Party Vibe

They had a similar march (though based around the 1970s “reclaim the night” campaign as this incident hadn’t happened) following the Ipswich sex worker murders.

it was also for all ages and genders and not just for sex workers – some of my mates went on it.

It did achieve its aims (greater help for sex workers, drug addicts and a clampdown on thuggery and violence in general including rape and domestic violence) but that came from the “top down” authorities (cops, councils, CCTV) – they implemented all the control systems of Amsterdam without any of the tolerance so loads of venues got shut down, sex workers arrested and put out off the game (they did get rehab and treatement), more cops and bouncers everywhere. it has worked though, detection rate in Suffolk rose loads in last year after apalling figures in 2006 (there is a residue of historic difficult to solve cases).

“victim blaming” affects everyone, not just sexual offences (which of course both genders can be victims off), rouind here there is too much of a attitude on the street that its normal for blokes to turn to arguing and fighting (whether or not they have even been drinking), also a lot of scrotes think that if someone has something nice (a car, a bike, a mobile) they can try and rob it off them, then you’ve got racism, envy and all the other bullshit.

what I think is needed is a wider campaign with a total zero tolerance attitude to any kind of bullying or controlling behaviour…

I’ll give the authorities their due here, what they did has made an impact but at the same time the scum have scored a tactical victory as everyone is now in fear of them, I know so many people what don’t go out any more because they know a few troublemakers can spoil everything..

@MC G-Tek 496552 wrote:

As GL says, the measures in his area work in one way, but in another way, aren’t helpful, because they just add to the climate of fear. Building up the ‘fear factor’ of these individuals just makes it worse, because they’ll feel empowered, when in reality, they’re just inadequate scumfucks!

The feds themselves are concerned about how the assessed fear of crime is double the actual amount of crime.

Not a simple solution – the people by their voting patterns show that they don’t want to pay for public services and particularly not to subsidise others’ fun.

There are other cultural factors – the whole region which is influenced by Ipswich (Ipswich, Babergh, Mid Suffolk, Suffolk Coastal) is semi rural and yet close enough to be influenced by TOWIE culture (I am but 10 miles away from Essex myself) and London (1 hour 30 by train but you need to be a corporate muppet or a teenage crack dealer to afford them). The locals aren’t bad folk but are influenced by the culture of rural areas and heavy industries (we still have some here) where “might makes right and life is cheap” and younger folk especially are finding it hard to cope with the economic depression and going into self destruct mode or turning on each other, even friends.

I do wonder if “party” cities like London or Brighton are actually way less safe for everyone (especially given the horror stories I’ve heard) and its only because of the current economic benefits night life is tolerated at all? OK London is a capital city and it would be rubbish if it didn’t have some nightlife (though its now increasingly being controlled) but if Brighton had a container port they would probably work out it brought in more revenue than tolerating clubs which are often funded by or linked to laundered drugs money, especially in maritime areas..

It wasn’t that easy to find the correct UK info, had to plough through expired / old data, links to marches in foreign countries, previous marches and in the end actually had to use the metpol website to confirm there was a march in London today! Of course being the cops they can’t and won’t give a free publicity platform to the march but I think its some law to do with traffic closures or human rights or perhaps both that details of all marches in London are shown there.

There was one mentioning the UK date in a odd corner but with posts, incidents etc mentioned in American English or some other places. Whilst its good to show international solidarity it is a bit disappointing (in comparison to 1970s/1980s similar campaigns) when there is that much confusion about you have to use a Police website to double check when the march actually is! This also explains why a clued up supportive person like TG would miss it.

and understandably girls and women usually aren’t going to google stuff with “slut” in it either because much unpleasantness often results. And no, I don’t do it either (other than to look up the lyrics of a traditional Dutch pop song about sailors in Amsterdam and their activities, which confirmed the areas similarity to Ipswich)

on that note the detection rate in Suffolk went from about 6% in 2006/7 to 28% in 2010/2011. Almost certainly this was due to the extra procedures implemented to protect women (not just sex workers) after the murders, but those include a great deal of control and nannying and closure of nightlife. They have prevented a lot of incidents in town and caught some real predators and I’ll give them their due the cops have really put a lot of effort into prevention and detection and they do give out sensible advice to both girls and boys about how to protect themselves and what boundaries of behaviour are (another thing they’ve copied from Holland) – but they’ve clearly now picked the low lying fruit and now have the difficult cases such as abuse within relationships to deal with.