Why Did The Cops Attack Us? (11/16)

i'm all for this discussion happening but i'd just like to point out that:
1) police brutality ain't nuthin new (although i always think it's important to support people who have been roughed up for the first time)
and 2) there is nothing you can do to dissuade cops from being ass kicking machines. it's their job and they are a huge part of how this and all states maintain their power over a population. please don't think that you can beg them to be more "humane."

this comment is not meant to be discouraging. it is my great hope that folks continue resisting (perhaps bringing more creativity into it) but just understand what they are dealing with. it might be good to hold a workshop that goes over some good self defense, first aid and supporting each other in the face of repression. repression is not just about knocking heads and installing fear. it's also about dividing people and fracturing movements.

fuck the police

There are definetely links in struggles and yes cops opress everyone. But really think when talking about police repression of UCSC Oaxaca and Palestine. Cause people in Oaxaca and Palestine are dealin with some way more serious shit than UCSC students. I hope that in your event you also spend some time on the differences of the police repression you experience as a UCSC college student and the opression of people in Palestine and Oaxaca.

why do you have such faulty info on the # of people killed in oaxaca on this flier? it seems to make yr comparison btwn the 3 different instances that much stranger that you don't even pay enough attention to oaxaca to understand that many more have been killed in the recent struggles down there, and even more have disappeared...

I'm excited by both the topic of this discussion and the thoughtful comments that have been posted (yes - including the simple 3-word slogan!). Each comment made strikes me as valid, and worthy of deeper analysis.

I'm excited because this is an area that I haven't seen much exploration of. Yes, let's get a better understanding of the role of the police as the state's "ass-kicking" machine. Yes, let's explore the different strategies of repression used in Oaxaca, Gaza, and UCSC. Not to draw comparisons, or compete for the title of Most Repressed, but to understand how different strategies (physical/psychological) are used in different environments to achieve the same result - maintenance of the status quo - and to explore how we can use that understanding to defend our physical and spiritual integrity.

I was also a surprised to read this:

"Four protestors have been murdered by the Mexican military in the state of Oaxaca."

First of all, the Mexican Military has not been in Oaxaca during the struggle since May 2006. The Mexican Federal Police (PFP) invaded Oaxaca City in late October (maybe the 27th or 28th... double check....)

Lots of people have been killed by paramilitaries back by the US and Mexico ruling elite.

we should also mention...

Names of Oaxaca´s Disappeared
http://indybay.org/newsitems/2006/11/10/18328715.php

Is there a report-back from the event??? How did it go?

There should be a taboo against men dressing alike (uniforms, gang colors, etc) and carrying weapons. They commit atrocities because they have overwhelming force against unarmed civilians, are anonymous (no badge numbers or any personal ID (names and addresses)showing on their uniforms) and are backed up by the force of law.

IN other words, they have permission to sink to their lowest level of club wielding thugs. Armies are legal gangs.

But who would enforce the taboo? Oh that.

While the police brutality was disgusting, there was much UCSC could have done to de-escalate the behavior of the police.

I recommend that UCSC start trying to deal with the people who show up at actions who throw things at police, who spit, who punch, who think you can fight cops with physical force. It doesn't work.

You can't beat the state at its own game: violence.

A camera phone captured a UCLA student being shot with a stun gun by a police officer.

11/15/06 Video Runtime 6 Minutes

 

..so in a sad, sad, twisted way, be happy that the conflictuality between the state and anyone who acts about their dreams of a slightly less fucked up world (or anyone who just happens to be too brown or too poor and has to be beat in line by pigthugs) was made obvious by the incident in santa cruz. at least there it made sense, in tactical terms, that the uc santa cruz pigs peppersdprayed kids. in UCLA thursday, someone from middle eastern descent was repeatedly tazered (obviously racial profiling and brutality) which is a whole lot more terrifying in some ways.

so do you suggest we just sit down and get our heads cracked by batons? and what about if we hasve to deal with paramilitaries like in oaxaca? even there people responded to teargas with bricks, in a nonviolent struggle. what the fuck is "violence" anyways? its a language construct. looks and language can be violent, hunting is violent, cops are violent, nukes are violent. i mean, where do you draw the fucking line?

theres a monster, and its eating your world. your life. and if youre unlucky, or speak too loud, they might just pepper spray you or beat you, to silence you while the oceans turn to acid, praries turn to deserts, the glaciers vanish and the poor are murederd and enslaved.

so when it tries to eat you, and theres noone left to defend you, will you just sit down and say "i wont play?"

