As of 10:00am today, there have been a total of 1,786 protest related arrests. From listening to the protestors as I walk past them in the East Village, it now seems to be cool and an honor to have multiple arrests under your belt. People mill about in groups sharing their arrest experiences and try to one up one another in telling their own tale of what they did to fend off police .
Yes, they are violent and they are proud of it. But what of there message? I’ve been getting emails with questions about this very thing. You are puzzled as to why there have been so many arrests. What are they trying to do/accomplish or say? Well Jeff Jarvis, commenting about this phenomenon yesterday in his blog sheds some light on these very questions and poses one of his own:
But now, it seems like an odd means to an end. Does getting arrested help make the point? Well, it does if you're arrested by the enemy. But New York isn't the enemy or an agent of it. The New York cops are generally polite and friendly (and happy for all the overtime pay). New York is a Democratic town; this ain't Texas. Matt Welch said yesterday that it's a different matter in L.A., when you can't see the beetle-eyes of cops behind sunglasses, you fear arrest or worse. In New York, you fear a gruff grunt and plastic jail. Hell, the one person seriously injured so far in the protests was a cop.
So do you have to get arrested to make your point? I don't think so. Do the cops have to arrest to keep order? In many cases, no.
When I spoke with Jay Rosen last night, he said that too many people -- media people particularly -- are trying vainly to make 2004 into 1968, though there really are very few parallels; they are different times with different causes, a different experience.
If getting arrested isn't necessary to make your point or to get publicity or to make the power look by turning the arresting agent into the bad guy, then is getting arrested really a form of protest nostalgia?
Well, Jeff, to these men and women it’s more than that. For Black Bloc and the coalition members of A31 it is showing how ‘the police are really tools for a fascist state disguised as democracy’. What better way to do demonstrate this than to gather protestors for a well-publicized march for which there is no permit. When these innocents then move into the street to block traffic everyone who unsuspectingly follows them, thinking the group is moving on, gets swept up and arrested. They become startled, frustrated and angry wondering why the police have arrested an otherwise peaceful demonstration. They are not aware how they are blocking traffic, how ambulances with injured protestors, cops and innocent civilians can’t get patients to hospital.
No Jeff, it’s not for the nostalgia or the glory, though it may seem like it is to you. It is for an absolute political end, one in which members of Black Bloc (BB), etc., succeed in representing this administration as out of touch with the will and needs of the people.
BB’s aim is to hog the spotlight, subvert the dialogue with strident rhetoric and instill fear in people that the normal political process doesn’t work. Go to a31.org and you will see that their rhetoric espouses protest with a means to break away from a political process (democracy) that they believe does not work. They wish to eliminate our economic system, and for us to live in a quasi communist/anarchist state, where the small collective rule supersedes that of government but the rights of individual reigns supreme over all. They wish to eliminate the rule of law, which the police currently represent, which limit their supreme rights as individuals to do as they please.
Of course you can’t see this clearly. You are in there with them involved in a dialogue without being aware of who they truly are. Some are the puppets, who are excited about being arrested and for what it means to them personally, they are part of an elite club. For others, such as Black Bloc it’s a means to an end. And you, dear blogger, are too deep in the forest to look back and see the whole forest. Hope you emerge soon to see what is truly going on!
I think that a lot of them are being released pre-indictment with just desk appearance tickets, by the way.
Posted by: RP at September 2, 2004 02:55 PMAlthough my favorite was in the NY Post yesterday when a judge said, to two defendants who did not want to give their names, that he was not arraigning "John Does" and that they could go back downstairs and he "would see them next week".
Posted by: RP at September 2, 2004 03:02 PMYou are correct! That's exactly what they're doing with them. Hence the revolving door effect of these protestors on the courtsystem.
Posted by: michele at September 2, 2004 04:01 PM