Peruvian arrests of British women - moved.

[precarian]

Two British girls locked up in Peruvian jail have not eaten for seven days and are said to be terrified and hysterical after they were arrested on suspicion of trying to smuggle £1.5million of cocaine out of the country

...

One guard told The Daily Mirror: 'Ever since they arrived both have refused to eat or drink. They have starved themselves while saying they are innocent. If they are found guilty they will see what hell is really like.'

One has gone to pieces. She is hysterical. She keeps crying saying there has been a huge mistake. They are both starting to realise just how serious this is.


This is heart-breaking. Yet more victims of the war on drugs and the savagely cruel bourgeois institution known as "the criminal justice system."

Fire to the prisons! Solidarity with Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum Connolly!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2389737/Terrified-Michaella-McCollum-Connolly-Melissa-Reid-locked-Peruvian-jail-cocaine-smuggling.html

[Zergling]

From reading the article it seems as if the girls were duped into being mules by cash. It is really hard to make any judgement at this point but seeing that their parents didn't even know they had gone to Peru makes their actions suspect.

[precarian]

Reminiscent of the Bali Nine. For me, this case certainly hits home considering Melissa is from my neck of the woods!

The selectively enforced anti-drugs laws, enacted by impoverished states on the capitalist periphery, are utterly savage - Of course, these policies are the product of the illegality of drugs in "first world" nations.

What really angers me is when the reactionary press imply that drug traffickers "deserve everything they get" for "breaking the laws of the country they're in." Compassion and universal notions of "justice" are apparently alien concepts..

Additionally, the mainstream media and the general public - quelle surprise! - absolutely refuse to delve a little further into these cases. Their analysis is invariably cursory and dismissive, marked by various bourgeois prejudices.

Personally, I fully understand why someone would take the risk of rotting in a Peruvian jail for the chance of obtaining a bit of money.

These girls come from a social fabric which has been ripped into a thousand pieces - a Hobbesian "war of everyman against everyman" where the entirety of existence is reduced to a cut-throat quest for material self-advancement. If you don't have money, you're immediately labelled a failure and your life will be shit. You'll be consigned to the drudgery of wage slavery for the rest of your life, forced to sell the majority of your waking hours to a boss for a pathetic pittance. If you're not so "lucky," you'll be thrown into the cluthches of a punitive welfare system and you'll barely be able to support yourself.

All the while our political-social-cultural elite live in luxury, and images of this alternate world are pumped into our brains every single day via the mass media spectacle. The millionaire lifestyle is upheld as an ideal by our rulers yet this lifestyle is completely out of the reach of the ordinary person. The elites have opulence while the working class live hand-to-mouth, and we're supposed to accept this as some sort of meritocratic natural order.

Fuck that! These are the options: Live like a shit-kicker, or take a risk and strike it rich. People in advanced-capitalist countries are conditioned to seek out individual ways to escape from ordinary life under this system and, in lieu of any collective means to change their condition, that's exactly what they do.

So, when a cartel member offers you the chance to acquire serious money which will provide you with a bit of security and might, potentially, help you escape from the morass of monotony and exploitation that is life under capitalism, wouldn't you take it?? Looking at the amount of Westerners in prison for trafficking, it's clear that many folk think like this.

Just like every other victim of the war on drugs, these poor girls are also victims of capitalism.

[Anti-Traditional]

From reading the article it seems as if the girls were duped into being mules by cash. It is really hard to make any judgement at this point but seeing that their parents didn't even know they had gone to Peru makes their actions suspect.

Like you said we don't know the full story. Likewise it is tragic that they are suffering in prison and look set to suffer for a long time. However if they were only duped by cash and not by violence or intimidation etc...can we really say they are victims?

1.5m worth of cocaine is a hell of a lot...

[ed miliband]

this will make a good episode of 'locked up abroad' someday, at least.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

It's always nice to see people focusing on minutiae in order to disguise their law-and-order stance. I predict that, by the end of this thread, these two women will be denounced as bourgeois, imperialist, and whatnot.

[brigadista]

must be bad also for all the peruvian women incarcerated in that prison also no doubt mainly for "crimes" arising from poverty....

[Leo]

must be bad also for all the peruvian women incarcerated in that prison also no doubt mainly for "crimes" arising from poverty....
Well, yeah. For all the women and men in all parts of the world, really, accused of "crimes" arising from poverty, and for boys and girls as well.

