a challop (i think) in the midst of G20

if you attack riot police you should be shot

just go home and eat a sandwich

l8r

that ain't no challop that's a truth bomb

not to be dr morbs up in this bitch but reactionary anti-protest crypto-conservatism is 100% my least favorite thing about the vice magazine generation

No crypto about it.

protesting is whatever - it's not my time, i don't really care. but when i see ppl rushing at riot police who are just standing there i become stunned at the stupidity and advocate severe violence

Er, "rushing at" someone is the same as "attacking" them? I should think that rushing at someone is the same as moving quickly in their direction, while attacking requires violent contact using parts of the body, a handheld weapon, or a projectile.

What are you on about?

they should be shot? really? wow dude

fuck the police

what else should be people be shot for jordan?

• liking the asher roth cd

mostly just rushing at police

what about rape or murder - those shootworthy or just being a dumbass in a crowd heinous enough to warrant the death penalty

I assume Jordan's never been threatened/shoved/pushed/kicked/beaten/arrested/intimidated by alphamales in military gear before

xpost

They should be shot for stupidity, apparently; it covers a lot of ground quite conveniently. It probably includes him from time to time, but hey, that's life.

http://www.aolcdn.com/aolr/breakfast-club-paul-gleason-400a012907.jpg

people should also be shot for rushing at rick ross as he is former police

don't "shoot" the messenger

I assume Jordan's never been threatened/shoved/pushed/kicked/beaten/arrested/intimidated by alphamales in military gear before

― Ray Libloata (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, April 2, 2009 2:48 PM (22 seconds ago) Bookmark

pretty easy to avoid this situation, i gotta say

420 shot a hippie every day

is asher roth anything like ash ra tempel

pretty easy to avoid this situation, i gotta say

okay now I assume you're joking

Predicting 1000 posts on this clusterfuck.

J0rdan unfamiliar with Chicago '68 or civil rights demonstrations or basically any peaceful demonstration that's been deliberately sabotaged by the police in order to initiate a violent conflagration

we have to respect the police--if we can't respect the police, who can we respect

I strongly disagree with the vice magazine generation thing

it is a very good magazine

I assume Jordan's never been threatened/shoved/pushed/kicked/beaten/arrested/intimidated by alphamales in military gear before

I mean come on this has happened to me while I was just WALKING DOWN THE STREET

Has anyone met Jordan S? Maybe he's a shut-in?

oh yes. it's on now

lol g20 tards /= civil rights demonstrators, but thx

xp yeah, I was going to say -- while I was just riding my bike in accordance with local laws and posted signage.

shit some BART police just shot an innocent guy in the head a couple months ago (not quite as good as when they shot an unarmed naked man but still...)

Now look at this.
Madness the helmets keep attracting me, me.
I try to run, but see I’m not that fast.
I think I’m first but surely finish last, last.

you've got to be kidding painfully young and ignorant

fixed

people die all the time though

Alphamales in military gear are people too!

- protest skepticism is probably good
- not having unnecessary knee-jerk positions about whether you're fixedly on the side of protesters or public safety officers is probably good
- people getting shot is probably bad
- my never having much interacted with alpha males in military gear (outside of the third world) is probably good

BART guy /= g20 tards

go on tho, shakes

what makes a g20 protester a "tard"

I suspect that no matter what anyone says here, jordan will remain strong in his belief right up to the moment he personally discovers how wrong he is.

if anything I would call the police tards

they wear safety helmets

I mean come on this has happened to me while I was just WALKING DOWN THE STREET

pls share

My fear/hatred of alphamales in military gear is about equal to my fear/hatred of violent alphamale protestors

- not having unnecessary knee-jerk positions about whether you're fixedly on the side of protesters or public safety officers is probably good

without this we would never have challops tho

My fear/hatred of alphamales in military gear is about equal to my fear/hatred of violent alphamale protestors

^^^the rational position

- protest skepticism is probably good
- not having unnecessary knee-jerk positions about whether you're fixedly on the side of protesters or public safety officers is probably good
- people getting shot is probably bad
- my never having much interacted with alpha males in military gear (outside of the third world) is probably good

― nabisco, Thursday, April 2, 2009 12:54 PM Bookmark

I think the only thing preventing a 'posts v much in character' is the lack of paragraph form.

I have to say that nabisco is otm there.

Also J0 I gotta pick a bone here if you will--it ain't really like the dudes are "just doing their jobs" and getting mercilessly rushed by mean ol anarchists. The story's much more complicated here: police infiltration & covert instigation, tear gassings & mass arrests & abuse that often precede but almost always outweigh any retaliation by protesters. It ain't just "some white dudes w/dreads & djembes runnin at riot shields"

big ol xp

BART guy /= g20 tards

cause its like day and nite????

without this we would never have challops tho

um dont u mean challops (i think)????

what are they protesting?

retarded people

i.e. hipster rap

starbucks world music cd's

i.e hipster rap

frippster rap

excelsior's revenge on challops

why don't the police use that new crowd control weapon where it makes people really hot or some shit. why? cuz that would be really funny to watch

Does it make people hot or hot cos that could be really horrible to watch

it makes ugly people hotter

I don't rilly want to watch a whole flashmob of Trusties on heat thx

if you attack riot police you should be goggled

what makes a g20 protester a "tard"

― open up a cat of whup-ass (dan m), Thursday, April 2, 2009 2:55 PM (51 seconds ago) Bookmark

http://i43.tinypic.com/24oplpw.jpg

if you google riot police you should be shot

the guy in orange on the left, not a tard (for clarification)

take that bullshit to the style forum

C'mon, his haircut isn't THAT bad.

J0rdan is a blase apolitical gay, right? Meets expectations.

While commuting on foot thru downtown Newark (maybe 20+ years ago?), I was barked at by a cop for some bullshit reason -- not walking around a patch of sidewalk under construction or something. I responded by giving him the Nazi salute and goosestepping. I'm amazed I didn't get roughed up or arrested, just a stream of verbal shit.

Also if you're a uniformed pig protecting the Lead Motherfuckers of the Western World in the midst of a depression, expect to get "rushed."

btw, who got shot? No sign of it on NYT homepage.

http://news.sky.com/sky-news/content/StaticFile/jpg/2009/Apr/Week1/15253791.jpg

J0rdan is a blase apolitical gay, right?

nah dude i'm in way deep w/ the machine

no one's been shot Morbz

gonna have to explain it better than that jordy

http://news.sky.com/sky-news/content/StaticFile/jpg/2009/Apr/Week1/15254588.jpg

maybe he fell and the policeman is helping

Well seriously, though, it's funny how we'll often argue this kind of stuff out in terms of cultural stances about whether people are, like, Generally Inclined to be supportive of certain types of protest or Generally Inclined to default to being skeptical about them. The actual case-by-case stuff about message and tactics is always some kind of background that gets tossed around as argument but is rarely the real substance of the thing.

Not sure I agree with Hoos's whole post there, but maybe that's because I have a kind of optimistic gut inclination that I want protesters I'm vaguely sympathetic to be better about message/tactic control than that, and not lose the PR game to police forces whose legalistic planning-based protest control tends to be less visible and less physical and at least starts from the position of the monopoly on violence, etc. And I haven't been paying attention to news today, but if you want my gut instinct, I might actually say that I don't see much reason any kind of serious physical confrontation should have to happen between G20 protesters and London police, and any that does happen is a bigger problem and a bigger tactical error for the protesters and their message than it'll ever be for anyone else involved.

While commuting on foot thru downtown Newark (maybe 20+ years ago?), I was barked at by a cop for some bullshit reason -- not walking around a patch of sidewalk under construction or something. I responded by giving him the Nazi salute and goosestepping. I'm amazed I didn't get roughed up or arrested, just a stream of verbal shit.

Morbs not to pick on you but--why would you do this? I totally respect people protesting and stuff, it's fine, but fucking with cops like this or attacking them is just plain stupid, every time.

yes Morbz why didn't you just take your licks from the bully with the shiny uniform

was about to say. fuck that cop

how hard is it not to put your hands on riot police? i've never attempted to riot so i obv don't know, i gotta imagine it's pretty easy tho

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/45626000/jpg/_45626839_cleanup5_getty.jpg

fwiw imho the reason attacking cops is stupid isn't because its morally wrong or anything (I can think of plenty of cases where it would be completely justifiable, even a moral imperative), its because as nabisco points out the cops have superior firepower and a legal monopoly on violence, so the cop-attacker will lose every time.

Cops are not forces of nature, guys.

Cops are people that we pay to do a particular, hopefully well-defined job.

totally agreed, well put^^ xpost with shakey mo

and should be beaten for being an idiot xp to shakey

don't fuck with cops. pretty easy rule to follow

Que, I admit it was stupid but only cuz cops are 80%+ dangerous, dick-swinging, power-tripping ex-jocks/slobs who I loathe to the core of my being.

xxxxxxxxxxxp

no one's been shot Morbz

― Ray Libloata (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, April 2, 2009 8:07 PM (7 minutes ago)

i assume this is why you are so cranky on this thread

xpost - Hahaha here we discover a gut disagreement. So a cop is rude to you. Lots of people are rude. He is a cop, though, and "rudeness" is pretty mild on the grand scale of ghastly violations of citizens' rights, so my gut tells me injecting antagonism into the hierarchy of civic authority is maybe not the best solution, and if it's really that annoying there are plenty of organized official complaints one can make. But that's partly because experience tells me it's much better not to engage police as "people," because they are not, they are municipal functionaries.

How in the hell did I ever get the idea that Morbs was a right-wing asshole?

yes skepticism of protests is probably a good thing but i'm still trying to get w/ the original post - like, really, "shot?" jordan u really feel that?

i knew a 100 pound 5 foot nothing girl what kicked a riot cop in the head a few years back. ahhh those were the days.

wow - massive post negating xposts

They will act like people and do rude/wrong things like everyday people but you cannot go make social claims on them about rudeness and respect, if you see what I'm saying.

people who goosestep through construction zones should be shot

itt sheeple

How in the hell did I ever get the idea that Morbs was a right-wing asshole?

― Monkey Pocket Boob (libcrypt), Thursday, April 2, 2009 3:16 PM (53 seconds ago) Bookmark

horseshoe diagram

jordan id still like to know what else you support the death penalty for!

ok, I just noticed that first post was a proposal by J0rdan, not an ironic report of a news event. WOW

btw "challop" is an even more fucking annoying term now that I'm in my second day of knowing what it means.

I have basically NEVER had a positive, productive interaction with a cop. They have been assholes every single fucking time. so I'm with Morbius.

many x-posts

cops are 80%+ dangerous, dick-swinging, power-tripping ex-jocks/slobs who I loathe to the core of my being

i agree with this 100%

and why running in a stupid direction should waive your right to due process and all that xxxp

We, as citizens of a theoretically democratic republic, have the right to expect our executive branch to enforce the laws the legislative branch creates, no more and no less. If these laws include provisions forbidding police from gratuitously attacking people who attack them, then that's the way they must behave.

yes skepticism of protests is probably a good thing but i'm still trying to get w/ the original post - like, really, "shot?" jordan u really feel that?

― mark cl, Thursday, April 2, 2009 3:16 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

cmon dude

if you didnt actually mean shoot, what was the point of the OP

How in the hell did I ever get the idea that Morbs was a right-wing asshole?

Reading Departed Andwhat's lies about me?

Speaking as an American here, tho. You crazy Britishers have some alien form of gov't that is totally unpredictable and wild.

btw "challop" is an even more fucking annoying term now that I'm in my second day of knowing what it means.
^otm

I have basically NEVER had a positive, productive interaction with a cop. They have been assholes every single fucking time.
^not otm

I'm speaking about my personal experience there, so not sure how you could say I'm not OTM. I can detail every time I've had to interact with a cop for you, but that seems like a waste of time...

why do cops hate you so much,shakey?

Shakey that first sentence doesn't necessarily justify the second one. I have had plenty of bad interactions with police officers; that is a pretty significant part of why I wouldn't do what Morbs is talking about. It's a significant part of why I figure creating unnecessary hostility or antagonism between citizens and police is actually pretty negative. (It's also a reminder to me that, like I said, police may act like people but they are not functioning as "people," they are functioning as a legitimate physical force, and so it strikes me as a bad idea to take out one's frustrations with them in people-interacting terms, rather than like official/organized state-force terms.)

haha, TT, all YOUR cops are like the Kids in the Hall sketch!

that would be AWESOME! we do have prick cops too tho.

I got locked out of my apt once and a cop let me use his cell phone to call a friend who had my keys. But that's the only positive I've got.

Basically because there are reasons you will get nowhere that way, and those reasons are actually pretty sensible and unimpeachable

i know a lot of peaceful RNC protesting dudes that would have preferred that some of the douchebag element had refrained from agressively rushing the cops, because they would have preferred not to get teargassed. just saying. xpostss and whatever

I could've been about 24 at time of that encounter, so I chalk it up to being young and having a shitty job. Wouldn't do it today.

thank u jj

i didn't mean to disparage your interactions with cops there, shakey. it seemed to imply that all cops are picks and don't agree with that.

Meanwhile, inside:

http://img.wonkette.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/g20group.jpg

I like to picture a challop as a kung-fu move with a cool soundtrack and sound fx.

why do cops hate you so much,shakey?

because I wouldn't let them cheat off my homework in high school

I mean yeah having seen cops in windows with watchin me with binocs at protests--and having been 13 when I saw Seattle go down on TV--I kinda naturally gravitate towards defending the actions of protesters here.

i gravitate towards the opposite - but then again your an unrepentant mall bomber

btw assuming the London crowds are led largely by the young "pros" who chant, smash windows and don't bathe, well, that's what keeps me away from many protests, I'm glad I've resolved that post-Reagan ones in America don't change a damn thing. (will go to a couple after more libs turn on Obama tho)

scallops > challops

^^should be a poll

The night they drove ol' Seattle down. You know the bells were ringing...

post-Reagan ones in America don't change a damn thing

this is mostly true, sadly. The anti-Iraq-war protests (several of which I participated in) achieved nothing and were the biggest protests ever. Mostly the only productive role these kinds of protests serve is as a psychological comfort to the protestors (ie, it helps them to feel less isolated, powerless, etc.) But in terms of impacting policy, the days of protests having any kind of impact is over.

do boycotts and strikes, that will scare who needs scaring.

i only interact with my private police force. public employees are so unpleasant and downmarket.

While commuting on foot thru downtown Newark (maybe 20+ years ago?), I was barked at by a cop for some bullshit reason -- not walking around a patch of sidewalk under construction or something. I responded by giving him the Nazi salute and goosestepping.

wasn't he just trying to keep you from getting fucked up by construction equipment or something

it's a wonder morbs' face didn't meet newark pavement that day

he tripped while goose-stepping

I have just enough German blood to goosestep competently

post-Reagan ones in America don't change a damn thing

dead-serious non-rhetorical question: what effect would it have on this situation if protests tended to be more confrontational / polarizing / destructive / "escalationist" / whatever other word you want to put here in this direction?

so the cop-attacker will lose every time.

