News :: [none]
Jim Maurer is a liar. Protesters not allowed to leave...
Jim Maurer lies about protesters.
single one of the protesters was legitimate--not just the ones whose politics Jim Maurer approves of. Secondly, the group under siege at Chicago Ave. Thursday night accurately represented the demographics of the march as a whole. This included students, parents with children, seniors, anarchists, liberals, and socialists, among many others.
The people who were arrested at Chicago Ave. varied widely. They were not arrested for anything they particularly did. They were arrested because the police merely had the opportunity to arrest them.
I shared a holding cell with a legal advisor from the National Lawyer’s Guild, a reporter from a local university who was clearly wearing press credentials (he was given the impression he could leave through the police line, but was then arrested), a Lithuanian who was not associated with the protesters, but was trapped by police, and then beaten and arrested by them), and a man who had been in Chicago for one day, also not associated with the protest, who was beaten and arrested when he objected to the treatment of the Lithuanian man.
Police couldn’t even be bothered with the task of distinguishing bystanders from participants.
These people were arrested and brutalized for no reason other than police irresponsibility. The police could have let protesters disperse, a few people at a time, if they wanted to diffuse the march. Most protesters wanted to leave anyway. But instead, the police command wanted retaliation for their tactical defeat earlier in the evening, and instigated a confrontation. When protesters did not respond violently, the police began arresting people anyway.
One few final notes of clarification:
Jim Maurer claims that when protesters stopped at Oak St. they were offered several options, and chose to go back south on LSD (he said this in his Friday press conference). This is not true. Protesters wanted to head south on Michigan Ave., but the police would absolutely not allow it. When protesters persisted in their demands, riot police began donning gas masks and pulling out their pepper spray. Looking to avoid an all out riot, protesters conceded and headed back south on LSD.
Also, I marched in the southbound lanes of LSD, weaving between cars. The majority of the drivers were either very enthusiastic or amused. Some people were obviously irritated. However, I did not see any one pounding on windshield as Jim Maurer claims. I was particularly watching out for this behavior, as I felt it would unduly irritate people. Much to my pleasure, I never saw it happen. I did see, though, many motorists high-fiving protesters as they passed their cars.
I should hope that a little anger and irritation are not too much to bear during a protest against our military’s devastating attacks on Iraq and its people through sanctions, bombing and war.