nov 21, 2013)

http://www.thejournal.ie/women-foun...rs-1185920-Nov2013/?utm_source=facebook_short



> TWO PEOPLE HAVE been arrested by British police after three “highly traumatised” women were discovered at a house in London, where they said they were held against their will for more than 30 years.
> One of the women is a 57-year-old Irish woman, who has not been identified. The other two women are a 69-year-old Malaysian woman and a 30-year-old British woman.


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

not just london but south london


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## unrepentant85 (Nov 21, 2013)

Do they have good basements in South London?


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

unrepentant85 said:


> Do they have good basements in South London?


the consensus among captives is those in south london are not as good as those in amstetten


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## el-ahrairah (Nov 21, 2013)

unrepentant85 said:


> Do they have good basements in South London?



no.  tiny horrid wet things.


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 21, 2013)

Apparently they phoned the helpline of the charity: 'Freedom Charity' after seeing a documentary.


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## unrepentant85 (Nov 21, 2013)

Barking_Mad said:


> Apparently they phoned the helpline of the charity: 'Freedom Charity' after seeing a documentary.


 Yeah I read that. Strange how they never thought of doing it before.


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 21, 2013)

unrepentant85 said:


> Yeah I read that. Strange how they never thought of doing it before.



Yeah. Without knowing the specifics i often find it remarkable in general that someone can be held for so long without making an escape, or getting a message to the outside world.


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## stuff_it (Nov 21, 2013)

Barking_Mad said:


> Apparently they phoned the helpline of the charity: 'Freedom Charity' after seeing a documentary.


Odd that they didn't call the police then...


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## SovietArmy (Nov 21, 2013)

I am not speculating but I think media and police watching too much Hollywood films and creating some fiction, fantasy world to us.


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

stuff_it said:


> Odd that they didn't call the police then...


not really. i'd call ghostbusters before i called the police and likely get a better response.


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## mao (Nov 21, 2013)

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/women-rescued-decades-slavery-south-london


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

mao said:


> http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/women-rescued-decades-slavery-south-london





> Reports said the house concerned was in the Lambeth borough area of south London.


might even be brixton


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## skyscraper101 (Nov 21, 2013)

Do we got a local hero element to this story yet?


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

skyscraper101 said:


> Do we got a handy local hero element to this story yet?


who did you have in mind?


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## Buckaroo (Nov 21, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> not really. i'd call ghostbusters before i called the police and likely get a better response.


 
Call an Inspectre.


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## Yossarian (Nov 21, 2013)

Barking_Mad said:


> Yeah. Without knowing the specifics i often find it remarkable in general that someone can be held for so long without making an escape, or getting a message to the outside world.



It's weird but it happens - there was one kidnap victim in California who was locked on a box until she was so psychologically terrorized that her captor could sent her out to work.


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## Fez909 (Nov 21, 2013)

The 30 year old has never left that house in her life 

Horrible.


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## skyscraper101 (Nov 21, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> who did you have in mind?



Reg D Hunter to play Charles Ramsay.


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

Yossarian said:


> It's weird but it happens - there was one kidnap victim in California who was locked on a box until she was so psychologically terrorized that her captor could sent her out to work.


here we send people to school till they're so psychologically terrorized they're motivated to get work.


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## spanglechick (Nov 21, 2013)

As a slavery case, it may be that they were lead to believe that the police would do nothing against their "legal employers", or perhaps their captors checked outgoing numbers for the police but the charity number wouldn't have caused alarm...

Who knows.  Sounds like a dreadful life they've lead.


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 21, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> who did you have in mind?



Ed.


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 21, 2013)

Lambeth Borough. Suspects are "not British".


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 21, 2013)

Left the house "without police help".


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## brogdale (Nov 21, 2013)

Barking_Mad said:


> Lambeth Borough. Suspects are "not British".



Bet it's on that bloody estate where all those fecking Austrians live.


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## secateurz (Nov 21, 2013)

anybody started a book on where the slave masters come from?


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## Pickman's model (Nov 21, 2013)

secateurz said:


> anybody started a book on where the slave masters come from?


eton


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## Buckaroo (Nov 21, 2013)

home secretary will do everything to tackle the scourge of modern day slavery


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 21, 2013)

Buckaroo said:


> home secretary will do everything to tackle the scourge of modern day slavery



Capitalism is dead?


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## shakespearegirl (Nov 21, 2013)

Just seen this.

http://www.brixtonblog.com/women-rescued-from-30-years-of-slavery-in-a-lambeth-house/18316

Not sure if it is in Brixton or not.

Horrible.


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## farmerbarleymow (Nov 21, 2013)

Buckaroo said:


> home secretary will do everything to tackle the scourge of modern day slavery


Do you work in the Home Office Press Office? That is probably what stock line they'll come out with.


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## Buckaroo (Nov 21, 2013)

farmerbarleymow said:


> Do you work in the Home Office Press Office? That is probably what stock line they'll come out with.


That is the line they've come out with!


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## AKA pseudonym (Nov 21, 2013)

woah...
Mirror updates.... 


> 5:40 pm
> Although the arrests were made today, the three women were freed on October 25.
> 
> Mrs Prem said: "We started in-depth to talks to them when they could, it had to be pre-arranged. They gave us set times when they were able to speak to us.
> ...



*Irishwoman among three rescued from London house after 30 years of slavery*



> An Irishwoman in her 50s is one of three victims who were rescued by police after spending 30 years as the slaves of a middle-aged couple who were arrested in London early today


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## brogdale (Nov 21, 2013)

30 year old victim was born into slavery. Shocking.


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## mauvais (Nov 21, 2013)

Is it The Queen?


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## clicker (Nov 21, 2013)

Looking forward to the details - at least a couple of families are going to receive some very good news about relations they must have given up as dead by now.


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## farmerbarleymow (Nov 21, 2013)

Buckaroo said:


> That is the line they've come out with!


They are depressingly predictable aren't they. Meaningless soundbites.


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## weltweit (Nov 21, 2013)

Very shocking. I remember when those women were freed in the USA thinking, could never happen here!! I was wrong!


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## eatmorecheese (Nov 21, 2013)

Details may take a while to come out, it's likely that it may take a while to gather evidence from these women. Imagine living in such fear of retribution that you can't walk out or call the police. The bars of a psychological prison can be stronger than the physical one. What a life, those poor people.


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## toph (Nov 21, 2013)

weltweit said:


> Very shocking. I remember when those women were freed in the USA thinking, could never happen here!! I was wrong!



We dont know the full details yet. It could be a right loaf of bollocks.


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## clicker (Nov 21, 2013)

the thirty year old has never known freedom...words fail me


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## gaijingirl (Nov 21, 2013)

it's here..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-25040741

horrendous...


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## spanglechick (Nov 21, 2013)

toph said:


> We dont know the full details yet. It could be a right loaf of bollocks.


what makes you say that?


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> what makes you say that?



It's odd that the call to the Freedom charity came from one of the 'slaves'.


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## billythefish (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> It's odd that the call to the Freedom charity came from one of the 'slaves'.


They had some 'controlled freedom' apparently...


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> It's odd that the call to the Freedom charity came from one of the 'slaves'.



Why is it?  I've taken plenty of calls from women with a perpetrator in the next door room.  One actually climbed out of the bathroom window while she was on the phone to me while he was watching the telly.

I think it's incredibly brave myself.


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## DietCokeGirl (Nov 21, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> I think it's incredibly brave myself.



Ditto. BBC said they found out about the phone number from TV. Even if they had known before that there were organisations that could help, it still takes a lot of guts, as well as ensuring a window of opportunity, to make the move.

(Edited for typo)


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> Why is it?  I've taken plenty of calls from women with a perpetrator in the next door room.  One actually climbed out of the bathroom window while she was on the phone to me while he was watching the telly.
> 
> I think it's incredibly brave myself.



Odd coincidence, or lucky, that after 30 years they apparently saw a programme about Freedom and decided to make the call, recognising their plight.


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## spanglechick (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Odd coincidence, or lucky, that after 30 years they apparently saw a programme about Freedom and decided to make the call, recognising their plight.


you think they didn't realise their plight before?  or perhaps didn't know whothey could contact that they could be sure wouldn't steam in with blue lights and sirens, and potentially result in one or more of thir number being beaten / killed when their captor gave some flannel, or even murdered but captors in fear of discovery.  


it's very peculiar the amount of suspicion being raised here.  i think some people need to read up on modern slavery in this city.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> you think they didn't realise their plight before?  or perhaps didn't know whothey could contact that they could be sure wouldn't steam in with blue lights and sirens, and potentially result in one or more of thir number being beaten / killed when their captor gave some flannel, or even murdered but captors in fear of discovery.
> 
> 
> it's very peculiar the amount of suspicion being raised here.  i think some people need to read up on modern slavery in this city.



I have no suspicion at all. It's an amazing story. 

I would have called the police that's all.


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## DietCokeGirl (Nov 21, 2013)

Yes, fear and control are powerful forces - think how many people with much more visible community presences stay with partners who hurt or even eventually kill them.


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## gaijingirl (Nov 21, 2013)

I think that they said that one of the women was born in that house.  I imagine if you're born into a situation like that - all normality as we know it is suspended.  We might find some things a bit odd/strange - but we're coming at it from an entirely different perspective.  Who knows what they knew/thought..  easy for us to say we'd have called the police.. do they even know what the police is?  Had they been told terrible things would happen if they called the police?  It's unimaginable really - which is probably why it's so difficult for us to get our heads round.


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## 8115 (Nov 21, 2013)

If from abroad, they could have been fearful of being in trouble, or sent back.  Even if not from abroad it's funny how people can perceive they can't do anything even if they nominally have freedom.  I think there have been cases of captives (maybe one in America), who were allowed to go out of the house, and returned to the house afterwards.


DietCokeGirl said:


> Yes, fear and control are powerful forces - think how many people with much more visible community presences stay with partners who hurt or even eventually kill them.


Fear, control and shame.

So sad.


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I have no suspicion at all. It's an amazing story.
> 
> I would have called the police that's all.



If only it were so easy.  People are scared of the police, even though they know deep down they can help. 

An anonymous help line is safe; it's a space to recognise and talk about what's happening without fear of consequences because you are in control of the level of information you provide.  And it won't be somewhere which tells you what you should do, either.  I never realised before how powerful helplines are at putting the control back into the hands of the individual because it's all on their terms. 

It took the charity over a year of working with these women before this escape could safely happen.  If you have been held captive for so long the level of trauma involved is unimaginably high.  It can't just be fixed quick.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> If only it were so easy.  People are scared of the police, even though they know deep down they can help.
> 
> An anonymous help line is safe; it's a space to recognise and talk about what's happening without fear of consequences because you are in control of the level of information you provide.  And it won't be somewhere which tells you what you should do, either.  I never realised before how powerful helplines are at putting the control back into the hands of the individual because it's all on their terms.
> 
> It took the charity over a year of working with these women before this escape could safely happen.  If you have been held captive for so long the level of trauma involved is unimaginably high.  It can't just be fixed quick.



This has been going on for a year?


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## Thora (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I have no suspicion at all. It's an amazing story.
> 
> I would have called the police that's all.


You have no idea what you would do though, really.  How could you?  Many victims of trafficking/slavery are afraid to call the police as they have been convinced they won't be helped (and sadly they are often right - treated as having committed immigration offences rather than as being victims at all).


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> This has been going on for a year?



Yes, the Founder of Freedom said they first had contact with them a year ago, was on t'news earlier.


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## SovietArmy (Nov 21, 2013)

i suppose news and movie directors are in favour to make good profits.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

Thora said:


> You have no idea what you would do though, really.  How could you?  Many victims of trafficking/slavery are afraid to call the police as they have been convinced they won't be helped (and sadly they are often right - treated as having committed immigration offences rather than as being victims at all).



Doesn't seem to be happening in this case


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## farmerbarleymow (Nov 21, 2013)

clicker said:


> the thirty year old has never known freedom...words fail me



It doesn't bear thinking about. Poor women. 

I hope they recover from the horrific ordeal and manage to rebuild their lives, as far as they can after that.


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## Gramsci (Nov 21, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> it's very peculiar the amount of suspicion being raised here.  i think some people need to read up on modern slavery in this city.



The Brixton Blog article does say "*reportedly* been held in captivity" not definitely. At moment two people have been arrested but not charged.

People are innocent until proved guilty in this country.


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## spanglechick (Nov 21, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> The Brixton Blog article does say "*reportedly* been held in captivity" not definitely. At moment two people have been arrested but not charged.
> 
> People are innocent until proved guilty in this country.


as was joseph fritzl before he was charged, and the guy in america with those three girls last year until he was charged.  but i doodn't remember so many people doubting the victims stories even before charges were made.


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## Gramsci (Nov 21, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> as was joseph fritzl before he was charged, and the guy in america with those three girls last year until he was charged.  but i doodn't remember so many people doubting the victims stories even before charges were made.



I have read the article in Brixton Blog and I would really like to know more before I jump to conclusions. 

Not even sure if this case is the same as Fritzl from what I have read so far.


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## spanglechick (Nov 21, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> I have read the article in Brixton Blog and I would really like to know more before I jump to conclusions.
> 
> Not even sure if this case is the same as Fritzl from what I have read so far.


no, it sounds like domestic slavery.  not everything is known, of course, but there's some pretty comprehensive articles. I read a live update page in the telegraph, and the bbc's article.


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## Smyz (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I have no suspicion at all. It's an amazing story.
> 
> I would have called the police that's all.


You don't know what you would do in circumstances you have never experienced. 

People thinking that they do know what they would do is why so many victims of abuse are disbelieved and how so many abusers get away with it for so long.

Have a word with yourself.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

Smyz said:


> You don't know what you would do in circumstances you have never experienced.
> 
> People thinking that they do know what they would do is why so many victims of abuse are disbelieved and how so many abusers get away with it for so long.
> 
> Have a word with yourself.



You have convinced me: all of this is my fault.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

Anyway, to make it more disturbing, there is talk of bodies being found and other missing people, which may explain why even the police are still not briefing journalists as to the address.


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## gaijingirl (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Anyway, to make it more disturbing, there is talk of bodies being found and other missing people, which may explain why even the police are still not briefing journalists as to the address.



oh fucking hell.. where is this talk coming from?


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## gaijingirl (Nov 21, 2013)

Smyz said:


> You don't know what you would do in circumstances you have never experienced.
> 
> People thinking that they do know what they would do is why so many victims of abuse are disbelieved and how so many abusers get away with it for so long.
> 
> Have a word with yourself.



although I agree with your general sentiment (in your first line), and actually said similar earlier on, that's a bit harsh tbf.... it is in our nature to think to our own experiences.  It's hard to think outside what we know.


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## Gramsci (Nov 21, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> no, it sounds like domestic slavery.  not everything is known, of course, but there's some pretty comprehensive articles. I read a live update page in the telegraph, and the bbc's article.



Yes I know it *sounds* like domestic slavery. What I am saying is that so far that is all the reports are saying. All that is being reported is from police and a charity. I do not take everything police say as gospel. 

BBC article has "reported" in commas.


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## butchersapron (Nov 21, 2013)

The release was a month ago. The police and charity have spent the last month putting together what happened. This is simply not a mistake and this  misplaced scepticism is baffling.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

gaijingirl said:


> oh fucking hell.. where is this talk coming from?



From the newsroom I'm working in now


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## toph (Nov 21, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> what makes you say that?



Because we don't. We can all start spouting off as much as we like but all we have is a few details. We're not the sun are we?


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## Smyz (Nov 21, 2013)

gaijingirl said:


> although I agree with your general sentiment (in your first line), and actually said similar earlier on, that's a bit harsh tbf.... it is in our nature to think to our own experiences.  It's hard to think outside what we know.


It is in our nature. So are rape and murder. He might have been born ignorant but he should know better by now.


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## butchersapron (Nov 21, 2013)

toph said:


> Because we don't. We can all start spouting off as much as we like but all we have is a few details. We're not the sun are we?


Why don't you do some reading then?


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## toph (Nov 21, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Why don't you do some reading then?



Its on the news it must be true

I'll reserve judgement until more details come out I think.


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## butchersapron (Nov 21, 2013)

toph said:


> Its on the news it must be true
> 
> I'll reserve judgement until more details come out I think.


You're an idiot.


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## toph (Nov 21, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> You're an idiot.



No I'm not.


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## Gramsci (Nov 21, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Why don't you do some reading then?



I have read that. So far no is charged with anything yet.


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## existentialist (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I have no suspicion at all. It's an amazing story.
> 
> I would have called the police that's all.


A lot of the people don't trust the police to respond predictably or sensitively, and with some justification. These women may well have felt - perhaps as a result of being told repeatedly during their incarceration - that the police would "take them away" or not believe them.

And don't underestimate the power of the "Stockholm Syndrome" thing - it's quite possible that, no matter how bad their situation, they felt unable to bring down The Law on their captor, but that the idea of calling a women's charity felt safer.

There's a lot of reasons why what they did makes perfect sense, and I expect that will emerge as more details come out.


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## gaijingirl (Nov 21, 2013)

Smyz said:


> It is in our nature. So are rape and murder. He might have been born ignorant but he should know better by now.



Well, we're probably coming at this from different angles.  I don't think rape and murder are in our nature.  That's probably a discussion for another thread.


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## wiskey (Nov 21, 2013)

B


purenarcotic said:


> Yes, the Founder of Freedom said they first had contact with them a year ago, was on t'news earlier.



I can't see anything which says they contacted the charity last year.. .everything seems to say the Irish woman rang on 18th October this year.. .


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

wiskey said:


> I can't see anything which says they contacted the charity last year.. .everything seems to say the Irish woman rang on 18th October this year.. .



It was an ITV news interview with the founder of the charity on the half 6 news this evening.


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## toph (Nov 21, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Why don't you do some reading then?



