The lethal, distanced threat of the guns serves to hold everyone, frozen, concentrated in place. Often, as a result, very little happens. An armed stand off is a time to talk. This was true of the only armed confrontation I have ever witnessed up close, the armed siege of a pub in Cambridge, one Sunday morning. That morning nothing moved for several hours. There was a deathly silence apart from the police loud hailer.
The policing of crowds we witnessed last night, is something very different. It is an intensely physical, sweaty, muscular business. This is state power exercised in the manner of a wrestling match or rugby scrum. One might also say that it has something in common with the herding of large-animals, except the animals are people, citizens, indeed.
https://adamtooze.substack.com/p/chartbook-280-the-state-as-blunt?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
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Mark Carrigan 