In which case, if the protester has anything like a coherent and resonable case, he will be misdirecting his anger and frustration in an impotent (mostly) manner. The kind of people who feel entitled to attack cops and destroy property in demonstrations are almost as loathesome to me as rogue cops. In a legitimate, functioning democracy civil disobedience may be acceptable or even a moral imperative, but beating on public safety officers who are doing their shitty jobs stinks of either deluded desperation or a kind of naive entitlement fed by the most cretinous romanticization of 'revolution' or whatever which is rarely the way that progress is made. I sympathise with the frustrations of the protesters but more so with cops who have to deal with violent vandals screaming "Abolish money!" I mean, c'mon...

michael white otm

However, making jokes about people being shot by cops in a country where Tonypandy happened, not so OTM.

http://i26.tinypic.com/ofndoh.gif

what effect would it have on this situation if protests tended to be more confrontational / polarizing / destructive / "escalationist" / whatever other word you want to put here in this direction?

it would just reinforce the authority of the police - as evidenced by J0rdan and many others on this thread, protestors only gain sympathy when they're being peaceful and the cops are beating them. When both sides are being violent, most people will side with the cops out of a desire to see order restored. In general, like I said upthread violently attacking the police is not really a tactic with much chance of success. In any violent confrontation, you should only engage in it if you can win with overwhelming force (Burroughs' truism about the two requirements for successful insurgency are relevant here; you need a) a steady supply of weapons and b) the support of the populace. Violent protestors have neither, and the police will outgun them with superior firepower every time). So "escalation" doesn't really achieve much - more often than not its generally more counterproductive in terms of achieving the protestors' endgoals.

beating on public safety officers who are doing their shitty jobs stinks of either deluded desperation or a kind of naive entitlement fed by the most cretinous romanticization of 'revolution'

This is a well-made point, and it's part of the reason I don't unreservedly stick up for the dudes in the black bandannas (or take part in this kind of thing on a regular basis) anymore, but the give-and-take involved in this kind of thing and the unequal force involved makes the inevitable cop-on-nonviolent-protester-violence (and it will happen, as it always does, because some dude with a beard is gonna throw some shit and then the dudes singing folk songs and guerilla journalists are gonna get gassed along with everybody else) indefensible imo.

^^^even more OTM

Okay, Shakey, I think I tend to agree with that. So: I know you haven't really taken a firm position on protest tactics in this thread, but ... if you think that's true, umm, wouldn't your desire be for protests not to escalate in that direction?

(re: your post, not Hoos's)

hoos, if you're protesting "non-violently" and you and the crowd you're in crowd gets gassed cuz someone threw something... i mean this is inherent risk of "non-violent" protesting right? if you show up and riot police are there you're putting yourself in that position. i can't really feel bad for you, if you're not willing to get gassed you shouldn't show up?

If you're not willing to get hit by a drunk driver you shouldn't leave the house? Okay it's a reach but...wow.

Or shot by a disgruntled right-wing crazy hermit, apparently these days.

laurel cmon

if you think that's true, umm, wouldn't your desire be for protests not to escalate in that direction?

this is true - I don't believe I've ever said otherwise on this thread...? I mean the protestors being violent are by and large stupid. Should they be shot? No fucking way. Do their actions justify the blanket violence that the police inevitably dish out in retaliation? Absolutely not.

No, you c'mon. You shouldn't take part in a non-violent protest unless you're willing to suffer violence from the authorities?

(sorry for the lapse into Rumsfeldian diction there)

i can't really feel bad for you, if you're not willing to get gassed you shouldn't show up?

you are aware that the first amendment guarantees a right of free association? how does "if you're not willing to get beaten up or gassed you shouldn't [go to church] [say anything publicly] [write or publish something]" sound to you?

Anyone else in E3 have the Obamacopter buzz their houses when it flew overhead at about 8pm?

It was flying so low I thought it was about to crash. Shook the fuck out of our kitchen.

i'm saying it's an inherent risk - tear gas and getting beaten by a dude w/ a baton if you're just chilling on the corner w/ a sign are diff stories. okay and obviously if a police gassing happens after one person throwing something (hoos's post) it would be an excessive retaliation, but my general feeling stands

share different feelings

http://img.wonkette.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/g20group.jpg

You shouldn't take part in a non-violent protest unless you're willing to suffer violence from the authorities?

I think this is more commonly known as "understanding and accepting risk", something we do with everything in pretty much every facet of our lives. I don't think the point is that you should be totes cool about it ("yay teargas, the stinging means Jesus loves me!"), more that you should recognize it as a risk involved in the activity you're participating in.

Look, they wanted to take advantage of the G20 and all the media coverage and they got what they wanted; we're talking about them albeit because it was more intense and confrontational. However, I remain convinced that they're way more about narcissism than about change and one proof of that is that they're willing to act like complete asses instead of being smarter than the 'alpha male' cops, which really shouldn't be that hard. At least the French spiderman dude did his stunt and surrendered peacefully - I have a certain respect for that kind of guy.

okay and obviously if a police gassing happens after one person throwing something (hoos's post) it would be an excessive retaliation, but my general feeling stands

dood this is the standard way these things go down. The police wait for someone stupid to do something (or, on occasion, plant someone to do something stupid and act as a provocateur) and then they move in and roll over everybody indiscriminately. Mass arrests, beatings, teargassing - this is what riot cops live to do.

At least the French spiderman dude did his stunt and surrendered peacefully - I have a certain respect for that kind of guy.[

^^^for realz - I am more in favor of these kind of creative tactics

dood this is the standard way these things go down. The police wait for someone stupid to do something (or, on occasion, plant someone to do something stupid and act as a provocateur) and then they move in and roll over everybody indiscriminately. Mass arrests, beatings, teargassing - this is what riot cops live to do.

― Ray Libloata (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, April 2, 2009 4:12 PM (6 seconds ago) Bookmark

okay i agree that this is common knowledge throughout the western world - if you show up at a protest and you get gassed should you be surprised? basically what dan says

how do you get a job as "riot cop plant" and how stupid do you have to be to want it ("so, you want me to try pulling down a fence so you have an excuse to throw teargas in my direction; SIGN ME UP")

I think more people get shot running away from riot police than towards them.

Okay, Shakey, totally gotcha -- yeah, you hadn't really said one way or the other this thread.

J0rdan you're being weird, by the way, which is why everyone is incredulous. Surely you'd agree with us all that it would be ideal for people to assemble and protest non-violently without being subjected to force. I assure you that people who do so are already completely aware that someone in the crowd could create some kind of public-safety issue that leads to chaos and arrests and use of force and all that. But that's not ideal or a very likable risk. I guarantee you that even police department spokespeople would tell you this, would tell you that they'd ideally like to maintain public safety just by addressing the problem elements of crowds.

Not "everyone" since I started posting that, but basically yeah duh police intervention is a risk in any protest or really anyplace you go; it's not ideal, yeah?

Shakey is saying there's a tiny thread of restraint that authorities bother to show before either rigging the game in their favor or just fucking you up anyway. That's kind of the opposite of you saying that anyone who takes part in a protest should be shot b/c they knew the risks of being abused by the authorities.

If you can't or won't admit that, you're either a plain old troll or someone whose opinions I don't need to bother reading in the future.

Ideally there's a balance of police forces maintaining public safety that's like minimally aggressive toward peaceful direction-following non-confrontational protesters, yeah? This should be uncontroversial

I'm not suggesting anybody feel bad for anybody else! But I'm making the (relatively obvious and uncontroversial??) point that (adrenaline-amped, jumpy, worried) cops have a bad habit of disproportionate response. And yeah realistically we should expect disproportionate police retaliation. Should we be OK with it? Absolutely not.

1 billion xps once again

if you show up at a protest and you get gassed should you be surprised?

um, not being surprised by it and ADVOCATING IT are two totally different things

x-posts

this really is an A+ troll thread

I think this is more commonly known as "understanding and accepting risk"

the point is this is a "risk" that is different from naturally occurring risks, it's not like "you're in seattle, if you're walking you should have an umbrella" or "you're in the jungle, you should have bug spray." jordan you're treating disporportionate police violence as a natural fact and not as a political decision in itself. one level that's like duh no shit, something might pop off, but on the other hand it's basically AGREEING TO UR OWN OPPRESSION DUED do you see

i quoted dan but i'm talking to jordan i guess

xps

i'm not advocating it

Parisians always use to point out the iron bars on the windows of the CRS (Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité, the French riot police) buses and say they weren't for protection from the outside but to keep the cops from getting out.

um, not being surprised by it and ADVOCATING IT are two totally different things

If you don't get this, Jordan, you're either a tad naive, imho, or being willfully dim.

In the sense that, yeah, you may expect it but you should feel appalled that you do.

i'm not advocating it

O RLY

lock thread

Er, "rushing at" someone is the same as "attacking" them? I should think that rushing at someone is the same as moving quickly in their direction, while attacking requires violent contact using parts of the body, a handheld weapon, or a projectile.

What are you on about?

― Aimless, Thursday, April 2, 2009 3:44 PM (1 hour ago)

"aimless" really sums it up here

lemme address laurel

for one i thought it was obvious that im not advocating blindly shooting ppl, lol sarcasm and exaggeration. and i made a distinction in the OP b/w being one who just shows up at a non-violent protest, and physically attacking/rushing/pushing etc riot cops, which is what some ppl at g20 are doing and always do. plz recognize the distinction.

as for the tear gas thing, i think in 2009 police retaliation to "protests" is pretty well known - in my opinion, if you showed up at a g20 protest and you were close enough to get gassed, and you get gassed, that is an inherent risk of the action of showing up to that protest. i'm not talking about you know ppl marching down the street or whatever, clearly, or so i thought.

to aimless and kevin

really there's a difference between "rushing" and "attacking" a cop? i'm the one whose 'dim'?

lol jordan was just throwing out hyperbole to smoke out the armchair revolutionaries, it was obvious to me

jordan fwiw i was agreeing with you, hence scarequotes

gtg but will catch up w/ this thread l8r

lol jordan was just throwing out hyperbole to smoke out the armchair revolutionaries, it was obvious to me

so he could start shooting them when they rushed him

loooooooool

Like the diagrams in Steal This Book are lol and dated and whatever, hilarious, but they instilled in me by 17 that you had to be ready for some shit to go down if you were at a big demo with a big crowd. That shit was an inherent risk in 1969 as much as it is in 2009. But that doesn't justify it.

that was in response to

i think in 2009 police retaliation to "protests" is pretty well known

btw

One of the problems I think a lot of protests wind up having is slipping into this position of treating police and other public-safety officers as an extension of the thing they're against, so instead of actually confronting the issue in question they wind up looking to all the world like they're confronting the idea of law / order / public safety / etc. This isn't really a problem in plenty of countries where police forces actually are physical representatives of a certain regime, where they're the actual muscle of the beast you're up against; it's definitely a problem to slip into thinking that way someplace like today's US or UK when the thing you're protesting is international economic institutions and trends that the police you're standing near are only very, very, very, very, very indirectly implicated in, if at all.

in my opinion, if you showed up at a g20 protest and you were close enough to get gassed, and you get gassed, that is an inherent risk of the action of showing up to that protest.

I.e. you're saying really nothing at all? I'm not sure anyone disputes that this is a thing that is more likely to happen if you show up at a protest than if you stay home in bed. Do you have any kind of opinion about that fact? Do you think it's too bad? If so, who do you think has the burden of acting differently so it doesn't happen? If so, do you have any kind of opinions about how protesters and police forces can better accommodate one another to ensure both free expression and public safety? Anything? I mean I do feel like you're backing away from a recognized "challenging opinion" by saying "oh I was actually not saying anything challenging at all, and was in fact stating the unimpeachably super-obvious."

-this post has become increasingly irrelevant since i started writing it-

People feeling bad for the unforunate individuals being paid to be police from a position of comfort and security is disingenuous and for a lot of people, nauseating. I've had family in the police and they were awesome, stoic and methodical but that does not come with the job. If police are brought up for being out of line by a member of the public, it's good if they don't resort to flexing petty authority and becoming antagonistic. Irresponsible behaviour from police and the failure to deal with it is damaging to the institution. Telling people to eat up disrespectful behaviour from police is worthless and complacent. Everyone knows the current status quo regarding police power and individuals, the question is an idealistic one. If you can't cope with adding anything wider than immediate repercussions into the discussion on how to react to police yr too thick to contribute.

The police don't have the skills/resources to deal with protests comfortably, the best they can do might not be all that good but that's what we have to accept. If they panic and take their eye off the ball though then they've fucked up. You wouldn't give elected members of the state a break, it shouldn't be any different for police. Putting up with shit policing hurts those who are good at it.

Telling people to eat up disrespectful behaviour from police is worthless and complacent.

and yet this post avoids the question of what the best ways are to deal with or address disrespectful behavior from police, which is really the heart of the discussion here

By necessity, riot police are 'alpha males' - who else would take, let alone want, such a job? But therein lies an interesting point. It shouldn't require a very sophisticated understanding of sociopolitical history to realize that the majority, if forced to choose between order and justice, will tend toward order and that riot police of some kind or another are an inevitable reality of any regime. It's a violent job and one where the cops cannot lose but may have to take it in the chin if they're deemed too harsh - kind of a lose-lose situation - and where taunting them is akin, to me at least, to taunting a chained fighting dog. The dog's job is to be a guard dog but I don't HAVE to egg it on. What I really want is a government that fears its people enough not to permit the police to get too far out of hand.

Like it is not ok to arrest a chick with a handicam & mic because she happened to be within a four block radius of the dudes rushing the shields!!

lots of strawpolicemen in this here thread

I.e. you're saying really nothing at all? I'm not sure anyone disputes that this is a thing that is more likely to happen if you show up at a protest than if you stay home in bed. Do you have any kind of opinion about that fact? Do you think it's too bad? If so, who do you think has the burden of acting differently so it doesn't happen? If so, do you have any kind of opinions about how protesters and police forces can better accommodate one another to ensure both free expression and public safety? Anything? I mean I do feel like you're backing away from a recognized "challenging opinion" by saying "oh I was actually not saying anything challenging at all, and was in fact stating the unimpeachably super-obvious."

― nabisco, Thursday, April 2, 2009 4:33 PM (45 seconds ago) Bookmark

yeah i feel the onus is on the protestors to keep it "non-violent" with the accepted knowledge being that "throwing something" at riot cops is considered an act of violence. i think it's been instilled since we were kids that it only takes one bad apple (or in the context of large protests, say 20 or 50 or 100) to fuck everything else up for everyone else. to ensure both public safety and free expression, i think people should heed the definition of a non-violent protest and should protest without violence, that means without "throwing things" at cops. plenty of protests have not devolved into this sort of thing that you see at g20. as well, i think cops could obv show more restraint (who couldn't?), but like i said, i think the onus is on the protestors.

it's definitely a problem to slip into thinking that way someplace like today's US or UK when the thing you're protesting is international economic institutions and trends that the police you're standing near are only very, very, very, very, very indirectly implicated in, if at all.

This an excellent point. Are the working class riot police really about protecting plutocrats' severance packages and stock options, etc? Have they not suffered from the economic downturn, too? I'm not defending bad policing but the a priori 'fuck tha police' attitude is mostly dumb swagger.

