AS people, should people be charged under this provision?

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This is the provision. In statutes, some provisions are said to "create offences", meaning that people can be charged under them as they specifically state what a person must do under certain circumstances or what that person is forbidden from doing, and others are set-up provisions of different sorts (definitions, declarations, affirmations of legal obligations).

Question; does this provision "create an offence", should people be charged under this provision and if so, for doing what specifically? What is the banned action? I want to put this to Asperger people like me to see how our reputation for more literal-mindedness may come into play...

No assemblies, parades or other gatherings; This could mean any number of people.

that disturb the peace, public order and safety; This could mean any kind of action.

parks and places or other areas of public property; Means everything but private property.


Edit: so no, I don't think anyone should be charged by something this broad.

It sounds as if you live in a fascist state.. the right to protest is an essential element of a modern democracy.

This is an anti-nuisance law.

Should aspires have carte blanche to behave badly in public? No.

Even if you have a special interest in playing cops and robbers with imaginary friends, you should not be permitted to engage in imaginary firefights with realistic model weapons in the park, for example.

Hopefully such a law is applied with some discretion and intelligence.

If you are running into trouble and such a law is being used against you, it might be a sign that something you are doing is not socially acceptable in your community and it might be a good idea not to do it.

I want clarify this further. This is Article 6 of the same bylaw...

Every PERSON MUST COMPLY...

That means, that this is directed at an individual and it states what he or she must do under this condition that they are present at an assembly as defined under Article 2 stated eariler, or any other gatherings banned under the bylaw...

So, does Article 2 create an offence, should people be charged under that, if it does not actually specifically state that an individual must do or not do anything but instead describes a type of event that is not allowed to be "held?

Article 2 should be clarified to explain what, exactly, is harmful or disruptive. A person should not be charged unless they do not obey the officer of peace, and they should be able to appeal if they felt the officer was unreasonable.

What happens if the officer violates article 2?

I'm pretty sure these terms have specific legal meanings. For example, "public safety", "disturbing the peace", etc.

The right to protest is constitutionally protected; the right to protest in a way that is unsafe is not. So, if I wanted to protest, I could not do it in the middle of the interstate, but I could protest on the courthouse lawn--but not by dumping a ton of manure on it. I could protest a business, but not by physically blocking the doors. I could write an angry letter, but not a death threat.

A lot of these laws were worked out during major protest-heavy movements, specifically civil rights and the anti-war movement during the Vietnam war.

Over the years we've refined the definitions, mostly supporting the basic idea of protecting people's right to protest, but only to the extent that it doesn't interfere with other people's rights. Not that there aren't still violations of rights, but we do have the right idea.

As a purely practical matter, it's a good idea to comply with the order of a police officer unless that order is immediately life threatening. You don't want to argue the law with an armed person explicitly authorized to use violence to enforce the law. Mistakes happen. Sometimes they aren't even mistakes.

If a police officer directs you to leave an unlawful assembly, do so.

The way the OP is worded it sounds like the imagined situation is that cops would be going around looking to get aspies off the street and using this law as an excuse to tell them to leave some situation that everyone else is allowed to remain in. But the quoted law doesn't say that at all.

What Callista said.

I can't see why cops would want to get Aspies off the streets: we are usually quite gentle creatures.....

Yeah, protest law isn't the problem for Aspies out in public. The risk is that if we look disabled, or look like we're high or drunk, a cop might think we're either lost and unable to care for ourselves (not usually true) or publicly intoxicated. Those are both situations a cop would interfere in, because they're both times where people who can't think straight are out on the street without anybody with them. And if the cop is wrong--if the person's actually autistic but competent to be on their own--it can lead to anything from confusion to a meltdown to a police shooting of someone they thought was dangerous.

So, the public protest thing is more an issue for Aspies who are wanting to stage protests, proper, perhaps for disability rights or else for some other cause they feel strongly about. It's more the training they give--or don't give--to the police that presents the real danger to Aspies out in public.

You're right, Callista.

My mention of Aspies has to do with the interpretation of language... We seem to want more precise language and do not like inferences so much... thus it is my opinion that we are more likely to say that it does not create an offence than is the case with neurotypicals.

It is my opinion that Article 2 does not create an offence because it does not specifically prohibit a person from doing anything. It simply states that certain kinds of events are not allowed. The provision that does create an offence is Article 6 that states that in the course of such an event one must comply with the order to leave the scene of the event.

Article 4 of the bylaw describes the characteristics that make an Article 2 event that disturbs "peace, public order and safety"...

I think if an Aspie wants to know whether a law applies and how it is used, they are likely to look up the terms in a legal dictionary and figure it out for themselves. At least, they are if they know that legal language has specific meanings that aren't necessarily the same as the vaguer meanings of the words as they are used in everyday speech.

And maybe that says a bit about us, too: We know we don't really use language the way others do, so we compensate by doing research and observation, collecting more data about language than most people do. That's what leads to "little professors": Kids who sound unusually formal because they're using the words that precisely mean what they want to say. Those words are less commonly used (common words get multiple meanings), so the kid sounds too formal for their age.

I know that when I had a spot of trouble with a ticket I took the trouble to look at a website that contains judgements in order to figure out the definitions that are in the description of the offence. This helped me to defeat the ticket.

By the way, in this jurisdiction the law of interpretation states that no provision may exist for nothing and if Article 2 of that bylaw creates an offence Article 6 has no reason to exist, and hence, this interpretation is not permitted, the only interpretation permitted is one that states that Article 2 creates no offence...

Elements of offence for alleged Article 2 offence: 1) Illegal event 2) Being there
Elements of offence for Article 6 offence 1) Illegal event 2) Being there 3) Not following order to leave.

No reason for Article 6 if you're already had on the elements for Article 2.

City cancels thousands of tickets issued under P-6 bylaw

Well, I won, I killled the tickets...

I killed the tickets,
I killed the tickets,
The provision creates no offence,
I killed the tickets...

The article there got it wrong, it mentioned the subsidiary decision which was also my idea... to say that if it DID create an offence it was for having HELD the event.

This is not a computer program.
This is left to interpretation and there are many "judgements" that go into being charged with this.

1 someone probably has to get annoyed or scared enough to complain
2 cops pretty much have to think a near riot is happening after they see the situation
3 you have to be kind of a dick to the cops
4 an actual Judge will eventually become involved
5 and a Jury

Try not to let the our typical Aspie Black & White thinking terrify you when reading NT laws.