alt Hacker News> On the contrary, it’s no different whatsoever from corralling away protest until it’s out of sight in an approved zone, and arresting anyone who expresses dissent in sight.
You are not being genuine here IMO, and this seems to be a case of the very tribalism I spoke of. The two are not remotely the same. One is restricting a protest to a zone. The other is punishing people for what they are saying, even when what they are saying is a blank piece of cardboard.
> It’s your contention that “nothing like this ever happened in the US” that I took issue with - it does and it’s entirely routine.
> ...
> the US, often painted in contrast as some sort of bastion, albeit a troubled one, is usually doing exactly the same damn thing.
Can you cite an example of people in the US being arrested for holding up a blank piece of cardboard?
> It’s a weird mix of jingoism and ignorance.
This only describes your behavior.
As another poster has already pointed out to you, the person holding the blank piece of paper was not arrested. A number of the arrests of anti-monarchy protestors were subsequently ruled unlawful (e.g. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwyenzdz66wo).
All of this was widely reported in the British media and generally agreed to be a bad thing, so it doesn't really fit with your narrative of Brits being in denial about these problems.
By being sloppy with the facts you're only reinforcing Nursie's point that much of the discussion around these issues on HN is based on exaggeration and poorly sourced claims. That's what people actually object to, but you misinterpret these objections as a defense of police overreach.