Personally I dont believe a thing the papers or the police say, do you?


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## wiskey (Nov 21, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> It was an ITV news interview with the founder of the charity on the half 6 news this evening.



Fair do's


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

toph said:


> Personally I dont believe a thing the papers or the police say, do you?



Really? You believe every single news item reported is untrue?  What makes you believe it is true?


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

wiskey said:


> Fair do's



It's not the most relevant part of the story tbh so I can sort of see why it would be left out of articles and stuff.


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## leanderman (Nov 21, 2013)

At risk of more abuse, I still find it fascinating that the lead apparently came from a charity, rather than the police, or some official body. It shows the value of the Freedom founder's work. And the role of sheer luck in the captives hearing of Freedom at all.


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## toph (Nov 21, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Why don't you do some reading then?



How come you have so much faith in the media and the police all of a sudden?


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## purenarcotic (Nov 21, 2013)

leanderman said:


> At risk of more abuse, I still find it fascinating that the lead apparently came from a charity, rather than the police, or some official body. It shows the value of the Freedom founder's work. And the role of sheer luck in the captives hearing of Freedom at all.



Which is arguably why there needs to be much more exposure given to charities like Freedom, women's aid, local charities like ASIRT etc. 

Going direct to an official body is a huge emotional undertaking when you think about it.  This isn't reporting your wallet being nicked, this is unburdening years and years of pain and torment.  People will tend to want to seek out something that offers immediate belief, immediate empathy and support.

The police have got much better at dealing with cases like this (and will often refer to charities anyway. Birmingham Women's Aid is automatically referred all MARAC cases for example) but the perception is that they haven't and there are still plenty of horror stories out there.


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## xenon (Nov 21, 2013)

toph said:


> Personally I dont believe a thing the papers or the police say, do you?





toph said:


> Its on the news it must be true
> 
> I'll reserve judgement until more details come out I think.


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## Casually Red (Nov 21, 2013)

hes just fucking trolling again


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## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Casually Red said:


> hes just fucking trolling again



Just highlighting the hypocrisy.


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## tbtommyb (Nov 22, 2013)

farmerbarleymow said:


> They are depressingly predictable aren't they. Meaningless soundbites.



Actually the Home Office is trying to bring in a new bill specifically to increase the punishment for slavery and human trafficking. 

But what a horrible thing. These kind of stories terrify me, you could be suddenly abducted with noone knowing you're alive or dead for decades. horrific.


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## ebonics (Nov 22, 2013)

I read this story online today, and then, like a massive idiot, fell down a wikipedia rabbit-hole reading about other long-term captivity cases. The mind fucking reels at the depravity of some people. It's absolutely heartbreaking to read about how many/most of the victims in cases like this become so inured to their conditions that the psychological hold their captors have replaces the need for physical ones.


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## existentialist (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> Just highlighting the hypocrisy.


That's not hypocrisy. Don't take yourself so seriously.


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## Artaxerxes (Nov 22, 2013)

Buckaroo said:


> home secretary will do everything to tackle the scourge of modern day slavery



I for one look forward to an end to the Workfare scheme.

Oh wait...


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## Boudicca (Nov 22, 2013)

leanderman said:


> At risk of more abuse, I still find it fascinating that the lead apparently came from a charity, rather than the police, or some official body. It shows the value of the Freedom founder's work. And the role of sheer luck in the captives hearing of Freedom at all.


If it's the documentary I think it is, it showed a hugely caring woman, who had been through a forced marriage herself, going all the way to Pakistan to rescue a girl.  So they saw an individual who they believed they could trust to help, rather than a faceless random policeman at the end of a phone, who might or might not believe them.  I think it does make some sense.


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## peterkro (Nov 22, 2013)

Although all the details of the case aren't clear,how where the two people arrested let out on bail.That is if the case is anything like what is being described.


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## leanderman (Nov 22, 2013)

The suspects have been granted bail.


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## spectrum48k (Nov 22, 2013)

PR Stunt. Did this even happen, you'll find the street doesn't exist... I mean no one knows where it is right?


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## Winot (Nov 22, 2013)

So is the house in Brixton somewhere or is it just that the reporting's being done from here on the traditional Lambeth=Brixton basis?


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## Remus Harbank (Nov 22, 2013)

clicker said:


> the thirty year old has never known freedom...words fail me


terrible story.

nonetheless one needs to wait what this story really is about before coming to any conclusions.


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## Remus Harbank (Nov 22, 2013)

brogdale said:


> Bet it's on that bloody estate where all those fecking Austrians live.


only place you can get proper wine with antifreeze


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## editor (Nov 22, 2013)

*identical threads merged


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## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

Winot said:


> So is the house in Brixton somewhere or is it just that the reporting's being done from here on the traditional Lambeth=Brixton basis?


yes


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## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Casually Red said:


> hes just fucking trolling again



I tend to get on my high horse and objectionable when drunk. There's no intention of trolling really.


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## ViolentPanda (Nov 22, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> Really? You believe every single news item reported is untrue?  What makes you believe it is true?



Paranoid delusion?


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## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> Really? You believe every single news item reported is untrue?  What makes you believe it is true?



No of course not. I just think its better no to be sensationalist until we have facts, and at the moment we know very little. Plus, I was drunk and trying to provoke a reaction.


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> No of course not. I just think its better no to be sensationalist until we have facts, and at the moment we know very little. Plus, I was drunk and trying to provoke a reaction.


how much have you had to drink today?


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> No of course not. I just think its better no to be sensationalist until we have facts, and at the moment we know very little. Plus, I was drunk and trying to provoke a reaction.


That worked a treat. Well done.


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> how much have you had to drink today?



Pint of Stella and just starting on the gin, why?


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> Pint of Stella and just starting on the gin, why?


the stella was on your cereal i suppose.


----------



## Onket (Nov 22, 2013)

Is this thread going to be about toph's drinking now?


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

> We believe at this stage to the outside world this may have appeared to be a 'normal' family. This does mean that over the course of many decades the people at the heart of this investigation and their victims will probably have come into contact with public services, including our own; that is something we must examine fully, and it is too early to provide details.


Give it rest eh onket. Serious thread not about you.


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

Onket said:


> Is this thread going to be about toph's drinking now?


i'm just trying to provoke a reaction


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> i'm just trying to provoke a reaction



That worked a treat. Well done.


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> the stella was on your cereal i suppose.



I'm not in denial.


----------



## AKA pseudonym (Nov 22, 2013)

hmmm.... I know there has to be concealment of details so as to effectively prosecute etc...

I have an uneasy feeling about this 'news'... whilst i recognise that what may have happened is bang wrong... The state and certain poverty pimps started circulating info a few months ago, for example, that there are organised 'traveller gangs' preying on homeless folk etc. so as to consign them to slavery... I note a resounding silence from that quarter....

As always there is always an agenda... i dunno what this one will carry as yet? perhaps we need to look around ourselves a bit more and recognise shit is happening.... and do something about it....


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

AKA pseudonym said:


> hmmm.... I know there has to be concealment of details so as to effectively prosecute etc...
> 
> I have an uneasy feeling about this 'news'... whilst i recognise that what may have happened is bang wrong... The state and certain poverty pimps started circulating info a few months ago, for example, that there are organised 'traveller gangs' preying on homeless folk etc. so as to consign them to slavery... I note a resounding silence from that quarter....
> 
> As always there is always an agenda... i dunno what this one will carry as yet? perhaps we need to look around ourselves a bit more and recognise shit is happening.... and do something about it....


Of course they will use things like this to further other agendas - but then, so what? Or are you suggesting this was known about months ago and somehow the irish woman was primed to ring only one month ago?


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

AKA pseudonym said:


> hmmm.... I know there has to be concealment of details so as to effectively prosecute etc...
> 
> I have an uneasy feeling about this 'news'... whilst i recognise that what may have happened is bang wrong... The state and certain poverty pimps started circulating info a few months ago, for example, that there are organised 'traveller gangs' preying on homeless folk etc. so as to consign them to slavery... I note a resounding silence from that quarter....
> 
> As always there is always an agenda... i dunno what this one will carry as yet? perhaps we need to look around ourselves a bit more and recognise shit is happening.... and do something about it....



I read some autobiography of a traveller a few years ago and he said that this thing of having "slaves" has been going on for years. They, travellers I mean, recruit vulnerable people in prison as well.


----------



## Onket (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Serious thread


 
Exactly the point I was making. Others managed to see that.


----------



## AKA pseudonym (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Of course they will use things like this to further other agendas - but then, so what? Or are you suggesting this was known about months ago and somehow the irish woman was primed to ring only one month ago?


tbh.. i dunno what i am saying...
I hope this case wasnt known about months ago and not acted on.... I just have a funny feeling that their is an agenda at play here that isnt obvious as yet...
I heard via soup runs I am involved that the poverty pimps wanted us to make folk aware of 'gangs' that are recruiting 'slaves' via that process


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Onket said:


> Is this thread going to be about toph's drinking now?



I'll drink as much as I want when I'm not at work. Dont like it, go fuck yourself.


----------



## Onket (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> I'll drink as much as I want when I'm not at work. Dont like it, go fuck yourself.


 
Er, yeah.

I was just saying that this thread isn't about your drinking, it's about a serious situation.

Drink what you want.


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Onket said:


> Er, yeah.
> 
> I was just saying that this thread isn't about your drinking, it's about a serious situation.
> 
> Drink what you want.



*cheers*


----------



## Wilf (Nov 22, 2013)

Astonished at the bail decision.  Usual to refuse bail if there's a chance they might approach the victims (even though they won't be able to approach them, the victims will be terrified that they _might_).  Also, the press are reporting the susects are overseas nationals who may have committed immigration offences - which is itself sometimes used to refuse bail.  On top of that, if their identity came out there's a chance somebody might give them a good kicking. Technically/legally, it might be the right decision, just amazed that they didn't find a reason to remand them in _this_ case.


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> I'm not in denial.


that's a yes then


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> that's a yes then



Point?


----------



## brogdale (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> Point?



Just a half for me, ta.


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

brogdale said:


> Just a half for me, ta.



Vodka?


----------



## Mr.Bishie (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> Point?



The point of a sharp stick jabbed into your eye?


----------



## brogdale (Nov 22, 2013)

toph said:


> Vodka?



Good Lord, no.

But I am tucking into my Bateman's "Victory Ale" which was in Morrison's 3 for £5 offer. Top value IMHO...anyone managed to buy anything with a higher gravity than Victory's 6.0%  [Vol] in a 3 for £5 deal?


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

Mr.Bishie said:


> The point of a sharp stick jabbed into your eye?



I'd prefer a used tampon if I had a choice.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

Any chance of not doing this?


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Any chance of not doing this?



Go fuck yourself.


----------



## AKA pseudonym (Nov 22, 2013)

so... folk on this thread who arent on the piss or trolling are feeling there is a lot more to this 'story' than is currently revealed....
thats why i am kinda uneasy....


----------



## Thora (Nov 22, 2013)

What do you mean by "a lot more to this"?  I can't see that there is likely to be more of a hidden agenda here than with any similar story


----------



## AKA pseudonym (Nov 22, 2013)

Thora said:


> What do you mean by "a lot more to this"?  I can't see that there is likely to be more of a hidden agenda here than with any similar story


by a 'lot more to this', I sadly believe there be more 'a lot more to this'.....


----------



## spanglechick (Nov 22, 2013)

AKA pseudonym said:


> by a 'lot more to this', I sadly believe there be more 'a lot more to this'.....


I'm not drunk, trolling or anything other than sincere.   I believe that sadly this story is probably pretty much straight down the line.


----------



## AKA pseudonym (Nov 22, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> I'm not drunk, trolling or anything other than sincere.   I believe that sadly this story is probably pretty much straight down the line.


though its not a 'story'.... it looks like fact.... 3 folk have been revealed to be slaves... in modernday london... 
WHERE was the state or out reach or just bychance thankfully one of these women contacted a non state funded body..... cause there was a documentary.... 
too many questions running through my mind sadly


----------



## brogdale (Nov 22, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> I'm not drunk, trolling or anything other than sincere.   I believe that sadly this story is probably pretty much straight down the line.



Yep, but some of the statements from the OB are not helping...



> Police said at least one of the women had been subjected to physical beatings but there was no evidence of any physical abuse.



and..



> Commander Steve Rodhouse from the Metropolitan Police said the case “unique” describing it as a “complicated and disturbing picture of emotional control over many years”.
> 
> He said to many in the outside world the group may have appeared to be a normal family which might explain why it went under the radar for so long.



and...



> Describing the circumstances in which the three alleged victims were held, Mr Rodhouse said: “It is not as brutally obvious as women being physically restrained inside an address and not being allowed to leave.”
> 
> He added that police were seeking to understand the “invisible handcuffs being used to exert such a degree of control over these women”.
> 
> ...


----------



## xenon (Nov 22, 2013)

What's state or outreach anyway? If they were too scared, too controlled and restricted to alert any authoraties then they would have been invisible.


----------



## Thora (Nov 22, 2013)

brogdale said:


> Yep, but some of the statements from the OB are not helping...
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The first one is a bit confused but the second two quotes look straight forward enough.  Many long term kidnap victims seem to have had some degree of freedom - Natascha Kampusch, Elizabeth Smart, Jaycee Dugard for example.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 22, 2013)

brogdale said:


> Yep, but some of the statements from the OB are not helping...
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I agree it's not brilliantly worded but it is extremely, extremely rare to encounter physical abuse without emotional abuse.  I think what they were trying to get at was that at the time of the escape there was no evidence of physical abuse but the victims have stated physical abuse did take place on some occasions. 

I think with the final thing he's saying something that's a really important point.  There is a perception (and I think it's perfectly understandable) that a victim might look a certain way: beaten down, depressed etc.  Of course that's true in some cases but there are plenty of cases where it is really hard to believe that person is being subject to abuse because they're successful, work high powered jobs, appear to have a perfect life, whatever.

I can completely believe that people could have seen them as a normal, happy family because people hide what is happening to them phenomenally well.  It is hard to get your head around though I suppose.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

Have there ever been cases of people using people with learning difficulties as domestic servants?


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Have there ever been cases of people using people with learning difficulties as domestic servants?



Yes, I have heard some stories.  I can't give you any links though I'm afraid, just testimony from colleagues like.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 22, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> It is hard to get your head around though I suppose.



It's totally baffling.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> Yes, I have heard some stories.  I can't give you any links though I'm afraid, just testimony from colleagues like.


Cheers, no links needed. I know from past working experience that it happened.


----------



## spanglechick (Nov 22, 2013)

I think perhaps there is a fairly narrow imagination of what being kept as a slave might involve.  

My understanding largely comes from child protection training, because there have been several cases of children, living with relatives or with people who claim to be relatives, but who have actually been trafficked into domestic slavery... And yet have, in some cases been allowed to attend school.   So we have to be aware.


----------



## Poot (Nov 22, 2013)

The thing that completely boggles my mind is the amount of planning it must take to kidnap someone and make them your slave. That's properly twisted.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 22, 2013)

leanderman said:


> It's totally baffling.



I suppose it is.  People are complex though and abusive relationships are just as complex as any other.  Things we can see happening from the outside just can't be seen from within, or don't want to be seen for a whole host of reasons.

I don't know how to explain more without writing a massive essay tbh. And it's Friday and I'm tired.


----------



## trashpony (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Have there ever been cases of people using people with learning difficulties as domestic servants?


Yes, there was a young man quite recently iirc - within the last 5 years or so. A whole family kept him as a sort of slave cum punch bag


----------



## xenon (Nov 22, 2013)

Here's one case, I thought I'd remembered a more recent one.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-epileptic-man-shed-months-starved-death.html

I'm baffled at people who think this stuff doesn't go on.


----------



## xenon (Nov 22, 2013)

And antoher similar one. http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2012/jul/11/four-face-jail-slavery-law-convictions


----------



## leanderman (Nov 22, 2013)

xenon said:


> Here's one case, I thought I'd remembered a more recent one.
> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-epileptic-man-shed-months-starved-death.html
> 
> I'm baffled at people who think this stuff doesn't go on.



These are extraordinary cases. 

All sorts of 'stuff goes on' of course.


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

xenon said:


> Here's one case, I thought I'd remembered a more recent one.
> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-epileptic-man-shed-months-starved-death.html
> 
> I'm baffled at people who think this stuff doesn't go on.


they're the ones you've got to watch


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 22, 2013)

Wilf said:


> Astonished at the bail decision.  Usual to refuse bail if there's a chance they might approach the victims (even though they won't be able to approach them, the victims will be terrified that they _might_).  Also, the press are reporting the susects are overseas nationals who may have committed immigration offences - which is itself sometimes used to refuse bail.  On top of that, if their identity came out there's a chance somebody might give them a good kicking. Technically/legally, it might be the right decision, just amazed that they didn't find a reason to remand them in _this_ case.



I'm surprised due to the seriousness of the allegations.  But thats sometimes not enough. To deny them bail, they would have to charge them. Presumably they don't have enough  evidence at this stage, or they would have done so.

Once they charge them they then have to be able to evidence that the reasons for denying bail are well founded and proportionate. There is a legal "presumption of bail", and if bail conditions can be imposed to mitigate against fears of witness  intimidation, reoffending, missing court etc, then this is  the official preference. When deciding if bail is appropriate, a court can take into  account strength of evidence, and seriousness of offence. What this means in practice is that someone up for murder can be remanded whilst they search for evidence. Someone up for shoplifting can't. 

I had a long argument with detective boy about the implementation of conditions not to contact witnesses. Whatever your opinion of the chap, he knew his stuff. Put me right on the issue of witness contact. Its rare to even have a condition not to contact witnesses. Only when there's a genuinely well founded fear that you might try to influence them. I grant such a fear would be well founded in this case, if the location of the witnesses was made known to the accused. I imagine they're well stashed away though, in whatever place social services could come up with. Would be hard to demonstrate such a fear was rational with a half decent lawyer pointing out the flaws in the argument.