I find it very hard to 'humanize cops' while they're on the job - whoever said above that they're not 'people' but 'functionaries' is largely OTM for me. I am extremely polite and cooperative with public safety officers while they're working but also, alas, a tad bit distanced from their humanity.

nabisco you want discussion of practical ways as how to best air greivances with police?

I largely agree, Jordan; I think what people are getting on you about here is the level of sympathy or concern we want to have for actual non-violent protesters who are exposed to harsh police tactics due to being part of a group that includes a limited number of shit-starters. And it's interesting because, like I said, I think both citizens and police would say that the ideal situation would be to be minimally bothersome to peaceful protesters while handling any elements that are creating problems or safety issues.

lots of strawpolicemen in this here thread
http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/06_02/Scarecrow240607_468x620.jpg

Ogmor I think it isn't much good to argue about whether or not to react to perceived bad policing unless we talk on some level about what that reaction is going to be!

J0rdan continues to conveniently ignore the many occasions when cops deliberately provoke shit in order to "escalate" the situation and give themselves a paper-thin excuse to kick protestors' asses. Cuz this happens a lot.

x-post

"did you see that guy? he threw a sandwich!"
"LOCK AND LOAD!"

You wouldn't give elected members of the state a break,

Have you heard of a country called the United States of America? A place of green pastures and plenty, where the streets are paved with golden stalks of wheat, and politicians never, ever pay the price for their mistakes.

"did you see that guy giving me the Nazi salute? I only shoved him a little!"
"IT'S GO TIME!"

http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/0eVX5GOdw772z/610x.jpg

"You're supposed to sit still while I club you"

my cousin is a chicago vice squad cop and like most cops is a decent guy who has seen some crazy shit and has mentioned that there are always some bad apples drawn to the force. not every cop is a dbag. i feel that protests are the same way, maybe. like a lot of people who show up don't really give a shit but just want to assail authority, which draws focus away from the people there who really have genuine concerns about what the hell they're protesting about.

go ahead and shoot these guys tho
http://english.aljazeera.net/mritems/Images//2009/4/2/2009421959568580_5.jpg

http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/02223FobXy9Ml/610x.jpg

michael white and carne asada otm

caek, that first one you posted should be the new official "Look at me! I'm an ATTENTION WHORE!!!!!!" pic.

I largely agree, Jordan; I think what people are getting on you about here is the level of sympathy or concern we want to have for actual non-violent protesters who are exposed to harsh police tactics due to being part of a group that includes a limited number of shit-starters. And it's interesting because, like I said, I think both citizens and police would say that the ideal situation would be to be minimally bothersome to peaceful protesters while handling any elements that are creating problems or safety issues.

― nabisco, Thursday, April 2, 2009 4:44 PM (51 seconds ago) Bookmark

yeah i'd rather argue about sympathy - i don't think arguing about the merit of the methods of modern protest policing is really worth anyone's time because it's the way it is now and it's gonna be like that until they bust out the overhead ovens that melt everyone in seven seconds. i bristle at the idea that i'm supposed to feel bad for people who get beat up at protests or even those who get gassed. sure getting tear gassed sucks, but like i've said, i think the risk involved is large enough and well known enough where if you are close enough to be within a tear gas canister it signals to me that you a. know this was liable to happen b. that you were willing to accept the risk of getting tear gassed. and if you rushed a cop and got walloped on the head w/ a baton four times, then that's stupidity that i can't reconcile.

shakey

obv there are bad apple cops and bad apple protestors - you're cynicism lies with the bad apple cops, mine lies w/ the bad apple protestors. we're in the same boat, just opposite side, i think

i am trying to figure out what exactly people want a riot cop to do about having a protester rush up on him, which seems to be sort of the unanswered question here.

i'm supposed to feel bad for people who get beat up at protests

lemme preemptively say that i realize that it has happened in the past where a person is just chillin out on the corner and a cop beats that person w/ a baton because the cop has classified anyone and everyone as an enemy combatant. i'm not talking about these ppl, and weren't in my OP

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3074/3105793897_aede485d46.jpg

i am trying to figure out what exactly people want a riot cop to do about having a protester rush up on him, which seems to be sort of the unanswered question here.

seriously

Wouldn't it be cool if the bad egg protestors and the riot police could meet for a little cage match action and ordinary, earnest protestors could just protest, like, on their own? Was this a Lennon song or am I confused?

tear gassing of a person who is just chillin out on the corner is a different story because of the obv pervasive nature of tear gas - i would like to make this distinction

let me perhaps give a personal, non-sarcastic example... during one of the anti-Iraq-war protests I was in the middle of a large crowd, walking up Union street along with several friends of mine. I was on the sidewalk, although the crowd spanned the entire street. Suddenly from behind us a squad of riot cops came marching up through the crowd - using their nightsticks they indiscriminately pushed and shoved everybody out of their way. Now a fair amount of people scampered when they saw/heard them coming, but others were taken by surprise, including a couple of my friends who were knocked to the ground. More violently-inclined protestors might have taken that as a provocation and thrown a rock or pushed back, which in turn would've been taken as a provocation by the cops to beat people/gas them/fire rubber bullets/what have you... this didn't happen in this particular case, but it could have. But my point is this is the garden variety physical intimidation/provocation that riot cops engage in as a matter of course. They expect protestors to show them deference at every turn and look for any excuse to unleash the full extent of their power and training. When protestors don't, things can quickly get out of hand. This being the case, my sympathies are with the less powerful, not the ones holding all the guns.

ty xp

i am trying to figure out what exactly people want a riot cop to do about having a protester rush up on him, which seems to be sort of the unanswered question here.

how about not shooting them? What are those shields for anyway? The riot cops have all that gear and armor and firepower, the protestors at best have homemade weapons.

x-post to nabisco

OK well I am very pessimisstic, I can't back the UK courts which have failed many times to prosecute police, and I think there probably is a degree of institutional arrogance that resists state officials being challenged by the public. Most cock ups ought to be resolvable on a personal level, if an official exerts petty authority outside of what is really legitimate you should be able to remove yourself from their grasp without them trying to pull rank. I've had enough bad experience that don't really have much faith in any official mechanism to monitor police actions when things go properly wrong (or the actions a lot of other branches of state). I think a lot of the time police have got each other's backs before they have yours, at the expense of yours even.

Shakey, it's more fashionable to protest on Fillmore or Chestnut than Union, fwiw. (def. not non sarcastic, sorry. Sounds traumatic.)

basically i understand that both sides (cops and protesters) have some major douchebags that are basically cruisin' for a bruisin' in the karmic sense...but

isn't the main point that policemen are supposed to be the "professionals" and therefore held to a higher standard of keeping their cool and overall rational behavior in general? i don't expect as much out of hopped up gutterpunx i guess.

sure getting tear gassed sucks, but like i've said, i think the risk involved is large enough and well known enough

J0rdan I'm sorry but this seems like terribly narrow thinking that we should be able to move past. I know I've kind of said this before, but: the question you keep circling here is does it have to be that way; isn't it too-bad and non-ideal that a person can't go engage in non-violent protest without having to take on this well-known risk; are there any ways of managing or alleviating that risk that are still consistent with order and public safety; etc. etc., all the things I was asking last time. Maybe you're just much more of a pessimist than I am about this being always and forever the natural of protest-type actions, but it's my sense that this "well-known risk" is actually a problem that it'd be very nice to find a solution to. Most people on your back here would probably be satisfied if you acknowledged that it could be considered a "problem," an unpleasant fact of life as it is, rather than just some shruggy inevitability.

Yes, the onus is definitely on the police to maintain non-violence. That is their job. Regardless of where your sympathies lie, for police to escalate violence against protestors is not simply unethical, but rather a failure to perform the very thing they were employed to do.

xpost

yeah nabisco OTM, the complacency grates. I know its akin to Godwin's Law to bring up civil rights protestors in this context but should they have just stayed home given the risk of being attacked by dogs/lynched/beaten/teargassed/shot?

x-post

cuz hey that's just the way it is, why didn't they stay home and have a sandwich

Not like they were going to get a sandwich at the whites-only diner, amirite?!?

If it is true that we should know that to protest is likely to result in getting tear gassed, isn't that something we should be, uh, protesting? Oh god, the cyclical horror.

(xp) please don't

of course i think it's problematic and i definitely think it would be better if there had been a different course of action throughout history than that of tear gassing, but yeah, im really pessimistic about the idea of that changing, just as i'm pessimistic about the idea of govt/bureaucratic arms changing anything that's currently status quo especially something that seems as engrained as the way riot polcie do things

well Civil Rights protesters by and large did everything anyone on this thread would ever ask in terms of non-violent compliance with police authority except in case of the very specific and focused AIMS of their civil disobedience

(and to be entirely fair they had an easier job of focus and specificity because the issues were right there in front of them in terms of civil disobedience, whereas protesting a general economic order is very non-immediate and in my opinion not a very clear-target tactic)

again shakey - forgive me if i'm not going to equate g20 protestors w/ civil rights activists

Maybe there should be a "what revolts would you have taken part in?" thread to see if/where people's loyalty to staying peacefully at home would end. Would you rush police to overthrow the shah?

or even WHICH revolts

Yes, the onus is definitely on the police to maintain non-violence. That is their job. Regardless of where your sympathies lie, for police to escalate violence against protestors is not simply unethical, but rather a failure to perform the very thing they were employed to do.

yeah but at the point that a protester is charging riot police, any aspect of non-violence has already been compromised

as for m@tt and emily

i think you guys are right to an extent - but i think it's really naive on the part of a protestor to feel like they can provoke a cop to the point of "professionalism" and when that cop decides that he's been professional enough that the provoking protestor should be "spared" or something.

Would you rush police to overthrow the shah?

and install Khomeini? fuck that

the protestors aren't children

i mean it doesnt only become violence when a cop does it. throwing shit at another person (who hey in this case is a cop in protective gear) is violence, no matter how semantically problematic it may be for a given argument.

again shakey - forgive me if i'm not going to equate g20 protestors w/ civil rights activists

It's not the specific content of their politics that matters, though, it's the manner in which they protest. The cops should NOT overreact.

as for m@tt and emily

i think you guys are right to an extent - but i think it's really naive on the part of a protestor to feel like they can provoke a cop to the point of "professionalism" and when that cop decides that he's been professional enough that the provoking protestor should be "spared" or something.

― strøm thurmond (J0rdan S.), Thursday, April 2, 2009 10:11 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i understand there's lines that get crossed...and believe me i've gotten in more arguments with critical mass/RNC protestor crap on local boards but you know...but sometimes the backlash against protestors seems creepy to a degree. like for example the post that started this thread, which i'm sure was exagerration to some degree

and install Khomeini? fuck that

Lest we forget, the intial phases of the Iranian Revolution were not just Islamists but people of varying classes and political persuasions, including Communists, etc... SAVAK were some ruthless bastards.

i think you guys are right to an extent - but i think it's really naive on the part of a protestor to feel like they can provoke a cop to the point of "professionalism" and when that cop decides that he's been professional enough that the provoking protestor should be "spared" or something.

No, I agree (ignoring the suggestion of shooting in the OP, anyway). There is always a level that can be reached where obviously the police have to restrain or arrest. But you go on to suggest that anyone within radius becomes fair game - this is not so. Also, the idea of 'rushing' a police officer is trickier than you suggest - there can be surges in a crowd where you find yourself pushed forward against the police: this does not give them the right to use force against you.

Oh geez wow am I becoming discontent with a bunch of these viewpoints -- this is becoming some kind of polarized "who started it" kind of argument, which seems pointless without talking about what "it" is. I mean ok, no duh, if you threaten or hurl things at police officers some sort of action is going to be taken against you that is unpleasant; I think the issue here is kind of what that action is going to be, what it should be, basically all these boring policing and public-safety issues this thread seems unlikely to ever address.

Maybe there should be a "what revolts would you have taken part in?"

totally unrelated but I would've to have ridden with this dude

would've LOVED

I was in the San Francisco anti-war protests in '03 as well, and I saw quite a few things that really turned me off. One thing I saw, about 15 minutes after walking up to Market St. to see what was going on, was some guy whip a bottle of Snapple at a Riot Cop, which shattered all over his mask and knocked him back. Cops grabbed the snapple tosser, threw him to the ground, hauled him away. I saw the cops pulled some total dickhead moves during those protests, too.

I read a few articles about the G20 protests, and in several of them it is mentioned that cops have been injured along with protesters. It is a dangerous job. Someone said earlier that you have to be an alpha male to want to do that kind of job... maybe I'm wrong here, but my impression is that these are regular beat cops in riot gear. Fairly sure I remember seeing some women in the riot gear, too, fwiw.

But you go on to suggest that anyone within radius becomes fair game - this is not so.

idk if you saw but i made the distinction wrt "fair game" b/w cop-on-protestor violence and tear gas, being as a cop can exercise self-control whereas a gas obviously cannot

Like not picking on emil.y's wording here, because I totally agree with that post and think she's completely on the money, but just to dig into a language thing: police always retain some abstract right to use force against you; what we're talking about here is basically best-practice tactics, and what those tactics should be! There's no question that police are supposed to adhere to them, because that's their job.

(I'm not trying to be a pedant about your language, emil.y, I totally agree with all that, just something about that word seems like maybe a crux issue here)

sometimes the backlash against protestors seems creepy to a degree.

yeah, this.

x-post Michael White otm

Anyone can rep for the revolutions that resulted in better, sustained governments, but that's not the same as asking what you'd have done at the time.

Oh geez wow am I becoming discontent with a bunch of these viewpoints -- this is becoming some kind of polarized "who started it" kind of argument, which seems pointless without talking about what "it" is. I mean ok, no duh, if you threaten or hurl things at police officers some sort of action is going to be taken against you that is unpleasant; I think the issue here is kind of what that action is going to be, what it should be, basically all these boring policing and public-safety issues this thread seems unlikely to ever address.

― nabisco, Thursday, April 2, 2009 5:21 PM (35 seconds ago) Bookmark

let's take rockapads anecdote as an example, since it seems like a fairly reasonable example in terms of frequency at protests - i think it's within reason for a cop to arrest with force someone who whips a snapple bottle at him. i think this is where m@tt and emily's argument comes into play wrt professionalism - sure if someone whipped a snapple bottle at your face irl you could reasonably physically attack this person, but you are a cop at a riot so you arrest them. if they aren't willing to go peacefully and immediately, then more excessive force (taser, administered properly or baton, whatever) is warranted, seeing as they've already whipped a weapon (which i believe would be considered deadly in a court) at your face.

I am decidely not a revolutionary though I may from time to time be a subversive. Revolutions mostly have a way of turning out horribly but I can easily see how the Iranian people were sick of their self-styled Emperor tyrant.

I used to take police officers from other countries (i.e. not UK) around "riot city" in Houslow where the British police would practise for these situations and have seen a huge variety of other tactics other than shooting people. But I remember well that the officers from other countries usual response was "Why don't you just shoot them?".

