3 Wise Monkeys

Last night (17th November) the Council Overview committee decided to ratify the Cabinet decision to formally reject the potential Indemnity partner Riveroak. However when the meeting had finished death threats (now a police matter) were made to a UKIP Councillor.

 The reaction from the majority of people who saw this post was understandable horror and revulsion, however nobody was surprised as many have felt for a long time certain elements within the Pro campaign were out of control and there have been many posts from that quarter blaming everybody for the failure of TDC, both Labour and UKIP, to "get the airport open".
The most vocal of the Pro supporters, who congregate in Manston loud hailer had this reaction:

Whilst this seems a reasonable debate on the surface what is consistent is their seeming inability to understand their own part in the conditions they create whereby some idiot feels it necessary to carry out "death threats" on another human being. Their constant dehumanising of anyone who disagrees with their point of view. Their constant vilification of Ann Gloag, Cartner & Musgrave, Chris Wells, Iris Johnston, Pauline Bradley, Paul Carter the list goes on. Their shouts of "corruption", "Brown Envelopes" Etc all add to the climate of Evil they spread. There is much written on the internet about this subject but I found this article which sums it up pretty well.

 "Particularly notable, Zimbardo said, is that people are seduced into evil by dehumanizing and labeling others.
"They semantically change their perception of victims, of the evil act, and change the relationship of the aggressor to their aggression--so 'killing' or 'hurting' becomes the same as 'helping,'" he said.
For example, in a 1975 experiment by psychologist Albert Bandura, PhD, college students were told they'd work with students from another school on a group task. In one condition, they overheard an assistant calling the other students "animals" and in another condition, "nice." Bandura found students were more apt to deliver what they believed were increased levels of electrical shock to the other students if they had heard them called "animals."."You don't need a motive," Zimbardo said. "All you really need is a situation that facilitates moving across that line of good and evil." So is it a few bad apples that spoil a barrel? "That's what we want to believe--that we could never be a bad apple," Zimbardo said. "We're the good ones in the barrel." But people can be influenced, regardless of their intention to resist, he said. People's aggression can also increase when they feel anonymous--for example if they wear a uniform, hood or mask" ( it's the same when posting on Facebook, you feel divorced from your actions. It's why Cyber-Bullies thrive *My PVP), Zimbardo said.* read
"What makes good people do bad things?"

Further examples in history are the assasination of Thomas a Becket (people remember the words of the King at the time "Who will rid me of this troublesome Priest"

 and

Joseph Goebbels

He fine tuned his Ministry of Propaganda in Nazi Germany

 and also the conditions within North Korea, as an example, where the State is always correct and any dissent is dealt with harshly are similar to certain Facebook pages because only one view is allowed "Manston as an airport"

What the more vocal pro supporters do not understand is posting memes like this is NOT banter nor is it funny in the wider context of dehumanising people who lets face it are only agreeing with the previous decision of the old Labour administration.

Nor is it funny when the same group of individuals make the same effort to dehumanise the blog author and attempt to discredit him without proof.

Free Speech does not mean freedom to abuse

 For those hard of reading (as opposed to hearing) please read this from the Mail

Freedom of speech should never mean freedom to abuse. As a victim, I welcome plans to unmask cowardly internet trolls

By Dominique Jackson for the Daily Mail

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2158120/Freedom-speech-mean-freedom-abuse-As-victim-I-welcome-plans-unmask-cowardly-internet-trolls.html#ixzz3s2XeYvKg