Should all people of Mid-East appearance be stopped on the street by police and searched in case they are terrorists?
Should all teenagers wearing a hoodie be searched for cans of spray paint in case they are graffiti tagger?
Should all mothers with shopping bags be stopped and searched in case they are shoplifting?
Should all V8 drivers be stopped and checked to see if their on-board computer has logged them speeding?
Of course not!
In what parallel universe would is be just to detain and harass the innocent on suspicion of evil because of how they look, dress or the type of vehicle they drive/ride?
Then why should groups of three motorcycle riders or more be subject to the same injustice?
That’s what the Queensland Government intends to do in their crackdown on outlaw bikie gangs.
Under laws before State Cabinet today three or more motorcyclists riding together will face police scrutiny regardless of whether they belong to an outlaw gang.
Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie has confirmed that riders would not have to be in club colours to warrant police attention if they were in groups of three or more.
Are the Queensland Police that dumb that they can’t tell the difference between a few recreational bikers and an outlaw bikie gang?
It’s not as if outlaw bikies go around in disguise. I can’t recall having seen outlaw bikies in groups riding without their colours flying.
This situation would be laughable if it wasn’t deadly serious.
I’m not saying everyone with colours should be pulled over, either. (Heaven help the pour Ulysses member with the old-guy emblem on his leather vest.)
If riders are not doing anything illegal, shouldn’t there have to be reasonable grounds to detain or search them?
I’m not here to tell the police how to do their job. But I am here to tell the government that I will not tolerate being stopped on the street simply because I am riding a motorcycle with a couple of mates.
However, I’m only one person.
So how do we put a stop this stupidity, this injustice, this – dare I say it – Nazi tactic?
Petitions, letters to the editor, street marches, etc won’t make a difference.
I believe in civil disobedience, Gandhi style.
We need to get some mates – maybe some from south of the border as well – and go for a ride.
Find some police – preferably down the Gold Coast way – and taunt them by riding back and forth past them in a proper and legal manner and put up with being stopped time and time again. (Make sure your bike is roadworthy!)
Exhaust them.
Make it obvious that punishing the innocent to chase the guilty does not work.
If it did, I don’t think I’d like to live in that society, anyway.
The final Cabinet announcement on this “law” is still up to a fortnight away, so we have time to act.