----------



## snadge (Nov 22, 2013)

Poot said:


> The thing that completely boggles my mind is the amount of planning it must take to kidnap someone and make them your slave. That's properly twisted.




You would be amazed at how many people in this world think they are owed something above anyone else, some people just abuse others and others take it a stage further, we have a royal family that instils this type of behaviour from above FFS.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 22, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> I'm surprised due to the seriousness of the allegations.  But thats sometimes not enough. To deny them bail, they would have to charge them. Presumably they don't have enough  evidence at this stage, or they would have done so.
> 
> Once they charge them they then have to be able to evidence that the reasons for denying bail are well founded and proportionate. There is a legal "presumption of bail", and if bail conditions can be imposed to mitigate against fears of witness  intimidation, reoffending, missing court etc, then this is  the official preference. When deciding if bail is appropriate, a court can take into  account strength of evidence, and seriousness of offence. What this means in practice is that someone up for murder can be remanded whilst they search for evidence. Someone up for shoplifting can't.
> 
> I had a long argument with detective boy about the implementation of conditions not to contact witnesses. Whatever your opinion of the chap, he knew his stuff. Put me right on the issue of witness contact. Its rare to even have a condition not to contact witnesses. Only when there's a genuinely well founded fear that you might try to influence them. I grant such a fear would be well founded in this case, if the location of the witnesses was made known to the accused. I imagine they're well stashed away though, in whatever place social services could come up with. Would be hard to demonstrate such a fear was rational with a half decent lawyer pointing out the flaws in the argument.



It won't necessarily be social services.  The charity themselves may have their own safe houses or they might be in hospital.


----------



## IC3D (Nov 22, 2013)

I met an Indian woman last year who had run away from an employer  who held her passport and limited her movement to some extent for over a year, she'd not been paid and was bullied constantly. She was being looked after by a friends mum who took her in. 
I think I'd call this indentured labour rather than slavery but I gathered from them that it wasn't such an uncommon thing


----------



## leanderman (Nov 22, 2013)

House was in Coldharbour, it is claimed. Unsure whether road, or ward


----------



## brogdale (Nov 22, 2013)

OB talking of a "cult' now.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

brogdale said:


> OB talking of a "cult' now.


Just bullshit.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 22, 2013)

The story literally is:



> Police are examining whether three women who were held in a south London house under what detectives described as extreme emotional control for 30 years were part of a cult which operated through beatings and brainwashing to bind them to their captors


----------



## brogdale (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> The story literally is:



Some of the Met's choice of language wrt this case does appear ill-judged.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 22, 2013)

BIzarre, utterly bizarre.


----------



## Manter (Nov 22, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> It won't necessarily be social services.  The charity themselves may have their own safe houses or they might be in hospital.


Saw this: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/slavery-human-trafficking-victims-golden-hour about initial rehabilitation for trafficking/slavery victims. Interesting that the Salvation Army has the contract


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 22, 2013)

Manter said:


> Saw this: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/slavery-human-trafficking-victims-golden-hour about initial rehabilitation for trafficking/slavery victims. Interesting that the Salvation Army has the contract


they're always after recruits for their bands


----------



## toph (Nov 22, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Just bullshit.



Its in the papers, it must be true.


----------



## Batboy (Nov 23, 2013)

leanderman said:


> The suspects have been granted bail.



 This is an interesting development and probably highlights the complexity of this case. If someone had abducted and kept as slaves three people, you would think that no way would bail be granted. A lot of speculation going on here as to the story, which could unfold differently to the way it is being presented and conclusions being assumed as usual on these forums.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 23, 2013)

Batboy said:


> This is an interesting development and probably highlights the complexity of this case. If someone had abducted and kept as slaves three people, you would think that no way would bail be granted. A lot of speculation going on here as to the story, which could unfold differently to the way it is being presented and conclusions being assumed as usual on these forums.


Not in this post though. Oh no.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 23, 2013)

You literally say that you're speculating. And that speculation should not happen. Whilst you're speculating.


----------



## clicker (Nov 23, 2013)

The 'suspects' are in their sixties,have probably had their passports removed...if they had one and are undoubtedly checking in regularly...bail seemed likely . This will take a long time .psychiatric reports alone on all concerned could stretch a year.


----------



## ricbake (Nov 23, 2013)

At The Savoy Hotel on the 7th November Teresa May the Home Secretary told the Spectator awards ceremony while receiving politician of the year : "We're sitting here in these beautiful surroundings, having had a wonderful meal.
"But remember there are men, women and children in our country who are living lives of servitude and misery - probably some of them not too far away from where we are today." 

http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2013/11/parliamentarian-of-year-awards-2013-the-winners/ at 2:50


----------



## leanderman (Nov 23, 2013)

clicker said:


> The 'suspects' are in their sixties,have probably had their passports removed...if they had one and are undoubtedly checking in regularly...bail seemed likely . This will take a long time .psychiatric reports alone on all concerned could stretch a year.



That sounds expensive. 

If the suspects are convicted, their house should be confiscated to cover the doubtless 7- figure costs of the investigation, counselling etc


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

Pickman's model said:


> the stella was on your cereal i suppose.



Cereal with beer on it is the Breakfast of Champions, I'll have you know!!


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

Remus Harbank said:


> only place you can get proper wine with antifreeze



Not anymore, unfortunately. 

Used to be you could always pick up a nice spicy white with a cheeky tang of ethylene glycol, but now you have to mix your own.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

toph said:


> I read some autobiography of a traveller a few years ago and he said that this thing of having "slaves" has been going on for years. They, travellers I mean, recruit vulnerable people in prison as well.



Just generic "travellers", or a particular subset of "travellers"?


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

AKA pseudonym said:


> though its not a 'story'.... it looks like fact.... 3 folk have been revealed to be slaves... in modernday london...
> WHERE was the state or out reach or just bychance thankfully one of these women contacted a non state funded body..... cause there was a documentary....
> too many questions running through my mind sadly



The state is where the state always is - walking the boundaries between policing the behaviour of those "below" and legitimating the behaviour of those "above".
My personal cynicism tilts me toward the belief that the couple arrested are either monied or diplomatically-connected.  It will be interesting to find out more about the circumstances surrounding their (as yet only alleged) crime.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 23, 2013)

Manter said:


> Saw this: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/slavery-human-trafficking-victims-golden-hour about initial rehabilitation for trafficking/slavery victims. Interesting that the Salvation Army has the contract



They run a couple of refuges up here and I have to say they are absolutely stunning places.  Purpose built, lovely playgrounds for the kids etc.  I've not a great deal of experience of how much they push god though as once I had a service user in refuge my work was done iyswim (I would have ended up duplicating the work so it would be totally pointless). Only bone of contention I had was that they don't use interpreters which must make life very confusing for some of the residents.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

brogdale said:


> Yep, but some of the statements from the OB are not helping...
> 
> 
> 
> ...



It's the old problem of different definitions and quantifications of what constitutes "abuse", isn't it?  There seems to be a belief in some criminal justice circles that if a beating leaves no permanent physical mark, it's somehow of a lesser degree.  As any psychologist will tell you, that's bullshit.  You can sufficiently traumatise someone that they will fear you utterly with words alone.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

IC3D said:


> I met an Indian woman last year who had run away from an employer  who held her passport and limited her movement to some extent for over a year, she'd not been paid and was bullied constantly. She was being looked after by a friends mum who took her in.
> I think I'd call this indentured labour rather than slavery but I gathered from them that it wasn't such an uncommon thing



Except, of course, that there is rarely an official indenture contract, so "slavery" - where a person can be compelled against their will to be a chattel of the "slaver" is indeed an apt description.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 23, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> The story literally is:



They appear to be mistaking cause for effect.


----------



## Smick (Nov 23, 2013)

Peckford Place, Brixton.


----------



## where to (Nov 23, 2013)

"We believe that two of the victims met the male suspect in London through a shared political ideology, and that they lived together at an address that you could effectively call a 'collective'."

The couple arrested came to the UK from India and Tanzania in the 60s.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25068525


----------



## brogdale (Nov 23, 2013)

where to said:


> "We believe that two of the victims met the male suspect in London through a shared political ideology, and that they lived together at an address that you could effectively call a 'collective'."
> 
> The couple arrested came to the UK from India and Tanzania in the 60s.
> 
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25068525


 Ah, some sort of commie "cult", then. 

Plod really are on form.


----------



## laptop (Nov 23, 2013)

*Oh noes! *

They "lived together at an address that you could effectively call a 'collective'." (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25068525).

Is this old OB showing off that they remember collectives, or young OB fishing for guidance on what one is?

(A very small bell is ringing at the back of my mind with this bit... I'm thinking New Age not commie.)


----------



## where to (Nov 23, 2013)

brogdale said:


> Ah, some sort of commie "cult", then.
> 
> Plod really are on form.



you're very quick to dismiss this.  it wouldn't be a first.


----------



## emanymton (Nov 23, 2013)

Fucking Hippies.


----------



## J Ed (Nov 23, 2013)

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/nov/23/london-slaves-political-collective-captor-police



> Two of the three women allegedly held for 30 years as slaves had lived in a political collective with their captors, police have disclosed.
> 
> Metropolitan police commander Steve Rodhouse told reporters that two of the alleged victims met the male suspect in London through a shared political ideology and began living together in a "collective".


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 23, 2013)

where to said:


> you're very quick to dismiss this.  it wouldn't be a first.


Have you examples?


----------



## where to (Nov 23, 2013)

an example of a horrific commie cult, yes, was thinking of Jim Jones.  there may not be many parallels between what's happened and Jim Jones though, too early to say.  

there's no reason to be dismissing what the Police are saying. healthy scepticism yes, outright dismissal no.

the latest on this is that the collective came to an end before the abuse began:

"Somehow that collective came to an end and … somehow the women ended up continuing to live with the suspects. How this resulted in the women living in this way for over 30 years is what are seeking to establish, but we believe emotional and physical abuse has been a feature of all the victims' lives."


----------



## toph (Nov 23, 2013)

ViolentPanda said:


> Just generic "travellers", or a particular subset of "travellers"?


 
Just travellers, I think. I don't the know ethnic divisions in the travelling community, if there are any. I just know I read that book and have also heard two first hand accounts of people been treat like ''slaves'' by travellers e.g being physically forced to work, been paid in food and substandard accommodation rather than currency, being paid below the minimum wage if they actually got paid in currency.


----------



## Belushi (Nov 23, 2013)

Police going house to house in Angell Town according to the news.


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## OvalhouseDB (Nov 23, 2013)

Peckford Place, SW9. Just by Max Roach Park.


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## mystic pyjamas (Nov 23, 2013)

Some cultish left wing organisations come to mind and we all know who they are. And so do they.


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## butchersapron (Nov 23, 2013)

mystic pyjamas said:


> Some cultish left wing organisations come to mind and we all know who they are. And so do they.


I don't. Who do you mean?


----------



## mystic pyjamas (Nov 23, 2013)

RCP, sparts, tiny sects of that sort.


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## Lilith Morris (Nov 23, 2013)

Brixton had any number of political communes/'collectives' in the 70s and 80s (100s of people involved in squats).


----------



## co-op (Nov 23, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> Brixton had any number of political communes/'collectives' in the 70s and 80s (100s of people involved in squats).



And religious ones too - remember all those converts to islam who lived in a squat - from memory - on Bellefields Road? They were really nice but_ seriously_ religious, used to spend all day talking about it.


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## Lilith Morris (Nov 23, 2013)

If it were a religious thing, wouldn't the police statement just say that rather than use that odd phrase "shared political ideology".


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## co-op (Nov 23, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> If it were a religious thing, wouldn't the police statement just say that rather than use that odd phrase "shared political ideology".



Probably. I was reminiscing.


----------



## laptop (Nov 23, 2013)

Dunno. Police can be _remarkably_ thick about religious/political distinctions. 

So all that cash for infiltration is a total waste, analytically speaking...


----------



## Batboy (Nov 23, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> You literally say that you're speculating. And that speculation should not happen. Whilst you're speculating.



I think you know what I mean...


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 24, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> Brixton had any number of political communes/'collectives' in the 70s and 80s (100s of people involved in squats).



Yes it did. I really hope this is not going to be used to smear the history of them.

I question whether the police should have released the information on this case until they had actually charged someone with a crime. Also I wonder who in police is deciding what info on case is made public.

Information from police on the case is coming out in small pieces. Mention of some kind cult was not mentioned in first reports.

There is no indication from police that they have enough evidence to charge anyone. Nor have they said what they may charge them with.


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## leanderman (Nov 24, 2013)

One could see it in terms of job creation - this will keep quite a few people busy for months. And, even then, no charges may follow.


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## PHS (Nov 24, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> I don't. Who do you mean?



The women were held for at least 30 years.

About 30 years ago, a Maoist group/cult in Brixton "went underground".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workers'_Institute_of_Marxism–Leninism–Mao_Zedong_Thought


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## Barking_Mad (Nov 24, 2013)

> Social workers were aware for over three decades of the dysfunctional "family" where three women were allegedly kept as slaves.
> On Saturday police began door-to-door inquiries in Brixton, south London, where a 67-year-old man and woman, of Indian and Tanzanian origin, were arrested on Thursday. They are suspected of keeping the women in a state of domestic servitude. Police said that emotional and physical abuse appeared to have "been a feature" of all the victims' lives.
> A local source claimed that at least one of the women had attempted to escape and that local authorities had been involved with the household. The "cult-like" nature of the relationship between the women and their alleged jailers meant that the victims had apparently previously vetoed any action being taken, making it almost impossible for the authorities to intervene. But there were thought to have been "explosions" of violence within the house, which at one time had six people living there.


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## Johnny Canuck3 (Nov 24, 2013)

If it's a political Kommie Kult, then I guess it's different from the guy in Cleveland.

http://www.today.com/news/cleveland...el-castro-was-obsessed-prostitutes-8C11533218


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## ViolentPanda (Nov 24, 2013)

where to said:


> an example of a horrific commie cult, yes, was thinking of Jim Jones.  there may not be many parallels between what's happened and Jim Jones though, too early to say.



The Peoples' Temple wasn't a "commie cult", you melonhead!
Since when have Communism and religion gone together?
The Peoples' Temple was based on *socialist* and Judeo-Christian principles. Jones was an adherent of the CPUSA, but he "sold" the idea of Jonestown as a Christian socialist enclave.


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## where to (Nov 24, 2013)

i'm using the term there in the same way as the poster who first used it, rather than trying to pin down a precise ideological persuasion.  i don't give too much of a fuck about exactly where Jim Jones ideology sits tbh. my point is that lunatics with forceful personalities have beaten a path to horrific outcomes before - and with their supporters in tow.  this happens in all sorts of arenas but the political left is not imune.


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## Pickman's model (Nov 24, 2013)

where to said:


> i'm using the term there in the same way as the poster who first used it, rather than trying to pin down a precise ideological persuasion.  i don't give too much of a fuck about exactly where Jim Jones ideology sits tbh. my point is that lunatics with forceful personalities have beaten a path to horrific outcomes before - and with their supporters in tow.  this happens in all sorts of arenas but the political left is not imune.


you could just have said you were an intellectual slob and saved yourself the contortions in your post.


----------



## where to (Nov 24, 2013)

an intellectual slob and a melonhead for calling Jim Jones communist not socialist, lol


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## Pickman's model (Nov 24, 2013)

where to said:


> an intellectual slob and a melonhead for calling Jim Jones communist not socialist, lol


no you're talking. but less of the lol.


----------



## where to (Nov 24, 2013)

best avoiding silly typos when you're doing the smug twat routine you know.


----------



## kenny g (Nov 24, 2013)

Is it this lot thirty years down the line? http://www.marxists.org/history/erol/uk.hightide/closure.htm

http://www.marxists.org/history/erol/uk.hightide/#wimlmzt


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## frogwoman (Nov 24, 2013)

as another example of a political cult there are also the larouchites who are (allegedly) linked to serious crimes including murder.


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## Nigel Irritable (Nov 24, 2013)

There are other cultish groups in the US which had entanglements with the early LaRouchites (ie when LaRouche's views were still formally on the radical left), most notably Fred Newman's New Alliance Party and Gino Parente's Provisional Communist Party. Their connection to LaRouche rarely lasted long as that kind of group only has room for one leader.


----------



## Sirena (Nov 24, 2013)

Not forgetting the Symbionese Liberation Army and their 'slave', the Stockholm Syndrome Queen, Patti Hearst....


----------



## kenny g (Nov 24, 2013)

Sirena said:


> Not forgetting the Symbionese Liberation Army and their 'slave', the Stockholm Syndrome Queen, Patti Hearst....



Nor Air Trees Water Animals http://www.allthewayalive.com/One_World_Order/atwa.html


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## leanderman (Nov 24, 2013)

A 'Maoist cult' apparently.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/24/theresa-may-modern-slavery-priority

Theresa May reckons she's going to make modern slavery her "priority".  

Seems to me that its not that much of an issue.  Absolutely horrendous when it does happen - one of the most shocking crimes, but surely made more shocking by its rarity?

To me this seems like the most cycnical kind of bandwagon jumping - what can she conceivably do to lessen it, given that its already pretty rare?  I would suggest that, by its very nature, it will remain under-reported.  I know someone mentioned previously that other people have come forward following these revelations - I do hope that's true, but I suspect that it will more likely make similar perpetrators more paranoid and inclined to take measures to increase their levels of control over their victims.  I will also suggest that this case will be well resourced, as would anything similar.  She talks of increasing the maximum sentence.  I shan't shed any tears for anyone who does such a thing and gets lifed off, but I'm not aware that sentence length is a particularly effective deterrent for most crimes.


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/24/theresa-may-modern-slavery-priority
> 
> Theresa May reckons she's going to make modern slavery her "priority".
> 
> ...


