CAAN outside Labour Conference - can you come? (4)

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Posted by C_A_A_N on Thu 18 Sep 08, 3:57 PM to the C_A_A_N group.

Degenerate wrote:
more info just in case anyone else wants to come with us

Greetings gorgeous people

The Labour Conference is in Manchester from 20 to 24 September. Someone who is going has suggested it may be worth attending a few fringe meetings and leafletting those coming and going, and helped draft a relevant leaflet for us. Which we urgently need to print too!

We would be giving leaflets out and asking peopel to sign their names up to the CAAN statement:

"We believe in the right of consenting adults to make their own sexual choices, in respect of what they do, see and enjoy alone or with other consenting adults, unhindered and unfettered by government."

"We believe that it is not the business of government to intrude into the sex lives of consenting adults."

Anyone got any time to help for one of these? - guess we'd need to turn up twenty mins before or so to say hi. Bring a mate if you can. please forward this if you know anyone willing to help.

LGBT Labour event. This is a party on Sat 20 Sept from 9.30pm at the AXM Bar, Canal Street, Manchester.

Sun 21 Sept 12.45pm Progress/Dr Foster Intelligence Too Much Information? Can we trust the state to use data for our benefit? Lancashire/Cumberland Room, IoD Hub, Peter House, Oxford Street

Mon 22 Sept 7.00pm Liberty Hotair? The battle of the columnists in liberty's balloon debate. Palace Hotel

In addition to leafleting the events we could *try* to leaflet the entrance queue on one or more mornings from about 8.30am and/or at lunchtime. Gordon Brown will give his speech on Tuesday and this may therefore be the best day to leaflet the entrance.

If any of you are up for any of these dates please let me know asap.

Sorry for the short notice, I thought this was NEXT weekend!

Clair Lewis (Degenerate)

Edited Mon 22 Sep 08, 9:12 PM by C_A_A_N

Replies

22 Sep 08, 9:07 PM
Degenerate

UK(M), 5 yrs

HERE'S THE LEAFLET WE'RE TAKING TO CONFERENCE

CAAN LOGO www.caan.org.uk

Campaign for sexual liberation!

'We believe in the right of consenting adults to make their own sexual choices, in respect of what they do, see and enjoy alone or with other consenting adults, unhindered and unfettered by government.'

'We believe that it is not the business of government to intrude into the sex lives of consenting adults.'

Adopt these principles, or show your support for our aims by giving your name and email to one of our representatives, or contact us at info@caan.org.uk.

Tony Blair in 2006: “..there are areas in which the State, or the community, no longer has a role or, if it does have one, it is a role that is completely different. It is not for the State to tell people that they cannot choose a different lifestyle, for example in issues to do with sexuality.”

Sexual freedoms are now at risk!

The Criminal Justice and Immigration Act (CJIA) 2008 sections 64 - 67 makes the possession of extreme pornography a criminal offence. Convictions are punishable with up to three years imprisonment or a fine. These sections are expected to come into force on 1 January 2009. Many images of consensual, safe and legal acts taking place between consenting adults will become illegal to possess.

More than 40 academics have condemned government-backed research into the effects of pornography, saying it is extremely poor, based on contested findings and ignores the considerable research tradition into "extreme" (be they violent or sexually explicit) materials. There is no evidence that extreme images lead to non-consensual violence.

Sections 63 - 67 of the CJIA will create harmless criminals and victimless crimes. Police time taken up enforcing this law could be better used in other ways. The CJIA is a move towards a more restricted society in relation to sexuality.

If you work in an area where CRB checks are needed, ask your union what they are doing to protect their members, and to advise them about deleting illegal images come January 2009.

Consenting Adult Action Network oppose sections 63 - 67 of the CJIA and will continue to take action about it.

Consenting Adult Action Network have a new website - visit it and sign up to CAAN's statement - http://www.caan.org.uk
Sexuality - strong and warm and wild and free, Sexuality - your laws do not apply to me, Sexuality - dont threaten me with misery, Sexuality - I demand equality Billy Bragg

Edited 22 Sep 08, 9:08 PM by Degenerate

22 Sep 08, 9:09 PM
Degenerate

UK(M), 5 yrs

Degenerate wrote:
Well chaps, chapesses and queerchaps...

We are such a success we urgently need a couple more leafletters to come with us tomorrow and tuesday. Please please help if you can spare a couple of hours at the times prevously listed. If it's Tuesday please send a memo but the likely meeting times are 8am or 1200.

It was SO nice to be back out on the streets again last night and we stayed out very late! I am mildly suprised to say the following... (always give credit where due)

The leafletting was a truly fabulous experience. The Labour deligates rocked actually.

The venue allowed leaflets to be displayed inside and were happy not to notice us leafletting fairly near their entrance on each side.

