This is what a police state looks like
These are the words that were being shouted here in Portland as protestors were being driven back and made to disperse at around 11:30 last night. That just really struck me. I didn't fully understand just how ignorant many of these people are until that moment. Let's look at the facts for a moment shal we? At 4:00 PM, protestors began marching WITHOUT A PERMIT through downtown stopping traffic on all the major roads and bridges including the I-5 and I-405. The police just watched and let these protests go on until 11:30 PM. Yes, police state indeed. Here in the US, you have the right to protest in a city so long as you have a permit, but these people were out to cause trouble and many of them WANT to be arrested so they can feel OPRESSED. I just don't get it. You don't have to support the war and I know that for many people, Bush's logic for wat seems weak at best, but can't we agree that these kind of almost childish protests and ingnorant chanting is not going to solve anything.
Comments
Yesterday I was on my way to an interview and the street I was driving down was blocked off by protestors. A couple-hundred protestors just decided to camp out in the street and who did the cops tell to move? Me.
What a fascist police state we live in when I am the one who has to divert course and end up 40 minutes late to an internship interview because protestors feel the need to skip class.
What a fascist police state we live in when the best we can come up with as an example of state oppression is a handful of illegal immigrants rounded up for a few hours and then released charged with nothing.
What a fascist police state we live in when people are shocked that they are arrested FOR BREAKING THE LAW. "What, officer, you mean I can actually get in trouble for breaking the law!? THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE AMERICA!!"
Oh yes, what a fascist police state we live in.
Saddam will have your tongue cut out, have you beaten and tied to a lamppost downtown left to die as an example to others who might dissent. But we live in a police state.
And this denial of permits for political reasons is happening:
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/ne...news-headlines
I know you are in portland and that contibutes a lot to your view, but it's important to realize that the country is big and that protests have accomplished extremely important things, most notably the civil rights marches of the early sixties.
That being said, I think some of these protests can be extremely childish.
March on the sidewalks.
I know you are in portland and that contibutes a lot to your view,
Could you spell out in full what you are implying here please?
Originally posted by groverat
What a fascist police state we live in when someone with a cause can't block up traffic because they need attention they didn't get from their parents.
March on the sidewalks.
of course, that's a pretty hefty assumption you are making about strangers a couple thousand miles away.
groverat: I guess he's implying that Portland is conservative.
? You smoke a little too much this morning?
ColanderOfDeath quote:
Could you spell out in full what you are implying here please?
Protests are very different here in chicago, everything from democraphics to the interactions with police. It's just a different culture. We also have a different history regarding protests. Making blanket statements about protests and protesters is just silly, as many in chicago realized even recently during the Trans-Atlantic Business Conference in November.
Originally posted by ColanderOfDeath
I think it is pretty safe to say that Portland is not conservative at all, at least relative to US norms. In fact I doubt you could find many cities of that size or greater in the US that are more liberal. I'm sure he knows that.
I'm surprised someone wouldn't
I suppose your right to protest wherever you want at any time, middle of the street or otherwise, trumps my right to get places in less than 3 hours.
Protests are very different here in chicago, everything from democraphics to the interactions with police. It's just a different culture. We also have a different history regarding protests. Making blanket statements about these things is just silly, as many in chicago realized even recently during the Trans-Atlantic Business Conference in November.
Sure. But I read your comment that protests have accomplished things in other places to be a distinction that you were drawing which implied that Portland protests have a less effectual history and perhaps are more frequently childish. I wouldn't necessarily dispute that but I thought it might be delineated a little more fully.
I suppose your right to protest wherever you want at any time, middle of the street or otherwise, trumps my right to get places in less than 3 hours.
You should have walked. You can do 11 miles in three hours no problem. And you would have saved the spotted owl as well.
Originally posted by ColanderOfDeath
Sure. But I read your comment that protests have accomplished things in other places to be a distinction that you were drawing which implied that Portland protests have a less effectual history and perhaps are more frequently childish. I wouldn't necessarily dispute that but I thought it might be delineated a little more fully.
Sorry, but I don't see where I typed that.
Originally posted by groverat
Why not pick a place that doesn't disrupt everyone else's life?
Considering one of the goals of protesting is to draw attention, non-violent disruption seems to be an adequate tool.
Originally posted by groverat
Why not pick a place that doesn't disrupt everyone else's life?
I suppose your right to protest wherever you want at any time, middle of the street or otherwise, trumps my right to get places in less than 3 hours.
I'm still trying to figure out why a protest on one street caused you to be 40 minutes late.
I had no idea that Austin was a one-street town.