CHOMP.

but on a happy positive note, cockraches and fungi will surely make it.

not much we know in our daily life will.

ciao

Nonviolence isn't reducible pacifism. It's a proactive political strategy and set of tactics. No true nonviolent tactician would just sit there as the monster eats them up. You need to wage nonviolent struggle five steps ahead of the "chomp."

The cops attacked because that's what they're trained to do. Those who fought back at UCSC on the day in question helped the UC Regents win the battle that day.

Sure, there's a monster killing us, killing the planet. But one reason that monster is so powerful is because it harnesses violence, it convinces humans that it's okay to harm other humans because it's for the right cause. We should be out there disarming it, not buying into its logic.

"I recommend that UCSC start trying to deal with the people who show up at actions who throw things at police, who spit, who punch, who think you can fight cops with physical force. It doesn't work."

Who is "UCSC" ?

Let's not assume to know who the 'people who show up at actions who throw things at police, who spit, who punch....."

What the hell are you talking about?! Don't post words on the Internet when you do not know what you are talking about. Also, this may be news to you, but there is a police tactic known as 'agent provocateur'

I know many of those who took part in the UCSC protest against the Regents, some of them are good friends.

I know that several students and some of the woodsy anarchist kids there provoked the police by striking at them with words and physical force. This was the wrong thing to do. It only led to your defeat. Of course the police were the ones who are to blame for attacking the students, but there was much you all could have done to prevent the ridiculous outburst and arrests that occurred.

As is the Regents don't even know what you all were so "angry" about up there. They were confused by you 20 some odd demands and felt as though they were being threatened by a mob.

I’m not advocating nonviolence as an ideology. I acknowledge that other tactics including use of force to defend or even liberate can gain a lot. But it can also cause great harm. In tactical terms you all should be building nonviolent mobilizations up there. That’s how you’ll win. In the meantime I guess the trendy (and seriously flawed) Gelderloos analysis of nonviolence will carry the day in the little backward bubble called Santa Cruz.

I was 2,000+ miles away on that day. I learned about it reading the story viewed only through the distorted lens of the SC Sentinel.

It was still plainly obvious that the police attacked the students, and it was plainly obvious why the students were there. The regents aren't confused. The regents are the enablers of the massive corruption that plagues the entire system. The regents are the reason UCSC will be turned into a Cal State Santa Cruz diploma mill. The regents are a large part of the problem.

I'm sick of listening to all the second-guessing and lectures on nonviolence from dried up sixties right-wing liberal has-beens and sell-outs. If those geriatrics would get off their collective arses and do something other than grumble about the massive slaughter the US and its proxy perpetrate in the Middle East, I'll start to take what they have to say somewhat seriously.

Those students represent one of the few glimmers of hope that we have as a community at UCSC. I take my hat off to them.

Sorry, but I'm on the font lines. I was just arrested at a Regents meeting. I'm fighting this first-hand. I've had cops hit me and drag me, and hurt me. I've also done much of the research on the UC Regents that students have used to understand who they are. I know just as well as you all do who they are, what their vested interests are, and how far they will go to repress us.

But you're analysis of nonviolence is totally backward.

You're bound to lose if you think you can fight back with force. I hope you can muster the courage to really question the way that the system functions. Otherwise you’re just playing into their hand. The context here is key.

I didn't analyze nonviolence at all.

What does get tiresome is hearing people like the President of our Academic Senate parrot the administrative claims that the police essentially did nothing wrong and were attacked by the violent rouge element of students that has to be singled out and eliminated (sorry if you thought I was targeting you with my words -- I was trying to be diplomatically vague).

Nonviolence is a tactic for most people, not a religious ethos. I respect those for whom it is a religious ethos, but it is presumptuous to think everyone operates (or even should operate) under this premise. There are certainly times when violent action can be successful and appropriate (think of the overthrow of Somoza in Nicaragua for example, or those 13 colonies who gave King George the boot, or the abolitionist movement).

I'm not suggesting that this was one such example, but rather am calling into question the relevancy of the debate on nonviolence. I think it is a distraction from the issue. It seems to me the UC police are the ones in need of the lecture about nonviolence (both the Santa Cruz ones and those at UCLA who torture with a taser for refusal to show id -- see above video); the students here have absorbed far more violence than they could even dream of dishing out. If in the process of being attacked they don't all live up to the spirit of Ghandi, I think it is fairly understandable, if not forgivable.

