Increased Police Violence in OWS protests
- Thread starter grazr
- Start date
You see my point that there's an obvious middle ground between "Ignore" and "Attack". Was walking around not an option? or separating them using multiple police officers?
Walk around.
I'm not fully versed on what happened at UC Davis, but from what I have been hearing on the news and such, and what it appears in the youtube video, the protestors were just sitting on the ground arms locked, no one was blocking anyone, no one needed to be sprayed with pepper spray.
It was Thomas Jefferson who once said, it is okay for protests to happen every few years, it is a good way for the government to check up on how its doin'.
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- Jul 22, 2009
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does the constitutional right to protest also entails a right to not let cops get past you?
those would be some laughable cops if they did that.
protestors ahead? oh no, lets backtrack and find another way. what if we get surrounded? oh well, we'll just set up camp, sit down, sing kumbaya and wait for a helicopter to rescue us.
there are multiple youtube videos btw. some starting right at pepperspray part and some starting 6 minutes before. i have nothing against protesting as long as it doesnt prevent other people from doing their thing.
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Yes, it is their right to protest, the cops could've moved through the -"mobile"- crowd easily, and walked around the sitting protesters.
Really, whatever really did happen, it was just bad judgement on the cops fault.
EDIT/Delay: I also do remember hearing specifically on NPR, the dean of UCDavis gave SPECIFIC orders to NOT use force or any sort of crowd control deterant, such as nightsticks and pepper spray unless ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY.... from any of the video's you see it wasn't really necessary.
Really, whatever really did happen, it was just bad judgement on the cops fault.
EDIT/Delay: I also do remember hearing specifically on NPR, the dean of UCDavis gave SPECIFIC orders to NOT use force or any sort of crowd control deterant, such as nightsticks and pepper spray unless ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY.... from any of the video's you see it wasn't really necessary.
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Terwonick
L6: Sharp Member
- Aug 25, 2010
- 278
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the general consensus against this argument is that "they weren't really hurting anybody" or "the police could have walked around/used manual force to walk around"
The Constitution of the united states grants freedom of PEACEABLE assembly*, and I agree that at the moment nothing was happening that warranted that type of reaction from the police. But, as a person who tries to understand what he reads, I believe that in a few(7-8) months the protest would have turned violent. If you look at the Declaration of Independence, it states the things the founding fathers did to change the "injustices" done to them by King George.** When you see what they did, it's pretty basic stuff; no protests, just a couple petitions. They had it pretty bad, when you look at what was going on back then. We are nowhere close to that bad and yet the OWS protesters decided to make their own declaration*** If it doesn't do anything, what will they do?
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_assembly
** http://www.earlyamerica.com/earlyamerica/freedom/doi/text.html
***https://sites.google.com/site/the99percentdeclaration/
(I'm learning to site my sources)
Declaration of independence wasn't saying how the founder fathers would change things, it was a basically a "we're fed up, here is a list of things King George has done to us that we don't like, and we're tired of it"
The changes they made came in with the Articles of Confederation, then later were re-fixed in the Constitution. Also, what the Americans did against the British is much worse than anything the OWS protest has done.
Thank you for citing your sources (its spelled with a c, not an s) though.
My mom majored in American history in college (and LOVES it). I've literally been taught US history since birth, so I'm just correcting you in what you were saying, not it the point you were trying to make, I'd like to clarifiy this.
The changes they made came in with the Articles of Confederation, then later were re-fixed in the Constitution. Also, what the Americans did against the British is much worse than anything the OWS protest has done.
Thank you for citing your sources (its spelled with a c, not an s) though.
My mom majored in American history in college (and LOVES it). I've literally been taught US history since birth, so I'm just correcting you in what you were saying, not it the point you were trying to make, I'd like to clarifiy this.
Where the fuck are you getting this from? Citing your sources is all well and good, even if wikipedia as a source is a bit wiers and it fits with the tone of smugness you've infused your post with, but you've made a hell of a logical leap here.
There's absolutely no reason why the cops needed to get past/through the students. The cops were supposed to be supervising a protest outside a regent meeting. The cops weren't called to arrest anyone so i don't get why you think the cops had to, or were trying to drag prisoners over or under a crowd of people.
As you can plainly see in the videos cops were freely walking over and around the students sitting on the path, the police officers were clearly not obstructed as much as you make out.
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- Jul 22, 2009
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there was one or two guys in those handcuff thingies being walked by the cops up until they came to protesters. most videos focus on the pepperspraying only so its hard to see.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WO4406KJQMc
I really can't see any evidence of what you claim. This guy has spliced 4 videos together showing 4 perspectives all in sync starting from before the incident. The police show no activity and are all bunched together in a phalanx formation, there are clearly no arrests until that one officer sprays the students.
