By now you are familiar with the routine: peaceful protesters engaged in non-violent civil disobedience meet armor-clad government-sanctioned thugs. Said security goons escalate situation by confronting and encircling large mobs of unarmed civilians. A clash ensues, tear gas and rubber bullets are fired. Many are injured, and many more are unlawfully detained. Freedom of speech takes yet another blow.
Yesterday this scene was re-enacted in downtown Oakland, as thousands of activists sought to reallocate an abandoned building, turning it into a headquarters, shelter, and symbol of something beautiful. ‘Not on our watch’ was the police response, as evidenced by the video below.
Keen observers will notice something new – the protesters are using makeshift shields along with a loosely followed phalanx formation. No doubt an adaptation learned from being shot at far too many times.
If there’s a couple things to be learned from this, one, is that the people’s uprising isn’t going anywhere. And two, if you give humans training and a badge, along with a gun and the pretense to use it, you are pretty much guaranteed to see shots fired.
I was put on a paddywagon with other nonviolent protestors and taken to a parking garage in Parker Center. They forced us to kneel on the hard pavement of that parking garage for seven straight hours with our hands still tightly zipcuffed behind our backs.
My hands… turned blue. I am now suffering nerve damage in my right thumb and palm.
Some began to pass out. One man rolled to the ground and vomited for a long, long time before falling unconscious. The LAPD officers watched and did nothing.
It seems unreal, yet tales like Patrick’s are becoming an all too common occurrence. Why are the police relying on such a militarized response to peaceful protesters? Because they are paid to do it, and they are getting away with it. Simple as that.
For how much longer is up to Americans themselves. No doubt, each case of shocking brutality made public adds more fuel to the already overstuffed tinderbox. And when the people’s uprising hits in full force, I’d like to think most police will be standing on the right side of the protest line.
The modern day bastions of democracy – sprawling tent cities which have sprung up in nearly every major city in North America – are under threat from the establishment. Several of them, like those in Oakland, Denver and London, have all seen their property demolished and/or seized. Others, like Vancouver, are desperately fighting court orders for their removal.
Yet one wonders, do the front lines of the #occupy movement really deserve such scorn?
Sure, for those people whose understanding of this movement comes from what little information trickles through the mainstream media (or the MSM as the kids are calling it) it can be easy to dismiss the encampments as major nuisances deserving the boot.
Unfortunately, with such contentious issues on the line, the potential for violent clashes runs high. Plus it’s just all around bad publicity when politicians crush free speech and squash the right to protest.
But whether or not to evict is really beside the point. The powers that be can clear out the protesters all they want – this uprising isn’t going anywhere. Any demonstrators forcefully removed will come back, in greater numbers, even more mobilized and determined than ever before.
What we see right now on the streets is just the initial call to action. These young, engaged activists from everywhere around the world are simply lighting the beacon. Over the coming years, as the world’s inherent injustices become further exposed by our newfound interconnectedness, more and more of us will be awakening to answer the very same call.
First up is Joe Rogan’s take on the ham-handed police tactics used to suppress peaceful protesters. Bear in mind that it is Joe Rogan, meaning there is strong language:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaRlQh4JlYs
Next, we see what happens when you give a bully free licence to brutalize people. In this case, it’s some power tripping riot officer, shooting a cameraman for absolutely no reason, other than the sick sadistic thrills the cop gets from hurting civilians:
Finally, here’s a chopper-cam view of the marches in Oakland, showing many tens of thousands of people in what was reported to be just one of three marches of similar size:
And we can’t have viewers all around the nation getting the same crazy notions, now can we?
But it doesn’t matter what the mainstream media does. People everywhere are rising up. The same revolutions that overthrew tyrants in the Arab World will continue to manifest themselves here in North America.
Pretty soon, the oligarchs who’ve stolen our political and financial systems will find themselves replaced with policies and people more favorable to the population as a whole.
Street protesters, unions, and regular people everywhere are coming together to say:
We are tired of being crushed by a system that works only for the super-rich, so we are going to replace it with a better one.
This movement might take years to reach the momentum it needs to uproot the establishment. But that day is coming!
Finally! I was ready for this to happen a decade ago, as we’re countless others. But the moment is here at last. Let us seize this opportunity for all it is worth.
Corporations and big banks are forever expanding their influence across the financial and political spectrums. Expensive and unproductive wars have been destabilizing nations and economies around the world. More than one in six humans on earth are currently starving while a few thousand people control enough wealth to feed the world indefinitely.
There are many very serious reasons to be upset at the establishment. But try to exercise your rights to free speech and peaceful assembly, and you just might find out how militarized our own police forces have become.
Just ask activists from Richmond, Rochester, Portland, Oakland, Austin, or Denver, who’ve found themselves forcefully evicted with their property demolished. Armor clad security forces are clashing with groups of unarmed civilians because the start of humankind’s very first global insurrection is proving a nuisance for nearby residents and businesses.
But it doesn’t matter what the police do. Regardless of how many arrests and beatings and deaths our governments inflict upon us, we will not be silenced.
Instead, we will continue to channel the deserved discontent of the masses into a voice too powerful for the powers that be to ignore. And in the end, humankind’s great awakening will result in a complete overhaul to the way democracy works around the globe.
We’ve already seen what can happen when a single Marine goes up against the police. Now just imagine what hundreds or thousands of them will do on the side of the activists.
More shocking videos of police brutality are emerging out of Oakland, as police clash with peaceful demonstrators once again.
Look how militarized the police have become, with their full body armor and potentially lethal use of force. It’s ridiculous, releasing such a strong-armed response upon unarmed civilians.
Don’t the OPD know that when video footage of their atrocities goes public that it will only provoke more angst from the population?
At five o’clock this morning, Occupy Oakland met up with some heavy-handed security tactics. Arrests, beatings, tear gas, smoke bombs, flash grenades and rubber bullets were used by police to disperse peaceful protesters trying to engage in free speech.
Once again, the world’s emerging police state reveals its ugly face. The people have legitimate reasons to be unhappy, but if they try to say anything about it, they will be bitch-slapped by the establishment.
All the more reason to take to the streets right now. Why wait until the act of protesting can get you shot?