How do you know it's "rare"? Because you don't know about it?


----------



## spanglechick (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/24/theresa-may-modern-slavery-priority
> 
> Theresa May reckons she's going to make modern slavery her "priority".
> 
> ...


the issue of trafficking is sadly not especially rare.  the sex industry, agricultural, domestic... all have problems with trafficked labour who are held as slaves.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> How do you know it's "rare"? Because you don't know about it?



I tend to think that things I rarely hear about are under-reported because they dont happen that often.  This may be some kind of confirmation bias or something, but yes, I do think its probably pretty rare.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

spanglechick said:


> the issue of trafficking is sadly not especially rare.  the sex industry, agricultural, domestic... all have problems with trafficked labour who are held as slaves.



Whilst I wouldnt doubt that its an issue within the sex industry, I would be curious to know how much of an issue, and how this is known.  

Domestic and agricultural - the cases I have heard about are usually well reported - what other examples are there?


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 24, 2013)

If what the police intimate ('shared political ideology') is true, then it follows that the situation of these women has nothing whatsover to do with modern slavery, trafficking, bonded labour, etc.....
It would seem (tentatively and subject to more information about what has happened) that this is more like decades of emotional and physical abuse in a non-normative 'family', and that's where we should go for our understanding - comparison with the situation of women in forced marriage (however voluntary the initial arrangement) might also stand.
If it turns out that the people involved were part of a millenarian Maoism, then that also has implications for the kinds of practice that is deemed acceptable within political organisations (rigorous self-criticism, reeducation etc...) and how we think about the power of groups over members.


----------



## equationgirl (Nov 24, 2013)

I disagree Lilith Morris I think this case has everything to do with modern slavery, even if they were first enticed into this situation back in the 1980s.


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 24, 2013)

The issue in domestic labour as I understand it is that the immigration status of domestic servants is often dependent on the visa of their 'employer' and so if, for example, a Filipino servant enters the country as the employee (and therefore on the visa of) a Saudi family and is then withheld wages, subject to physical or other abuse, works more hours than contracted etc.... then she has no recourse.  She can report the family, but she can't transfer her employment legally, so reporting means being deported.


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> I tend to think that things I rarely hear about are under-reported because they dont happen that often.  This may be some kind of confirmation bias or something, but yes, I do think its probably pretty rare.


That's some logical thinking there! Have you ever been to Prague train station? I ask because if you've been outside and seen all the homeless people it's quite shocking (well, I found it anyway), I'd ask you ... who would notice if they go missing and more importantly who would care?



Jon-of-arc said:


> Whilst I wouldnt doubt that its an issue within the sex industry


If you look at the stats about people who have been found to be trafficked in this country the vast majority of them were for labour exploitation rather than sexual exploitation. That tells me labour exploitation is more widespread than sexual exploitation, the latter of which you appear to be well aware of...


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## Lilith Morris (Nov 24, 2013)

It only has everything to do with 'modern slavery' if all situations in which the use or threat of violence by one person to control and exploit another over a sustained period of time count as modern slavery.  That is the definition used by Kevin Bales, which I think applies also to anyone who has ever been in a situation of domestic violence for instance.   To call those situations 'slavery' is really unhelpful analytically.  I understand the motivation.  It is a way of saying "really bad."  It comes from a very binary understanding of slavery-freedom (i.e. everything that is 'not slavery' is okay).  When in fact there are lots of situations that are really bad and not okay, but are also not 'slavery' in a way that is at all meaningful.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

Just looking at a BBC q&a, following the Bedfordshire case a couple of years back.  They refer to 200 reported cases of domestic slavery, over 2 years.  Usually imigration related.  Anti-Slavery International reckon that their may be up to 5000 slaves within the UK.  

I would suggest that these numbers put slavery in the category of "rare".  Abhorent, and uncomfortably frequent (the suggestion that there are 4997 people out there suffering similar fates is pretty scary), but in the grand scheme of things, pretty rare.  And by its nature, decidedly difficult to tackle making Mays promises to make it a "personal priority" sound like a hollow promise, which was my original point.


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 24, 2013)

where to said:


> best avoiding silly typos when you're doing the smug twat routine you know.


pedantry alive and well i see


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> That's some logical thinking there! Have you ever been to Prague train station? I ask because if you've been outside and seen all the homeless people it's quite shocking (well, I found it anyway), I'd ask you ... who would notice if they go missing and more importantly who would care?
> 
> 
> If you look at the stats about people who have been found to be trafficked in this country the vast majority of them were for labour exploitation rather than sexual exploitation. That tells me labour exploitation is more widespread than sexual exploitation, the latter of which you appear to be well aware of...



I was looking at the stats (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14888112) - happy to look at better ones, if you have them.

Amount of homeless people is not equal to the amount of slaves.  I've worked with homeless people, been homeless, and have never heard of anything that sounded even vaguely like that Bedfordshire case.  

The link I posted suggests sexual slavery is the most common.


----------



## Sirena (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/24/theresa-may-modern-slavery-priority
> 
> Theresa May reckons she's going to make modern slavery her "priority".
> 
> ...



I'm tempted to agree with you.  I thought quite draconian laws had already been enacted, even before anyone had been convicted in this country of slavery, specifically sex slavery.

There has been a meme on Xtian discussion boards for some years now: an extension of the child:sex:danger meme which is that children are in danger from sex slavery and that thousands (tens of thousands?  hundreds of thousands?) of children are being trafficked for sex.  They are trying to work it up into another moral panic.

I am not saying it does not exist, just that we should be cautious and a little bit circumspect.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> I tend to think that things I rarely hear about are under-reported because they dont happen that often.  This may be some kind of confirmation bias or something, but yes, I do think its probably pretty rare.



We very rarely here DV talked about in the news but two women a week are still dying as a consequence of domestic abuse. 

We don't hear about every racist arrest but racism happens on a daily basis.  Likewise homophobia etc.

Your thinking is very bizarre.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> We very rarely here DV talked about in the news but two women a week are still dying as a consequence of domestic abuse.
> 
> We don't hear about every racist arrest but racism happens on a daily basis.  Likewise homophobia etc.
> 
> Your thinking is very bizarre.



So the statistics on domestic violence, commonly and justifiably referred to as a "hidden crime", seem to say that 2 million people state they victims every year (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21372875).  Compared with the (estimated - not reported) 5,000 victims of slavery (see my above link).  

So, I feel somewhat justified in claiming that slavery is rare in comparison - because there is 400 times as much domestic violence as slavery.  

I don't actually feel this is a wildly controversial statement, the more I think about it.


----------



## purenarcotic (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> So the statistics on domestic violence, commonly and justifiably referred to as a "hidden crime", seem to say that 2 million people state they victims every year (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21372875).  Compared with the (estimated - not reported) 5,000 victims of slavery (see my above link).
> 
> So, I feel somewhat justified in claiming that slavery is rare in comparison - because there is 400 times as much domestic violence as slavery.
> 
> I don't actually feel this is a wildly controversial statement, the more I think about it.



I'm not saying your point about slavery is wildly controversial, my point was that lots of issues aren't regularly reported but it doesn't necessarily make them rare occurrences.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

purenarcotic said:


> I'm not saying your point about slavery is wildly controversial, my point was that lots of issues aren't regularly reported but it doesn't necessarily make them rare occurrences.



I admitted possible "confirmation bias" - a fallacy everyone can fall into, and not at all bizarre.  Looking into it, it seems I was right, though.  Sometimes, things are not reported because they don't happen often.


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> I was looking at the stats (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14888112) - happy to look at better ones, if you have them.
> 
> Amount of homeless people is not equal to the amount of slaves.  I've worked with homeless people, been homeless, and have never heard of anything that sounded even vaguely like that Bedfordshire case.
> 
> The link I posted suggests sexual slavery is the most common.


Not sure where on your link it says sexual slavery is more common? I thought it said there was a 50 50 split between that and labour exploitation? On this page there are some links to the same stats the BBC guy got his from (but more up to date). It says when cases have been proved to be trafficked, most were for labou exploitation

My comment about homeless people outside Prague station was as much to do with nationality than whether they were homeless or not. If you've worked with homeless people in this country then perhaps you would be none the wiser about those trafficked from abroad and kept as slaves in this country?


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

Sirena said:


> I'm tempted to agree with you.  I thought quite draconian laws had already been enacted, even before anyone had been convicted in this country of slavery, specifically sex slavery.
> 
> There has been a meme on Xtian discussion boards for some years now: an extension of the child:sex:danger meme which is that children are in danger from sex slavery and that thousands (tens of thousands?  hundreds of thousands?) of children are being trafficked for sex.  They are trying to work it up into another moral panic.
> 
> I am not saying it does not exist, just that we should be cautious and a little bit circumspect.



Indeed.  Reminds me of season 5 of the wire - at the end, when Carcetti finds out the "homeless murders" weren't murders at all, and his blokeys laughing at the fact that "they've manufactured an issue to get what they want, and you're getting elected off the back of it" (or something - don't remember the precise quote - season 5 sucked) and nobody wants to go and admit the truth even after they find out, cos everyones getting what they want...

People will exploit rare cases to suit their own interests/agendas.  Whilst I very much doubt May has an "agenda" on this (I doubt she'd spent more than 5 minutes thinking about it in her life, before this week), it is very much in her interests to make it an issue - especially if its rare.  She can appear "tough" on the issue, without anyone every suggesting that she needs to spend anything much to combat it.


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc - can you define what you mean by "rare"? All crimes are "rare" that doesn't mean we should ignore them, nor does it mean a problem might not be a lot worse than what we read about in the papers...


----------



## kenny g (Nov 24, 2013)

Spoke with someone a few weeks ago who is getting £40 a day for working from 9-7 with ten minute breaks for prayers and  lunch.


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> People will exploit rare cases to suit their own interests/agendas.  Whilst I very much doubt May has an "agenda" on this (I doubt she'd spent more than 5 minutes thinking about it in her life, before this week), it is very much in her interests to make it an issue - especially if its rare.  She can appear "tough" on the issue, without anyone every suggesting that she needs to spend anything much to combat it.


I've no doubt May is cashing in on something the media seem to be popularising at the moment, she's a politician that's what they do. But the assumption that because she is doing that it automatically makes this a non-issue seems a bit odd


----------



## kenny g (Nov 24, 2013)

kenny g said:


> Spoke with someone a few weeks ago who is getting £40 a day for working from 9-7 with ten minute breaks for prayers and  lunch.



My point is that it is in the enemy's interest to make us  feel like we are better off than someone else so we stop realising how much worse off we are than the scum who live off our backs.


----------



## peterkro (Nov 24, 2013)

OvalhouseDB said:


> Peckford Place, SW9. Just by Max Roach Park.


Hmm, I lived in Villa road (backs onto Peckford place for thirty five years presumably the women were there most of that time,odd.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> Not sure where on your link it says sexual slavery is more common? I thought it said there was a 50 50 split between that and labour exploitation? On this page there are some links to the same stats the BBC guy got his from (but more up to date). It says when cases have been proved to be trafficked, most were for labou exploitation
> 
> My comment about homeless people outside Prague station was as much to do with nationality than whether they were homeless or not. If you've worked with homeless people in this country then perhaps you would be none the wiser about those trafficked from abroad and kept as slaves in this country?



You're right - I got the bit about 3/4 being women and 1/2 being sex slaves mixed up.  

The October 2012 SOCA report you link to sucggests that the most common adult slavery case type "referred" (presumably where someone is referred to the police, but does not necessarily go onto prosecution or other action?) is sexual exploitation, but the most common type who "received a positive conclusion and where thefore found to be trafficked" was labour exploitation.  

I wonder if this says more about police attitudes to sex-workers, than it does about the realities of slavery?  I admit this is total conjecture, but their track record on victims of sex crimes leaves you wondering.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> Jon-of-arc - can you define what you mean by "rare"? All crimes are "rare" that doesn't mean we should ignore them, nor does it mean a problem might not be a lot worse than what we read about in the papers...



No, I can't.  Soz.  It means different things in different circumstances.  less than 0.01% of the population, or less than 1 in 10,000 people is rare though.

e2a - I would say that, for example, domestic violence is "not rare" by comparison - around 3% of the population being victims each year.  This means that you will probably know a few people who are victims, and probably won't know any who are victims of slavery.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> I've no doubt May is cashing in on something the media seem to be popularising at the moment, she's a politician that's what they do. But the assumption that because she is doing that it automatically makes this a non-issue seems a bit odd



Sorry, I should not have used the phrase "not an issue".  It is absolutely abhorrent, and I'm certainly in favour of anything proportionate that can be done to tackle it.  

I didn't say that the fact that she's commenting makes it a "non-issue", though.  It's rare, and the hypocrisy of her claiming to make it a personal priority when the reality is that it is so infrequently reported that she can do very little more than is already being done is what I was criticising.


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> No, I can't.  Soz.  It means different things in different circumstances.  less than 0.01% of the population, or less than 1 in 10,000 people is rare though.


Yes sorry, what I mean is can you compare it to something else? You've mentioned sex trafficking and the stats suggest it's at least as bad if not worse than that, so do you think sex trafficking is an important issue worthy of tackling?


----------



## CyberRose (Nov 24, 2013)

Jon-of-arc said:


> I didn't say that the fact that she's commenting makes it a "non-issue", though.  It's rare, and the hypocrisy of her claiming to make it a personal priority when the reality is that it is so infrequently reported that she can do very little more than is already being done is what I was criticising.


It's natural to be sceptical when a politician starts banging on about something that's 'popular', but this isn't a vote winner when you think of the likely victims (unlike tackling Muslamic rayguns) so maybe there's something here?


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> Yes sorry, what I mean is can you compare it to something else? You've mentioned sex trafficking and the stats suggest it's at least as bad if not worse than that, so do you think sex trafficking is an important issue worthy of tackling?



I think any dispicable example of one human exploiting another through an imbalance of power (whether that be economic, physical, psychological or "other") is worth doing something about, if possible.

I would suggest that it might be difficult to tackle some issues more than we already do, without allocating valuable resources that might possibly be better used elsewhere.  

This is a case in point.  They have 30-summink cops working full time on this case.  I don't doubt that the complexity requires this many people. Would we be able to do the same again, if another 100 similar examples came to light, over the remainder of Mays term in office?  What is the likelyhood that another example will happen?  Let alone a hundred?  Do we need to set up a human slavery task force?  Can we afford to?  What outcome would we hope to achieve from this?

It's a nuanced issue, and one I don't claim to have all the answers on.  I imagine that tackling the problem is almost always going to be reactive, though, due to its hidden nature and comparative infrequency.


----------



## Jon-of-arc (Nov 24, 2013)

CyberRose said:


> It's natural to be sceptical when a politician starts banging on about something that's 'popular', but this isn't a vote winner when you think of the likely victims (unlike tackling Muslamic rayguns) so maybe there's something here?



Well, she did say she'd be increasing minimum sentences.  Can't hurt, I suppose, and I shan't shed a tear for anyone who gets lifed off if they're found guilty.  

I'd be happy to see more come of it.  I just don't think it will.


----------



## Frances Lengel (Nov 24, 2013)

Regardless of how rare slavery may or may not be, Jon's right in that May saying she's making it her priority is nothing more than a cynical bit of bluster to get her name in the papers saying "I'm against slavery, me".


----------



## 8115 (Nov 24, 2013)

It might need to be a bit of a priority for a while because it's been under-recognised so there aren't teams, structures, whatever in place to deal with it.  Other serious but rare crimes like murder or whatever, the police are set up to deal with.  But slavery probably tends to be more dealt with by immigration teams and I'd be in favour of the police taking more of a lead on it if they need to.

(Obviously I hate Theresa May, but even a stopped clock, etc).


----------



## lang rabbie (Nov 24, 2013)

Monday's Independent is reporting that the household WAS reported to authorities previously:

*Police alerted Lambeth about ‘slavery house’ 15 years ago *


----------



## leanderman (Nov 24, 2013)

lang rabbie said:


> Monday's Independent is reporting that the household WAS reported to authorities previously:
> 
> *Police alerted Lambeth about ‘slavery house’ 15 years ago *



Not surprising really because it seems the 'girl', now 30, never went to school etc.


----------



## Nigel Irritable (Nov 25, 2013)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukn...ran-a-revolutionary-Communist-collective.html

The Telegraph indicate that this was indeed connected to the Workers Institute for Marxism Leninism Mao Tse Tung Thought.


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 25, 2013)

Interesting comment on this thread http://www.network54.com/Forum/3932...51071485/Maoism+in+Britain+-+Is+this+the+End- discusses a documentary on the commune.


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## Divisive Cotton (Nov 25, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> Interesting comment on this thread http://www.network54.com/Forum/393207/thread/1250214424/1251071485/Maoism in Britain - Is this the End- discusses a documentary on the commune.



There's a few:



> Many years ago there was a documentary on television about a commune in London that was overseen by someone whom the residents called "Comrade Bala" (I think). Would this happen to be the Balakrishnan whom NM refers to in his post? If so, I'd be grateful for any further information about him and his organisation. They came across as a pretty sinister lot. Apparently a naive young woman from Wales had joined the commune and was found dead some time afterwards, and the implication of the documentary was that there may have been something sinister about her death. The presenter doorstepped some of Comrade Bala's people and a young woman called Josephine called her a fascist and threatened to call the "fascist police force" unless she went away.





> I know he did refer to himself as "Bala". And his group had definite cult-like tendencies, as distinct from the merely sect-like tendencies of most of the left in this country. My only direct contact with them was meeting some of their people leafletting outside ULU in the early 1980s. But I heard stories...





> I think that there is/was a prominent Tamil or Sinhalese marxist know as Comrade Bala (perhaps a nom de guerre). Perhaps this London cultist chose a name similar to this in an attempt to get some reflected glory?