Here's another video of protestors on the side walk at another scene, trapped passively and doing nothing but shouting. Then an officer spreys 2-3 girls in the face at point blank:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ05rWx1pig
EDIT: Here's an interesting 33 minute radio podcast covering the topic of the mayer and the park in New York. Apparently The NY officials don't actually have the right to close the parks at night, it's just a rule in place that nobodies questioned.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JnQr5n7xas
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I dont know about you, but it looks like the cops could walk around the protestors preeeeetttyyy easily...
I mean, he got around them and he was about to pepper spray them. And what I mean byt that is that the students would've probably resisted him from doing that. (going around the line and spraying him). Just look how they acted before (yelling PROTECT YOURSELF!) and then how they basically were driving the police back after it happened.
Watching the first video of grazr with all 4 of the videos pretty much shows 100% that the students did NOTHING that deserved pepper spray. The video shows that the police could have easily walked around the protestors.
Also, adding to the fact that the UC Davis dean gave specific orders to NOT use any sort of crowd control device unless it was a life or death situation... which no ones life was at stake... They actually were told not to wear riot gear, which they did anyways. This is completely the police officers lack of judgement.
tl;dr: grazr's first video and the fact that the UC davis dean said to observe, not control the crowd, shows that this is the police's fault.
I mean, he got around them and he was about to pepper spray them. And what I mean byt that is that the students would've probably resisted him from doing that. (going around the line and spraying him). Just look how they acted before (yelling PROTECT YOURSELF!) and then how they basically were driving the police back after it happened.
Watching the first video of grazr with all 4 of the videos pretty much shows 100% that the students did NOTHING that deserved pepper spray. The video shows that the police could have easily walked around the protestors.
Also, adding to the fact that the UC Davis dean gave specific orders to NOT use any sort of crowd control device unless it was a life or death situation... which no ones life was at stake... They actually were told not to wear riot gear, which they did anyways. This is completely the police officers lack of judgement.
tl;dr: grazr's first video and the fact that the UC davis dean said to observe, not control the crowd, shows that this is the police's fault.
English Mobster
L6: Sharp Member
- Jul 10, 2011
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In a nutshell about the Declaration of Independence:
Colonists started a war by pissing off the French (known as the French and Indian War in the U.S., The 7 Years' War in any other reasonable country).
The English won, beat the French (and the Spanish, but they were just kinda jumping on the bandwagon and didn't really do much overall) soundly, took the French colonies in India and many of the ones in North America. The war bankrupted them, however.
Because the colonists were the ones who started the goddamn war, the English decided they would tax them more heavily than in the past.
Now the colonists had gotten used to England being so far away it didn't bother following up on what it was supposed to do, so these taxes came as a surprise. They refused to pay regardless, because what good are taxes for? (Also, they said that they didn't have a fair say and representation when it came to making the tax.)
The colonists sent a bunch of strongly-worded letters and petitions to the British, who reacted by sending troops over to America. Because there weren't enough British military bases, they would use peoples' homes as temporary barracks for soldiers.
Things got worse and worse (just read the text of the Declaration of Independence for the full list; it goes into considerable detail), and the colonists kept making more letters with more strong words, and the British weren't listening.
So, about a quarter of the colonists said that they were going to go off and make their own country where they don't need to pay taxes. Another quarter said that it belongs to England, and about half just didn't care, as long as they get to keep their farms.
We had a war, we were getting our asses kicked by a bankrupt England until the (also bankrupt) France decided to help us out with training and threatening war on England. England got scared and backed off, and we got our independence.
France, however, was now even MORE bankrupt, and decided that taxing the poor was the correct thing to do, which caused spiraling inflation and the loss of many heads. Literally.
They turned to us for help since they helped us when we were going through our revolution, and while a quarter thought that help was a good idea, another quarter thought it was a bad idea and half didn't care, so we didn't do it. Napoleon planned to get revenge on us for causing everything bad that ever happened to France, but a slave revolt in Haiti scared him off, and diminishing funds for his military made him sell all of his stuff in America to the U.S. and call it a day.
But I digress.
OWS isn't like the American revolution; I don't know where you got that idea from. If anything, it's actually a fair bit closer to the French revolution minus the violence. We aren't going through nearly the same number of stresses as we did under English rule; soldiers aren't being quartered in our homes and we aren't paying a tax on every single thing that can be put onto a piece of paper. And the paper itself.
We do suffer from spiraling inflation and a scapegoating of the upper class (justified or no). We also have peaceful revolutions throughout the world that are happening and we are drawing inspiration from.
But you don't see notable Libyan ambassadors sexing up the OWS camps and trying to persuade us toward revolution. We aren't under the rule of a totalitarian dictatorship (depending on who you talk to, however, that idea might change), we still have the freedom to say what we want, assemble peacefully, and in general do things that are very anti-government.
