STATEMENT FROM FREEDOM WATCH GB
Today, Freedom Watch GB founder Montgomery Toms and our team travelled to Bristol University to debate students and engage directly with people who disagree with us. We managed to hold one debate before being surrounded by a huge, organised mob. We were not surrounded by hundreds. We were surrounded by thousands!
Our tent was completely swarmed, our gazebo was ripped apart and collapsed, microphones and other equipment were stomped on, and one of our cameras was knocked over. Masked individuals were among those surrounding and obstructing our team, while our attempts to continue recording were constantly disrupted, making it extremely difficult to properly document the endless assaults.
The situation became so serious that the police closed off the road and brought in riot horses, yet despite the enormous crowd surrounding us, there was no effective dispersal and no meaningful effort to protect our team or our property. The police simply did not have the capacity to get us out while protecting us from the mob, leaving our team effectively trapped and forced to work out how to escape with our people and equipment. This is an extraordinary situation to find ourselves in while attempting to exercise the most basic democratic right: speaking to the public and debating political ideas.
We are not asking everyone to agree with Montgomery Toms or Freedom Watch GB. In fact, we actively encourage people to challenge us, criticise us and debate us. What is completely unacceptable is attempting to prevent those conversations from happening through intimidation, obstruction and the destruction or interference with our equipment. Students wanted to approach us, ask questions and debate. They were prevented from doing so by the atmosphere created around our team. That is not free speech. That is the suppression of free speech.
The events at Bristol demonstrate exactly why Freedom Watch GB exists. Political debate cannot be reserved for comfortable rooms where everyone already agrees. If our views are controversial, then challenge them. If our arguments are wrong, defeat them in debate. But do not send masked thugs to swarm people, destroy their equipment and intimidate members of the public into silence.
We have extensive footage from today and we will publish it. We will show what happened to our equipment, the scale of the crowd, the disruption to our filming and the response of the police. The public can then judge the events for themselves.
Freedom Watch GB will not be intimidated into silence. We will continue going into universities, we will continue debating students, and we will continue putting our arguments directly to the public. You can shout over us, surround us and attempt to shut us down, but you will not stop us from turning up.
We will keep debating. We will keep exposing what is happening. And we will keep fighting for freedom.
Freedom Watch GB