Well, I'm trying to remain fairly fact-based and non-emotive in my discussion, so yeah, it's right (ach) to pick up on that. The police do have a 'right' to use force against people based on their own judgement in these situations (if you want a better discussion of stuff like this, see Benjamin and Agamben on the state of exception), so yes, they do have a 'right' to use force against you if you're being carried along with the crowd towards them. But again, even if we ignore the ethics, it's bad policing. Unfortunately I can't proffer many ways in which better policing could manifest itself - standing as a barrier, restraining and arresting are obviously better than randomly gassing, hitting or shooting, but further than that I cannot really go.

multiple xposts to nabisco

I'd love to hear from a riot cop on this (lots of strawmanning of cops is right), but since this is ILX maybe we could just settle for

http://www.dsng.net/images/shaq_police.jpg

if a cop is standing on the front line and is rushed by a person i think it can be assumed that a cop could take the person down and arrest them. if a cop or a group of cops is rushed by another group of protestors, i think more excessive force is warranted, ie batons

I meant, I agree with whoever said that there was too much strawmanning of cops on this thread. Yeesh, I can't write clearly today.

honest question to J0rdan: do you think anyone posting to this thread substantially disagrees with that?

emil.y -- yeah, totally agreed, was just trying to drive home the point that everyone's venting some kind of disagreement about rights and responsibilities when I'd guess people are largely in agreement about tactics, which are what we're really discussing

honest question to J0rdan: do you think anyone posting to this thread substantially disagrees with that?

shakey mo collier

There were two escalations I saw in SF/2003 that I thought deplorable considering the relative legitimacy of the aims of the protest: People hurling abuse and projectiles at the 'pigs', and cops, like the douche who just resigned in Texas, who insisted on asserting their authority even when it was not conducive to keeping the march peaceable. There was one cop down on the corner of Grant, I think who started yelling at some people who were milling around waiting for some laggard members of their group to "Just keep moving along." It was such dickish authoritarian for authority's sake bullshit that I, who of course came to the protest a white man in a suit, tarried myself awhile, at a distance, but near enough and steadily enough to let the cop know I was watching him.

I am not a riot cop but have spoken to many (in the UK - who are generally, just regular cops on riot duty - overtime! extra pay!) and they don't particularly like the "being a barrier and just taking it" approach but recognise that that is probably the best way of getting through the problem without too many people (including police officers) getting hurt.

What this thread needs is for the youth of London to have their say

Your picture of yourself is a media myth
Underneath this floor we're on the edge of a cliff
Someone told me Jesus was the Devil's lover
While we masturbated on a magazine cover
Chorus:
Dead in the streets
Who's that girl?
Ireland screams
Africa burns
Suburbia stumbles
The tides are turned
I can feel the fear in the Western world
I can feel the fear in the Western world
I can feel the fear in the Western world
I can feel the fear in the Western
The Western world
Mama's still on valium, Daddy puts the news on
TV orphans laugh at the confusion
The audience finds itself on the stage
Fifty million people in a state of decay
(Chorus)
The party goes on behind elevator doors
While the elevator plummets from the 69th floor
All the cars lost in the scrapyards of paradise
The newspaper photographs have all come alive
(Chorus)
I can feel the fear in the Western world
I can feel the fear in the Western world
I can feel the fear in the Western world
I can feel the fear in the Western
The Western world

P.S. If I had to imagine a tactical situation in which I think people on this thread might have vastly different feelings, it's the following:

- one guy in a crowd of hundreds whips a Snapple bottle at a police officer
- police decide that situation has now escalated and safety dictates that they forcibly disperse the entire crowd
- police deploy tactics like riding out into crowds or cordoning off sections of crowd
- crowd is thrown into chaos and confusion in which most protesters are nonviolently objecting to being pushed or cordoned off or told to disperse when they're trapped amid hundreds of other people, and some protesters become more confrontational with police
- situation deteriorates and leads to use of tear gas or mass arrests

The crux of this is never going to be an argument about whether everything was the fault of the guy with the Snapple bottle or whether it's understandable that police take action when shit gets thrown at them -- it's always going to be a question of what tactics serve what purposes and trying to make sure that the value of nonviolent free expression is balanced equally and fairly with safety/order in terms of choosing those tactics! I mean the above scenario seems like a somewhat common way that protests turn sour, and it really can't be boiled down to some kind of "some protesters are jerks" or "some cops are jerks" situation

Sorry if that's "equivocating" or just putting it down to things being complicated or something, but honestly

honest question to J0rdan: do you think anyone posting to this thread substantially disagrees with that?

shakey mo collier

lolz now who's strawmanning

- one guy in a crowd of hundreds whips a Snapple bottle at a police officer
- police decide that situation has now escalated and safety dictates that they forcibly disperse the entire crowd
- police deploy tactics like riding out into crowds or cordoning off sections of crowd
- crowd is thrown into chaos and confusion in which most protesters are nonviolently objecting to being pushed or cordoned off or told to disperse when they're trapped amid hundreds of other people, and some protesters become more confrontational with police
- situation deteriorates and leads to use of tear gas or mass arrests

^^^ this is basically the "dude with a beard throws some shit" scenario i posited upthread

i think there is some strange ground here where people want to portray cops as violence hungry truncheon wielders on one hand, but then also want them to show some superhuman amount of restraint when under violent attack. it should also be noted that peoples perceptions of cops as thugs tend to exacerbate the situation in that A)protesters approach certain situations in a way they wouldn't if the barrier was, say, riot geared bus drivers keeping the peace B)cops are aware that there is a perception of them as evil targets for abuse and probably are a bit more on edge than they would be otherwise

It totally feels like a plausible scenario to me.

xpost

people want to portray cops as violence hungry truncheon wielders on one hand, but then also want them to show some superhuman amount of restraint when under violent attack

well to be fair this isn't incoherent -- they view them as the former because of disappointment in terms of the latter, right? but you're totally right that these expectations and antagonisms don't help anything

- one guy in a crowd of hundreds whips a Snapple bottle at a police officer
- police decide that situation has now escalated and safety dictates that they forcibly disperse the entire crowd
- police deploy tactics like riding out into crowds or cordoning off sections of crowd
- crowd is thrown into chaos and confusion in which most protesters are nonviolently objecting to being pushed or cordoned off or told to disperse when they're trapped amid hundreds of other people, and some protesters become more confrontational with police
- situation deteriorates and leads to use of tear gas or mass arrests

i think in this situation i just don't understand why some protesters would "become more confrontational with police" - as john outlines above, you know they have heightened suspicions about the situation already, why not just move your way along, even it means being pushed by police.

that's not to say that i don't think someone should object to what they perceive as excessive crowd dispersion in a protest, just that there are many more effective routes than "becoming more confrontational", many of which would happen once you leave the protest

Let me add to Nabisco's scenario the very real fact that many of the cops along the protest route in SF in '03 were visibly not anti-war guys. Tensions were high in the country over the issue and many of the cops seemed quite condescending in their body language. I think there was a personalization on both sides of the cop/protestor divide.

Hahaha okay, Jordan, you have found a way to make that scenario still be about your personal knee-jerks and bugbears by looking through an entire scenario with many tactical decisions made and focusing in on what's described as a minority action within a large crowd -- congratulations, I guess

i think in this situation i just don't understand why some protesters would "become more confrontational with police"

There is a general commotion, heightened emotions, confusion, you're seeing your friends being pushed to the ground by police - you react in a way that is not the most logical. This is why the onus is on the police to keep to non-violence in this situation: they are being paid precisely to reduce this chaos, not to escalate it.

I mean, I don't say this in a demonizing way at all, but crowd-control police can make bad tactical decisions that escalate situations just as much as contingents of protesters can (even when the actions on both sides are well-meaning and non-violent), so it just seems so silly to look at something like that and go "well I guess it's the fault of those people right there"

xpost - emil.y OTM, basically

Let's also be clear that not to escalate with a reasonable crowd is smart but not to escalate with a less reasonable crowd may lead to more unrest if the cops can't nip the insurrectional drift in the bud. It's not as if the cops have magical powers to know the nature and intensity of the crowds they're dealing with.

My opinion about Riots and Police is colored by what I've read about what was happening in Minneapolis for the Republican Convention this year.

pre arrests of independent journalists, people being herded into dead ends and tear-gassed, residents treated as marchers, random arrests, film confiscated.

Basically Authority out of control to quell a dubious threat. Probably has little or nothing to do with what is happening in Europe right now, just an example of how my sympathies are standing.

America's history from the Revolutionary War to Civil Rights to Kent State to the Houston Republican Convention several years ago, all lead me to immediately knee jerk in sympathy with protesters and away from sympathy with cops.

http://www.secretlyironic.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/georgian-riot-police.png

(Ha, Michael, that was actually supposed to be the "bad" tactical decision I was building into that example scenario -- it doesn't include any grounds for police to make the judgment that it's safer/better/easier to disperse a large crowd than to identify and remove what could be a lone bottle-thrower. Which seems like a good example to me because people upthread talking about heavy-handed police tactics don't necessarily need to be demonizing police; sometimes police really do non-demonically make counterproductive decisions about the point where they need to subdue things.)

Greek riots of December, 2008 in pictures

Another factor, naturally is with the relative legitimacy of the goverment and relative legitimacy of the protestors' unrest.

I don't think having high expectations of police is unhelpful, or that some behaviour or situations can lead to a situation where suddenly the standards of behaviour fall away and we can't condemn anyone or ask for better. There are police out there who keep their cool and use the minimum possible force around people who are not returning the favour and I don't know why you'd ask for less. I don't expect it, but I think police ought to be calm and methodical with even the most aggro people.

Hahaha okay, Jordan, you have found a way to make that scenario still be about your personal knee-jerks and bugbears by looking through an entire scenario with many tactical decisions made and focusing in on what's described as a minority action within a large crowd -- congratulations, I guess

― nabisco, Thursday, April 2, 2009 5:52 PM (26 minutes ago) Bookmark

i'm not exactly sure why you posted that scenario - i thought it was to try and trace out where ppl found faults

Best trolling ever.

it's pretty impressive.

i got no fuckin idea what the london protestors were protesting for/against, and that's their problem not mine.

but the whole point is to get whaled on by the police, pretty explicitly. it's kind of meaningless to gather into a large group of people and wander round the city of london. u need to have some kind of confrontation 2 make it relevant.

geezers need excitement

My opinion about Riots and Police is colored by what I've read about what was happening in Minneapolis for the Republican Convention this year.

pre arrests of independent journalists, people being herded into dead ends and tear-gassed, residents treated as marchers, random arrests, film confiscated.

Basically Authority out of control to quell a dubious threat. Probably has little or nothing to do with what is happening in Europe right now, just an example of how my sympathies are standing.

America's history from the Revolutionary War to Civil Rights to Kent State to the Houston Republican Convention several years ago, all lead me to immediately knee jerk in sympathy with protesters and away from sympathy with cops.

― james k polk, Thursday, April 2, 2009 10:59 PM (40 minutes ago)

as a dude in STPL/MPLS, this shit was totally uncalled for, but it was also not the cops really, the pre-event marching orders were getting dished out by the shadowy RNC organizers, not the cops per se. as for the teargassing in blind alleys thing, it is fair to say that there were some people down there doing dumb shit, and a bunch of normals got in the middle of it.

oh yeah also the supposed intel the cops got fed to them was 1000% pure grade A terrifying and also mostly not true, but unfortunately most of it came from internal paid informants fucking shit up for reasons known only to them.

but the whole point is to get whaled on by the police, pretty explicitly. it's kind of meaningless to gather into a large group of people and wander round the city of london. u need to have some kind of confrontation 2 make it relevant.

― FREE DOM AND ETHAN (special guest stars mark bronson), Friday, 3 April 2009 00:44 (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

those liverpool street flashmobbers deserved a 'confrontation' alright

FUN FACT: due to one dude getting caught with detailed underground maps of saint paul, they actually covertly WELDED ALL THE DOWNTOWN MANHOLE COVERS SHUT for the duration of the RNC.

^^genius

omg u guys got so trolled he got you to post to a messageboard you regularly read. yr so owned!!!

xp

those Greek riot pics are great. thanks for the link!

in light of the direction this thread eventually took

just go home and eat a sandwich

is so lol

i was home eating a sandwich ^_^ - watching shep tbh, basking in the glow of the man

April 2nd, 2009 12:56 pm ET
I read somewhere that in 57 yrs … the Queen has never touch someone like she touch Mrs. Obama. That it show how much the Queen liked her and the President …..

actually reading this thread would probably just make me angry, so i'm glad i saw this near the top

not to be dr morbs up in this bitch but reactionary anti-protest crypto-conservatism is 100% my least favorite thing about the vice magazine generation

― rip dom passantino 3/5/09 never forget (max), Thursday, April 2, 2009 2:33 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark

pro-cocaine and pro-headbands and pro-violent cops

btw raise yr hand if you have ever been attacked minding yr business by a cop who was doing "crowd control"

augh, i am getting trolled by a thread i haven't even read :-/

vice mag generation, the strawman that keeps giving

yall were being really fucking dense on purpose. shakey mo almost had me sympathizing with him for a second but then lost me with that pussy-ass anecdote he gave. seriously, dont provoke cops. if a cop is pushing his way through a crowd of people, get the fuck out of his way.

b-

you can do better

this:

i got no fuckin idea what the london protestors were protesting for/against, and that's their problem not mine.

but the whole point is to get whaled on by the police, pretty explicitly. it's kind of meaningless to gather into a large group of people and wander round the city of london. u need to have some kind of confrontation 2 make it relevant.

is the most otm post in this godforsaken thread. the worst of london protesters were pissing on bank buildings and according to news reports "several hundred clashed with police, who were pelted with eggs, paint bombs and empty beer cans."

these protests have no unified agenda to speak of--everyone with a cause shows up en masse, the vast majority are peaceful--but for a couple hundred assholes the point is to provoke the cops so you can later grandstand about how brutal they were.

i would personally love for the several thousand nonviolent folks who were there to figure out how to take it upon themselves to reject these dicks and their tactics.

Riot Police rush at crowd, and standing still looks like going really fast towards a crowd, from the point of a crowd.

Plus, if a bunch of Riot Police charge towards you, you tend to defend yourself. Which looks like attack.

cad, the problem is how do you stop them from coming? they will always upstage the more 'focused' chill groups.

yeah i mean i don't have a good answer to that. to whatever extent it's accurate, the perception that these people kind of run away with these events probably keeps a lot of folks (i.e. me) who agree with the positions but not the actions away.

that's why the mentioning of the civil right protests upthread is so galling to me--some of the targeted, well-organized, brilliant acts of civil disobedience from that era just don't apply at all to this.

Riot Police rush at crowd, and standing still looks like going really fast towards a crowd, from the point of a crowd.

Plus, if a bunch of Riot Police charge towards you, you tend to defend yourself. Which looks like attack.

― Mark G, Friday, April 3, 2009 9:36 AM (22 minutes ago)

no, shut up. what does this even mean? "standing still looks like going really fast toward a crowd"??? and "defending yourself" is being a pussy and throwing shit and pissing on buildings?

augh, i am getting trolled by a thread i haven't even read

Am feeling you gbx.