While it's true that you can certainly find elements of a French Revolution-esque society within the OWS camps, the ideas are not as prevalent or OBVIOUS as they were in Revolution-era France. We won't be storming military bases to arm ourselves against the police anytime soon. Not even 7-8 months.
IF conditions degrade at a steady rate, IF we get into a double-dip recession, IF 25%+ of Americans are unemployed, IF gas reaches $5 a gallon, IF politicians still don't make any movement toward progress AND the rich are still seen as profiting off of everything, THEN I would be worried. But that would be 5-6 years from now before we have a Bastille situation, and trust me, things would have to be pretty bad.
The government knows this too, and they'll listen to peaceful protests before it gets that far. Obama's a constitutional scholar, remember, and despite outward appearances, most of the important people in Washington do indeed know their history.
Note that "important" means in this case "Senate and above." The House can't be trusted with knowing (or doing) anything; even the Founders knew that.
Source: I'm a History major.
Colonists started a war by pissing off the French (known as the French and Indian War in the U.S., The 7 Years' War in any other reasonable country).
The English won, beat the French (and the Spanish, but they were just kinda jumping on the bandwagon and didn't really do much overall) soundly, took the French colonies in India and many of the ones in North America. The war bankrupted them, however.
Because the colonists were the ones who started the goddamn war, the English decided they would tax them more heavily than in the past.
Now the colonists had gotten used to England being so far away it didn't bother following up on what it was supposed to do, so these taxes came as a surprise. They refused to pay regardless, because what good are taxes for? (Also, they said that they didn't have a fair say and representation when it came to making the tax.)
The colonists sent a bunch of strongly-worded letters and petitions to the British, who reacted by sending troops over to America. Because there weren't enough British military bases, they would use peoples' homes as temporary barracks for soldiers.
Things got worse and worse (just read the text of the Declaration of Independence for the full list; it goes into considerable detail), and the colonists kept making more letters with more strong words, and the British weren't listening.
So, about a quarter of the colonists said that they were going to go off and make their own country where they don't need to pay taxes. Another quarter said that it belongs to England, and about half just didn't care, as long as they get to keep their farms.
We had a war, we were getting our asses kicked by a bankrupt England until the (also bankrupt) France decided to help us out with training and threatening war on England. England got scared and backed off, and we got our independence.
France, however, was now even MORE bankrupt, and decided that taxing the poor was the correct thing to do, which caused spiraling inflation and the loss of many heads. Literally.
They turned to us for help since they helped us when we were going through our revolution, and while a quarter thought that help was a good idea, another quarter thought it was a bad idea and half didn't care, so we didn't do it. Napoleon planned to get revenge on us for causing everything bad that ever happened to France, but a slave revolt in Haiti scared him off, and diminishing funds for his military made him sell all of his stuff in America to the U.S. and call it a day.
But I digress.
OWS isn't like the American revolution; I don't know where you got that idea from. If anything, it's actually a fair bit closer to the French revolution minus the violence. We aren't going through nearly the same number of stresses as we did under English rule; soldiers aren't being quartered in our homes and we aren't paying a tax on every single thing that can be put onto a piece of paper. And the paper itself.
We do suffer from spiraling inflation and a scapegoating of the upper class (justified or no). We also have peaceful revolutions throughout the world that are happening and we are drawing inspiration from.
But you don't see notable Libyan ambassadors sexing up the OWS camps and trying to persuade us toward revolution. We aren't under the rule of a totalitarian dictatorship (depending on who you talk to, however, that idea might change), we still have the freedom to say what we want, assemble peacefully, and in general do things that are very anti-government.
While it's true that you can certainly find elements of a French Revolution-esque society within the OWS camps, the ideas are not as prevalent or OBVIOUS as they were in Revolution-era France. We won't be storming military bases to arm ourselves against the police anytime soon. Not even 7-8 months.
IF conditions degrade at a steady rate, IF we get into a double-dip recession, IF 25%+ of Americans are unemployed, IF gas reaches $5 a gallon, IF politicians still don't make any movement toward progress AND the rich are still seen as profiting off of everything, THEN I would be worried. But that would be 5-6 years from now before we have a Bastille situation, and trust me, things would have to be pretty bad.
The government knows this too, and they'll listen to peaceful protests before it gets that far. Obama's a constitutional scholar, remember, and despite outward appearances, most of the important people in Washington do indeed know their history.
Note that "important" means in this case "Senate and above." The House can't be trusted with knowing (or doing) anything; even the Founders knew that.
Source: I'm a History major.
Bold is the important stuff...
You also talk about the Louisiana purchase, which is WAAAAY off on a tangent.