Adventures in Emerging Adulthood
I just want to reiterate, the fact that people are surprised that this was aired is a sad commentary on the state of our media. Sure, we still have free press under the law, but not under the companies that own these news outlets. I miss the days of REAL journalism.ALL THE MOTHER FUCKING AWARDS TO THIS REPORTER.
Holy shit I cannot even believe they aired this. ldkjk;lsakd I’m just in shock right now.
Ask yourself exactly what it means when you’re shocked as most people are that they aired this. Think about that for a minute. Do we really have freedom of speech?
Everyone needs to watch this. at the very least, support the protesters, even if it’s just signal boosting.
i cannot believe this actually aired.
I’ve seen a lot of those individual clips through tumblr, but watching them strung together with a public someone condemning the police brutality makes it more poignant for me. I want every reporter in America to report on Occupy Wall Street and police brutality everywhere, Wall Street and not. These cavalier and nonchalant violent displays of power sicken me and make me want to be violent myself. Consciously though, if I were ever in a situation like that, I would hope to remain peaceful and that I was being filmed.
I hated cops on instinct growing up. Then I met some and I disliked them with reason while still hating on instinct. Then I saw videos and heard stories of police brutality and I feel like a volcano. This type of behavior is despicable, disgusting, and fucking wrong.
everyone watch this
outrageous.
incredible. so enraged right now. please take the time to watch this all the way through and see what’s really going on down there. I’ve seen videos and read articles on separate stories, and this video pretty much strings them all together perfectly. props, mister anchorman.
Wow. This was disheartening.
I went to Ellis Island the other day, and the exhibits featured thoughts from people who jad to pass through. Many of the quotes from the then-recent immigrants reflected on how they were afraid and distrustful of people in uniform because of their experiences in their home countries. They couldn’t accept that police were there to help them, protect them.
And a century later, this.
During my time down at Zuccotti thus far I’ve always felt more anxious when the police are around, rather than more safe. Wednesday night, a few police officiers—both white and blue shirts— were on there way to put down a wall of barricades on Cedar Street. A professional news channel was doing an interview on the far side of Cedar— I heard it was an MSNBC show— and thus the NYPD truck was going to have clear a path in the crowd of protesters eager to be filmed, and lay down the steel barricades between the black directors chairs and the protesters.
On there way over I overheard one cop say to another “Remember, it’s going to be on TV.” You think they’d understand by now that if anything happens and is recorded by a cell phone camera, it could be broadcast on TV.
I’m thankful that this video made it to MSNBC in this manner. I must say, as with the fellow rebloggers here, I was surprised to see this anchor put it so bluntly. And of course I’m further surprised that I was surprised that a journalist would show a little passion in presenting his team’s take on a situation on television.
Initially, in looking at these protests and their story, I believed any coverage of the NYPD’s brutality would only serve to sidetrack the greater aims of the movement. In other words reforming the NYPD’s policies were not a stated goal of the protesters. And while we should keep O’Donnell’s point about how most of NYC’s Finest were doing a commendable job, I can’t help but begin to think that this violence is something, maybe a symptom of a deep frustration. I don’t know. It’s wrong, at least.
(Source: allenfalkner, via thetrueprotest)
OK, now that I’m home…some thoughts about what went down tonight. That shit started like a bottle of decent champagne and ended like flat ginger ale on a hungover Sunday. The rally in Foley Square? Went off without a hitch. The union speakers were concise and practiced and the whole enterprise benefited from that professionalism. The march to Zuccotti went smoothly, the rally there was frankly awe-inspiring (at least in terms of numbers).
It’s after that that things went really, really south. I’ve never seen so many cops in my life as I saw tonight. They’d been pulled from every precinct. The mood on Wall and Broadway was incredibly tense as cops didn’t let us through. It became clear that there was a choice here: either we all needed to storm the barrier and do it up ‘68 style, or meekly leave. Instead, the protesters chose a weird middle ground that worked out badly for everyone, waiting and formulating a half-assed new plan.
Look, I saw cops beating people with nightsticks. I saw a cop on a scooter plow into three girls, slamming them into a parked car. I saw all that shit and I’m not defending it. But the creepy mob mentality of many of the protesters w/r/t the NYPD is nothing if not unfortunate. They know that if they antagonize the cops, the cops will respond, and that’s when the cameras start rolling. And that’s what happened tonight.
The night ended totally off message. Two or three hundred kids wandering the streets of FiDi, an arrest here and there, everyone looking exhausted. Complete 180 from the high at Foley Square at the beginning.
The take-home: they need the structure and message that the unions can provide. The minute you leave OWS to their own devices, things have the potential to go off the rails in a big way. I forget which union president said this, but one of them said at Zuccotti “you bring the brains, we bring the muscle” and I think that’s exactly right if they want to squeeze any tangible success out of this thing.
Yes. This.
As for my less exciting night, I mostly stayed in Zuccotti but still saw three arrests on side streets. Easily my favorite part of the night was following a march past Cipriani and watching wealthy, older diners literally look down on us from the balcony, cocktails in hand. That and being in the media center when they got the call from Spike saying that he wanted to livestream from inside a paddy wagon.
We’re talking about a democratic awakening. We’re talking about raising political consciousness, so it spills over; all parts of the country so people can begin to see what’s going on through a different set of lens. And then you begin to highlight what the more detailed demands would be, because in the end we’re really talking about what Martin King would call a revolution; a transfer of power from oligarchs to every day people of all colors, and that is a step-by-step process. It’s a democratic process, it’s a non-violent process, but it is a revolution, because these oligarchs have been transferring wealth from poor and working people at a very intense rate in the last 30 years, and getting away with it, and then still smiling in our faces and telling us it’s our fault. That’s a lie, and this beautiful group is a testimony to that being a lie.
When you get the makings of a U.S. autumn responding to the Arab Spring, and is growing and growing—-I hope it spills over to San Francisco and Chicago and Miami and Phoenix, Arizona, with our brown brothers and sisters, hits our poor white brothers and sisters in Appalachia—-so. it begins to coalesce. And I tell you, it is sublime to see all the different colors, all the different genders, all the different sexual orientations and different cultures, all together here in Liberty Plaza; there’s no doubt about it.
”Cornel West, interview. Democracy Now!, 29 September 2011
A good response to people who keep demanding that the OWS protestors draw up some sort of platform of demands. That rarely happens in the early stages of liberation movements. At the moment, it’s about raising the consciousness of everyday Americans who have thus far accepted the notion that the U.S. is a democratic, fair, and equal society. It may be a strange notion to most Americans, but our country is one that—like the countries involved in the Arab Spring—is crying out for a democratic revolution.
(via downlo)
Yup.
(via raptoravatar)
Thank you, Mr. West. Sounds a lot like fostering a protest culture. It’s time to normalize this type of dissent, because it doesn’t just belong to easily mocked stereotypes. It’s for everyone. Think about it.
(via youngmanhattanite)
It is a beautiful group.
(via youngmanhattanite)
