Paganarchy Press

A gaggle of nine clowns from the Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army went to Parliament Square yesterday not to protest the new law outlawing such protests. The new law, which we didn't break is more correctly termed The Section 132 Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005. Well, we're clowns so there's no way we could engage in Serious Organised Crime so of course we didn't protest.



We started the day out by walking the perimeter of the new zone. We had a magic map and traced out a lot of the route with chalk. We weren't shy at all - we warned many people on which side of the line they were allowed to protest. Just to clarify the law for those who missed us - if you are on the London Eye and you are wearing a "Save The Whales" T-Shirt, you can be arrested for Serious Organised Crime. We were very helpful and let many people know this. We were surprised how few of London's 8 million knew about this law.



Eventually on our travels we turned up in Trafalgar Square... The Serious Organised Crime act makes an exception to this place which is not covered. In fact it specifically mentions Trafalgar Square in the legislation. This is odd, I thought to my clown self. Is it not Serious Organised Crime to protest here? But luckily some helpful security guards came up to us and informed us: "You are right, Trafalgar Square is exempt from the Serious Organised Crimes Act and that is not the reason you cannot protest here. The reason you cannot protest here is because our supervisor doesn't allow it."



"Right you are!" we thought to ourselves and continued on our merry way...



Eventually we made it in to the danger-zone and turned up in Parliament Square. Some Police gave us a flyer that said

"We believe you may be, or are about to be, involved in a demonstration blah blah blah Serious Organised Crime blah blah blah The demonstration has not been authorised blah blah blah if found guilty you may be liable to a fine or, in certain circumstances a term of imprisonment.




Nice and friendly!



There were 150 or so other people not demonstrating when we got there. Most of them didn't protest because they also are not involved in Serious Organised Crime. A clown from my gaggle was stopped and searched [pictured below] but of course, he is not involved in Serious Organised Crime and he didn't protest. Maybe they just wanted to say hello to him and hear some of his bad jokes? He has a lot of them!







Maybe the younger and more sensitive readers should turn away now because there was at least one extremely scary moment in the middle of the day and I don't want to give anyone nightmares... Out of nowhere we saw a number of people engage in scary Serious Organised Crime!!!



All of a sudden these people were holding up placards! Haven't they read the new crime's act? Have they no respect for authority? Don't they know that the new law makes unauthorised protesting in Central London completely illegal? These Serious Organised Criminals are a danger to, a danger to, a danger to, oh I didn't read the small print of the Act but I'm sure they are a danger... But I did read the placards, which read "Protest By Right, Not By Police Permission."



The placard-wielding Seriously Organised Criminals were dragged off by the police and the rest of us didn't protest for another hour or so... Later on a gaggle of us went to Islington Police Cells where we played Pass The Clap and other clown games until the five dangerous Serious Organised Criminals were released on bail...