Am watching this:

..and I'm genuinely steaming about the police seemingly wading in to a peaceful action and just randomly whacking people for no lawful reason.

not to be dr morbs up in this bitch but reactionary anti-protest crypto-conservatism is 100% my least favorite thing about the vice magazine generation

Scratch the Vice magazine bit cos I don't know too much about that, but otherwise this is depressingly otm. And I don't exclude myself from this - I eye-rolled about the London protests plenty myself, yeah it was an incoherent mess but it seems like we're in the post-protest era or something, it doesn't achieve anything so why bother. Which sucks.

protesting the global economic system in the traditional take-to-the-streets way doesn't make a lot of sense imo

Most ppl have no more interest in withholding even a portion of their support from the global economic system than they do in protesting it.

OK, fair question (xpost)

Were the riot police attacking the people pissing on buildings? No.

The perspective we all see is from a high-up TV camera.

The view is of Riot Police pushing a crowd back.

Crowds do not walk backwards, same way cats cannot. People fall over.

So they resist. Which looks more like attacking.

..and I'm genuinely steaming about the police seemingly wading in to a peaceful action and just randomly whacking people for no lawful reason.

― Dom Cry For Me, Passantino (NickB), Friday, 3 April 2009 14:04 (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

which is what it looked like to me.

protesting the global economic system in the traditional take-to-the-streets way doesn't make a lot of sense imo

How should people protest against it? Not being a dick, I don't have an answer to this.

i would personally love for the several thousand nonviolent folks who were there to figure out how to take it upon themselves to reject these dicks and their tactics.

OTM. If I were genuinely interested in a legitimate protest I wouldn't be giving free passes out to the element bringing it down.

jjusten, michael white OTM throughout.

How should people protest against it? Not being a dick, I don't have an answer to this.

the easiest way is to outsource; send me $$$ and I will protest for you

How about a yellow post-it-note on the door of the bank?

Colonel, a few options:

Zero out your credit cards, pay in full each month. (no i'm not there yet; it's a goal)

Stay out of Disney World and other mega-bullshit.

Refuse to go to concerts and other events that charge "service fees" for ticket purchases.

Don't shop at chains, buy local, etc.

mark, i don't understand what your point is here. that clip (which was obviously made by someone among/sympathizing with the protesters) didn't show the stimulus that provoked the police into going into the crowd. yall are happy to just cry "injustice!" without even considering that maybe there was a reason for what they did. and "what they did" was, what? they formed a wall and pushed the crowd back a little? a couple of people got shields to the face but if you'll notice, these were the same people deliberately provoking and fighting back agaisnt the cops, so they'll get no sympathy from me.

and i'm not some kind of conservative law and order dude, either! i'm generally in the same boat as morbs wrt my feelings toward cops. there's just nothing i've seen here that's made me feel like these stupid kids are getting wronged

some police were probably being dicks.
some protesters were probably being dicks
most police were probably trying to do their jobs
most protesters were probably very peaceful

ken "voice of reason" c

so.. fuck 0.025% of da police

kill 0.025% of hippies i say

otm ken c xxpost

mark, i don't understand what your point is here. that clip (which was obviously made by someone among/sympathizing with the protesters) didn't show the stimulus that provoked the police into going into the crowd. yall are happy to just cry "injustice!" without even considering that maybe there was a reason for what they did.

There was apparently no reason for what they did. This was a video of the Climate Camp protest which was a totally separate thing to the more agressive anti-capitalist protest that was going on outside the Bank of England. It was basically lots of friendly folk sitting around having a picnic, until the police decide to shut it down. And even then, as you saw, most folks reacted with their hands in the air.

And they ALL got detained for six hours after the police moved in.

by someone among/sympathizing with the protesters) didn't show the stimulus that provoked the police into going into the crowd. yall are happy to just

Yall assuming a stimulus, and that the film was made by a sympathiser.

but that shouldn't be a problem if they were going to sit around having a picnic anyway?

xpost

It was basically lots of friendly folk sitting around having a picnic

sorry, I've seen a lot more than 0.025% of da NY police act like goons at the RNC '04 and other times, it comes naturally to many of them.

ts:
having a retarded outdoor picnic and not going to work -vs- doing essentially the same thing under police surveillence and not going to work

xxpost what ken c said

You guys left out the bit about getting whacked round the head with a baton.

i can only hope that someday these dudes are gonna tell their gradkids about the time they "took a stand on G20" and their grandkids will know enough to say "lol, that pussy shit? you showed 'em, gramps"

xpost yes batons should be outlawed. cops should use their words in situations involving crowds of crazy people

getting whacked round the head with a baton seems like a reasonable risk to take on if you're going to have a picnic

cops should use their words in situations involving crowds of crazy people

Should have just managed a peaceful protest in a peaceful way. I'm specifically talking about the climate protest at the G20 here, which was what the video was of and would basically have comprised of Guardian-reading middle-class types and students on their Easter holidays. They are just sooo not 'crazy people'. You really don't need to beat these folks up, and they pose absolutely no threat to people or property. I'm guessing the police were just carrying over their pent-up aggression from the anti-capitalist protests earlier in the day. It's not a ridiculous thing to be pissed off about this.

I wonder how many of these conflicts arise out of a subconscious desire to be immortalized in a moment in history; everyone knows the photos from the Civil Rights Movement, everyone knows the tank in Tianamen Square picture, etc etc, and I wonder if there's an unrecognized "this will make me famous forever" impulse going on in the backs of the heads of everyone involved (police and protesters alike).

that is right in line with dudes provoking cops and thinking that they're gonna get martyred or something.

http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/0eVX5GOdw772z/610x.jpg

http://alertedeye.files.wordpress.com/2007/02/girl.jpg

"I DEMAND THE REPRODUCTION RIGHTS TO THAT PHOTOGRAPH YOU ARE TAKING!"

C'mon Kevin, look at these dweebs they're detaining:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3612/3405780416_9a2b92bb74.jpg?v=0

my point exactly. you go ahead and lose sleep over english hippies being forced to sit one place rather than another. i've got other things to worry about

lol, kevin, you are in college, what on EARTH are these things you have to worry about

It's basically a personality lithmus test- if some people see a guy dressed like Cpt. Jack Sparrow getting the slap of a baton in the middle of a London crowd, they're maybe going to assume on balance that he's done something to provoke it.

Many others (the majority on this thread?) may assume that a member of the fascist pig cops just felt like wading in at random on a member of the public because of repressed GSCE inadequacy issues.

I'm pretty sure neither extreme end of the spectrum is closer to the truth than maybe assuming Cpt. Jack was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and maybe the majority of us brave internet posters wouldn't like to be put in a riot cop's position in a fairly adversarial crowd scene.

Those, sir, are not riot shields.

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/44213000/jpg/_44213137_policeshields_afp.jpg

THESE are riot shields.

getting into pharmacy school, getting a job this summer, getting laid xxp

'Adversarial crowd scene' at Climate Camp demo:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/celesteh/3404805434/

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3563/3404805434_88420f484e.jpg?v=0

yeah, i uh fail to see any pig cops beating on jack sparrow there

which was what the video was of and would basically have comprised of Guardian-reading middle-class types and students on their Easter holidays. They are just sooo not 'crazy people'. You really don't need to beat these folks up,

must... resist.... facetious...comment.....

fascistious?

that pic upthread reminds me of something...

https://books-and-records.com/wayne_war_worlds1.jpg

is there anyone on this thread that can truthfully claim that if you were a riot cop and some college student came up to you and started to explain his attempts to achieve poppage, you wouldn't be swinging away with a baton? cmon

also.. good to see multi-millionaire footballers joining in on the fight against capitalism
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3592/3408934837_17e1f781ba.jpg?v=0

xposts, even if you were just out with friends

"standing there minding my own business, trying to keep the crowd under control and all of a sudden some little fucker is up in my face playing the vacuum cleaner and i just snapped..."

yes i would click suggest baton too.

Jason Statham?
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2009/4/2/1238710377305/Police-stop-G20-protester-001.jpg

Looks like it's pretty ugly in Strasbourg, too.

jason statham taking on a crowd of jugglers and cpt jack sparrow- sure fire success.

oh wait they already made batman returns

http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/00xe3rlax61r1/610x.jpg

look at all those fuckin cops, breakin up that picnic.

It's basically a personality lithmus test- if some people see a guy dressed like Cpt. Jack Sparrow getting the slap of a baton in the middle of a London crowd, they're maybe going to assume on balance that he's done something to provoke it.

Many others (the majority on this thread?) may assume that a member of the fascist pig cops just felt like wading in at random on a member of the public because of repressed GSCE inadequacy issues.

I'm pretty sure neither extreme end of the spectrum is closer to the truth than maybe assuming Cpt. Jack was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and maybe the majority of us brave internet posters wouldn't like to be put in a riot cop's position in a fairly adversarial crowd scene.

― Old Big 'OOS (AKA the Cupwinner) (darraghmac), Friday, April 3, 2009 3:26 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

oh bullshit.

i don't think most cops are bad at all.

but still i think some of the RNC shit that went down was just over the line.

i'd fucking rather hang out with cops than douchey protest movement people any day of the fucking week.

Dr. Morbius otm upthread a bit when he pointed out that one of the best ways to protest corporate control of the economy is by voting with your cash. Stop enriching the bastards.

Incidentally, I have seen this work on a small scale. The local NBA franchise was widely known as the Jail Blazers about 5 years ago. Disgusted fans just stopped attending games or watching them on tv. For a couple of years the management tried to bullshit their way around this with stupid PR moves and phony promises.

Finally, it got so dire that the owner cleaned house and got rid of the yahoos, both on the team and in management. The fans waited about a year to see if the changes were real. They were. The fans came back.

It never would have happened without the spontaneous boycott of the team by the paying fans voting by staying away in droves, even when the team was still winning.

agreed, the best thing about morbs' very excellent advice was that it didn't involve wandering the streets with a "FUK THA GOVERMENT!!!" sign.

spelling "the" as "tha" always helps IMO

it shows that you're serious

my rhetoric only becomes violent in public when I am locked out of 77boadrum.

we are in there photoshopping your head onto newt's body right now!!!!!

ok loool xp

I wonder what the optimal mixture is for Molotov Cocktails?

3 parts pepper vodka
1 part spiced rum
1 part mango juice

Shake with ice and serve neat in a lowball glass. Garnish with chutney.

Is that something you can light on fire? It should really be a flaming drink.

maybe if you can float the rum on top...?

Thanks, HI DERE, but I actually wondered what the best flammable mixture to put in a bottle would be.

It depends on what you wanna do to what you're throwing it at.

On the theory that gas and such burns quickly but doesn't stick.

let's all google "molotov cocktail" and link instructions for making them here, I'm sure that could lead to nothing but good things

M White just briefly the way around that is something soaked in your fuel

but mods feel free to delete that or w/e if you think its a problem

lol

I Love Anarchy

I'm not trying to turn this into 'The Anarchist's Cookbook' but I remember reading about the development of napalm precisely to deal with the fact that just spraying fire at people or objects wasn't 'enough'. From the looks of those Greece photos I posted upthread, some of the fires looked pretty serious.

perhaps this is pertinent to this discussion

Right and with the slushy consistency brought about by a mixture of fuel & (say) styrofoam one purportedly ends up with something whose properties are akin to the stuff. xp happy to stfu just tryna answer the man's q

Personally, I think mixing rum and vodka far more destructive to society. It's like some old Soviet-Cuban solidarity drink.

lol HOOS I am not telling you to stfu, I am dicking around

I'd somehow like to think that the Greek students somehow found the ancient recipe for Greek fire.

"If we can just find a way to bottle this stuff..."

meanwhile this case in mpls proceeds thru the courts

http://www.twincities.com/ci_12033266?nclick_check=1

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/apr/07/video-g20-police-assault

oh dear

They got away with pumping seven bullets in Jean-Charles de Menenzes' head, so no sweat for the boys on blue here

that is incredibly shitty

I would say its shocking except it isn't really shocking at all now is it

not really shocking, still incredibly shitty

shakey mo 1, jordan s. 0

:-/

The guy was so *pissed too

(*inebriated)

Now that's a situation where you kind of wish the angry mob would have charged in and started ripping the riot police to pieces.

my point is this is the garden variety physical intimidation/provocation that riot cops engage in as a matter of course. They expect protestors to show them deference at every turn and look for any excuse to unleash the full extent of their power and training. When protestors don't, things can quickly get out of hand.

― Ray Libloata (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, April 2, 2009 9:58 PM (5 days ago) Bookmark

*ahem*

Even some of the other officers seem to be looking at the one who pushed him and going WTF?

what this capital city needed was a full-blooded public slaughter involving police and citizens

:(

Now that's a situation where you kind of wish the angry mob would have charged in and started ripping the riot police to pieces.

Where's a fuggin' anarchist when you need one?

srsly

I imagine worse went on but nobody else actually died

That's so stunningly counterproductive of the police.

Like I said upthread though (I think) a lot of these blokes aren't "riot cops", they're ordinary coppers who have had a bit of riot training. But even if that officer had been, say in a city centre on a Friday night, he would have known that going behind someone and pushing them as hard as possible was not a good idea. I mean it's the kind of thing a drunk yob would do to his mate and end up in prison for when his mate clunks his head on the kerb. It's just fucking stupid.

Basically what Michael said in 7 words.

Plus, as Nabisco repeatedly says up thread, why should the cops escalate anything? It's not in anyone's interest.

what now

Like I said upthread though (I think) a lot of these blokes aren't "riot cops", they're ordinary coppers who have had a bit of riot training.

pretty sure this is the case across the board, yeah. seems like beat cops would know better.

I wish I had something productive to say, but jesus fucking christ, that's awful.

They got away with pumping seven bullets in Jean-Charles de Menenzes' head, so no sweat for the boys on blue here

― Sacco, Vanzetti, Passantino... (Tom D.), Tuesday, April 7, 2009 7:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is pretty stupid tbh

Police making it hard to keep yr cool. I've got £10 that says no jail time for any police for that. If I can get rich from knowing the police can get away with pretty much anything, maybe it'll bother me less.

Bronson are you saying the de Menezes case was more complicated than that or that there's some other reason it doesn't bear comparing or...?

Good comment from Duncan Campbell in the Guardian.

Yeah, I've been on lots of protests in my time, and I have never experienced violence from police or protesters (I've been spat on by passers by, but on the whole it has been peaceful). My only complaints come from the containment tactics of the police, mostly during anti-war protests during the build up to the Kosovo bombing and the Iraq war (the G8 was different, mostly because we weren't allowed anywhere near the hotel).

The 'containments' I've been subjected to have involved being held, along with hundreds of others, by mounted police for a couple of hours. As a purely rights-based criticism it should be noticed that we had not been charged with anything, yet were being prevented from going about ur business. The more serious problem though, was that the crowd was a lot more diverse than right wing caricatures would have you believe - children, the elderly and at least one pregnant woman held without access to water or toilets (I think it was a hot day too, but given this was Scotland that is probably a trick of memory). It seems like a dangerous and unnecessary approach.