----------



## JHE (Nov 25, 2013)

Is the role of Maoist sects to make the Trotlets look comparatively sane and benevolent?


----------



## Sirena (Nov 25, 2013)

PHS said:


> The women were held for at least 30 years.
> 
> About 30 years ago, a Maoist group/cult in Brixton "went underground".
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workers'_Institute_of_Marxism–Leninism–Mao_Zedong_Thought


The BBC News has just confirmed it is these.  The Bala and Chanda couple.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 25, 2013)

Sirena said:


> The BBC News has just confirmed it is these.  The Bala and Chanda couple.



Extraordinary!


----------



## treelover (Nov 25, 2013)

> Most of the remaining Maoists in Britain live in London, a large cosmopolitan capital city. Indeed the Maoists themselves are of an international composition, some of them being political refugees from their countries of origin. In London there is a continuous round of leftist political meetings, demonstrations and pickets. If one wants to, it is easy to spend all of ones available time attending such occasions and this is what some of the Maoists do. A lot, but not all, of this political activity is focussed on events abroad such as developments in Nepal, India and Iran. *To a far lesser degree are these occasions directly concerned with what is happening within British society. Of course, communists are internationalists and should necessarily see and conduct the struggle against capitalism on an international basis rather than a narrow national one. Even so, many of these people seem far more concerned and knowledgeable about political struggles thousands of miles away rather than on their own doorstep*. We should not forget that Lenin and Mao asserted that the best form of internationalism is to engage in and develop revolutionary struggle in whatever place one happens to be.






Lilith Morris said:


> Interesting comment on this thread http://www.network54.com/Forum/393207/thread/1250214424/1251071485/Maoism in Britain - Is this the End- discusses a documentary on the commune.



He got that bit right anyway.


----------



## laptop (Nov 25, 2013)

Anyone got a link to the papers on the Institute by Steve Rayner?


----------



## Belushi (Nov 25, 2013)

It's the same group that I remember being mentioned on here once as inspiring the Tooting Popular Front in Citizen Smith.


----------



## laptop (Nov 25, 2013)

Belushi said:


> It's the same group that I remember being mentioned on here once as inspiring the Tooting Popular Front in Citizen Smith.



Sadly, the WikiFacts on the Institute reference an inacessible Times Diary column in this connection, not the discussion here


----------



## Belushi (Nov 25, 2013)

laptop said:


> Sadly, the WikiFacts on the Institute reference an inacessible Times Diary column in this connection, not the discussion here


 
Yes, apparently the Times Diary used to enjoy posting up their more ludicrous pronouncements.


----------



## Belushi (Nov 25, 2013)

http://www.urban75.net/forums/threads/maoists-in-brixton.313187/


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

laptop said:


> Anyone got a link to the papers on the Institute by Steve Rayner?


Google books version.


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 25, 2013)

That chapter (missing some pages in google books) is taken from his PhD thesis which is available as a pdf here -> http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/1349448/1/D32160.pdf


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 25, 2013)

where to said:


> an intellectual slob and a melonhead for calling Jim Jones communist not socialist, lol



There's more than a little difference, old chap.


----------



## laptop (Nov 25, 2013)

Belushi said:


> http://www.urban75.net/forums/threads/maoists-in-brixton.313187/



Ta!

Should we update the WikiHistory? Downside: loads of journalists arriving on that thread.

And ta also for the thesis...


----------



## Wilf (Nov 25, 2013)

Whether this ultimately gets prosecuted as slavery or 'merely' abuse, it's bizarre that just about the most absurd version of 70s far leftism should feature in a 30 year story.  At one level that's a ridiculous thing to say of course, it's _almost always_ batshit political/religious ideas that cult leaders use to abuse. Still, there's a bit of me that struggles to see something most people regarded as a political joke coming centre stage.  Shadesof Gery Healy.


----------



## Dogsauce (Nov 25, 2013)

How long till some fuckwhistle at the Mail links these characters and the 'poisonous philosophy' they followed to Ed Milliband's Dad?


----------



## laptop (Nov 25, 2013)

Dogsauce said:


> How long till some fuckwhistle at the Mail links these characters and the 'poisonous philosophy' they followed to Ed Milliband's Dad?



He was a Maoist? Who knew?


----------



## Dogsauce (Nov 25, 2013)

laptop said:


> He was a Maoist? Who knew?


 
Conflating the two should be pretty easy for some right-wing hack. After all, Obama is a socialist, right?


----------



## not-bono-ever (Nov 25, 2013)

without wishing to affect any subsequent legal action, these Maoists are clearly unhinged


----------



## Sirena (Nov 25, 2013)

laptop said:


> Ta!
> 
> Should we update the WikiHistory? Downside: loads of journalists arriving on that thread.
> 
> And ta also for the thesis...



btw there is a piece in tonight's Evening Standard that probably owes a little debt to what people have written in the preceding few pages.


----------



## co-op (Nov 25, 2013)

Were these the people that used to stick up little stickers everywhere round Brixton and Stockwell in the arly 90s demanding that passers by "Move heaven and earth to defend Chairman Guzman!" (presumably just after he got nicked in 1992)? It wasn't just that the Shining Path were Maoist but there was something oddly cultish about the language - there were others but I can't remember the slogans now.


----------



## co-op (Nov 25, 2013)

Ah, *note to self* Google before posting, looks like the Move Heaven and Earth quote is from this lot

http://www.aworldtowin.org/back_iss...th_to_Defend_the_Life_of_Chairman_Gonzalo.htm

Dunno if the Revolutionary Internationalists are connected to the Mao Zedong Thought groupiscule.


----------



## co-op (Nov 25, 2013)




----------



## ChrisD (Nov 25, 2013)

I fear the link to obscure leftist group with comedic overtones will make the media not treat this as seriously as the plight of those "trapped" deserves.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

co-op said:


> Ah, *note to self* Google before posting, looks like the Move Heaven and Earth quote is from this lot
> 
> http://www.aworldtowin.org/back_iss...th_to_Defend_the_Life_of_Chairman_Gonzalo.htm
> 
> Dunno if the Revolutionary Internationalists are connected to the Mao Zedong Thought groupiscule.


That lot came out of the WRP rapist split i think - certainly one of them had World to Win or something similar.

edit: ah no


----------



## chilango (Nov 25, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> That lot came out of the WRP rapist split i think - certainly one of them had World to Win or something similar.



I've a feeling that was a completely different "a world to win" group.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

chilango said:


> I've a feeling that was a completely different "a world to win" group.


Yep, this lot lots like some foreign maoists and stalinists over here


----------



## chilango (Nov 25, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Yep, this lot lots like some foreign maoists and stalinists over here



probably linked to the R.I.M. i would've thought.


----------



## chilango (Nov 25, 2013)

Yep. As discussed on here in this thread.

The all time classic "Workers Power have split" thread of course.

On AWTW is something to do with the SEP splinter of the WRP. The one quoted above should indeed be the Maoists of the RIM, who themselves split iirc and led to the hilarious Maoist film reviewers of the MIM (again long time faves of the board).


----------



## chilango (Nov 25, 2013)




----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 25, 2013)

chilango said:


> probably linked to the R.I.M. i would've thought.


a dubious acronym if ever there was one.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 25, 2013)

ChrisD said:


> I fear the link to obscure leftist group with comedic overtones will make the media not treat this as seriously as the plight of those "trapped" deserves.



Putting the cult into Cultural Revolution. 

And confirms my prejudices about political extremists.


----------



## Nigel Irritable (Nov 25, 2013)

co-op said:


> Dunno if the Revolutionary Internationalists are connected to the Mao Zedong Thought groupiscule.



No connection at all, beyond being both Maoist and nuts.


----------



## barney_pig (Nov 25, 2013)

Tourish is getting an airing on the news


----------



## Nigel Irritable (Nov 25, 2013)

barney_pig said:


> Tourish is getting an airing on the news



Which channel has this prick on?


----------



## barney_pig (Nov 25, 2013)

Both itv and bbc news had him


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

i wonder whether their politics can be linked to their actions. i know maoism has some weird things like "self-criticism" where they all sit round and say what terrible comrades they have been.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

Proper proletarian self-criticism:



> The United Red Army (連合赤軍 Rengō Sekigun?) was a Japanese revolutionary armed group, established on 15 July 1971. It united the Red Army Faction, led in 1971 by Tsuneo Mori, and the Maoist Revolutionary Left Wing of the Japanese Communist Party, led by Hiroko Nagata. The United Red Army had 29 members and lost 14 by killing them in less than a year.
> 
> Early in August, two defectors were lynched and their bodies buried in Inba numa marsh, Chiba Prefecture. In the winter of 1971–1972 the United Red Army was hiding in the mountains in Gunma Prefecture. They established camps and trained for military purposes. The leaders of the United Red Army encouraged their fighters to examine their weaknesses in criticism and self-criticism, and these sessions turned into lynchings. The group purged itself one by one of members deemed not sufficiently revolutionary. Many of the twelve victims died tied to posts in the open, exposed to the elements, but others were beaten to death or slaughtered with knives. The first died on 31 December and the last on 12 February. The United Red Army leaders later did not admit that they had killed, but called it* death by defeatism*


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 25, 2013)

frogwoman said:


> i wonder whether their politics can be linked to their actions. i know maoism has some weird things like "self-criticism" where they all sit round and say what terrible comrades they have been.


whereas at other left-wing meetings they all sit around and think what terrible comrades they have


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

Didn't LaRouche start out as a maoist?


----------



## seventh bullet (Nov 25, 2013)

frogwoman said:


> i wonder whether their politics can be linked to their actions. i know maoism has some weird things like "self-criticism" where they all sit round and say what terrible comrades they have been.



Which came from earlier Bolshevik experience.


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

This small sect of religious Maoists are renowned for having more
front organisations than any other group on the far-left, for publishing
unreadable journals, and for engaging in lunatic confrontations with the
police. In 1974, the CPE M-L achieved publicity by standing for a
number of candidates in the October general election. They were also
involved in the violent breaking-up of lectures by the controversial
psychologist H.J.Eysenck. The CPE M-L is the organisation from which
Balakrishan and Brome seceded in 1975 in order to start their own group
in Brixton, the Workers' Institute of Marxism-Leninism Mao Xedong Thought,
not far from the CPE M-L's headquarters in Battersea. The Workers' Institute
characterises Hardail Baines, Alan Evans of the CPI M-L, CPE M-L leader
Carol Reakes, and the 'Worker Aristocrat' Reg Birch as the West's own
Gang of Four!


----------



## Nigel Irritable (Nov 25, 2013)

frogwoman said:


> Didn't LaRouche start out as a maoist?



No. He had a brief period in the US SWP, but he started building his group as a kind of study circle in and around the Students for a Democratic Society. Right from the start the group's views had no obvious link to Trotskyist, Maoist or Anarchist currents. They were idiosyncratic before they became obviously deranged.


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

they chose brixton for their centre because "it's the worst place in the world"  

i can think of much worse places tbh


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

I was told by one member that the Chinese had nothing to fear
from nuclear reprisals by the United States or the Soviet Union, against
a major onslaught by the People's Liberation Army . This is because of
Chinese secret electronic weaponry which will prevent enemy missiles from
taking off . Yet in the,same conversation , my informant said of the
Chinese nuclear test in September 1977 that China needed to develop
nuclear weapons only for self-defence and would never be the first to
use them . I suggested that this was inconsistent with the possession
of electronic weaponry which would render other powers ' nuclear capacity
useless but on thisyas on other occasions any attempt by an outsider to
expose possible inconsistencies met with total resistance . The outsider
simply does not understand because of his failure to 'think dialectically' .


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

So what do we know about this 1997 death? Someone fell from a 2nd floor window to their death. Any more?


----------



## toph (Nov 25, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> So what do we know about this 1997 death? Someone fell from a 2nd floor window to their death. Any more?[/quote



What conclusions are you hoping to draw poirot?


----------



## where to (Nov 25, 2013)

ViolentPanda said:


> There's more than a little difference, old chap.



its splitting hairs over _his_ ideology that amuses.


----------



## losttheplot (Nov 25, 2013)

The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
Something`s not right about the entire affair.


----------



## sleaterkinney (Nov 25, 2013)

I wonder what the bourgeois justice system will come up with this time.


----------



## where to (Nov 25, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> So what do we know about this 1997 death? Someone fell from a 2nd floor window to their death. Any more?



it was a woman, and she was young and Welsh, according to:
http://www.network54.com/Forum/3932...51071485/Maoism+in+Britain+-+Is+this+the+End-

the dates suggest the incident may have taken place when they lived in Herne Hill.


----------



## Maurice Picarda (Nov 25, 2013)

losttheplot said:


> The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
> the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
> Something`s not right about the entire affair.



Why don't you think the Maoists would have bothered to educate the child?


----------



## ChrisD (Nov 25, 2013)

losttheplot said:


> The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
> the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
> Something`s not right about the entire affair.


could they spell "neighbours" ?  and had the statement the requisite number of exclamation marks?


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

where to said:


> it was a woman, and she was young and Welsh, according to:
> http://www.network54.com/Forum/393207/thread/1250214424/1251071485/Maoism in Britain - Is this the End-
> 
> the dates suggest the incident may have taken place when they lived in Herne Hill.


Yes, this is what neighbours suggested to the standard apparently. They had a pic of a news clipping on c4 news earlier but i couldn't make the name. But i could make out that it said she was a member of a womens group using the building, rather than the maoist group.


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 25, 2013)

The adults in the situation could read and write (even if it was to write denunciations of every other leftist etc...).  Lack of liberty is completely different from lack of basic education (i.e. learning to read and write).


----------



## kenny g (Nov 25, 2013)

losttheplot said:


> The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
> the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
> Something`s not right about the entire affair.



You can be an educated slave. I agree with you that something is not right though.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 25, 2013)

losttheplot said:


> The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
> the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
> Something`s not right about the entire affair.


I have seen many such letters and they all match  the published one.


----------



## Wilf (Nov 25, 2013)

ChrisD said:


> could they spell "neighbours" ?  and had the statement the requisite number of exclamation marks?


 This was merely a message - no the full Communique.


----------



## kenny g (Nov 25, 2013)

Are there any pictures of the dear leader?


----------



## Maurice Picarda (Nov 25, 2013)

kenny g said:


> Are there any pictures of the dear leader?



http://www.urban75.net/forums/threa...fresh-mug-action-for-your-delectation.274873/

Somewhere in here. Has to be. Where else would a cabal of reclusive ultra-leftists from Lambeth post?


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

losttheplot said:


> The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
> the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
> Something`s not right about the entire affair.



this is your first post


----------



## Maurice Picarda (Nov 25, 2013)

frogwoman said:


> this is your first post



Only just left the cellar?


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 25, 2013)

I find it weird that the guy now reports receiving 500 letters over a seven year period, some of which had very disturbing content, and didn't consider talking to the police, social services or any other agency.


----------



## Divisive Cotton (Nov 25, 2013)

or least knock on the door and say, er can you stop shoving these hand written letters through my letterbox please


----------



## Sue (Nov 25, 2013)

Rev Bob Nind, who was the vicar of St Matthew's church in Brixton and a well-known community figure at the time, said he went to the Maoist group's centre once, and also knew of them by reputation. "The place itself didn't see that remarkable. It mainly looked like a bookshop," he told the Guardian. "There were a lot of young people around, including a lot of women. *There was a lot of literature connected to Mao*."

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/25/slavery-london


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

http://www.anorak.co.uk/376996/mone...ngland-marxist-leninist-august-1st-1974.html/


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

> Statement of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) – August 1st, 1974
> 
> At an extraordinary plenary session of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) held on July 17th, the Central Committee decided unanimously to endorse the decision taken by the National Executive Committee of the Party on July 10th to suspend Aravindan Balakrishnan from all posts and from membership of the Party. The Central Committee also took appropriate disciplinary action on members of Aravindan Balakrishnan’s small clique.
> 
> ...


----------



## brogdale (Nov 25, 2013)

Silas Loom said:


> Why don't you think the Maoists would have bothered to educate the child?



Especially as they only had the one child per family, like.


----------



## The39thStep (Nov 25, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> I have seen many such letters and they all match  the published one.



A man of letters


----------



## The39thStep (Nov 25, 2013)

I have only met a handful of Maoists over the years. All bar one were more interested in China and the correctness of what ever was going on there or where China was involved than anything else. the other was a thoroughly boring bloke whose ambition was to be a union full timer and used to try and engage in discussions with me about how many votes either the SWP or the Millies got in Unison branches. He was useless when it came down to any form of negotiation or defending members.


----------



## shygirl (Nov 25, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> I find it weird that the guy now reports receiving 500 letters over a seven year period, some of which had very disturbing content, and didn't consider talking to the police, social services or any other agency.



Some people are so deeply anti-authority that they wouldn't consider picking up the phone to police or social workers.  Added to this, I think I recall reading that she asked him not to say anything.


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 25, 2013)

There's no evidence that that is his reason for keeping quiet (i.e. he hasn't said so in what he's said to the press)


----------



## shygirl (Nov 25, 2013)

I didn't say it was.


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 25, 2013)

You offer it as a plausible explanation, without any evidence. Some people are that deeply anti-authority (e.g. members of Maoist cults, anarchists with an ACAB line).  Some people don't have the option of going to the police (members of the nationalist community during the Troubles).  But there's no reason to think this guy is deeply anti-authority to that extent, or that it's usual to be deeply anti-authority to that extent - so it's not really an explanation of his receiving 500 letters and not telling anyone.


----------



## equationgirl (Nov 25, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> You offer it as a plausible explanation, without any evidence. Some people are that deeply anti-authority (e.g. members of Maoist cults, anarchists with an ACAB line).  Some people don't have the option of going to the police (members of the nationalist community during the Troubles).  But there's no reason to think this guy is deeply anti-authority to that extent, or that it's usual to be deeply anti-authority to that extent - so it's not really an explanation of his receiving 500 letters and not telling anyone.


