UK Police recently broke up a barbecue celebrating a 30th birthday because it was advertised on Facebook as an “all-night” event.
The celebration, with all of 17 confirmed guests, was to be held in an isolated field in Devon last weekend. The event was listed on Facebook as being overnight, in case any guests wished to stay over. Unfortunately, police in riot vans, body armor, and a helicopter (!) crashed the party at 4pm, ordering everyone to leave before the hosts had a chance to turn on the music.
The birthday boy, Andrew Poole, was understandably quite surprised by all this: “It was on private land. We were nowhere near anyone. We weren’t even playing any music. What effectively the police did was come in and stop fifteen people eating burgers.”
Police in the UK have been granted special powers to stop “raves.” A rave is defined as “a gathering on land in the open air of 100 or more persons (whether or not trespassers) at which amplified music is played during the night (with or without intermissions) and is such as, by reason of its loudness and duration and the time at which it is played, is likely to cause serious distress to the inhabitants of the locality.” Of course, there don’t actually need to be 100 people for the police to shut down a rave. An officer simply needs to believe that two or more people are preparing for a rave, or that ten or more people are waiting for a rave to begin.
The police are defending their actions by saying that if they hadn’t stopped the party early, more police resources would have been used to break up the inevitable hamburger-fuelled riots. Don’t you feel safer, Brits?
Brad Taylor is a graduate student in Political Science at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. He blogs at 
I understand there will be a conservative uprising next year in the U.K. I hope the good citizens there succeed in taking back that great land.
Except for the fact the law banning raves was enacted by the previous conservative government.
This seems like a curfew in your own home. People don’t have the right to have a party in the UK? This story, along with all I’m hearing about the ubiquitous surveillance cameras, is clear evidence that Britain is already a police state.
Don’t worry, brits. I’m sure this trend toward more and more police control of your lives will eventually just go away without you having to do anything about it.
Liberty, once lost is lost forever.
“The tree of Liberty must be watered from time to time with the blood of tyrants and patriots.”
Poor Brits…. they have sat back politely while their government has gone insane. Quite frankly, their people are getting what they deserve for voting in liberals. So will America.
Whereas Americans have already gotten what they deserve by voting in conservative bigot war monger spendthrift racist xenophobic homophobes. Whee.
None of the Brits I’ve met sit back politely. But none of them have guns at home, either, which makes sitting back more likely, polite or not.
This is beyond ridiculous. The move was raving mad, that’s what it was. What’s more, Brit taxpayers have to foot the paychecks of cops and legislators who enforce and enact ridiculous laws such as this one.
The exact same thing is going on in America… Americas media is very good at masking such atrocitys as for the good and safety of the people
That statement is complete crap. I can do anything I want here, I can and do have huge parties. I shoot my many guns right outside my front door, I call our president the anti-Christ, among other things.
I will kill trespassers and bad guys dead, dead, dead. There’s no cover up here, except on the part of the libtard idiots who hate this country. I’d die for all my rights, hell, I’d die to protect YOUR rights here. You brits deserve all you get and us Americans still live in total freedom. Not one of my rights has ever been trampled on like you british tools. I run my mouth nearly constantly and have never been told not to. Choke on it.
Oh, now this is just silly. Surely the Police have more important things to be concentrating on; like breaking up drunken Saturday night fights, or stopping drug deals.
Why is everyone blaming Liberals? This isn’t even an economic issue, it’s social, so the whole Liberal/Conservative thing doesn’t even come into it. It’s because of the increasingly authoritarian governments we seem to elect here, who think they need to regulate society for its own good. Bugger off I say. Don’t blame Liberals though, in fact it’s the Liberal Democrats who are most opposed to stuff like this in the UK
I agree, the above is not about right/left or conservative/liberal.. it is about the increasing abuses that are brought on by police states, which are a direct result of authoritarian governments (aka Nanny Governments/States.) The belief that we can not take care of ourselves, the belief that we do not know what is best for ourselves, the belief that someone has to protect us before we ask for their protection, and the belief that everyone is evil or doing bad is a sign of the times.
Sorry Andrew Poole for the bummed party. But to be honest people, with all the internet monitoring occurring world wide, this could of happened almost anywhere. And unless I miss my mark, Nanny Protectionism is increasing, so anticipate more of this in our future….
Hey, Americans, fuck off. Don’t even try to talk about other countries’ politics- it just shows up what ignorant fucking extreme right cunts you really are. Suck out.
Brad Taylor, the author of this page, is a Kiwi. So, minus fifty for style, and another million off for being out of your frickin’ mind. Bigot. Hey, FOADUSA, we’ll talk about whatever we please. Why not come over here and make us stop talking about your queen and her festering anti-rave boils.