Though, again, I appreciate the police have a hard job, and on the whole are friendly and efficient. The idea that you should avoid protests for fear of violence, or that people who go should expect violence, is reactionary nonsense. People who think all protesters re 20-something men with masks and RATM t-shirts are buying into a dangerous right-wing myth.

my favorite kind of protestors are the angry grandmas.

http://viralpolitics.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/angry_grandma.jpg

^^^holla

Bronson are you saying the de Menezes case was more complicated than that or that there's some other reason it doesn't bear comparing or...?

― ogmor, Tuesday, April 7, 2009 9:03 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is completely unlike the menezes case on about a million levels. the blame there was clearly with the whole organization of the operation: if they suspected him he should never have been allowed on to a bus. but terrible as it was, i don't think it signifies much, and the emphasis put on it as an indictment of the police in general is tiresome.

the cop here seems to have lashed out, as cops on demonstration duty are wont to do. that's very different from the menezes case, and not just because the cops there were (obviously) setting out to kill the target.

It's more like the Blair Peach case, and they never prosecuted anyone for his death either. Much harder to push this one under the carpet what with the video evidence though.

Look it's perfectly simple, if you don't want to be shot in the head then you shouldn't be getting on public transport while looking a bit like a Muslim.

Likewise if you don't want to be knocked over, beaten and then killed by a heart attack you probably shouldn't be walking down a street.

I can't even get past the first six posts on this thread. Stunningly moronic.

since 4 of those first 6 do not agree w/the OP then i can only assume that you are in favor of bashing protestor heads open

Actually I stopped at post-5 (J0rdan's last post.) I do not agree.

"but terrible as it was, i don't think it signifies much, and the emphasis put on it as an indictment of the police in general is tiresome."

I have no idea who you are or how yr doing Bronson, but this is weary, unengaged and I hope you get well soon.

All the best, ogmor

agree that the de menezes case is not just worse, but qualitatively different, but it doesn't seem to be true that this was just one cop lashing out - according to the eyewitness reports in the guardian, tomlinson was beaten in two separate locations, in royal exchange passage and at the junction with cornhill.

no idea who you are either ogmor. i *am* weary. four years of using menezes's death as a) a punchline b) basis for "omg police death squad" bs will do that.

the cover-up signifies something about how the police operate; but the killing itself, not really. happened in fairly unusual circumstances.

my point is this is the garden variety physical intimidation/provocation that riot cops engage in as a matter of course. They expect protestors to show them deference at every turn and look for any excuse to unleash the full extent of their power and training. When protestors don't, things can quickly get out of hand.

― Ray Libloata (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, April 2, 2009 9:58 PM (5 days ago) Bookmark

If threads had "best post" ratings, this one.

Actually, if protesters do show them the deference, they still are ready to unleash..

In training, they get into the 'angry mob' situation re-creation. Do they ever have a training situ where they get confronted by a crowd of football hoolies that basically go from one pen to the other without complaint ever?

what are you even saying? ok, this was bad, so now what? how about no police presence at protests from now on, plzzzz

I'm saying "Confirm"

cool dude. hopefully 100 more posts saying "boo this sucks!" by the time i wake up

Lol dumb reactionary stance posing as weary ennui about a message board thread.

Yeah giving a shit about police brutality is so lame.

xpost

Kevin I say this with all the respect due a relatively-new ilxor I don't really know all that well: shut the fuck up.

They got away with pumping seven bullets in Jean-Charles de Menenzes' head, so no sweat for the boys on blue here

― Sacco, Vanzetti, Passantino... (Tom D.), Tuesday, April 7, 2009 7:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is pretty stupid tbh

Pretty stupid but also true.

"And we would have got away with it, but for you pesky kids and your "look he's not wearing a pufferjacket" photo"

"got away with" implies there was some kind of plan or plot to kill the guy, or that the police maliciously or wantonly decided to do it. it's become a touchstone in a really weird way imo. people die in police custody, or because of the police's dangerous driving, relatively often; but that isn't a punchline for some reason.

"got away with" implies there was some kind of plan or plot to kill the guy

or alternately that there was some kind of plan or plot to quash any suggestion of police wrongdoing - instant denial despite not knowing the facts of the case, followed by bullshit rushed internal enquiry in order to bolster the denial and sink the story quickly - which has been scuppered by those pesky kids and their filmed evidence.

well, the extended quote was "got away with pumping seven bullets..." not "got away with covering their arses". but anyway the two kinds of wrongdoing are quite distinct; the police cover-up/smear tactics are about the same.

whereas in this case, instant denial, a publicly viewed contradicton, and a very long-time coming enquiry...

xpost yes, that be the point.

The brilliant bit is that a BANKER filmed and then handed in the footage because he felt the family were not getting answers. Suck. On. That.

HE gets his bonus.

i only just realised this thread was here, can someone sum it up for me please?

if you attack riot police you should be shot

― strøm thurmond (J0rdan S.), Thursday, April 2, 2009 7:26 PM (6 days ago)

vs

my point is this is the garden variety physical intimidation/provocation that riot cops engage in as a matter of course. They expect protestors to show them deference at every turn and look for any excuse to unleash the full extent of their power and training. When protestors don't, things can quickly get out of hand.

― Ray Libloata (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, April 2, 2009 9:58 PM (5 days ago) Bookmark

This one guy on the radio this morning:

Peter Smyth, chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, said some physical confrontation was inevitable during a large protest.

He told Radio 4's Today programme: "On a day like that, where there are some protesters who are quite clearly hell-bent on causing as much trouble as they can, there is inevitably going to be some physical confrontation."

He added: "Sometimes it isn't clear, as a police officer, who is a protester and who is not.

"I know it's a generalisation but anybody in that part of the town at that time, the assumption would be that they are part of the protest.

"I accept that's perhaps not a clever assumption but it's a natural one."

I didn't see the police beat each other up.

The man was walking away from them, with his hands in his pockets, and minding his own business. Peter Smyth is full of shit.

and even if he was protesting i dont see how it would be excusable

Sometimes it isn't clear, as a police officer, who is a protester and who is not.

And when the vast majority of protestors are peaceful it doesn't matter one fig. You should be looking out for the

protesters who are quite clearly hell-bent on causing as much trouble as they can

Yeah, the implied assumption is that if they're a protester, then they're fair game.

this is a pretty inflammatory thing to post but what the hell:

Good observation, maybe there was a pile of bricks falling on him.

For what little its worth on de Menezes, I think yr contempt for the discourse you get pale from taking yr part fighting in has grown and spread. I don't know what history of past arguments you were fighting with "i don't think it signifies much", but to place no importance on or be blind to the culture and systems that lead to a group making the worst kind of mistake is complacent&you can't expect other people to care for yr weary unexplained wisdom. To try and diminish the symbolic value of what happened and say that people should not be so agitated is deeply conservative, but no one would do that, right?

To try and diminish the symbolic value of what happened and say that people should not be so agitated is deeply conservative, but no one would do that, right?

excellent 'have you stopped beating your wife?'-type question. i honestly don't know what the stockwell killing symbolizes for you. i don't think he was the fifty-whatever-th victim of 7/7 (as some people do), but nor do i think it tells us that much about police culture. again, i'd say deaths in custody, a more regular occurence than what happened with de menezes, tell us more.

an innocent man was killed; it was fucked up. but what bigger story are you putting it in, and how is that 'progressive' as opposed to 'conservative'?

anyway, here is the ilx thread, where i'm one of the first to say it was fucked up:

Murderers In Our Midst

but then again, the title of that thread is the kind of discourse i'm wary of.

This is like a black hole and I am the sucker astronaut going through atom by atom.

Ending an assertion with something like "...but no one would do that, right?" does not make it a paradox. The stockwell killing's significance to me is not strictly personal, or "for me". Yr argument seems to be that because the situation was so unusual and particular, the observations and conclusions we draw are similarly specialised and unusual, and not useful for wider understanding. This is why Aristotle didn't use any sort of experiments when he was learning about the natural world, only observation.

I agree that more regular occurences give you more confirmation and evidence than unique ones, but that they are necessarily more revealing or insightful. What I said was conservative was playing down the symbolic value of what happened, of ignoring the significance of the roles of the people involved, and the message that sends out, but I think you know that.

"...evidence than unique ones, but not that they are necessarily..."

how does getting pushed down cause you to have a heart attack?

see other thread.

Stress can cause spasms/tightening in the coronary artery.

in short, sudden unexpected jolt from behind installs the 'fight or flight' reflex, which calls upon the heart to boost circulation to enable sudden burst of energy, whichever way.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=scared-to-death-heart-attack

ah, do they know how soon after the encounter he had it?

A matter of a few minutes. Read the news.

im not saying it's a paradox, just a leading question. which you've done again with "... but I think you know that." do i? you still haven't explained what is symbolic, but you at the same time want me to accept not only that *not* to acknowledge the symbolism is conservative, but that i actually already know! i really don't, and it's on you to explain it.

but you don't even say what observations and conclusions we should draw! just that we ought to do so. there are (obviously) all sorts of lessons to take from stockwell. the operation was a complete mess; there were failures on the ground and further up the chain of command. but i don't think that's what you're getting at.

what is 'the significance of the roles of the people involved', though? they were police... if they were not police, the event would be somewhat differently significant, but again, that isn't what you mean. what progressive cause is being suppressed by lamenting that this happened, by saying the police ought not kill innocent people, but that the reaction to this terrible incident is excessive?

(as it goes, i think the reaction was partly fostered by the police's stonewalling/deceit, and that's fair enough, and typical of the police to be their own worst enemy.)

xposts to ogmor

This slightly germane to the thread, I think.

Video found of CRS riot police throwing stones at protestors in Strasbourg at NATO meeting.

Evening Standard readers, gotta love 'em:

As usual we now have people such as Mr Howarth of the Liberal Demoprats and others such as Jacqui Smith (who no doubt is glad to see publicity deflected from her disgusting behaviour) crowing about the police actions during the G20 demonstrations and calling for a witch hunt.
YES a man died . . . but clearly he was not complying with police directions and the officer in question was well within the constraints of his/her public order training to use force to ensure compliance. A shove is at the lower end of the scale in such matters.
I also find it doubtful as to the press allegation that he was not a protester, but merely an innocent bystander. This old chestnut is one we heard in Northern Ireland time and time again from rioters after they had been struck by plastic bullets - " Oh, poor me, I was only out for a loaf of bread and a pint of milk (just ignore the fact that it was the middle of the night)"
The man ultimately died from a heart attack, and it is just as likely this was brought on by the actions of the demonstrators . . . maybe he found them shocking ! ! !
Its time all this whining ended.
If I was in a MET or any police TSG now, I would be looking for a transfer out to another branch and would not get involved in any public order duties whatsoever. Let the Parliamentarians form up and deal with these disturbingly pathetic demonstrators from now on, see how they fair out.
The police are DAMNED if they do and DAMNED if they don't ! ! !

- Eoin Mcgreeghan, Derry, NI

x-post

I started out on a long post, but this will have to do. If you see the events of stockwell as a police operation then you may draw some useful conclusions, but they will not address the concerns of those who see it as an abuse of power between those wielding state authority and its citizens. When the coroner restricts the possible verdicts, he is conservative, he forbids that we can see that something has gone wrong on the level of state authority. To dismiss the reactions of people to this event is similar, it allows us to continue with everyone still in place as they were, next time they will be more effective, they won't have to abuse their power again, nothing more needs to be said.

To dismiss the reactions of people to this event is similar, it allows us to continue with everyone still in place as they were, next time they will be more effective, they won't have to abuse their power again, nothing more needs to be said.

ok, it isn't similar to the coroner's verdict. why? because he's a coroner, not a person arguing on the internet. but again, the coroner's verdict evidently does *not* 'forbid' that we/you can see something has gone wrong at the level of state authority. we/you have, although you still won't quite say what.

i wouldn't want the same thing to happen again. without looking at the coroner's verdict, i'm fairly sure that he would have recommend the police change their systems to avert a similar thing happening. there was no need for the killing.

what do you mean by 'next time they will be more effective'? i can't tell if you mean: the problem is that by improving their systems in response to this tragedy the police will only extend their ill-gotten authority, or something more conspiratorial.

Am watching this:

http://www.youtube.com/v/t244-zEENSs&hl=en

..and I'm genuinely steaming about the police seemingly wading in to a peaceful action and just randomly whacking people for no lawful reason.

Not to harp on this point, but I was watching this video, and it seems to me like a prime example of the original issue in this thread really not being about the bad actions of individual people, and mostly existing on the level of overall tactics and practices. I mean, I'm not a crowd control expert, and I don't know what preceded this scene, but the whole police action seems to suffer from some crazy lack of clear objectives and seems almost designed to create chaos, injury, and damage. Or at least I'm not sure what the goal is (move crowd back beyond X point? disperse crowd? allow officers to move through crowd?), and it seems abundantly clear that the crowd doesn't either, which is a pretty good way of making it impossible for them to be cooperative, ensuring that they feel assaulted, and not exactly tamping down any urges people have to behave badly.

the goal is to crack some fucking skulls

No, it isn't

I'm not so sure about that.

fascetious lolz aside I think you're underestimating the degree to which riot cops are unable to maintain a professional demeanor and a clear head in the face of a confusing and confrontational situation. There's only so much verbal abuse these guys are willing to take before they reach a collective decision of "fuck it, let's shut this thing down/vent our frustration"

in which case the goal really does become little more than "I'm going to beat that dreadlocked hippie who's been yelling at me for the past hour and a half"

talking from experience, guessing but not phrasing it as a guess or just typing a bunch of bullshit

probably all three!!!!!

xpost - You guys are being deliberately glib, right? That's a video of an organized, choreographed police action. It's based on some form of goal-oriented command, not a bunch of guys just deciding it would be fun to push into a crowd of people (which it wouldn't). What that goal or command is, or how it was decided, isn't at all clear (move the crowd? disperse the crowd? get to something on the far side of the crowd?), but at some point there is obviously an organized command decision that a group of officers will enter the crowd and that the line in riot gear will start pushing the crowd back.

xpost - argh, Shakey, watch the video -- what they're doing is organized and tactical and there's a clear moment they undertake it -- it's not some snap of professional behavior, it's a planned action

yeah I watched the video - I don't really trust the way its edited tbh. But I agree its not a case of "one bad apple" snapping - its more like a collective basket of bad apples agreeing that its time to let loose.

More like it's someone in charge of these fellows giving them the order to shut things down aggressively.

right

xpost - Shakey you realize that an entity like the London police has likely spend millions and millions of pounds developing some ridiculously complete set of best practices for crowd control, involving large numbers of experts and the training of officers in basic tactics, right? And that they presumably engaged in fairly intense planning for how they would handle this event in particular? So when they execute a very clearly choreographed and organized tactic like the one in that video, it seems self-evident to me that someone in some sort of command decision has made a call that that's the tactic they're going to employ, and that they're going to do it at that specific moment.

The only point I'm trying to make with this is that I honestly don't think the bulk of the issue is what individuals (police or protesters) are doing in the thick of things, important as that might be -- I think one major issue is the top-down police tactics and goals and their willingness to communicate those things effectively to crowds. I.e., what creates that situation isn't that individual cops are pricks or that protesters are goading them -- it's a total response plan that has problems, or allows people to make decisions without clear goals, or doesn't hold them accountable for those decisions, or is overall too focused on using force to disperse people, or whatever. In any case, I guarantee you those 40-some people didn't just huddle and decide it was time to engage the crowd that way; someone made a command decision and picked out a tactic, and I think more rests on that than any given officer who swings a baton a little too happily.

