![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/670a551652ad7bb3913c64d9f97e24df.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve known journalist and lecturer Jan Goodey for many years and was shocked and saddened to learn he had been sentenced last November to a six-month jail term for taking part in one of the Just Stop Oil protests. Jan is a decent man, unassuming and thoughtful, but he is\u2014demonstrably\u2014passionate about environmental issues and the damage that’s being done to our planet, as are many of us. It tells us everything about the moral bankruptcy of Tory Britain where idealistic activists are criminalised and temporarily removed from society when they are no threat to anyone.<\/p>\n
The judge said that Jan\u2019s conduct\u2014climbing up onto a gantry over a motorway to hang a banner\u2014was “not acceptable in a peaceful and democratic society”. But isn\u2019t protest supposed to be a core component of a \u201cdemocratic society\u201d?<\/p>\n
The huge irony here is that our \u201cdemocratic society\u201d only ever came about precisely<\/em> because<\/em> of protest. Our very universal suffrage was achieved through the protests and sacrifices of radicals such as the Levellers, Diggers, Chartists and Suffragettes\u2014all were persecuted and criminalised in their times, but all have long since been historically vindicated as democratic pioneers. I believe in time Jan will also be vindicated, and, I suspect, a lot sooner than his precursors.<\/p>\n Jan undertook a radical act of protest, it was inescapably disruptive, that\u2019s part of the point of protest, but it was peaceful, and did no actual harm to anyone. With our prisons overspilling and in appalling condition, how can it be justified either morally or practically to sentence peaceful protestors to serve jail terms? A key sign of a society that has lost its way morally is when compassionate idealists are criminalised by its legal system.<\/p>\n Below is a poem composed in support of Jan\u2014it is based on the villanelle verse form which repeats the first and third lines of the first verse alternately for each third line of the subsequent four verses and the closing two lines of the four-lined final sixth verse, but here I\u2019ve varied the third lines throughout, so this is a semi-villanelle, or what I will term a \u2018villanelle-vague\u2019.<\/p>\n Jan on a Gantry<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n In solidarity with Jan Goodey, first protestor to be convicted for <\/em><\/span>No place in a peaceful democracy Radical demurring, recusancy, Certainly not a busy motorway\u2014 Just as, historically, Winstanley, Nor Levellers, Diggers, Chartists, tree- (Just who scooped the protest<\/em> from Protest<\/em>ant?)\u2014<\/p>\n Heroes of our hard-won rights & liberties Alan Morrison<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I\u2019ve known journalist and lecturer Jan Goodey for many years and was shocked and saddened to learn he had been sentenced last November to a six-month jail…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":372,"featured_media":15039,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1645],"tags":[2729,2728,2196,2737,2725,2726,2197,2731,2738,2736,2727,2734,2733,2732,2730,2735,2717],"class_list":["post-15044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultural-theory","tag-chartists","tag-democracy","tag-diggers","tag-hmp-belmarsh","tag-jan-goodey","tag-just-stop-oil","tag-levellers","tag-lilburne","tag-m24","tag-police-crime-sentencing-and-courts-act","tag-protest","tag-rentstrikers","tag-robin-hood","tag-samuel-bamford","tag-suffragettes","tag-unions","tag-winstanley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/372"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15044\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gfdesign.co.uk\/culture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
‘causing a public nuisance’ under the draconian\u00a0<\/em><\/span>Police, Crime,
Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Act \u2013 sentenced to six months in
HMP Belmarsh for climbing a gantry over the M24 to hang a
JUST STOP OIL banner<\/p>\n
For peaceful protest, disruptive dissent
& Jan hanging a banner on a gantry.<\/p>\n
Outspokenness, complaint, argument:
No place in a peaceful democracy,<\/p>\n
Where cars career in daily sacrament\u2014
Brought to a standstill by a bannered gantry;<\/p>\n
John Lilburne, Robin Hood, Samuel Bamford,
Had no place in peaceful democracy,<\/p>\n
Hugging green men, Suffragettes, rent-
Strikers, Unions, & Jan on a gantry<\/p>\n
Without whom we\u2019d have no enfranchisement
Nor, in fact, meaningful democracy,
But banners urging OBEY from gantries.<\/p>\n