This idea that students, Palestinians, or whomever have to be perfect victims to be taken seriously is a major propaganda coup for the repressors.

The other problem with this focus on violence vs. nonviolence is that you very quickly see acts of vandalism labeled violence. No, I am not endorsing destruction of property either (although I acknowledge that too can be a valid tactic in an appropriate situation) but am simply pointing out that the definition quickly gets expanded to include fairly trivial stuff for the purpose of isolating and dividing the people who react to injustice. The university is divisive enough without us doing their work for them.

William,

I agree with a lot of what you're saying there in that last post. But I also think that the debate about violence vs. nonviolence is important. What happened at UCSC when the Regents showed up could have been avoided had there been more discussion about what is tactically appropriate in a setting like UCSC. I know it's not very sexy to acknowledge the ridiculousness of armed struggle/defense in the context of modern US social movements, but it is just plain silly to be forceful, especially at UCSC - a very white privileged place.

Your comments about being "sick of listening to all the second-guessing and lectures on nonviolence from dried up sixties right-wing liberal has-beens and sell-outs" makes me engage further on the nonviolence issue. Of course the administration has their line about how the students were to blame. But if you all react to that simply be rejecting outright that you have any responsibility, that you all fucked this action up also because you failed on tactical grounds then I think you're not learning from your defeats. Ya'll were defeated on so many accounts. You won in terms of creating chaos (which I think is great BTW), but in terms of the moral high ground, public opinion, the opinion of students on your campus and other campuses, your message and reasons for mobilizing: ya'll lost.

Your comment about the cops needing a lecture on nonviolence is right on. How this really happens in a profound way is a long term process, and it's not the authorities that give this lecture. It's the brothers, sisters, mothers of the cops who spread questions that eventually lead state agents to question the legitimacy of what they're doing and to sympathize with those who they've been told are the enemy.

Disarming police and military forces is very difficult. What people did up there at UCSC was exactly the opposite of what should be done to disarm the cops and make them ineffective/illegitimate in the immediate situation. I'd hope that there's more talk internally amongst students and others up there about not just "why the cops attacked us," but what we could have done differently to disarm the cops and push our movement forward.

I know I've ranted on this thread like an unrelenting critic of you all up there, but it's because I identify with you all and want us to win. So take my words with a grain of salt and some solidarity.

Well, I am not a student (I am on the faculty), so what I had in mind were the commentaries offered some of my older colleagues who seem to think that what they all know better and that what was achieved in 1968 was the pinnacle of human moral development, and today's struggles and anti-war movement are a pale imitation to be sneered at. I'm not suggesting those students currently involved are beyond reproach, but they are the only ones at UCSC who seem to be taking a serious stand, and I admire them for doing so. I actually haven't met them, but have corresponded with a few and I can tell they are intelligent, thoughtful, and sincere.

I've been here about 8 years, and I was really shocked at the level of student apathy. Things have really started to change for the better in that regard in the last few years, but after every major action (this, tent city, war recruiters, etc) there seems to be unending denunciation of the tactics and mistakes, and much of this denunciation comes from those who want to ingratiate themselves with the university power structure. I find that disheartening and disempowering, and all I have done for the most part is to watch from the sidelines.

The other point I want to challenge is that the students "fucked up" the action.

I think that simply is not true at all. It appears to have been a success. Like I say, I only read about it (originally) in the Sentinel while 2000 miles away, so I saw it portrayed through a rather critical filter. The reason why I bothered to look in the Sentinel was because my wife (who has at home with our 3 year old at the time) phoned me up and said the police cars were screaming all around campus and basically going nuts in a way that they usually reserve for a skateboarding dog without a leash.

The police come off as looking ridiculously heavy-handed, and the students come off as making pretty clear and reasonable demands like "Fix it first" (referring to the insane notion that maybe UCSC would be better off addressing its current problems before embarking on wanton and directionless expansion).

The chaos and the clashes drew a lot of attention. It underscores the fact that the only way the University is capable of dealing with dissent is to bring out heavily armed enforcement. Despite whatever you might think about rich white kids playing anarchist, the fact remains that when rich white parents turn on their TVs in the evening to see their rich white progeny getting sprayed with mace for demanding quality education, it makes an impact.

I'm sorry people got hurt, but I think the action was incredibly successful.