Not that I don't think these two women are victims of the same system of poverty and the same bourgeois justice system, but I do nevertheless feel the need to question why it is their case discussed here in particular and not that of millions of others like them, who perhaps aren't so white or so English.

I don't question the intentions of the original poster and so far have no reason to think he doesn't sympathizes with millions of others just like these two. However I don't like the implication of singling out their case without emphasizing the international and the general situation for wide masses of proletarians. Is it only a problem when white English women are in a Peruvian prison? Do the Peruvians deserve a Peruvian prison more than these two English women? Do those in English prisons deserve to be in there but it's only a problem when UK citizens are arrested abroad? Are British patriots supposed to have a national stand on UK citizens being held abroad while saying nothing about those imprisoned in England? All these certainly are implied in the Daily Mail article.

Looking at the international situation is vital on a question like this.

[adipocere]

It's always nice to see people focusing on minutiae in order to disguise their law-and-order stance. I predict that, by the end of this thread, these two women will be denounced as bourgeois, imperialist, and whatnot.

It's hard to have sympathy for people who do incredibly stupid things solely for personal monetary gain. Two young British women busted trafficking drugs out of Peru who expect special treatment is quite bourgeois.

[precarian]

Well, yeah. For all the women and men in all parts of the world, really, accused of "crimes" arising from poverty, and for boys and girls as well.

Not that I don't think these two women are victims of the same system of poverty and the same bourgeois justice system, but I do nevertheless feel the need to question why it is their case discussed here in particular and not that of millions of others like them, who perhaps aren't so white or so English.

I don't question the intentions of the original poster and so far have no reason to think he doesn't sympathizes with millions of others just like these two. However I don't like the implication of singling out their case without emphasizing the international and the general situation for wide masses of proletarians. Is it only a problem when white English women are in a Peruvian prison? Do the Peruvians deserve a Peruvian prison more than these two English women? Do those in English prisons deserve to be in there but it's only a problem when UK citizens are arrested abroad? Are British patriots supposed to have a national stand on UK citizens being held abroad while saying nothing about those imprisoned in England? All these certainly are implied in the Daily Mail article.

Looking at the international situation is vital on a question like this.

Indeed! An international perspective is absolutely crucial for leftists, in opposition to the parochial outlook of the mainstream press.

The main reason this case is being reported in the Western media is because the "offenders" are young Westerners. Also, the contrast between "naive young Britons" and "horrendous third world prison" is quite jarring - Certainly more jarring (in the eyes of middle-class society) than a Peruvian being gaoled in a country where he is likely to be familiar with the abject squalor present there.

The thing is, I doubt the likes of the Daily Mail (or most of the population) even think there's a problem here. They "broke the law" after all - a cardinal sin in the eyes of Middle Englanders! "No sympathy", "should have thought about the consequences", "hang 'em and flog 'em" - The moral assumptions of bourgeois society invariably colour the debate regarding these incidents. In an uncaring "me first" society, I suppose it's unsurprising that many ordinary citizens internalise selfish and uncaring notions.

However, it's important for leftists to transcend this paradigm.We must stand in solidarity with all those who have fallen victim to the tyranny of "law and order", wherever they are. The very idea of punishing transgressors of arbitrary conceptions of "legality" should be mercilessly critiqued. Allowing the state to define notions of "right and wrong", whilst granting the courts carte blanche to extract their pound of flesh from working class people, is a scandalous abuse of human rights and an affront to the dignity of humankind.

In a truly civilized society, "prison" would not exist.

[RedBen]

It's impossible to engage with people who are locked into this ultra-vigilant outlook. You can't keep on the right side of them. They take a perverse pleasure in pulling folk up over trivial things and seeking offence where none is intended, in order to use the "transgressor" as a punching bag to assuage their own guilt.

Of course, the offending person is then hung out to dry since, in the activist ghetto, an accusation of having been "offensive" is akin to a charge of fucking witchcraft in 17th century Salem.

The average person in the street wouldn't be able to say more than a few sentences to a privilege theory-adherent without falling afoul of their speech code - which indicates how much contact they've actually had with working class people!

we on the left love to use words that end in "ism", i call that tendency "spring loadedism". the propensity of some to leap 30 feet out of their chairs at a perceived transgressions. sexism does exist, patriarchy does exist. i can understand calling someone out for the "girl comment", but the amount of drama kicked up over the original post is insane. on the ORIGINAL TOPIC if they knew what they were doing than they were pretty stupid to try this. you have to understand the gov will come down hard on you, it feeds the prison industrial complex. if they were tricked somehow into this, then they are incredibly gullible and should have a closer look at their case. i disagree with throwing people in cages over drugs but come the fuck on, i'm sure most people would have enough of an idea that it won't end well. fucking with drugs never does...