I think he was 19 when he first started receiving letters. I suspect he may not have known exactly what was going on at least to start with.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 25, 2013)

What have the two suspects being doing for 30 years? You can't live off Maoist thought alone. Someone must have worked with them or something.


----------



## hibsgrrl (Nov 25, 2013)

http://www.itv.com/news/2013-11-25/slavery-suspects-were-leaders-of-maoist-commune/

More about woman who fell out of window in this report - not sure which Herne Hill street it is.  Looks a bit like one of the Poets Corner streets.


----------



## not-bono-ever (Nov 25, 2013)

I dunno, the chairman wrote extensively on self reliance 

"The wealth of society is created by the workers, peasants and working intellectuals. If they take their destiny into their own hands, follow a Marxist-Leninist line and take an active attitude in solving problems instead of evading them, there will be no difficulty in the world which they cannot overcome"


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 25, 2013)

they were working but they gave all their money to the cult or at least that's what it said in that stephen rayner article.


----------



## toph (Nov 25, 2013)

So where they actually slaves or just stupid?


----------



## shygirl (Nov 25, 2013)

In my experience, there's loads of people, probably mainly in w/c communities, who are deeply anti-authority, mainly towards social services and police.  I live on a council estate in Brixton, grew up on one in Wales, and have seen all sorts of shit going on that, in spite of its seriousness, usually doesn't get reported by most people.  And as you pointed out, it can be more entrenched in some communities than others (your eg being the 6 counties during the troubles).


----------



## DotCommunist (Nov 26, 2013)

toph said:


> So where they actually slaves or just stupid?




somebody born into a cult and raised in indoctrination veering on brainwashing can hardly be accused of being stupid you cretin


----------



## toph (Nov 26, 2013)

DotCommunist said:


> somebody born into a cult and raised in indoctrination veering on brainwashing can hardly be accused of being stupid you cretin



What about the other two then? Assuming they weren't born into it that is. Stupid?


----------



## DotCommunist (Nov 26, 2013)

plenty of people can end up in cults- and it doesn't indicate stupidity.

I don't know if its whats usually defined as slavery but it certainly isn't stupidity.


----------



## rover07 (Nov 26, 2013)

Can 5 people be a cult? 2 Leaders and 3 followers seems too small to me.

I would think 12 is a minimum number.


----------



## Humberto (Nov 26, 2013)

People can be convinced to be fearful, convinced that they are potentially under a terrible curse.

Some people can be conditioned into becoming prey and their captors predators.

We look for 'safety'. And will behave in such a way, bear in mind the power of the word.

This, this and this must be done or do you call me a liar?!


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 26, 2013)

co-op said:


> Were these the people that used to stick up little stickers everywhere round Brixton and Stockwell in the arly 90s demanding that passers by "Move heaven and earth to defend Chairman Guzman!" (presumably just after he got nicked in 1992)? It wasn't just that the Shining Path were Maoist but there was something oddly cultish about the language - there were others but I can't remember the slogans now.



I remember them. Did they use to have impromptu marches around Brixton?


----------



## equationgirl (Nov 26, 2013)

toph said:


> So where they actually slaves or just stupid?


You really are phenomenally lacking in empathy.

One might think you are stupid for not knowing the difference between 'where' and 'were'. Or that you might be dyslexic, for example.

It's thought that these women are suffering from extreme Stockholm Syndrome at the very least. That doesn't make them stupid in the slightest. Next time think before you spout utterly idiotic shite.


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 26, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Proper proletarian self-criticism:



There is a film about the Japanese Red Army that I have heard about but not seen. Did not get released here. Got good reviews.


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 26, 2013)

hibsgrrl said:


> http://www.itv.com/news/2013-11-25/slavery-suspects-were-leaders-of-maoist-commune/
> 
> .



The photo of the building looks like the green ( solar panels etc) development near Brixton road.


----------



## Wilf (Nov 26, 2013)

toph said:


> So *where* they actually slaves or just stupid?


----------



## Wilf (Nov 26, 2013)

Wilf said:


>


 Curses, beaten to it. I actually _am_ stupid.


----------



## equationgirl (Nov 26, 2013)

Wilf said:


> Curses, beaten to it. I actually _am_ stupid.


No you're not, just not as quick as the rest of us 

toph on the other hand...


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> There is a film about the Japanese Red Army that I have heard about but not seen. Did not get released here. Got good reviews.


It's very good with an excellent soundtrack - the director is just the right person given his background as well. (to be pedantic it's about the United red army rather than the red army).


----------



## hibsgrrl (Nov 26, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> The photo of the building looks like the green ( solar panels etc) development near Brixton road.


The report on the woman falling out of the window looks like Shakespeare Road, on the right hand side, heading away from Dulwich Road. There is a junction over Railton with the Brixton Advice Centre in the corner.  It looks like this from the shot that accompanies the sister's interview.


----------



## steeplejack (Nov 26, 2013)

false flag operation to discredit the coming tiger that is UK Maoism IMO

I hope Comrade Brar and the CPGB M-L are ready. Having attacked Mao the forces of imperialism won't be long in turning their reactionary fire on the objective truths of Juche thought.


----------



## ChrisD (Nov 26, 2013)

laptop said:


> Anyone got a link to the papers on the Institute by Steve Rayner?




The BBC hauled him in for an interview on Radio 4 "Today" at 7.50.
his  verdict:  "- are cults dangerous?   all talk no trousers"


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 26, 2013)

His PhD (including chapters on Workers' Institute, WRP, SWP and IMG) is here -> 
*http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/1349448/1/D32160.pdf*


----------



## lazyhack (Nov 26, 2013)

hibsgrrl said:


> The report on the woman falling out of the window looks like Shakespeare Road, on the right hand side, heading away from Dulwich Road. There is a junction over Railton with the Brixton Advice Centre in the corner.  It looks like this from the shot that accompanies the sister's interview.


It was Shakespeare rd.


----------



## toph (Nov 26, 2013)

Wilf said:


>



Author correct.


----------



## Louis MacNeice (Nov 26, 2013)

Dogsauce said:


> How long till some fuckwhistle at the Mail links these characters and the 'poisonous philosophy' they followed to Ed Milliband's Dad?



On Radio 4 yesterday a news item said that the couple were members of the communist party central committee.

Cheers - Louis MacNiece


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 26, 2013)

losttheplot said:


> The thirty year old who allegedly has been captive since birth wrote and gave a message to one of the neighbors,
> the message, printed in the papers was not one wrote by an uneducated enslaved from birth person, the grammar and handwriting is of a very high standard.
> Something`s not right about the entire affair.



Because it's absolutely obvious that no-one who kept a person under their control for 30 years would see education as a fit matter for their chattel, you mean?
History kind of thumbs its' nose at you.


----------



## chilango (Nov 26, 2013)

Louis MacNeice said:


> On Radio 4 yesterday a news item said that the couple were members of the communist party central committee.
> 
> Cheers - Louis MacNiece



an easy slip between "a communist party central committee" and "The Communist Party central committee "


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 26, 2013)

rover07 said:


> Can 5 people be a cult? 2 Leaders and 3 followers seems too small to me.
> 
> I would think 12 is a minimum number.



You're kind of assuming that all "followers" would live in the commune.  Usually with cults you have inner and outer layers of members - acolytes who serve the whim(s) of the leader, and the breadwinners/feeders who tithe, and who forward potential recruits to the leader.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 26, 2013)

ViolentPanda said:


> Because it's absolutely obvious that no-one who kept a person under their control for 30 years would see education as a fit matter for their chattel, you mean?
> History kind of thumbs its' nose at you.



Just as soon as the charges are dropped, she'll suddenly be quite wealthy. Her story will fetch a good six-figure sum. 

Not much compensation though for a miserable life and the unexplained death of her mother, a death the police are apparently now investigating.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

rover07 said:


> Can 5 people be a cult? 2 Leaders and 3 followers seems too small to me.
> 
> I would think 12 is a minimum number.


Plus one comrade up on the cross. Put there by the fascists.


----------



## panpete (Nov 26, 2013)

Barking_Mad said:


> Yeah. Without knowing the specifics i often find it remarkable in general that someone can be held for so long without making an escape, or getting a message to the outside world.


Morbidly, the reason could be stockholm syndrome.


----------



## RedDragon (Nov 26, 2013)

The whole story has become a quagmire of tittle-tattle.


----------



## treelover (Nov 26, 2013)

ViolentPanda said:


> You're kind of assuming that all "followers" would live in the commune.  Usually with cults you have inner and outer layers of members - acolytes who serve the whim(s) of the leader, and the breadwinners/feeders who tithe, and who forward potential recruits to the leader.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 26, 2013)

Humberto said:


> People can be convinced to be fearful, convinced that they are potentially under a terrible curse.
> 
> Some people can be conditioned into becoming prey and their captors predators.
> 
> ...



Mix together psychological and physical terror, and you have one of the most successful conditioning agents known to man, as the priest-castes of various deities have known all too well for several thousand years.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 26, 2013)

treelover said:


>



I'm so glad that I hadn't just eaten!


----------



## lazyhack (Nov 26, 2013)

ITV found the footage everyone has been searching for - www.itv.com/news/story/2013-11-21/women-slavery-arrests/


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> ITV found the footage everyone has been searching for - www.itv.com/news/story/2013-11-21/women-slavery-arrests/


Blimes itv

Buffs up the idea that they though they were/told they were under fascist attack since '74. What do you do under fascist attack if you can't fight? You go undercover. You let one person tell you, for security reasons, what's going on.


----------



## chilango (Nov 26, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> What do you do under fascist attack if you can't fight? You go undercover. You let one person tell you, for security reasons, what's going on.



Sounds like an ANL demo to me.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

I could have had the ITV stuff within a few hours if i had access to all they have. Hey, wheels, put a word in for me.


----------



## where to (Nov 26, 2013)

Lucy Manning of ITV News has tweeted that the MET haven't interviewed the victims yet.  that seems very strange - is the allegation only (directly) from Freedom charity at this stage?

they're also asking the media to consider they're reporting of this story.  also strange given that the way the fed the media this has been designed to ensure a high profile and sensational coverage.  higher powers intervening perhaps?  they do face potential embarressment over this afterall.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

where to said:


> Lucy Manning of ITV News has tweeted that the MET haven't interviewed the victims yet.  that seems very strange - is the allegation only (directly) from Freedom charity at this stage?


No, it's from the MET. And they were involved in a month long thing. Neither of them think that it's an allegation.


----------



## where to (Nov 26, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> No, it's from the MET. And they were involved in a month long thing. Neither of them think that it's an allegation.


i mean, are they acting on an allegation made only by Freedom?


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

where to said:


> i mean, are they acting on an allegation made only by Freedom?


We can't know.


----------



## toph (Nov 26, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> I could have had the ITV stuff within a few hours if i had access to all they have.



Ye, and my auntie could have been my uncle if she had a pair of bollocks.


----------



## lazyhack (Nov 26, 2013)

where to said:


> they're also asking the media to consider they're reporting of this story.  also strange given that the way the fed the media this has been designed to ensure a high profile and sensational coverage.



They didn't feed the media the story though, since Freedom came out with it the cops have said fuck all except the ages of people arrested and they got that half wrong - the media had to figure out where the house was, then what the group was, then who the members were. There was more info coming from old Urban threads than the cops on this.


----------



## equationgirl (Nov 26, 2013)

Lilith Morris said:


> His PhD (including chapters on Workers' Institute, WRP, SWP and IMG) is here ->
> *http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/1349448/1/D32160.pdf*


Why do you keep posting links to rayner's thesis?


----------



## Lilith Morris (Nov 26, 2013)

I posted the same link twice - my mistake for misreading the quote of 'laptop' in ChrisD's post upthread as a new question.


----------



## secateurz (Nov 26, 2013)

the nasty Left


----------



## equationgirl (Nov 26, 2013)

secateurz said:


> the nasty Left


The nasty _evil_ Left.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 26, 2013)

toph said:


> Could have, but didn't.





secateurz said:


> the nasty Left


You have no nice left in your mental vista. So off you go.


----------



## DotCommunist (Nov 26, 2013)

ViolentPanda said:


> I'm so glad that I hadn't just eaten!




'I've had many lives and many faces. But there is one..one I have tried to forget'


----------



## toph (Nov 26, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> You have no nice left in your mental vista. So off you go.


 
You've lost me, it's like you're talking in riddles.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 26, 2013)

Baffled too - it's turning into a Maoist thought session


----------



## Divisive Cotton (Nov 26, 2013)

Here's your cut out and keep guide to British Maoism: http://www.marxists.org/history/erol/uk.hightide/uk-tree.pdf

Print it off and keep on your refrigerator... just in case you suspect a Maoist commune and few doors down from you


----------



## where to (Nov 26, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> They didn't feed the media the story though, since Freedom came out with it the cops have said fuck all except the ages of people arrested and they got that half wrong - the media had to figure out where the house was, then what the group was, then who the members were. There was more info coming from old Urban threads than the cops on this.



this is what the Police said on the day they broke the story, when stood outside Scotland Yard with the head of Freedom in a prime time press conference which was broadcast live by BBC 24 and Sky News:



> “The human trafficking unit of the Metropolitan Police deals with many cases of servitude and forced labour. We’ve seen some cases where people have been held for up to 10 years but we’ve never seen anything of this magnitude before."
> 
> “We’ve established that all three women were held in this situation for at least 30 years.
> 
> “Their lives were greatly controlled and for much of it they would be kept in the premises.”



i think they knew how the press would respond.  "less is more"...


----------



## where to (Nov 26, 2013)

as i say, at the time of that press conference, the Police had not interviewed the victims, and had not arrested (or spoken to?) the alleged culprits.

seems bloody odd, on the face of it.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 26, 2013)

toph said:


> Ye, and my auntie could have been my uncle if she had a pair of bollocks.



As it was, your auntie had a cunt....





....like you as a nephew.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 26, 2013)

secateurz said:


> the nasty Left



No you haven't.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 26, 2013)

Anyway, this is what the old fraud Comrade Bala looks like, right, his 'slaves' following at a respectful distance


----------



## frogwoman (Nov 27, 2013)

> Various media have asked us to comment on the Brixton "slavery" affair. As the media might have established by now, Aravindan Balakrishnan was expelled from an organisation which preceded our own in 1974, at a time when it carried a large amount of work against state-organised racist and fascist violence and in defence of minority rights and the right of the Irish people to self-determination.
> 
> You can see with the current revelations in the police investigation that the organisation which expelled him must have had good reason – first and foremost, opposition to his penchant for cultism.
> 
> ...


----------



## leanderman (Nov 27, 2013)

Who is 'we' and 'us' in the above?


----------



## Nigel Irritable (Nov 27, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Who is 'we' and 'us' in the above?


The Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist Leninist), the present incarnation of the Communist Party of England (Marxist Leninist). The CPE(ML) was the group that expelled Balakrishnan before he set up the Workers Institute.


----------



## William of Walworth (Nov 27, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Baffled too - it's turning into a Maoist thought session


 
What, this thread?

Most of the 'Maoism' in this thread has either just been explaining what it's all about (hint : explanation isn't _exactly_ the same as supporting it uncritically, you know!  ), or been thoroughly taking the piss out of it, as far as I can see.

I have some suspicion (just a hunch, you understand) that you consider *anyone* a bonkers leftie who doesn't fervently subscribe to the Thoughts of Chairman Thatcher ...


----------



## bignose1 (Nov 27, 2013)

panpete said:


> Morbidly, the reason could be stockholm syndrome.


Stuckathome Syndrome


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 27, 2013)

47 coppers on this. Really.


----------



## Wilf (Nov 27, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> 47 coppers on this. Really.


 46 of those will be working their way through On Guerilla Warfare.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 27, 2013)

How many on Orgreave and Hillsborough - niente.


----------



## brogdale (Nov 27, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Baffled too - it's turning into a Maoist thought session



Mr Bone helpfully posted this...

Reminds me that during the 1980's a colleague was in the Marxist Industrial Group and regularly left a copy of their paper in my pigeon hole.


----------



## treelover (Nov 27, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Anyway, this is what the old fraud Comrade Bala looks like, right, his 'slaves' following at a respectful distance
> 
> View attachment 43988



Surely 'looked like' they are old images.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 27, 2013)

Today's Evening Standard on the 'extremist enclave' of Brixton

http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle...pian-place-8966786.html?origin=internalSearch


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 27, 2013)

Who is  
Susannah Butter
?


----------



## leanderman (Nov 27, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Who is
> Susannah Butter
> ?



http://readingagency.org.uk/young-p...e-life-of-an-evening-standard-journalist.html


----------



## treelover (Nov 27, 2013)

Its not the worse hatchet job I've seen.


----------



## Pickman's model (Nov 27, 2013)

treelover said:


> Its not the worse hatchet job I've seen.


what is the worse hatchet job you've seen?


----------



## el-ahrairah (Nov 27, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Today's Evening Standard on the 'extremist enclave' of Brixton
> 
> http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle...pian-place-8966786.html?origin=internalSearch



i'm not sure that it is entirely appropriate for me to criticise this, seeing as my time in brixton was mostly spent living in anarchist-communist sex&drugs-cults urban75 group houses.  i guess she's got us bang to rights.


----------



## peterkro (Nov 27, 2013)

el-ahrairah said:


> i'm not sure that it is entirely appropriate for me to criticise this, seeing as my time in brixton was mostly spent living in anarchist-communist sex&drugs-cults urban75 group houses.  i guess she's got us bang to rights.


Ooh er,that's me that is.What a badly researched piece of hogwash."although one original squatter remains with a tent on the roof" Pim who wasn't  there originally lived  in a construction on a roof in Peckham and left several years ago.31 and the hardline communists, arf.We did have a small problem with a few Oxbridge Marxists who seemed to think they could talk to the media representing the entire group but them and the Vanguardists were soon side lined.It's interesting that they are using quotes from the documentary from the usual suspects,the vast majority of Villa roaders had nothing to do with the docu and wouldn't talk to the media about anything,we got burned early doors by reporters and most people treated them as the scum they are.