Haha okay xpost I guess we agree, per Nick's post

x-post

This is pretty much me reiterating myself to each of yr points, largely because you've not said whether or not you agree with the thrust of what I said.

"it isn't similar to the coroner's verdict. why? because he's a coroner"

I agree that the fact the coroner has power means his judgement is binding and therefore has real world effects that ours doesn't, but the content of the two positions is similar. The conservatism of that position does not exist solely in its being exercised.

"the coroner's verdict evidently does *not* 'forbid' that we/you can see something has gone wrong at the level of state authority"

This is completely obvious, so I think I have no idea what you mean.

"what do you mean by 'next time they will be more effective'? i can't tell if you mean: the problem is that by improving their systems in response to this tragedy the police will only extend their ill-gotten authority, or something more conspiratorial."

Hopefully you can work out that I think neither.

It seems there's a clear and unanswered argument that their have been numerous very serious abuses of power that no one has accepted responsibility for. Furthermore its difficult to specify exactly what mistake has been made because there are so few rules or standards to hold any of these parties to, and this has not been used as an opportunity to implement them. All the changes that yr alluding to in police practise come from seeing it as a failing in police tactics, which is an important way of looking at the issue that will help plan more effective police tactics, but it cannot give answers to questions about the relationship between police and their state authority and powers or questions about the interests and loyalties of the various branches of government that were involved in the aftermath. To ignore those issues serves conservative ends.

okay the police control was pretty damn impressive in that video

BBC HYS http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=6325&edition=1&ttl=20090408202100

Added: Wednesday, 8 April, 2009, 17:22 GMT 18:22 UK

The police should treat protesters as protesters treat them.
If violence is used against the police, the policemen have the right to fight back.
If they are spit on, then they have the right to retaliate.
Remember, these are men doing a job we pay them for.
Nowhere would a human being accept being hit and spit at without hitting back.
If you hit a cop, then be prepared to be hit back.
I love these babies who go to a rally, start trouble, then cry when they get a beating.

Joe Pepe

Recommended by 32 people

i don't know what the thrust of what you're saying is! i wouldn't say you're reiterated anything.

"Hopefully you can work out that I think neither."

i still don't know what is meant by "next time they will be more effective."

feel free to call whatever you like conservative, but what "questions about the relationship between police and their state authority and powers" are you raising? say what you think the progressive or revolutionary position is.

xposts

"i still don't know what is meant by "next time they will be more effective.""

Police tactics. All things being equal, pretty much everyone will agree that's a good thing.

"feel free to call whatever you like conservative"

Please have some faith, there's nothing arbitrary in what I've said.

"what "questions about the relationship between police and their state authority and powers" are you raising? "

A lot of people, including you in places, have expressed some concern over the way police have avoided responsibility for using the power they have been entrusted with in ways that fail not only in terms of good police tactics, but in terms of fulfilling the basic role of the police to protect the public. Similarly, some people have expressed concern that different branches of government have colluded to protect each other against the interests of the public.

Those are significant issues that have not been addressed. To complain about people going on about them is to downplay their value. To complain that people keep bringing up and put too much significance on a case where the government intervened in a trial and made it impossible for anyone acting with state authority to be prosecuted is conservative.

"say what you think the progressive or revolutionary position is."

I don't think addressing those issues puts you in any particular camp. Its in the interests of the public and all uncorrupted people with state power to address them.

W/out proper agreement or disagreement, or a restatement of belief, this is going to go no further.

To complain that people keep bringing up and put too much significance on a case where the government intervened in a trial and made it impossible for anyone acting with state authority to be prosecuted is conservative.

ok, i don't think that's exactly what happened, but i've been clear that the cover-up, smear tactics, etc, were totally wrong. how exactly to deal with what happened i don't know, because in the end i think we need to have armed police, and accept that means that sometimes innocent people will die. even in the most perfectly designed system. the system in place was by no means perfectly designed; it was also operating under unusual pressure.

anyway all of this has been addressed in the public sphere, including by mainstream (conservative) politicians (iirc).

to return to where this began: i am wary of what calls itself the left-wing response, which is the tendency to totalize. it has a not-bad pedigree, but it is often used selectively or just badly. i don't think the de menezes case itself calls into question *that much*. i should probably be more angry about the cover-up, but this is the government that -- etc.

Most think G20 police actions justified, poll finds

June 30, 2010

Wendy Gillis

The majority of Torontonians believe police actions against G20 protesters were justified, according to a new poll.

The Angus Reid poll, which surveyed 1,003 Canadians and 503 Torontonians, found that 73 per cent of Torontonians and two-thirds of Canadians believe police treatment of protesters was justified during the G20 summit.

It also found that 80 per cent of Canadians and 90 per cent of Torontonians think the federal government should compensate businesses damaged or forced to close during the summit. Other findings:

• Two-thirds of Canadians are disgusted with the G20 demonstrations in Toronto. Fifty-nine per cent are ashamed, 57 per cent are angry and 54 per cent are sad.

• In Toronto, 81 per cent said they are disgusted with the G20 protests, while 74 per cent are angry, 65 per cent are sad and 61 per cent feel ashamed.

• Seventy-three per cent of Torontonians and 57 per cent of Canadians believe it was a mistake to hold the summit in Toronto.

• Only 31 per cent of Canadians and 46 per cent of Torontonians say they followed the final comments from participating nations closely or moderately closely.

• Fifty-three per cent of Canadians and 86 per cent of Torontonians watched the protests closely or moderately closely.

The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 per cent for the Canadian sample, and 4.4 per cent for the Toronto sample, 19 times out of 20.

Sometimes I hate this country everything.

The start of this thread is quite something - hardcore trolling or hardcore idiocy?

Nah I have a genuine disdain for these types of protesters and could care less what happens to ppl who break shop windows and the like

But I have friends who've been involved in that kind of political action - I'm unsure as to whether I endorse it myself, but I certainly don't want them to be arrested or summarily shot. In all cases they are incredibly socially minded, but feel the need to express their dissent in an extreme manner in certain contexts.

i feel pretty bad for the legitimate protesters, which lets face it - is the majority (and random pedestrians) - who got caught up on the total over reaction on sunday. i mean what do you do when you're randomly blocked in at an intersection by the cops for 4 hours, in the rain, and then rushed by them; possibly getting your head cracked open in the process.

just because 2% of the group were idiots does not mean anybody and everybody around you is fair game the next day.

and what the cops did is fucking disgusting. intentionally letting private property get damaged - literally standing by as stuff gets damaged by some total retards and then using that as an excuse to go totally insane on the citizens the next day.

and disgusted is putting it mildly. Harper brings in his police force in from Alberta so that they can all have their loyalty rewarded with the chance to beat on some random Toronto liberals. it makes me sick to my stomach to see people pulling this armchair police chief nonsense - acting like it's ok to arrested and beat on a man when he's done nothing wrong because of a small pocket of idiots doing idiotic things a day earlier.

ya this is so fucking fucked up

i am furious about it

when police show this like blanket panicky FEAR of the populace it is just about the worst thing

obviously this would not have been as mental if not for the black block crazies - but with a budget of 1.2 b - one point two billion - they could not have contained these guys before anything got out of hand?! 1.2 billion!

Those public opinion poll figures are terrifying. I fear for this country.

to me 1.2 billion budget means they would have had an interest in formenting large scale unrest to justify their expenditure

Nah I have a genuine disdain for these types of protesters and could care less what happens to ppl who break shop windows and the like

milo z, are you chained to a starbucks as you type this?

I only drink fair trade shade grown barista-getting-paid-a-living-wage coffee, maaaaaaaaan.

milo z, are you chained to a starbucks as you type this?

― the last airbenderizer (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, July 4, 2010 12:01 PM (25 minutes ago) Bookmark

sounds more like YOU'RE chained to YOUR starbucks "fraps" bro

wake up sheeple

peeps still protesting the new world order?

Is there really anything ‘that wrong’ with the world?

also, lol at people on this thread being like 'J0rdan, u just don't understand police brutality now, but once you experience it, you'll change your tune,' like conservative-bros who say, 'once you're mugged/have a family/make a mil, you'll be a conservative.' Whoever first discovered that human opinions SHOCKINGLY have a correlation with personal experience did a great service to the world of arguments.

i dunno, i really like direct action, but i've pretty much realized that whenever i go to a protest, it's smart to stand like 100 meters from anyone with a bandana on their face

Radiohead are just dicks if Lou and Byrne can pull this off and they can't be assed to do it.

lol wrong thread

this is awesome
http://i223.photobucket.com/albums/dd120/hipsterrunoff/photographs/hro/4212aa5e.jpg

i heard the story about them throwing poop into AA, but how did they launch the poop? Did they all diahrrea in a supersoaker or something?

holy shit (lol xp) public opinion polls are really so much bs though (i mean, we know this). the full story needs to include: who did this poll, who answered it (age, income, location, etc etc), how were the questions posed (language itself, tone, sequence, etc), where did those polled get the majority of their information about the protests (mainstream media outlets i am guessing, and of that, possibly mostly TV news). as if the answers to these questions are somehow merely academic??

and then corporate, advertising-funded media takes this poll and makes another big story out it. cycles! time to wake the fuck up and break them. a protest can be one of the most effect ways to claim public space as public, to show that a community actually works because of the people in it. i'm really worried about what community means to people anymore... yet i know most people do actually care, esp when faced with infringements of it anyway.

sorry to be a bit ranty :/ it's all v disturbing. i just want to work towards change that doesn't involve a clampdown on personal and political freedom, b/c i can see such tactic coming to pass, however subtlety...

down with capitalism!

not really tho, to me. more like down with corruption!

and authoritarianism! and power for power's sake!

who throws poop

that is just gross i mean cmon waht

so many challops in this thread i dont know who to turn to first

AA, even with the issues people have with it, srsly has NOTHING on Walmart and hundreds of other chain stores and the goods they sell
xp
you will find yr way thru!

so many challops in this thread i dont know who to turn to first

― max, Sunday, July 4, 2010 6:44 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark

you could always turn... TO YOURSELF

not to be dr morbs up in this bitch but reactionary anti-protest crypto-conservatism is 100% my least favorite thing about the vice magazine generation

― rip dom passantino 3/5/09 never forget (max), Thursday, April 2, 2009 8:33 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark

"bitch" is hate speak iirc

did l0u1s j4gg3r agree to suck yalls dicks if you started throwing around the word fucking 'challops' all the damn time or something?

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/7138VS95CNL._SL500_AA240_.gif
― special guest stars mark bronson, Sunday, 24 August 2008 20:50 (3 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^underrated zing

― Peter "One Dart" Manley (The stickman from the hilarious 'xkcd' comics), Thursday, November 27, 2008 9:59 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark

there was a docu on bbc3 about the 'english defence league' and they were singing ♫ no surrender to the talibannnnnn ♫

like

ya - the AA thing is especially retarded.

all enemies of the state should be shot without question or mercy, but only if the state is worth preserving. and the only state worth preserving is a state without individuals or fun.

You're right, Robyn, but I just can't see how those factors could account for this large of a majority. We do rely on polls all the time. I'm happy, for example, to cite polls when they show that >80% of the population supports a public single-payer health care system.

I'm seriously worried that being a progressive liberal country might turn out to have just been a 40-year phase for Canada.

I agree Sundar, the people I know here are pretty conservative in many ways. The poll results are likely the direct result of the terrible reporting of the protests in the big media outlets. I admit I don't follow the news like I should, but the big news outlets were all "MAYHEM AND VIOLENCE" and the blame was squarely on the protesters.

xpost I mean the welfare state is dead everywhere else, not really sure why you'd expect it to live on in canada 'just because'

"Everywhere else" = the US?

... 21st-century europe?

unless "neoliberal" counts as "liberal"

Is it dead or being scaled back a little?

This blurb seems to suggest that it's still fundamentally quite viable in Scandinavia (which countries were always more social democratic than Canada): http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BCCF9/%28httpPublications%29/218CAD0393B83EE680256B67005B6836?OpenDocument

Social expenditure still appeared relatively high in 2001 in much of Western Europe: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_state#The_welfare_state_and_social_expenditure

Am interested in more in-depth (or reliable) sources though.

In any case, none of this means that the public needs to or should accept the kind of police brutality and disrespect for basic civil rights that we have seen here.

sorry, it wasn't meant to be much more than a snarky comment re: the shift away from 'liberal'/keynesian/welfare state/whatever policies in the 'developed nations' reaching canada too... I can try to find sources if yr interested, but I thought this was sorta just the standard take on the post-cold war political conjuncture... but

In any case, none of this means that the public needs to or should accept the kind of police brutality and disrespect for basic civil rights that we have seen here.

if you attack riot police you should be shot

just go home and eat a sandwich

l8r

― strøm thurmond (J0rdan S.), Thursday, April 2, 2009 12:26 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark

If you hit a cop, then be prepared to be hit back.
I love these babies who go to a rally, start trouble, then cry when they get a beating.

Joe Pepe

Recommended by 32 people

― pfunkboy (Herman G. Neuname), Wednesday, April 8, 2009 12:25 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark

i have noticed a prevalence of this attitude over the last decade or so. most recent example here in seattle concerned a 19-year-old girl who began shoving a cop who attempted to arrest her friend for jaywalking. in order to maintain control of the situation, the male cop full-on punched her in the face. struck me (ha) as an extreme and unacceptable use of force, but there hasn't been much of an outcry. suppose most people would say that he was using moderate/appropriate force to combat unlawful force and to prevent a potentially dangerous situation from spiraling out of control. but i don't buy it...

i grew up with the idea that cops should be held to a higher standard than ordinary citizens. that they should never use force, and certainly not lethal force, unless absolutely necessary in order to protect the public at large. i take this "higher standard" criteria seriously, and am often disgusted by the impunity with which police officers abuse their authority and those they are sworn to protect. otoh, i understand that police work is vital to society and extremely dangerous besides, and that cops will sometimes have to use force. further, i get that they have to more-or-less constantly project the idea that they're willing to use force in order to keep others from testing the boundaries. which makes for a very delicate balance.

still, i'm surprised by the tolerance i see extended to the idea that by acting out in the presence of police officers, one basically surrenders all rights and perhaps even sentences oneself to death. i reject this entirely. i understand that some officers will overreact in high-pressure situations, but see no reason to condone such overreaction on general principle -- "you get what you deserve." this thinking goes hand-in-hand with the idea that extreme circumstances justify torture and other human rights violations. as though the rule of law is just a polite fiction that no one can be expected to take seriously when the chips are down.

who the fuck gets arrested for jaywalking?

(Yeah, "dead" just seemed rather strong. I did find this interesting but poorly translated article: http://www.scipub.org/fulltext/jss/jss3243-51.pdf. I read the major sections of it and will go back to read it in greater detail when it's not midnight and I haven't been driving all day.)

xposts to bernard snowy. Also, contenderizer so OTM as usual.

