I predict a riot

I attend a weekly pub trivia night and there is this really annoying team that turn up every week who are disruptive, pick fights and are generally pain in the arse. I have a very non-PC name for them which was deemed a step too far by my team so we came up with a name for them based on the three things mself and my team mates despise. So they are officially named the Banana Panda Cops – I am the cops quotient of this name.

I have no idea where my distrust and dislike of cops comes from. Oh yeah, I remember. At a protest where I pointed out that two policemen were assaulting a minor and had removed their identification badges for the beating they were serving up. For my troubles, I was chased down the street by a baton wielding cop who was going to club me for pointing out that they were breaking the law. Ahh good times, but fortunately the cop lived up to this cliché and I could easily out run him. That and all the times I’ve seen people injured by their actions at otherwise peaceful protests (being a lefty in the 90’s and 00’s was a rough and tumble business).

Once again Katie brought to my attention that the Death From Above 1979 reunion show at got a little bit out of hand and the cops had to be called in. I love it when they refer to a concert as a riot, a sure sign of a great night. As usual Officer Friendly showed up and as Pitchfork recounted:

Spinner reports that shortly after that, mounted police arrived with mace and tasers, "and, in the case of one blonde female officer, hand-beating a particularly aggressive rioter."

Yeah, because I’m totally sure riding a group of horses into a crowd isn’t provocative at all. To be honest, one of the scariest moments in my life was being in a crowd charged by police horses and being dragged out of the path of them by a stranger as I fell down trying to run away. Firstly, horses are huge and kind of scary looking. Secondly, cops really don’t like that chant “get those animals off those horses.” Thankfully, I’m too fat, old and middle class for such shenanigans these days.

But, is there any measure of overkill than watching all the youtube videos of mounted police lining up against a bunch of fans that just want to hear DFA 1979? This is hardly a 'riot', more like a hipster beat down. Seriously, they need to chill and remember the sage like advice of Bryan Adams – Everywhere I go, the kids wanna rock. Just let them rock coppers, they ain’t harming no one.

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