Almost forgot "Aleister Crowley" enthusiasts what fucking drugs do they put in the coffee urn at the Standard?


----------



## where to (Nov 27, 2013)

The Met's Steve Rodhouse at the first press conference:



> “The human trafficking unit of the Metropolitan Police deals with many cases of servitude and forced labour. We’ve seen some cases where people have been held for up to 10 years but we’ve never seen anything of this magnitude before."
> 
> “We’ve established that all three women were held in this situation for at least 30 years.
> 
> “Their lives were greatly controlled and for much of it they would be kept in the premises.”



The Met's Steve Rodhouse today:



> "We have not yet been able to formally interview the victims in this case so we don't fully understand the nature of the allegations.



The Guardian adds, "detectives stressed the unique nature of the case and warned about jumping to conclusions that the case amounted to "modern-day slavery"."


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 28, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Today's Evening Standard on the 'extremist enclave' of Brixton
> 
> http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle...pian-place-8966786.html?origin=internalSearch



"An extremist enclave" oh dear.

I suppose considering that the so called "Slave house" was a stones throw from Villa road this was article was to be predicted.

"Sex Marx and Primal Screaming- it was a wildly utopian place"

As el-ahrairah  says some of this true. Where I am in Brixton has a history but its changed over time.

What is not said is that these buildings were saved by these people. Without us a lot of Brixton would not be here. It was not all wild parties. It was also about the daily work of keeping these buildings habitable.

The people who quietly got on with it do not make the papers.

It offered a place to live also for those who would not necessarily fit anywhere else. Its forgotten that a lot of what is taken for granted now like gay rights was still being struggled over back in 60s and 70s.

Its easy to portray these people has having a wild time then "growing up".

The history of squats, short life housing and Coops is a history that Brixton can be proud of. The Afro Caribbean history is getting , rightly, a new historical centre to be opened soon. But the "Alternative Brixton" is not well documented.I think articles like the Standard one trivialize it.

I have kept small archive of photos/ books etc which Lambeth Archives are interested in having. I really need to get down there.


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 28, 2013)

For a better picture of squatting this book is excellent. Its here as download ( you have to buy)

Its full of pictures and a good history of the period.

Just found it online For free

There is chapter on Villa Road.


----------



## Casually Red (Nov 28, 2013)

_Their literature says Brixton was chosen as a  headquarters for building “a stable revolutionary base because it is the worst place in the world”._


----------



## peterkro (Nov 28, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> For a better picture of squatting this book is excellent. Its here as download ( you have to buy)
> 
> Its full of pictures and a good history of the period.
> 
> ...


That's a good chapter by Nick (RIP ex 66 wiltshire and 15 Villa road) and Jill (ex 15 Villa Road).One thing they don't mention is the closure in a large part was stymied by the police (as much as I hate to admit it) who wouldn't countenance the road closure because it is a major access street to the Police Station.
RIP also Dr Pat Day ex of Release who also did good work on Travellers health issues in West London and Sian Daniells our very talented blues singer (along with Carol Grimes of course).
Myself I lived on the north side of St Johns then 321 Brixton road (behind barricades) then 33 (I think the school site went from 31 up so those houses weren't included in Lambeths eviction attempts) then 35 from where I was rehoused by Lambeth coming up to two years ago although the council didn't ask for the keys back for almost a year later.There is still one squatter in 35 who is due to be evicted in January.I also lived in the hut (built by Pim with some help from me) behind no 33 and of which there is a pic on page 177 of the book.
Some squatters managed by hook or by crook to get finance to enable them to buy their houses (between four and six houses).

Link to Nicks Obit in the Guardian:

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2003/may/12/guardianobituaries.russia

Edit: it's been a year since I was rehoused not two FFS.


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Nov 28, 2013)

peterkro said:


> Ooh er,that's me that is.What a badly researched piece of hogwash."although one original squatter remains with a tent on the roof" Pim who wasn't  there originally lived  in a construction on a roof in Peckham and left several years ago.31 and the hardline communists, arf.We did have a small problem with a few Oxbridge Marxists who seemed to think they could talk to the media representing the entire group but them and the Vanguardists were soon side lined.It's interesting that they are using quotes from the documentary from the usual suspects,the vast majority of Villa roaders had nothing to do with the docu and wouldn't talk to the media about anything,we got burned early doors by reporters and most people treated them as the scum they are.
> 
> Almost forgot "Aleister Crowley" enthusiasts what fucking drugs do they put in the coffee urn at the Standard?



Me and the rents were just having a right laugh at that terrible article  which seemed  to be heavily sourced from that dodgy  documentary a while back


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Nov 28, 2013)

> The Villa Roaders were finally split up in 1978, when the council struck a deal to knock down the south side of the street but keep the north. Many of the surviving buildings now belong to a housing association, although one original squatter remains, with a tent on the roof. Leaving was difficult for many and some had bad breakdowns afterwards.



the whole  who is squatting and who isn't still kinda in the air

plus  the whole co-op vs  housing assosiation this.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 28, 2013)

Thought i'd get this in here before Nigel:

Inside the paranoid maoist cults of 1970s britain

(and more here)

Comments include a brilliant (but possibly not true - bah!)thing from Ian Birchall:



> Everyone seems to have forgotten their wonderful slogan: “Dig tunnels deep, store grain and never seek hegemony.”



edit: the last is an actual mao thing btw


----------



## shygirl (Nov 28, 2013)

I heard that a SKY tv bloke got beaten up by three men late night/early hours of the morning in the last week.  Think he and his colleagues were sat in their van.  There was lots of expensive equipment in the van, but nothing taken.


----------



## lazyhack (Nov 28, 2013)

shygirl said:


> I heard that a SKY tv bloke got beaten up by three men late night/early hours of the morning in the last week.  Think he and his colleagues were sat in their van.  There was lots of expensive equipment in the van, but nothing taken.


It was an engineer. Poor bloke.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 28, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> For a better picture of squatting this book is excellent. Its here as download ( you have to buy)
> 
> Its full of pictures and a good history of the period.
> 
> ...




I'm probably mistaken, but quite a few of the authors of this very interesting book seem to have posh names.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 28, 2013)

shygirl said:


> I heard that a SKY tv bloke got beaten up by three men late night/early hours of the morning in the last week.  Think he and his colleagues were sat in their van.  There was lots of expensive equipment in the van, but nothing taken.



DHL guy told me he and his colleagues have been robbed three times between them on the Tulse Hill estate neighbouring us.

They get beaten up while their vans are emptied.


----------



## shygirl (Nov 28, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> It was an engineer. Poor bloke.


 
It was quite bad, I really feel for him.   As they didn't take anything, I'm assuming it came from antagonism towards their presence?


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Nov 28, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I'm probably mistaken, but quite a few of the authors of this very interesting book seem to have posh names.


we try to keep up appearences


----------



## lazyhack (Nov 28, 2013)

shygirl said:


> It was quite bad, I really feel for him.   As they didn't take anything, I'm assuming it came from antagonism towards their presence?


Street crime happens, could be totally unrelated to his job. Who knows. Tabloids running in offering people with dubious stories £5000 for pictures usually makes things quite tense in these rolling news stories.


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 29, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I'm probably mistaken, but quite a few of the authors of this very interesting book seem to have posh names.


 
What point ru making?


----------



## leanderman (Nov 29, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> What point ru making?



The pointless trustafarian one.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

Time for a musical interlude i think:


----------



## andysays (Nov 29, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Time for a musical interlude i think:



I've never heard that before, but it is far worse than I could ever have imagined or feared.

It now seems more likely to me than ever that if Cardew was deliberately run over, it wasn't by an anti-Maoist M15-linked hit squad, but by some random disgruntled music lover...


----------



## artyfarty (Nov 29, 2013)

leanderman said:


> I'm probably mistaken, but quite a few of the authors of this very interesting book seem to have posh names.


Thanks Gramsci for the link, I had this book in the 80's and lost it.
Thanks Leanderman, I've got a posh name too. Sorry about that. I'll get it changed. What do you suggest?
You must mean Piers... who is not posh.
*Piers Richard Corbyn* (born 10 March 1947)[1] is the owner of the business *WeatherAction* which claims to make accurate weather forecasts up to a year in advance.


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

artyfarty said:


> Thanks Gramsci for the link, I had this book in the 80's and lost it.
> Thanks Leanderman, I've got a posh name too. Sorry about that. I'll get it changed. What do you suggest?
> You must mean Piers... who is not posh.
> *Piers Richard Corbyn* (born 10 March 1947)[1] is the owner of the business *WeatherAction* which claims to make accurate weather forecasts up to a year in advance.


Jeremy Corbyn's brother too. I don't know if Piers is posh but he is now very very rich.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 29, 2013)

shygirl said:


> It was quite bad, I really feel for him.   As they didn't take anything, I'm assuming it came from antagonism towards their presence?



TBF, most of the local street crims are probably feeling well paranoid, what with all the dudes with cameras lurking around.  Not really surprised this has happened.  I'm only surprised it didn't happen when there was a week's worth of media frenzy around Brixton mosque.


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 29, 2013)

andysays said:


> I've never heard that before, but it is far worse than I could ever have imagined or feared.
> 
> It now seems more likely to me than ever that if Cardew was deliberately run over, it wasn't by an anti-Maoist M15-linked hit squad, but by some random disgruntled music lover...



I've always gone with the theory that some poor paper-and-comb player was so upset that Cardew had appropriated the instrument for his "scratch orchestras" that they decided he had to be done away with.
"Take that, you cod-Communist neo-imperialist appropriator of the peoples' instrument!!! We can only thank Heavens you never tried to appropriate the spoons or the Jew's Harp!!  "


----------



## ViolentPanda (Nov 29, 2013)

artyfarty said:


> Thanks Gramsci for the link, I had this book in the 80's and lost it.
> Thanks Leanderman, I've got a posh name too. Sorry about that. I'll get it changed. What do you suggest?
> You must mean Piers... who is not posh.
> *Piers Richard Corbyn* (born 10 March 1947)[1] is the owner of the business *WeatherAction* which claims to make accurate weather forecasts up to a year in advance.



Do calm down, Montagu, there's a good chap!


----------



## William of Walworth (Nov 29, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> For a better picture of squatting this book is excellent. Its here as download ( you have to buy)
> 
> Its full of pictures and a good history of the period.
> 
> ...


 

It's a brilliant book that, I agree. I originally read large chunks of it back in the early eighties!! (I borrowed a copy off a friend) when print copies were still readily findable -- I really wish I'd bought a copy back then, because they're ultra-rare now ....

Good on squat.net though for preserving it and making it freely available


----------



## Gramsci (Nov 29, 2013)

artyfarty said:


> Thanks Gramsci for the link, I had this book in the 80's and lost it.
> Thanks Leanderman, I've got a posh name too. Sorry about that. I'll get it changed. What do you suggest?
> You must mean Piers... who is not posh.
> *Piers Richard Corbyn* (born 10 March 1947)[1] is the owner of the business *WeatherAction* which claims to make accurate weather forecasts up to a year in advance.


 
I noticed that Standard had a photo of Piers from the late 60s. Piers ( yes he is brother of the MP) was ok.


----------



## leanderman (Nov 29, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> I noticed that Standard had a photo of Piers from the late 60s. Piers ( yes he is brother of the MP) was ok.



Piers seems to be a climate change denier, which I suppose relates to his weather work.


----------



## artyfarty (Nov 29, 2013)

Anyway, about these women held for 30 years?


----------



## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

Lightly researched piece by a poster from here:

COMRADE BALA AND SOUTH LONDON'S CRAZY COMMUNIST WAR


----------



## chilango (Nov 29, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Lightly researched piece by a poster from here:
> 
> COMRADE BALA AND SOUTH LONDON'S CRAZY COMMUNIST WAR



I hope any fee for that gets donated to the server fund.


----------



## rekil (Nov 29, 2013)

Lots of ableism in there, "nutters" and the like.


----------



## William of Walworth (Nov 29, 2013)

leanderman said:


> Piers seems to be a climate change denier, which I suppose relates to his weather work.


 

I know of his weather work (in fact I talked with him about it a few years back -- we had a great meteorology/synoptics centred chat  )

But the climate change denialism bit passed me by -- will do a bit of digging.

ETA : OK fair enough, that wasn't hard to find -- he's a full on denier, for sure  

(I only remember him as a tad 'eccentric' just about weather, when my path crossed with his)


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## William of Walworth (Nov 29, 2013)

artyfarty said:


> Anyway, about these women held for 30 years?


 
Oh yes ....


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## lazyhack (Nov 29, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Lightly researched piece by a poster from here:
> 
> COMRADE BALA AND SOUTH LONDON'S CRAZY COMMUNIST WAR


I'll take the bait. I've worked on the story since Sunday for C4 News, knocked the door of every address associated with the group, stood outside the buckle centre for hours waiting to doorstep the comrades, called up several old squatters from Villa Road and Railton. Spoken to Steve Rayner, read his thesis and ordered a book featuring his later essay from amazon. Read the archives of the SLWB. What does _lightly researched _mean? I note you earlier boasted you could have had ITV's scoops, except you didn't. Hurler on the ditch.


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## shygirl (Nov 29, 2013)

ViolentPanda said:


> TBF, most of the local street crims are probably feeling well paranoid, what with all the dudes with cameras lurking around.  Not really surprised this has happened.  I'm only surprised it didn't happen when there was a week's worth of media frenzy around Brixton mosque.



Yeah, I was thinking they might have been getting in the way of business.  When was the media frenzy at the mosque?  Was it after Reid?


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## ViolentPanda (Nov 29, 2013)

shygirl said:


> Yeah, I was thinking they might have been getting in the way of business.  When was the media frenzy at the mosque?  Was it after Reid?



Yep.


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## co-op (Nov 29, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> Hurler on the ditch.



eh?


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## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> I'll take the bait. I've worked on the story since Sunday for C4 News, knocked the door of every address associated with the group, stood outside the buckle centre for hours waiting to doorstep the comrades, called up several old squatters from Villa Road and Railton. Spoken to Steve Rayner, read his thesis and ordered a book featuring his later essay from amazon. Read the archives of the SLWB. What does _lightly researched _mean? I note you earlier boasted you could have had ITV's scoops, except you didn't. Hurler on the ditch.


What was my boast exactly? That if i had itv resources and access i could have found that 1997 death pretty quickly. I could. Anyone who can type could have.

Lightly researched - by that i mean a sort of week long cram session. Everything you found was just there anyway - half the left blogs, and esp those with a local flavour have posted or refereed to all the stuff that you've posted - no matter how hard you personally worked on the story. Did you credit the organisational map btw, i can't remember. And this, in Vice. And with that (easily sold) title.


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## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

co-op said:


> eh?


It's Irish leftist for standing on the sidelines criticising.


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## lazyhack (Nov 29, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> Lightly researched - by that i mean a sort of week long cram session. Everything you found was just there anyway - half the left blogs, and esp those with a local flavour have posted or refereed to all the stuff that you've posted - no matter how hard you personally worked on the story. Did you credit the graph btw, i can't remember. And this, in Vice. And with that (easily sold) title.



Seems an empty sneering criticism, that I wrote the story for an audience who wouldn't have engaged with it otherwise, including the stuff we'd been breaking on it at C4/ITN. Reporters don't write their headlines.


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## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> Seems an empty sneering criticism, that I wrote the story for an audience who wouldn't have engaged with it otherwise, including the stuff we'd been breaking on it at C4/ITN. Reporters don't write their headlines.


Vice readers wouldn't have heard of it otherwise? Are you sure?  After all, every single thing in the mainstream news or that has a flash of violence/sex/conflict/oddness is lept on an vice-ified.


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## lazyhack (Nov 29, 2013)

I don't think I said they wouldn't have heard of it. I get it, you have a gripe with me and want to play it out. It is dull.


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## butchersapron (Nov 29, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> I don't think I said they wouldn't have heard of it.


You said 'engaged with it' - now given there's no way of them engaging with it beyond posting 'holy shit!' or something i think it's safe to assume that at best this will mean read your story isn't it?


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## Nigel Irritable (Nov 29, 2013)

While I don't like some of the lazy little asides about the "bonkers" leftists, I don't think that a lack of research is the issue. It shows a knowledge of who was who in a pretty esoteric little field, and so in that regard at least is a lot better than other mainstream media stuff on the subject.


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## Nigel Irritable (Nov 29, 2013)

It's a real pity that Tron Ogrim, the patron saint of the leftist trainspotters list is dead. There was I think nobody who knew more about what various Maoist/Hoxhaite/anti-rev groups thought of each other, whether old ruling parties, nutty groupuscules or contemporary mass parties in South Asia. As someone who had been the de facto leading figure in the largest Western Maoist Party, he met most of them personally.


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## ChrisD (Nov 29, 2013)

Gramsci said:


> For a better picture of squatting this book is excellent. Its here as download ( you have to buy)
> 
> Its full of pictures and a good history of the period.
> 
> ...



thanks for that.... just been googling various contributors to see what they've been up to for the last 35 years and how they've aged....


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## leanderman (Nov 29, 2013)

ChrisD said:


> thanks for that.... just been googling various contributors to see what they've been up to for the last 35 years and how they've aged....



Please share your learning.


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## ChrisD (Nov 29, 2013)

......for example when I was an architecture student in the 1970s I used to fancy the designer of that book...haven't heard what became of her. But she seems to have become "head of regeneration" of a local authority before claiming unfair dismissal.


