Protestor held by police at Sarah Everard vigil is slammed for video
Protestor held by police at Sarah Everard vigil is slammed for ‘making it all about herself’ by recreating her arrest photo in ‘insensitive’ TikTok video
- Patsy Stevenson, 28, filmed a TikTok video that was branded ‘insensitive’
- Physics student fined £200 after she was handcuffed at Sarah Everard’s vigil
- She recreated photographs showing police officers pinning her to the ground
- Viewers slammed Ms Stevenson for making Sarah’s death ‘all about herself’
A protestor photographed as she was held down by police at Sarah Everard’s vigil has been slammed for ‘making it all about herself’ by recreating the viral image.
Patsy Stevenson, 28, filmed a TikTok video that was branded ‘insensitive’ because she changed the camera angle to mimic photographs showing her being handcuffed by Metropolitan Police officers last month.
Ms Stevenson, a Physics student at Royal Holloway, University of London, was pinned to the floor after joining hundreds of women to mourn Sarah’s death at a vigil on Clapham Common in south London on March 13.
She later wrote a controversial first-person article for the Independent which called her the ‘face’ of the vigil. The headline has since been amended.
Patsy Stevenson (pictured), 28, filmed a TikTok video that was branded ‘insensitive’ because she changed the camera angle to mimic photographs showing her being handcuffed by Metropolitan Police officers last month
Ms Stevenson, a Physics student at Royal Holloway, University of London, was pinned to the floor after joining hundreds of women to mourn Sarah Everard’s (pictured) death at a vigil on Clapham Common in south London on March 13
In the short clip Ms Stevenson posted to TikTok she is seen posing in front of the camera, with the words: ‘I really recognise you from somewhere but I can’t think where.’
She then imposes the photo from the vigil at the bottom of the screen as she dramatically puts on the same mask she is wearing in the photo from that night.
As the video ends she recreates the pose from the well-known snap, eyes looking up at the camera from below.
But fellow TikTokers weren’t impressed with many accusing her of making Sarah’s tragic murder about herself.
In the short clip Ms Stevenson imposes the photo from the vigil at the bottom of the screen as she dramatically puts on the same mask she is wearing in the photo from that night
Ms Stevenson went viral after she was pictured being held on the ground by officers
One user even went so far as to film a separate reaction video in which she says Ms Stevenson is ‘self-centred.’
She said: ‘She keeps centering herself in a conversation that is about the protection of all women, especially one that was literally murdered.
‘She has appointed herself as the face of this movement, nobody wants her, she has no conviction. She’s doing it for clout.’
Another said: ‘God…someone was kidnapped and murdered and she’s literally making it about herself.’
Singer Rachel Chinouriri said: ‘How do you make yourself the centre of attention in someone else’s murder?’
Fatima Begum added: ‘She just seems so self-absorbed to use a woman’s murder as some sort of opportunity.’
Others said her activism was ‘performative’ and self-centred. One posted: ‘Wasn’t about you though was it?’
Others said the clip was ‘insensitive’ and in ‘bad taste’.
Another wrote: ‘Is it not inhumane to call yourself the face of a vigil for another woman?
At the time Ms Stevenson (pictured) called for another gathering to take place at 5pm on March 15 outside Parliament Square in London
Well-wishers light candles around a tree in honour of Sarah on Clapham Common, south London on March 13
‘Yes this has impacted her, but I don’t think this is very sensitive at all.’
Last month a crowd had assembled in Clapham Common to remember 33-year-old marketing executive Sarah, but clashes broke out as police surrounded a bandstand covered in flowers left in tribute.
Ms Stevenson previously said she was arrested ‘for standing there, I wasn’t doing anything, they threw me to the floor’.
She told the left-wing blog Counterfire: ‘I’m 5ft2 and I weigh nothing, and several police were on my back trying to arrest me.
‘They arrested me in cuffs, dragged me away, surrounded by like 10 police officers and when we got in the van they said we just need your name and your address and we’ll let you go with a fine.’
She created a Twitter profile following her arrest saying: ‘So I’ve just gone viral. I’ve decided to make a twitter again to follow what’s going on. All in solidarity.’
There was condemnation of the policing of the vigil, with Home Secretary Priti Patel seeking a full report on events
Ms Stevenson said she would like to ‘have a conversation’ with Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick.
She said she was still unsure why she had been detained and was contemplating whether to challenge the £200 fine she had received.
In her article for the Independent, Ms Stevenson wrote: ‘I’ve been called “terrier-like”, I’ve been labelled as “bossy”, or “loud”.
‘Well, I am loud. I will continue to be loud. Women have been fighting for so long to change the patriarchal society that we live in – yet, when we look back to the Suffragettes, not a lot has changed.’
The article was blasted after its headline painted Ms Stevenson as the ‘face’ of Sarah’s vigil. She used the platform to claim she ‘looked straight down the barrel lenses of those camera’ to fight against misogyny.
Metropolitan Police officers had grabbed several women, leading them away in handcuffs and the force later said four people were arrested for public order and coronavirus regulation breaches.
There was widespread condemnation of the policing of the vigil, with Home Secretary Priti Patel seeking a full report on events.
She described footage from the vigil as ‘upsetting’, while Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey called on Commissioner Cressida Dick to ‘consider’ her leadership of the force.
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said the scenes were ‘unacceptable’, tweeting: ‘The police have a responsibility to enforce Covid laws but from images I’ve seen it’s clear the response was at times neither appropriate nor proportionate.’
Assistant Commissioner Helen Ball said police were put into a position ‘where enforcement action was necessary’.
Police constable Wayne Couzens, 48, is charged with kidnapping and murdering Ms Everard, who went missing while walking home from a friend’s flat in south London on March 3.
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