What irks me about these protests is that the protesters are remarkably simple-minded. I've yet to figure out why blocking a bunch of regular joes going about their business is going to convert anyone to their way of thinking.
Roads are for cars, bikes (but don't get me started on how annoying most cyclists are), and - after an encounter with a car with failing brakes - some flattened protesters.
I was at an antiwar demonstration in San Francisco 6 weeks ago. After the main rally, a group of black-masked demonstrators blocked an intersection. The police sat it out very calmly until some motorists, many stuck in their cars for an hour or so started getting really impatient and thats when the police linked arms and waded in., clearing the intersection. No punches were thrown, nobody got hurt, but a number of the protesters started yelling "police brutality". This one little incident was shown time after time on the Bay Area media. Crying wolf like this is shooting the cause in the foot.
On the other hand: in New York City recently, "United For Peace" was refused a permit to march, citing security concerns...although in the previous 3 weeks, and in the week after, several parades through NYCs streets (not anti-war) were allowed, which makes the issing of permits appear politicized. During that "static march/ demonstration, the NYPD backed police horses into people and pepper-sprayed protesters who were penned into areas and weren't causing trouble.
I have some friends in Santa Barbara, where anti-war protests have been going on for 6 months, with between 500 and 8000 people march through the downtown on a regular basis. Everything I hear from the anti-war movement from there is reports of excellent policing, very few arrests, and a good relationship between the city and the demo organizers.
Then there's the odd case of the Seattle WTO demos in 1999, where some 400 black clad "anarchists" went round downtown Seattle smashing windows and setting fire to cars, with the media in tow, with the SPD watching! Thos core group weren't even arrested or charged, and some have claimed they were "agents provocateurs"...but who sponsored them? Nobody really knows for sure, and the SPD still refuse to comment. Shortly after the riot, the SPD went ballistic, arbitrarily pepperspraying peaceful protesters and even arresting and tear-gassing people in subdivisons who had wandered onto their front lawns.
There's good policing and bad policing. There's politicized policing and even handed policing. just like anything else in this world, nothing is black and white.
For me this is like going back in time. In a lot of these cases it's the police or the military that get out of hand ( Kent State )
Guess what? Some people WORK ALL DAY, and - I'm guessing - come 5:00 or so would love to get home to their wives, husbands, kids, dinner, etc. and the LAST thing they want is so neo-hippie in a piece-of-shit, homemade "skull of death" mask leaning on the hood of their car and waving a blindingly clever "NO WAR FOR OIL" poster in front of their windshield.
Yeah, that's original...
Protest and scream all you want, just don't do it in the damn streets where people are actually trying to get somewhere and live their lives, ass. Go to a park or other designated area so your little passions don't conflict with mine (like, say, getting home BEFORE MIDNIGHT).
Nowhere does it say that your right to protest and be heard gets to infringe upon my right to go to and from work, home, the grocery store, etc.
Look it up.
Originally posted by groverat
Why not pick a place that doesn't disrupt everyone else's life?
I suppose your right to protest wherever you want at any time, middle of the street or otherwise, trumps my right to get places in less than 3 hours.
Because it's supposed to get and hold your attention.
Originally posted by pscates
I'm all for protest (peaceful and law-abiding, of course) and all that. I really am. I don't agree or understand it in this particular case, but you've certainly got the right to voice your opinion and state your views. But you don't help your cause or engender much support or sympathy by being a destructive, childish, road-blocking asshole.
Guess what? Some people WORK ALL DAY, and - I'm guessing - come 5:00 or so would love to get home to their wives, husbands, kids, dinner, etc. and the LAST thing they want is so neo-hippie in a homemade skull mask leaning on the hood of his car with a blindingly clever "NO WAR FOR OIL" poster.
Protest and scream all you want, just don't do it in the damn streets where people are actually trying to get somewhere and live their lives, ass. Go to a park or other designated area so your little passions don't conflict with mine (like, say, getting home BEFORE MIDNIGHT).
Nowhere does it say that your right to protest and be heard gets to infringe upon my right to go to and from work, home, the grocery store, etc.
Look it up.
Guess what? This is more important. Most protesting is designed not to be a comfortable experience so you can imediately forget and dismiss it. It's supposed to get your attention. The only time it's wrong in my book is when it causes violence.
Originally posted by jimmac
Because it's supposed to get and hold your attention.
Frankly, I'm quite able to make my own decisions without trying to decipher a hastily written sign being waved around.
The longer I'm delayed, the less I am likely to feel any compassion for the cause.
They may well be holding my attention ... unfortunately that attention is focussed mainly on figuring out how likely it is that the sign fits up their ass.