You're more likely to get arrested for hitting a jaywalker than actually jaywalking.

seattle is not friendly to jaywalkers, and this spot had been targeted as particularly crime-of-walking prone. that said, it began with the attempt to cite someone for jaywalking, not necessarily to arrest them.

one way to look at the "you get what you deserve" stance would be to say that it reflects post-60s cynicism and the effects of cynicism on civic culture. once upon a time, america's agreed-upon social truth was that police officers should be held to a very high standard of behavior and would not be justified in mistreating you if you mouthed off to them or perhaps even threatened them. that one had to be able to take abuse and danger without losing your cool in order to be a good cop.

that idealistic social truth was always a lie, of course. everyone understood that cops had more power than ordinary citizens and were very likely to use it if challenged. but the fictional truth kept us focused, i believe, on what we thought we should expect -- on the ideals towards which we strove.

to the extent that we've grown up as a culture, we've become more "realistic", i.e., more cynical. we're no longer willing to mouth the patently false platitudes that midcentury americans apparently relied on to reassure themselves of their own fundamental decency. it's great that we no longer deceive ourselves in this manner, covering up misdeeds with denial, but i wonder if we've perhaps begun to lose the idealism that once urged us towards a better way. i mean, how do you admit the ugly truth without surrendering to it?

(Anyway, the other, Toronto-specific, non-challopsy thread, for reference: G8/G20/Anarchy on Queen St thread?

The thing is, AFAICT, in this case, the people who should have been restrained were not while people who were not behaving provocatively were attacked or arrested. Even going by the mainstream media's reports, e.g. the CBC's coverage or pictures in the Toronto Star, I can't see how the public could see the police action as justified.)

As a person who didn't pay close lot of attention to any of it (had to leave the city unexpectedly and was gone/distracted that whole week and afterwards), all I really heard about it was that a bunch of stores got smashed. This is admittedly through headlines, hearsay and little else, but I'm willing to bet that many people answering that poll had about the same level of info as I did. Since I got back I've been reading more about it, but people I was interacting with out-of-town had that attitude: you smash a store, you get arrested. There was no discussion of people getting arrested who DIDN'T smash anything.

I guess what I'm saying is I know a lot of ignorant people? IDK.

you're saying you get most of your info from main media outlets, which is the same as most people tbf.

that said, it began with the attempt to cite someone for jaywalking, not necessarily to arrest them.

so what happened?

they got ex-cited

(there's a video clip on a thread called fuck tha police or similar)

i think the sad truth is most people think protesters=hippies and if one does something dumb then what's the diff - they should all be beat on for it.

i also think in the states there is sort of a worship of police culture. or at least an obsession of sorts, is what it seems like from outside. and since the conservatives in Canada love everything American they fully embrace this kind of mindset up here.
9-11 made this way way WAY worse too. everyone was falling all over themselves to chip away at their freedoms etc in favour of expanding security/police powers. and i think so few people are aware or even care about what degree they're damaging democracy that there no sense of where the line should be drawn. you get the impression that challenging authority is unamerican and standing up for human rights or democracy or whatever (basically any kind of activism) makes you some kind of hippie/cry-baby/terrorist-lover and you get what you deserve. it's disgusting.

challenging authority is unamerican and standing up for human rights or democracy or whatever (basically any kind of activism) makes you some kind of hippie/cry-baby/terrorist-lover and you get what you deserve

challenging it in huge groups facing up to riot cops isn't always the way to go, i think. that's offered without judgement on behaviour of th emajority of the protestors and not saying that riot cops are 100% angels with perfect judgement, but that kind of organised (even passive) activity turns very many people off imo

i'm worshipping police culture right now!

If people are turned off by legal, organised and peaceful protests then I really don't care what they think about much of anything - and nobody said they had to march!

As passive as it may be, protesting can be very disruptive and intrusive to the people who live or work in the area.

Yes, but it is legal and necessary and as someone who lives in such an area, I'm completely down with any so-called disruptions/intrusions. Beats the fuck out of the inept tourists that usually crowd the streets by my house. Besides, doing the right thing is not always comfy - especially to people who confuse their own minor inconveniences with something IMPORTANT.

If people are turned off by legal, organised and peaceful protests then I really don't care what they think about much of anything

agreed. and even if they are turned off, i don't think it should then be okay to whack 'em over the head with batons.

As passive as it may be, protesting can be very disruptive and intrusive to the people who live or work in the area.

yes sometimes democracy is inconvenient.

*hi-fives, Chick*

inconveniencing the stupid proles is a valid way to make change happen y/n?

FREELANCE HIVEMIND

Protesting =/ voting.

y'know dara this might blow yr mind but there's probably 'stupid proles' protesting too? so i don't think yr dumb strawman class-war steez really fits here

voting /= democracy

like dara not everyone protesting is yr straw-man posho lefty y'know?

Actually, in London the people who whinge hardest are petit-bourgeois Thatcherbabies. So...fuck 'em.

in my limited experience of peaceful protesting, plenty of proles in the ranks (like y'know myself).

challenging it in huge groups facing up to riot cops isn't always the way to go, i think. that's offered without judgement on behaviour of th emajority of the protestors and not saying that riot cops are 100% angels with perfect judgement, but that kind of organised (even passive) activity turns very many people off imo

[...]inconveniencing the stupid proles is a valid way to make change happen y/n?

― ,,,,,,eeeeleon (darraghmac), Tuesday, July 6, 2010 11:31 AM (16 minutes ago) Bookmark

I don't know. I just have a family to go home to and I only get to see them for maybe two hours a night and it sucks really bad when I'm on the bus going home and we're stuck in traffic and when we get to the front of the traffic jam it's a bunch of people dressed up in skeleton masks to protest Israel or something. Good job, protestors! I'm sure you changed a bureaucrats mind with that one! Your hard work has not gone unnoticed. Three cheers for democracy.

yes, protests can be inconvenient and annoying, but it still surprises me that people would be okay with their violent suppression

Yeah, I'm not saying they should be violently suppressed. I just want them to not be wherever I am.

When I first moved to London, businesses had alternative transport plans when there were demos or bus and Tube strikes - and we were discouraged from crossing ANY picket lines as official policy. That's changed; since about 1995 it's been OK in British no-such-thing-as society to whinge about the inconvenience to your day and completely ignore the underlying reasons for strikes (or protests).

I don't care if protests have an underlying reason. They sure as hell don't have any outcome.

Tell that to the Suffragettes.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0a/AlicePaul_1901.jpg

R.I.P.'d before I was even born.

They sure as hell don't have any outcome.

Just a fly-by posting here but dude, if nobody did anything that they weren't sure of the efficacy of, pretty much every interesting, useful, inventive, or for-the-greater-good thing in history wouldn't have been done.

Who's unsure of anything? I am certain that contemporary protests do not yield any influence over policymakers.

Yeah, I'm not saying they should be violently suppressed. I just want them to not be wherever I am.

Not sure how much irony to read into this small-minded NIMBYism; I don't deny that if I were stuck waiting for an unending protest or blockage while needing to BE AT SOMETHING, I'd be pissed...but if protests were scheduled/expected and for a defensible cause, I think I might make them a family point of interest and talk about where and why they were happening, possibly take a day or 1/2 day off to introduce kids to some level of involvement (something safe, obv) instead of resenting demonstrations or demonstrators for making my life not exactly the same as every other day?

for the most part, i agree. it doesn't mean it's not worth doing tho.
i vote even tho i'm normally 99% of what the outcome in my riding is going to be.

xpost

I lolled so hard the first time I learned that France has laws governing transport strikes, e.g. "you are allowed to reduce by x many trains per hour, but no more!" It's such orderly disorder.

I don't deny that if I were stuck waiting for an unending protest or blockage while needing to BE AT SOMETHING, I'd be pissed

But SOMEBODY always needs to be at something! Even if I don't specifically have to go to a school play or ballet recital, SOMEONE does. Someone has a dying relative in the hospital.

A few years back, I worked for a major university system and belonged to the same union as some workers at their hospitals. Eventually, there was a strike and we were encouraged to come and protest. I did, because I DO believe in unions and worker's rights.

Anyway, we were running around out there with signs and chants and slogans and noisemakers. The whole time, all I could think of was those poor, sick people up there and all their relatives who were going in and out of the building to visit them, maybe for the last time. We didn’t NEED to protest. We were already striking. We just wanted to raise a stink and get attention for ourselves. I’ve never been so disgusted with myself.

Anyway, I'm too emotional now. I'll get off this thread and leave it to people who want to discus G20. Sorry.

Toronto Police Services Board has ordered an independent review:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2010/07/06/g20-police-review611.html

FWIW, btw:

Number of people arrested during the October crisis: 497

Number of people arrested during the G20 protests: >900

Labor actions that involve people in caretaking fields are extremely difficult from what little I've read about nurses and healthcare working conditions. And it's understandable: people in caregiving roles wouldn't BE THERE if they weren't invested in their patients' experience and outcomes; these are not people who can walk away from their work. Unfortunately it robs them of pretty much the only negotiating lever they have.

Not to be compared with any other kind of demonstration, imo.

(That "497" figure was from Wikipedia tbh. The Canadian Encyclopedia simply gives the number as "over 450".)

Sundar - the craziest thing about the arrest number is that yesterday i saw the headline that Blair (Toronto's police chief) was "vowing" to track down the trouble makers from that weekend! like - you arrested hundreds upon hundreds of people and STILL didn't get the right guys?! you had over a billions dollars and STILL couldn't get the job done right?!
the incompetence alone boarders on criminal.

Ha.

stevie/suzy

My flashpoint-causing comment was half rushed out around football and dinner. As rural Irish, I'm quite the Finn on class issues, so if proles was the RONG word to use there to make my point, I'll apologise for that.

I won't change the thrust of the point I was making, however

doing the right thing is not always comfy - especially to people who confuse their own minor inconveniences with something IMPORTANT.

was what I was responding to. I actually agree with the point, broadly, but what we were actually talking about was the unbelievable gall of people to not cheerlead protestors. If people are inconvenienced by a protest, they're automatically not gonna be well-disposed towards those protesting, particularly if they catch the whiff of 'it's my right, maaaaan' entitlement from those involved. Especially if they're collateral damage with nothing to do with the issues being protested.

If that's a controversial comment, I'm confused.

contenderizer-

protests can be inconvenient and annoying, but it still surprises me that people would be okay with their violent suppression.

you've c&p'd my post before typing that, so it should be relatively easy for you to point me t'ward where I'm 'ok with...violent suppression'. I've taken care to state quite the opposite, in fact. Don't really appreciate that, tbh.

and "inconveniencing the stupid proles" (ridiculous class baggage there) is hardly the primary point. protests aim to raise awareness, to give voice to the unheard and to assert the rights of ordinary individuals to make fair use of public space. all of which are fundamental to my concept of real democracy.

But crucially, other people in a democracy won't agree with you on the relative importance of all of those issues (and particularly, I think, the last one, which is really quite central to the 'inconveniencing the general public' point). Protests that aim to 'raise awareness' by taking over/back the streets are not going to generate universal popularity.

Again, it's not that I even disagree with you in any strong way, but it seems strange to complain then about the results of a poll or what-have-you where those not strongly partisan will come down on the opposite side of your issue.

This is as mature as I get on ILX, so if it ain't enough for you guys after almost wilfully misunderstanding me to suit your arguments above, I don't think we're gonna find any middle ground on this one. Luv ya anyway.

The poll results that upset me were these:

The Angus Reid poll, which surveyed 1,003 Canadians and 503 Torontonians, found that 73 per cent of Torontonians and two-thirds of Canadians believe police treatment of protesters was justified during the G20 summit.

I was actually pretty far from cheerleading the protests in the first place. I just think the police's and government's handling of the situation are appalling.

If people are inconvenienced by a protest, they're automatically not gonna be well-disposed towards those protesting

Not necessarily! I'm inconvenienced by monthly Critical Mass rides but I really enjoy the racket.

Ah but you're just weird in fairness

The thing is, there are protests (which, depending on the cause, I am totally behind) and then there are content-free flashmob knobbery like the idiots who shut down Liverpool St station recreating a TV ad, and it is sometimes difficult for someone attempting to get home so they can start dinner for their kids to tell the difference between the two; the fewer of the latter there are, the more meaningful the former become.

*HUGE* difference between viral marketing dumbfuckery and organized protest.

And then there are legit good-cause protests with 5% attendance of fuckheads that make it a very tough situation to police with the luxury of treating individual crowd members to the standards they'd hope for, and make it impossible for neutrals to sympathise (especially when the media will report only in the most narrow and negative of lights on any trouble)

yeah but HI DERE is saying that a lot of people have trouble making that distinction when it just seems like a bunch of people getting in your way and making you late for work.

I agree with the "inconvenience is the price of democracy" viewpoint fwiw.

xp, kinda

yeah the rowdy element is always a problem, I haven't seen any steps toward resolving that issue other than the "break-away march" tactic, which still seems to tar the peaceful folks with the same brush.

Inconvenience is the price of democracy, and responsibility is the price of freedom. IMO.

pointless, achieves-nothing, aimed-at-the-wrong-people inconvenience is not the noble ideal you guys seem to be lauding. that's what kkvsgz said above, and i agree totally.

'We're RAISING AWARENESS MAYNE' go raise it on the internet, or in your local high school, or in a letter to yr reps, or talk amongst your friends at voting time.

if you feel like you got to raise it in some bypasser's face at rush hour, then you're on an ego trip.

imco

true, but I part ways with kkvgz when we get here:

I don't care if protests have an underlying reason. They sure as hell don't have any outcome.

this is opinion, not fact, especially when dealing with the private sector (which is terrified of boycotts etc.).

as someone who has put a lot of time/work into organizing various demonstrations, I am probably even less tolerant than most people when it comes to participants who endanger others, or skew public perception in a negative way. it continues to be a big issue for folks who want to organize legit marches or rallies, as we can see in the poll that revived this thread. weird that we were having these debates in my community ten years ago and nothing has changed. the violent jerks still hitch a ride on the hard work of peaceful people with good intentions.

i don't in any way dispute it.

yeah, not saying that! just noting that it isn't a new problem by any means. the flipside of this coin is that you can end up with these sterile, meaningless protests where people stay in their "free speech area" corral and relentlessly enforce obedience to even the most ridiculously arcane laws. which is what is REALLY worthless imo. better to stay home and write letters.

in other words. blocking traffic = always dud.

i accept also that inconveniencing the right people is damn near impossible, because they're masters of the universe and all that. which is why, in a time, i think, of growing public apathy towards protests (are there more of them now, or is the coverage greater, or is it that the coverage makes them homogenous and is constantly focused on the negative, i wonder?), there's gotta be better ways of going after your rich white man.

I agree. It's worth noting that among my more seasoned activist friends the whole process of going to these G20/G8/whatever events is referred to as "protest tourism". It is generally considered to be an ineffective strategy among people who are doing a lot of the real work.

also worth noting that the other Toronto G20 thread had some discussion of how the police very possibly set some deliberate bait traps for the violent elements of the crowd, hence the unlocked police cruisers that were conveniently trashed.

u need to think more along the lines of tyler durden imo, non violent economic terrorism