Anyone who has been following the events at Zuccotti/Liberty Plaza events today knows why I'm posting "Gee Officer Winski" at this point.
Jake -- JRozLive on Ustream -- was video streaming the events as police moved in to the park this evening and started harassing and arresting people. Ultimately, Jake himself was arrested. He managed to document the action in the video below:
Video streaming by Ustream
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/23928054
Nate was also streaming, and according to reports, he recorded Jake's arrest, though I haven't see it yet.
Officer Winski figured prominently in all the police violence today. But then, as someone drolly put it, "That's his job."
"Gee, Officer Winski..."
Highlights of the evidentiary video submission in the federal case of
Rodriguez Vs. Winski seeking oversight of NYPD, MTA and other entities
in light of the systematic suppression of the constitutional rights of
politicans and journalists to observe police actions against Occupy Wall
Street protesters.
----------------------------------------------------
I just want to add that these sorts of actions have the effect of delegitimizing the police in the eyes of more and more Americans. Of course minority communities have been subjected to far worse over a far longer time, with the result that the police and the civil authorities that back them have literally no legitimacy in the community at all. They are the equivalent of an army of occupation. Throughout the Occupy Era (isn't that a turn of phrase!) the police, particularly in New York, have extended their "occupation army" theory of operation far and wide, such that all public space whatever is now subject to arbitrary imposition of authority, Americans are routinely subjected to arbitrary and random mass arrest, and numerous cases of police raids -- mostly in the dead of night -- on fishing expeditions for "communists" and "anarchists" are now expected features of our police state no matter where one lives. In addition, police forces all over the country have acquired military equipment through DHS with which to "combat" the People should they persist in demonstrating their displeasure with the way things are.
All of it together, cumulatively, has the effect of making the police look like an army and behave like thugs and goons toward the People they are sworn to protect and serve. Most especially, their behavior makes mock of their oath to "protect and defend the Constitution."
This behavior ultimately is a severely destabilizing force in a society that is already under extraordinary strain from continued economic shocks. Apparently, the belief on the part of Authority is that by force alone they can maintain control of the deteriorating situation. In other eras, in other lands, for a time, that may have been the case. I doubt it will prove to be so in the United States as the 21st Century wears on.
Showing posts with label Liberty Plaza. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Liberty Plaza. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Saturday, November 19, 2011
More on the "Romania" take down and suppression of access to information
Another view of the police aktion:
Another:
Another (This one appears to show that Brendan is on the ground but not injured earlier in the melee. Could be important. On the other hand, there are people calling out "Look at his face!" so he may have already sustained injury.)
RT's take on all the overthetop police violence against demostrators:
Yes. Well.
Of course it is clear that NYPD are using "tactics" against the demonstrators. Since they've been back in Zuccotti/Liberty Plaza, there have been numerous assaults and destructive actions against the demonstrators.
The Plaza is surrounded by a double row of barricades. The barricades are used to pen (aka: "kettle") the demonstrators inside the Plaza and to protect the police outside the Plaza. There are clear metaphors here, but I'll skip them for the moment.
Periodically and arbitrarily, the police mount aktions on the people in the Plaza; they have quite a diversity of actions available, and they've tried them out on many occasions. In the case of Brendan "Romania" Watts, they used the excuse that he was "throwing things" at them to launch a full-scale "invasion" from many directions, all to capture this one "threat" to their dignity and well-being.
It was both spontaneous and coordinated. Think about that for a minute.
Hundreds of officers participated, most on behalf of crowd control and force protection, but there were several dozen directly involved in "subduing" this one "threat." One of the supervising officers is seen in the first video above performing a face-plant on a bicycle; that must have left a mark. There have been other scenes of police officers banging on one another with nightsticks or yanking one another out of the way to go bang on protesters and bystanders alike.
It's quite riotous on their part -- and ultimately deliberately chaotic.
In the case of Brendan, he is seen relatively early in the upper video briefly -- at least I think it is him -- standing with his hands up in the middle of the sea of blue uniforms, and then the camera angle shifts and he's gone. He's apparently down on the ground again and police are grabbing at him. Later, he's seen on his back with his knees pulled up, perhaps trying to protect his vitals from whatever it is they are doing to him.
Still later, he is seen pulled out of the planter, lying on his back, his head in a pool of blood.
It's obvious the police know he is badly injured, and some of them seem to be taking care not to hurt him further. At the same time, it appears that the goal of the aktion is to parade Brendan, bloodied and nearly unconscious, through the crowd, so that the demonstrators see what happens to somebody who gets out of line or even thinks about it.
The police want the attention they are receiving in their mass attack on Brendan as well as the parade through the crowd showing off their handiwork. They want people to see the blood. They want people to see how hurt he is.
