Chris Hedges, is so on point. This article pretty much articulates everything I feel about the trajectory of OWS from here, and what I’ve been blogging about for the last few weeks. Except of course, Chris Hedges put it so much more elegantly.
Chicago city officials comment on the “Militarized Red Zone” being set up in their city 3 weeks in advance of the NATO summit.
When asked if City Officials were blind sided by the Fed’s move, the Mayor’s office insists that it was a “security decision they were not involved in”.
Andy Thayer, a spokesman for the Coalition Against NATO-G-8, accused the federal government of creating the Red Zone to send a “message of intimidation” to protesters expected to descend on Chicago for the summit.
“It’s reminiscent of what happened prior to the Trans-Atlantic Business Dialogue, when the city got all Rambo-ed up as a way of scaring people from exercising their First Amendment rights,” Thayer said.
“If security measures are necessary, there are ways to go about it rather than getting hyper-militarized in a very visible way. It does nothing to stop any violence, but it does send a message of intimidation. This is a political show. It’s not about security.”
Despite the unsettling image of uniformed federal agents on the streets of Chicago, Thayer said his message to protesters is the same as it was after Mayor Rahm Emanuel rammed through his “sit-down-and-shut-up” ordinance to reign in the demonstrators.
“Don’t allow the city or the feds to intimidate you from exercising your freedom. It’s your right to be on the streets of Chicago on May 20,” Thayer said.
In fact, Thayer said it’s all the more reason to protest, adding, “If people are resentful of the militarization of our streets, just think how people in 130 countries around the world feel about U.S. troops in their countries.”
Great article by the Chicago Tribune about the “Militarized Red Zone” that is being set up by police already, for the May 20th NATO summit.
I am impressed by this article because it addresses the double standard of the media to imply that the increased security is necessary for the Occupy Chicago protesters (which have been fully peaceful up to this point), as opposed to the wider pattern across the nation of police being involved with and inciting violence at most OWS protests.
The article chronicles historical examples of when police incited violence within peaceful protests to give them bad press. For example:
We’ve seen this script play out before. Under the notorious government COINTELPRO program of the 1960s and ’70s, police and FBI operatives would infiltrate civil rights and anti-war organizations and, finding nothing that could justify surveillance let alone repression, would invent or actively encourage violence and other illegal actions.
Closer to today, any serious look at the “poster child” for alleged protester violence, the 1999 World Trade Organization protests in Seattle, shows that the police were the main cause of the violence.
Don’t take my word for it. Seattle’s former chief of police, Norm Stamper, has said so, repeatedly. He blamed not just the actions of rank-and-file officers but his own decision-making.
And juries of our peers have agreed with Stamper’s assessment, repeatedly. Seattle paid out $1.8 million to WTO protesters due to the violence and other misconduct of its police officers. Washington, D.C., paid out $22 million to protesters and bystanders due to police violence and other misconduct during two protests in 2000 and 2002. Los Angeles paid close to $12.85 million for a police attack on a 2007 May Day rally. And in February, Chicago agreed to pay $6.2 million to Iraq War demonstrators, on top of millions in attorneys’ fees.
It has begun. Thousands of events across America, planned for May Day, or “International Workers Day” an international holiday recognized by 75 different nations, but ironically enough, not by the U.S., a nation whom typically logs some of the longest work weeks, with the fewest benefits and least vacation time out of any of the western industrialized nations.
I don’t typically link yahoo news articles, because it’s not one of my preferred sources. However, this article has some great photos of the “propaganda art” that has been used by Occupy Sites around the nation to publicize the event. Art has played a central role in OWS, and likewise with all resistance movements.
It is this aspect of the yahoo article I find enlightening and refreshing. Additionally, one of they purposes expressed for this blog was to broaden the number of media outlets individuals are exposed to, because typically we get our information from only a select few, limiting our perceptions. While Yahoo has an incredibly wide readership, it has not traditionally been one of mine— this post represents me heeding my own advice, in an attempt to diversify my information sources. ;)
Hope you enjoy it.