[RedAnarchist]

I've renamed the thread. I also question why the Daily Mail was used as a source - surely there are better places to link to than that cesspit?

[Anti-Traditional]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/10240751/British-drug-mules-claim-they-were-forced-at-gunpoint-to-carry-cocaine-by-Colombian-gang.html

Well, this might well sseem to change things...

[Os Cangaceiros]

Damn. This story reminds me of an episode of "Locked Up Abroad" (as EM previously mentioned), about two Americans who tried smuggling coke out of Lima & got busted. Supposedly so much coke gets trafficked out of Peru via drug mules using airports that the Peruvian customs officials have gotten pretty good at sniffing them out (although a lot of people still get through).

[MarxSchmarx]

I have sought to extract the drug arrest related posts from the previous thread. Henceforth, anyone who uses the term "girls" to refer to females over 18 or for that matter boys to refer to males over 18 in this thread will receive first a verbal warning and then an infraction if it is continued.

Whatever the merits of the discussion about the sexist language, the original thread had gotten too OT. I have moved everything about the language used here:
http://www.revleft.com/vb/calling-adult-females-t182617/index.html
in discrimination, if you want to continue it.

Please, everyone, try to remain on topic.

[Jolly Red Giant]

Just for a point of clarification - one of the girls, Michaela McCollum, is Irish from Co. Tyrone. She declared herself as Irish when questioned by the Peruvian police.

[precarian]

This link contains an interesting narrative! It could, potentially, be a game changer!

Even if their story were false, how could the authorities possibly bring a conviction against them?? Surely if they keep calm and composed, it's their word against the state's? Even if they trip up a bit, they could claim they're emotionally stressed and not thinking straight.

Also, I saw a video of them being questioned by Peruvian authorities - where the fuck were their lawyers?? I'm hardly an expert on the legal systems of South American countries, but are there seriously no rights if you're caught trafficking narcotics?? It certainly looks that way. Very ominous indeed..

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/peru-drug-arrests-gangsters-held-2164152

[MarxSchmarx]

Just for a point of clarification - one of the girls, Michaela McCollum, is Irish from Co. Tyrone. She declared herself as Irish when questioned by the Peruvian police.

Thanks for the clarification, but please be careful with your language and don't call these people "girls" as I requested above. I trust you didn't mean any malice, so this is a verbal warning.

[Luís Henrique]

must be bad also for all the peruvian women incarcerated in that prison also no doubt mainly for "crimes" arising from poverty....

Ah, but pay attention to the Daily Mail, will you? Those are not "girls", they are "dangerous criminals". They are Peruvian, after all, aren't they?

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

This link contains an interesting narrative! It could, potentially, be a game changer!

I don't think so. This is not the usual modus operandi of drug smugglers. They offer you money for carrying their commodities, or they lure you into doing it by disguising them as something innocent that must be delivered to their old aunt abroad. I may of course be mistaken, but forcing people at point gun doesn't sound like something they would do, nor it is a thing that I have heard or read them having done.


Even if their story were false, how could the authorities possibly bring a conviction against them?? Surely if they keep calm and composed, it's their word against the state's? Even if they trip up a bit, they could claim they're emotionally stressed and not thinking straight.

That's not how it works. The prosecution has evidence that they were carrying drugs. If the defense alleges they were forced at point gun, it has to prove it. If they don't, the allegation is useless.


Also, I saw a video of them being questioned by Peruvian authorities - where the fuck were their lawyers?? I'm hardly an expert on the legal systems of South American countries, but are there seriously no rights if you're caught trafficking narcotics?? It certainly looks that way. Very ominous indeed..

I am no expert on Peruvian legal system (which may or may not be very different from those of Ecuador or Colombia, btw), but I am pretty sure they have a right to legal counsel. If (and this is a big "if") this is being denied, they might have a good argument in court.

Luís Henrique

[Jolly Red Giant]

Thanks for the clarification, but please be careful with your language and don't call these people "girls" as I requested above. I trust you didn't mean any malice, so this is a verbal warning.
Jaysus - I am just after reading some of the nonsense on the other thread.

Just as an aside - I have three daughters who I love and respect greatly - they are aged between 19-24 and to me they are all girls. Maybe I am showing my age - but this nonsense is political correctness gone mad - and ban me if you want - really is off the wall.