That guy with the lighter whose face was photographed is fucked.
Footage from yesterday:
A press release from Occupy Oakland:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 29, 2011 – Oakland, CA – Yesterday, the Oakland Police deployed hundreds of officers in riot gear so as to prevent Occupy Oakland from putting a vacant building to better use. This is a building which has sat vacant for 6 years, and the city has no current plans for it. The Occupy Oakland GA passed a proposal calling for the space to be turned into a social center, convergence center and headquarters of the Occupy Oakland movement.
The police actions tonight cost the city of Oakland hundreds of thousands of dollars, and they repeatedly violated their own crowd control guidelines and protester’s civil rights.
With all the problems in our city, should preventing activists from putting a vacant building to better use be their highest priority? Was it worth the hundreds of thousands of dollars they spent?
The OPD is facing receivership based on actions by police in the past, and they have apparently learned nothing since October. On October 25, Occupiers rushed to the aid of Scott Olsen who was shot in the head by police, and the good Samaritans who rushed to his aid had a grenade thrown at them by police. At 3:30pm this afternoon, OO medics yet again ran to the aid of injured protesters lying on the ground. Other occupiers ran forward and used shields to protect the medic and injured man. The police then repeatedly fired less lethal rounds at these people trying to protect and help an injured man.
Around the same time, officers #419, #327, and others were swinging batons at protesters in a violation of OPD crowd control policy, which allows for pushing or jabbing with batons, but not the swinging of them.
In the evening, police illegally kettled and arrested hundreds of protesters. Police can give notices to disperse, if a group is engaged in illegal activity. However, if the group disperses and reassembles somewhere else, they are required to give another notice to disperse. Tonight, they kettled a march in progress, and arrested hundreds for refusing to disperse. Contrary to their own policy, the OPD gave no option of leaving or instruction on how to depart. These arrests are completely illegal, and this will probably result in another class action lawsuit against the OPD, who have already cost Oakland $58 million in lawsuits over the past 10 years.
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At least 4 journalists were arrested in this kettling. They include Susie Cagle, Kristen Hanes, Vivian Ho who were arrested and then released, and Gavin Aronsen who was taken to jail.
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Numerous protesters were injured: some shot with “less lethal” rounds, some affected by tear gas, and some beaten by police batons. There are no totals yet for the numbers of protesters injured. One 19 year old woman was taken to the hospital with internal bleeding after she was beaten by Officer #119.
Cathy Jones, an attorney with the NLG gave the following statement to Occupy Oakland’s media team: “Through everything that has happened since September, from Occupy to the acceleration of “Bills” — NDAA, SOPA, PIPA, ACTA — never have I felt so helpless and enraged as I do tonight. These kids are heroes, and the rest of the country needs to open its collective eyes and grab what remains of its civil rights, because they are evaporating, quickly. Do you want to know what a police state looks like? Well, you sure as hell still do not know unless you were watching our citizen journalists.”
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Once again, Oakland shows the country how it's done. From the picture and videos I've seen, most, if not all, of these demonstrators look like anarchists. Anarchism and socialism essentially call for the exact same things, so I'm typically very sympathetic towards them. The west coast has a pretty big anarchist movement, and I'm sure the reason why Oakland has become so feisty is because they're all descending there.
More video:
See that sign? What they were wanting to set up in that vacant building is a commune. Originally, I thought communes were what this Occupy movement was going to be all about (it's called "occupy" for crying out loud). This is what we need to see.
History lesson. The Paris Commune of 1871 was the first major socialist experiment in the history of the world. France had just suffered a defeat by Germany, and it left the agitated, politically aware citizenry in Paris extremely bitter. They were dragged into a war they didn't even want, and then their city was fucking bombarded. They were pissed. The newly elected National Assembly (which had a large royalist majority) decided that Paris was too turbulent for them to meet there. They moved several miles southwest of Paris. What this created for the Parisians was a power vacuum.
The Paris National Guard (basically a citizen militia) was getting increasingly radical. The French government decided that they should not be allowed to have cannons. But when regular troops arrived to seize them, they began to fraternize with the National Guard and Paris residents. When a general ordered them to open fire on the Guard and civilians, he was dragged from his horse by his own troops and later shot, along with a hated former National Guard commander. The rebellion was now in full swing.
The Central Committee for the National Guard was now the only thing in Paris resembling a government. It arranged elections for a Commune. The Commune was not allowed to exist for very long before it was crushed, but here's some of the things they were able to implement in that short time:
- Complete separation of church and state
- Abolition of night work
- The granting of pensions to the widows and children of National Guards killed on active service
- The right of employees to take over and run an enterprise if it were deserted by its owner
- Education for women
- Free clothing, food, and school materials for children
This is what socialism is: extremely weak central government; a culture based around caring for your fellow man; workers in control of their own lives; democracy in its purest, most beautiful form. The Commune was accepting of everyone, regardless of their political alignment. Reformist royalists were allowed to participate with open arms, and the socialists looked back to the left wing Jacobins of the Revolution of 1789. This is the blueprint we should strive to emulate.
It only last for a week before clashes with regular troops began. Fighting would take place over the course of about a month, and the Commune was finally crushed for good on May 28. Regular troops began slaughtering and executing Guardsmen and civilians almost at random.
These are exactly the kinds of tactics we need to be implementing. With things like the NDAA, Citizens United, the Patriot Act, SOPA, PIPA, and ACTA, the American people are no longer in control of their government (if they ever were at all). Voting is so strongly emphasized in our country, because it brings about the smallest amount of change. Activists, meanwhile, are equated to terrorists. This kind of rhetoric is going to become a standard talking point very soon.
Here's Howard Zinn talking briefly about the Paris Commune, and why Marxists and Anarchists should ally with each other.
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