Some LGBT Labour people and their supporters talked our poor little heads off, and snatched our hands off for leaflets with the CAAN statement on - we have some more people signed up and hopefully others signing up. Lots of people hanging out in the gay village took them too.

What a pleasure to leaflet activists who love to talk sexual politics! When's the next one? Oh.. tomorrow! Hurrah! We need more people as everyone was so interested that we couldn't keep up and didn't manage to leaflet as many people as we'd liked, but we did get rid of hundreds of flyers. If you can come with us tomorrow or tuesday we can guess that you will have a rewarding experience.

When we ran out of flyers we were allowed inside and then people talked the last bits of our heads off.. or perhaps I dropped mine in my pint, not sure. we learned new things and we've got better skills for doing the next lot tomorrow.

We also have some marvellous new tshirts which say "Never Kissed a Tory (And Never Will)" - but we have kissed a good few labour delegates!

It was a very encouraging night, all round. And there was beer when the work was done so it can't be bad.

Oh mi gosh! Strange things are afoot.

'it's like rollin' thunder, growing stronger' (Ian Stanton)

22 Sep 08, 9:09 PM
Degenerate

UK(M), 5 yrs

e attended the Equality and Human Rights Commission meeting today and managed to get a question to Trevor Philips about whether he would meet with CAAN and consider how new laws such as those concerning kinky porn and paying for sex are criminalising people's sexual choices and whether the ECHR can join the fight for the rights of people to have sexual choices. He seemed to say we can discuss it (and then a load of stuff about uhhh how we can't drive all the cars on the road at once.. dont ask me - i was baffled too). Will follow up with an email, as he did accept the leaflet afterwards.

Then we leafletted the deligates leaving and then more deligates from other meetings outside.

We then moved to near where people enter and exit the secure area on foot to leaflet. John Prescott took a leaflet too (apparently he was the big smiling man who headed right for me to get one, knew he looked familiar).

The lads have just finished doing leafletting at Liberty's meeting by laying them out, which was low in attendance but still important to do, then moved outside to leaflet other stragglers. More leaflets were distributed in the gay village afterwards.

Thanks to everyone who took the time to come and leaflet today, especially at such short notice! We're raising our profile..

We'll be back tomorrow in different locations at 12 and at 7 so if anyone else finds a few hours on their hands and fancies helping us leaflet, please memo me - and wednesday there's something to attend too.

24 Sep 08, 3:23 PM
Degenerate

UK(M), 5 yrs

We're finished now...

Everyone's been working really hard - one person did every thing we planned for conference incl two on their own! We're all wrecked today so decided not to farewell them with more flyers and we're going to spread the rest around during freshers week for the crazy students. I dunno about the others but I'm still in my bed groaning!!

At lunch time yesterday delegates leaving and entering the area for the priome minister's speech were leafletted. Then in the evening we leafletted people at the celebration of 50 years of the Human Rights Act and some people coming to see Gordon Brown who arrived later.

We chatted to a few police about the law who were becoming curious about us as we'd been around all weekend/this week. Can I just say we haven't met one officer yet who says they disagree with our aims as an individual. They had some brilliant advice and ideas!

We saw Trevor Philips again from the Equality and Human Rights Commission at the Human rights act celebration we were flyering, who smiled and acknowledged us, so he has not forgotten us. I am hopeful he will meet with someone from CAAN, we'll be writing to them soon.

One of David Millibank's people took our flyer and they were on their way to meet Gordon Brown. so I am fantasising that Gordon may know about us now. of course he probably doesnt but we can live in hope.

We gave a flyer to a guy who declared that he is on side who then said he was the lawyer who took spanner to europe so I cheered him! (he's on my list of heroes - first time I've been star struck all weekend - and we've seen the PM, Trevor Philips, David Milliband and John Prescott

We met a guy who runs The House Magazine which is circulated to all MP's who said it would help a lot to advertise the campaign in there. the smallest AD however is £350 plus VAT. I said we dont have £350 but mayeb if we get a big donation when we get higher profile we could do that - I have his card. He gave us some campaigning leads too.

I LIKE conference! it's just spending days around other activists! YAY My biggest surprise is that out of all the people we leafletted - probably a couple of thousand, that only ONE person said 'i don't like that' and I am not kidding. I have been doing demos and leafletting about activism for nearly a decade, normally on what I think are pretty easy to agree with disability rights demos, although we always have the majority of observers in support, I have never seen what looks like virtual total support like this before.

Is the kinky porn ban a Labour law?

I'm not so sure, actually. Go backbenchers!!!

Massive thanks to everyone who came to the streets with us and those who helped us get ready behind the scenes.

Edited 24 Sep 08, 4:07 PM by Degenerate