It's all part of the psy-ops to discourage further participation in OWS demonstrations. I've read that this tactic -- swarming, bloodying and parading -- is used in our various imperial wars of aggression overseas. As is "snatch and grab" -- in which officers single out, target and force-detain individuals in crowds, sometimes arbitrarily, but often on the presumption that these individuals are leaders or instigators whose absence will bring the demonstration to a standstill or even lead to its dissolution.
The repeated destruction of the People's Library at Liberty/Zuccotti Plaza is one of the most emblematic efforts at suppression that's been going on there. It is an aktion that brings to mind far too many previous efforts to destroy books and libraries and to prevent the People's free access to information.
The suppression of free access to information (about Civil Rights and the War in Vietnam, among other things) at UC Berkeley in the fall and winter of 1964 is what led to the Free Speech Movement (I know, broken record. So what. ;-P) which was the trigger for all the rest of the rebellion/revoluja of the '60's.
And yes, the cracked skulls and the bloody suppression of rebellion was used as propaganda by "both sides."
So it is again.
----------------
The Zimbio Photostream appears to show that Brendan was not bleeding when he was on the ground.
Another:
Another (This one appears to show that Brendan is on the ground but not injured earlier in the melee. Could be important. On the other hand, there are people calling out "Look at his face!" so he may have already sustained injury.)
RT's take on all the overthetop police violence against demostrators:
Yes. Well.
Of course it is clear that NYPD are using "tactics" against the demonstrators. Since they've been back in Zuccotti/Liberty Plaza, there have been numerous assaults and destructive actions against the demonstrators.
The Plaza is surrounded by a double row of barricades. The barricades are used to pen (aka: "kettle") the demonstrators inside the Plaza and to protect the police outside the Plaza. There are clear metaphors here, but I'll skip them for the moment.
Periodically and arbitrarily, the police mount aktions on the people in the Plaza; they have quite a diversity of actions available, and they've tried them out on many occasions. In the case of Brendan "Romania" Watts, they used the excuse that he was "throwing things" at them to launch a full-scale "invasion" from many directions, all to capture this one "threat" to their dignity and well-being.
It was both spontaneous and coordinated. Think about that for a minute.
Hundreds of officers participated, most on behalf of crowd control and force protection, but there were several dozen directly involved in "subduing" this one "threat." One of the supervising officers is seen in the first video above performing a face-plant on a bicycle; that must have left a mark. There have been other scenes of police officers banging on one another with nightsticks or yanking one another out of the way to go bang on protesters and bystanders alike.
It's quite riotous on their part -- and ultimately deliberately chaotic.
In the case of Brendan, he is seen relatively early in the upper video briefly -- at least I think it is him -- standing with his hands up in the middle of the sea of blue uniforms, and then the camera angle shifts and he's gone. He's apparently down on the ground again and police are grabbing at him. Later, he's seen on his back with his knees pulled up, perhaps trying to protect his vitals from whatever it is they are doing to him.
Still later, he is seen pulled out of the planter, lying on his back, his head in a pool of blood.
It's obvious the police know he is badly injured, and some of them seem to be taking care not to hurt him further. At the same time, it appears that the goal of the aktion is to parade Brendan, bloodied and nearly unconscious, through the crowd, so that the demonstrators see what happens to somebody who gets out of line or even thinks about it.
The police want the attention they are receiving in their mass attack on Brendan as well as the parade through the crowd showing off their handiwork. They want people to see the blood. They want people to see how hurt he is.
It's all part of the psy-ops to discourage further participation in OWS demonstrations. I've read that this tactic -- swarming, bloodying and parading -- is used in our various imperial wars of aggression overseas. As is "snatch and grab" -- in which officers single out, target and force-detain individuals in crowds, sometimes arbitrarily, but often on the presumption that these individuals are leaders or instigators whose absence will bring the demonstration to a standstill or even lead to its dissolution.
The repeated destruction of the People's Library at Liberty/Zuccotti Plaza is one of the most emblematic efforts at suppression that's been going on there. It is an aktion that brings to mind far too many previous efforts to destroy books and libraries and to prevent the People's free access to information.
The suppression of free access to information (about Civil Rights and the War in Vietnam, among other things) at UC Berkeley in the fall and winter of 1964 is what led to the Free Speech Movement (I know, broken record. So what. ;-P) which was the trigger for all the rest of the rebellion/revoluja of the '60's.
And yes, the cracked skulls and the bloody suppression of rebellion was used as propaganda by "both sides."
So it is again.
----------------
The Zimbio Photostream appears to show that Brendan was not bleeding when he was on the ground.
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