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## Gramsci (Nov 29, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> I'll take the bait. I've worked on the story since Sunday for C4 News, knocked the door of every address associated with the group, stood outside the buckle centre for hours waiting to doorstep the comrades, called up several old squatters from Villa Road and Railton. Spoken to Steve Rayner, read his thesis and ordered a book featuring his later essay from amazon. Read the archives of the SLWB. What does _lightly researched _mean? I note you earlier boasted you could have had ITV's scoops, except you didn't. Hurler on the ditch.







> While Brixton feigns radicalism now – with protests against cheese shops staged by middle-class kids who don’t recognise themselves as the first wave of gentrification – in the 70s and 80s it was the real deal.



Its no more the real deal then as it is now.

Back in 80s same criticisms were made. 

There is lightly researched and there is doing research and saying the above? Why did you bother?


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## peterkro (Nov 29, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> I'll take the bait. I've worked on the story since Sunday for C4 News, knocked the door of every address associated with the group, stood outside the buckle centre for hours waiting to doorstep the comrades, called up several old squatters from Villa Road and Railton. Spoken to Steve Rayner, read his thesis and ordered a book featuring his later essay from amazon. Read the archives of the SLWB. What does _lightly researched _mean? I note you earlier boasted you could have had ITV's scoops, except you didn't. Hurler on the ditch.


Several old squatters from V road? I'll take the bait I'm guessing you spoke to Piers (who wasn't V road) and Christian Wolmar.


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## lazyhack (Nov 30, 2013)

peterkro said:


> Several old squatters from V road? I'll take the bait I'm guessing you spoke to Piers (who wasn't V road) and Christian Wolmar.


Eh, no. Plus, bit off to try name people who contribute to an article if it clearly says they don't want to be named.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Nov 30, 2013)

Our  house is  still  part of the villa rd squat  and  we didn't hear shit from anyone


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## peterkro (Nov 30, 2013)

lazyhack said:


> Eh, no. Plus, bit off to try name people who contribute to an article if it clearly says they don't want to be named.


Of course this gives the ability to write any old shit and say it was from well connected but anonymous sources.

By the way both people I mentioned are media whores and would view any publicity as good.


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## ViolentPanda (Nov 30, 2013)

peterkro said:


> Of course this gives the ability to write any old shit and say it was from well connected but anonymous sources.



No-one but a lazy hack would do such a thing!

Oh....!!!


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## revol68 (Nov 30, 2013)

copliker said:


> Lots of ableism in there, "nutters" and the like.



yeah because "nutter" is a real diagnosis, next calling someone stupid or an idiot will be labelled "ableism"...


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## PHS (Nov 30, 2013)

butchersapron said:


> What was my boast exactly? That if i had itv resources and access i could have found that 1997 death pretty quickly. I could. Anyone who can type could have.



Everyone here, from the hipster "scoop" journalists to the forum whiners, are late to the party. Unlike them, I called the whole thing Saturday night. Where were you lot then?


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## equationgirl (Nov 30, 2013)

PHS said:


> Everyone here, from the hipster "scoop" journalists to the forum whiners, are late to the party. I called the whole thing Saturday night. Where were you lot then?


What do you want, a medal? 

For a newbie you seem awfully familiar, so which returner are you then?


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## campanula (Nov 30, 2013)

Ah lost in squatting memories (Holloway, Tufnel Park, Warwick Avenue, Crouch End, Cambridge). I had a true surge of maternal pride when my daughter squatted in Shakespeare Road 4 years ago (almost more than when she got her degree).


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## equationgirl (Nov 30, 2013)

OK, there's something gone wrong on the thread - there's two posts numbered 469, two more both numbered 471 and my reply to PHS appears before their post. Xenforo blip?


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## ddraig (Nov 30, 2013)

that is weird!
e2a
2 471's too!


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## Lazy Llama (Dec 1, 2013)

equationgirl said:


> OK, there's something gone wrong on the thread - there's two posts numbered 469, two more both numbered 471 and my reply to PHS appears before their post. Xenforo blip?


Possibly, doesn't seem to break anything.
I'll keep an eye on it.


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## ddraig (Dec 1, 2013)

ta mr Llama


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## equationgirl (Dec 1, 2013)

Aye, thanks Lazy Llama


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## newbie (Dec 1, 2013)

PHS said:


> Everyone here, from the hipster "scoop" journalists to the forum whiners, are late to the party. Unlike them, I called the whole thing Saturday night. Where were you lot then?


yes, I noticed that at the time, but thought it was just one of those self-referential u75 things so took no notice.

so why did you post that, then?  lucky guess, inside knowledge, purely sherlock deduction from known facts?


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## butchersapron (Dec 1, 2013)

PHS said:


> Everyone here, from the hipster "scoop" journalists to the forum whiners, are late to the party. Unlike them, I called the whole thing Saturday night. Where were you lot then?


If your first name is Sam then i think yes,  you may well have posted the first public linking of the stroy to this group (as might be expected if you are linked to erol). If not, nope.


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## equationgirl (Dec 1, 2013)

Lazy Llama said:


> Possibly, doesn't seem to break anything.
> I'll keep an eye on it.


I think it's sorted now


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## Lazy Llama (Dec 1, 2013)

equationgirl said:


> I think it's sorted now


Yeah, I re-ran the cache rebuilder and that renumbered them.


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## equationgirl (Dec 1, 2013)

Lazy Llama said:


> Yeah, I re-ran the cache rebuilder and that renumbered them.


Thanks, it's appreciated


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## butchersapron (Jul 29, 2014)

*Tom Symonds*@tomsymonds
Met's Human Trafficking Unit re-arrest Aravandin Balakrishnan aka Comrade Bala in connection with allegations of 'serious sexual offences'


----------



## DaveCinzano (Sep 24, 2014)




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## DotCommunist (Sep 24, 2014)

so thats it then?


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## butchersapron (Sep 24, 2014)

DotCommunist said:


> so thats it then?


Nope. The woman has been released and no further action. Not comrade bala though. It literally says that above!


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## lang rabbie (Sep 24, 2014)

DotCommunist said:


> so thats it then?


No, her husband Aravindan Balakrishnan aka "Comrade Bala" remains bailed until December.


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## DotCommunist (Sep 24, 2014)

oh it says rebailed for bala. must wash my eyes


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## DaveCinzano (Dec 11, 2014)

CPS charging decision:

*Aravindan Balakrishnan charged with false imprisonment, cruelty, indecent assault and rape*
11/12/2014

Anthony Connell, senior prosecutor at the CPS, said: "The CPS has today authorised the police to charge Aravindan Balakrishnan with a number of charges including false imprisonment, cruelty to a person under 16 years, indecent assault and rape.

"After careful consideration, we have decided that there is sufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction and that a prosecution is in the public interest.

"Aravindan Balakrishnan will appear before Westminster Magistrates' Court on Wednesday 17 December 2014.

"A decision of no further action has also been made in relation to a second individual, a woman arrested on 21 November 2013, as there is insufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction.

"May I remind all concerned that criminal proceedings against the defendant have been commenced and of his right to a fair trial. It is extremely important that there should be no reporting, commentary or sharing of information online which could in any way prejudice these proceedings.

"Any decision by the CPS does not imply any finding concerning guilt or criminal conduct; the CPS makes decisions only according to the test set out in the Code for Crown Prosecutors and it is applied in all decisions on whether or not to prosecute."

*Details of the full charges: Aravindan Balakrishnan*


Cruelty to a person under 16 years, contrary to section 1(1) of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933
False imprisonment
Indecent assault, contrary to section 14(1) of the Sexual Offences Act 1956
Rape, contrary to section 1(1) of the Sexual Offences Act 1956
*Ends*​
http://www.cps.gov.uk/news/latest_news/aravindan_balakrishnan/


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## Red Storm (Dec 11, 2014)

DaveCinzano said:


> CPS charging decision:
> 
> *Aravindan Balakrishnan charged with false imprisonment, cruelty, indecent assault and rape*
> 11/12/2014
> ...



First they came for the Maoists...


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## frogwoman (Dec 11, 2014)

Sounds like a lovely guy. Very dialectical ..


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## DaveCinzano (Nov 12, 2015)

Trial begins:

Maoist cult leader raped female followers and imprisoned daughter for 30 years


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## Belushi (Nov 12, 2015)

Grim stuff


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## Winot (Nov 12, 2015)

In court now, according to www.courtnewsuk.co.uk Twitter feed.


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## TopCat (Nov 26, 2015)

Illuminating court reports today. 

Maoist sect leader says daughter he is accused of imprisoning is 'fantasist'


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## spanglechick (Nov 26, 2015)

TopCat said:


> Illuminating court reports today.
> 
> Maoist sect leader says daughter he is accused of imprisoning is 'fantasist'


wow.  And that's by his own version of events?  What a cunt.


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## TopCat (Nov 26, 2015)

spanglechick said:


> wow.  And that's by his own version of events?  What a cunt.


Very well said.


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## laptop (Nov 27, 2015)

spanglechick said:


> wow.  And that's by his own version of events?  What a cunt.



Is he going for an insanity defence?



> Balakrishnan told the court that his political beliefs included faith in the existence of an invisible “electronic satellite warfare machine” called Jackie, which he said was built by the Communist party of China and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.
> 
> He told the court he could control it through thought and linked the device to the recent Labour leadership contest. He also said it was responsible for the death of a Malaysian leader and for the Challenger air shuttle disaster.



Or is he Jazzz?


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## Sparkle Motion (Dec 4, 2015)

Some very unfortunate posts early on in this discussion. 

It seems we have much to learn about domestic oppression.


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## butchersapron (Dec 4, 2015)

He got a guilty btw


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## DaveCinzano (Dec 4, 2015)

Convicted:

Maoist cult leader guilty of child cruelty and sexual assaults

The Brixton sect where paranoia and cruelty reigned


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## frogwoman (Dec 4, 2015)

Good.


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## frogwoman (Dec 4, 2015)

Cult leader Comrade Bala's daughter: 30 years as a 'non-person'


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## frogwoman (Dec 4, 2015)

Paranoia, not camaraderie, reigned. Bala insisted members inform on each other and that cooking should be done in pairs to avoid poisoning. He was routinely and viciously violent to several of the women, the court heard, but human suffering seemed to mean little to him. He once said he wished 3 million, not 3,000 people had been massacred at Tiananmen Square in 1989. He predicted that one day 7 billion people were going to be blown up and said: “I’m going to replace them with a billion who are like robots.”


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## frogwoman (Dec 4, 2015)

im glad he's in jail, hope he never gets out. scum.


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## bimble (Dec 4, 2015)

This whole story so .
Is this sort of thing less possible now because of communications and stuff ? Or is it just that he wouldn't be able to afford the rent in Brixton.


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## elbows (Dec 4, 2015)

laptop said:


> Is he going for an insanity defence?
> 
> 
> > Balakrishnan told the court that his political beliefs included faith in the existence of an invisible “electronic satellite warfare machine” called Jackie, which he said was built by the Communist party of China and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.
> ...



It would not surprise me if 'Jackie the electronic warfare satellite that he can control with his thoughts' started off as the device mentioned in the following quote that frogwoman posted just over 2 years ago.



frogwoman said:


> I was told by one member that the Chinese had nothing to fear
> from nuclear reprisals by the United States or the Soviet Union, against
> a major onslaught by the People's Liberation Army . This is because of
> Chinese secret electronic weaponry which will prevent enemy missiles from
> ...



I cannot judge whether it was a personality type, personality disorder, or a mental illness that sponsored his paranoia, but paranoia is clearly an important part of why all this happened and why he did these terrible things.

I'm glad some people found freedom and he has been found guilty now. That nothing stopped him decades sooner is depressing but unsurprising.


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## Plumdaff (Dec 4, 2015)

bimble said:


> This whole story so .
> Is this sort of thing less possible now because of communications and stuff ? Or is it just that he wouldn't be able to afford the rent in Brixton.


I also think the early 1970s was the peak time for openness to joining odd Maoist cults. Not that it lessens the awfulness of what happened but I don't think Comrade Fucker would have much success today.


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## Sparkle Motion (Dec 4, 2015)

Don't believe that for one second. Extreme groups (religious as well as political) have always attracted damaged individuals and those able to control them. Gerry Healy springs to mind. A lot of people must have come and gone from that group over the years, yet nobody with knowledge in wider political circles said or did anything.


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## bimble (Dec 4, 2015)

Sparkle Motion said:


> Extreme groups (religious as well as political) have always attracted damaged individuals and those able to control them.


This is true, maybe more now than then even - and damaged individuals in the ascendant surely. But still I hope that maybe what he did would be harder to do now, at leat if the women somehow got access to a mobile phone.


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## Plumdaff (Dec 4, 2015)

Sparkle Motion said:


> Don't believe that for one second. Extreme groups (religious as well as political) have always attracted damaged individuals and those able to control them. Gerry Healy springs to mind. A lot of people must have come and gone from that group over the years, yet nobody with knowledge in wider political circles said or did anything.



I absolutely agree people will always join bizarre controlling sects but Maoist ones? No bloody way.


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## BigMoaner (Dec 4, 2015)

What in God's name would be the beliefs of a maoist sect????


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## butchersapron (Dec 5, 2015)

Sparkle Motion said:


> Don't believe that for one second. Extreme groups (religious as well as political) have always attracted damaged individuals and those able to control them. Gerry Healy springs to mind. A lot of people must have come and gone from that group over the years, yet nobody with knowledge in wider political circles said or did anything.


Apart from those people that did.


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## Sparkle Motion (Dec 5, 2015)

Who said something about the suffering of that child and those women, and to who did they say it?


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## BigMoaner (Dec 5, 2015)

Horrible fuck beat the 4 year old with over 60 punches


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## butchersapron (Dec 5, 2015)

Sparkle Motion said:


> Who said something about the suffering of that child and those women, and to who did they say it?


Sorry, i thought you were referring to the WRP.


----------



## Sparkle Motion (Dec 8, 2015)

I recall plenty defended that disgusting old pervert. 

The woman in the Lambeth case came across on TV as remarkably well adjusted.


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## Lurdan (Jan 29, 2016)

23 years.

Maoist cult leader Aravindan Balakrishnan jailed for 23 years - Independent.


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## trabuquera (Jan 16, 2017)

Either he, or his cult minions, or (shudders) new "fans" are keeping up their twisted version of the good fight: I saw a flyer in the last fortnight - on a messageboard at Pop Brixton, of all places - with one densely-printed side of A4 text yelling passionately that it was all an evil State fix, "hidden forces of oppression" smearing brave Comrade Bala with vile and _entirely false _charges of domestic abuse in order to head off the ranks of revolutionaries waiting to make a better world, but real proletarians would work for his release from The System, etc etc etc.

Proper creepy and very very sad. Wanted to rip it off the wall and jump up & down on it, but I didn't - the loonspuddery of the wording would have put off anyone I think. But yes, there is at least one person out there still willing to stand up for him.


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## ViolentPanda (Jan 17, 2017)

trabuquera said:


> Either he, or his cult minions, or (shudders) new "fans" are keeping up their twisted version of the good fight: I saw a flyer in the last fortnight - on a messageboard at Pop Brixton, of all places - with one densely-printed side of A4 text yelling passionately that it was all an evil State fix, "hidden forces of oppression" smearing brave Comrade Bala with vile and _entirely false _charges of domestic abuse in order to head off the ranks of revolutionaries waiting to make a better world, but real proletarians would work for his release from The System, etc etc etc.
> 
> Proper creepy and very very sad. Wanted to rip it off the wall and jump up & down on it, but I didn't - the loonspuddery of the wording would have put off anyone I think. But yes, there is at least one person out there still willing to stand up for him.



It's two of his acolytes, one of whom gave evidence against him, but since has decided she was "brainwashed by the state to get Comrade Bala out of the way". Met her about August last year, and she was all over the place verbally with her story, so I reckon this flyer is a way of trying to get her story across more coherently. I saw a version myself last October when she handed them out at a Stand Up to Lambeth Council meeting, and it was a bit more linear than her previous rambling.
She tried to get the RCG onside, but several of the women comrades gave her the fish-eye.


----------



## Lurdan (Jan 22, 2017)

Interesting and very sobering article including an interview with Katy Morgan-Davies in the Guardian.
(She's the daughter of Balakrishnan and one of his followers.) 

There's a documentary on BBC2 at 9pm next Thursday. BBC iPlayer link for when its up.
Ooops : edited to remove link to a trailer for the wrong film.


----------



## Dom Traynor (Jan 22, 2017)

ViolentPanda said:


> It's two of his acolytes, one of whom gave evidence against him, but since has decided she was "brainwashed by the state to get Comrade Bala out of the way". Met her about August last year, and she was all over the place verbally with her story, so I reckon this flyer is a way of trying to get her story across more coherently. I saw a version myself last October when she handed them out at a Stand Up to Lambeth Council meeting, and it was a bit more linear than her previous rambling.
> She tried to get the RCG onside, but several of the women comrades gave her the fish-eye.


Too mad for the RCG


----------



## Sparkle Motion (Jan 23, 2017)

That Guardian link moved me beyond comprehension. Maybe more later. Probably best not.


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## ddraig (Jan 27, 2017)

anyone see the tv prog last night? can't find a link to it!
had a couple of the women, including the youngest speaking about it all.
fear and control


----------



## Lazy Llama (Jan 27, 2017)

The Cult Next Door: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08c3vrx via @bbciplayer


----------



## ddraig (Jan 27, 2017)

cheers LL!


----------



## toblerone3 (Jan 28, 2017)

Lazy Llama said:


> The Cult Next Door: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08c3vrx via @bbciplayer



What a moving story this is....and not a little creepy as well.


----------



## jakejb79 (Feb 3, 2017)

Why was his Wife cleared of all charges?


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Feb 4, 2017)

jakejb79 said:


> Why was his Wife cleared of all charges?



First victim perhaps?  by placing a person in a de facto chain of command  it enhances the concept of control on both ends?

The phycology of it all get very complicated


----------

