FW: Eyewitness account of nonviolent action at WTO

* * *

I have one problem with the activists' premise.  That is, the line should be
drawn farther back.  I disagree with the groups who try to draw a
distinction between shutting down the meeting and rioting.  Although no one
got hurt, shutting down the conference was an act of violence, in that it
deprived the delegates of their rights to association, assembly and speech.
I'm disappointed that when the WTO offered to include activists in open
forums, the activists declined, instead deciding that it is better to shut
down the process completely.  That's as undemocratic as throwing stones at a
McDonald's window.

The problem is that activists don't distinguish between the successful
protests of the civil rights movement and the unsuccessful ones that
followed.  I can't imagine Martin Luther King leading anything like what
happened in Seattle.  Did MLK shut down the Birmingham bus system?  No, he
led a boycott.  Did he shut down Selma?  No, he led a march.  Did he block
the streets of Washington and prevent Congress from meeting until blacks
were better represented?  No, he led a peaceful protest on the Mall.  Even
the Greensboro lunch counter boycotts--the prototype for civil
disobedience--did not deprive others of their right to do business at the
very same lunch counter or of the lunch counter owner to keep his business
open.

The Seattle protesters should not have blocked the convention center.  They
should have gathered peacefully, spoken, demanded that their voices be heard
and participated in forums when invited.  Instead, they waged a "Battle."
Is it any surprise that some took the battle literally?  Mike Dolan and his
collegues are every bit as much to blame for what happened as the less
informed thugs in ski masks.

C. Sisk


>-----Original Message-----
>From: owner-wsn@csf.colorado.edu [mailto:owner-wsn@csf.colorado.edu] On
>Behalf Of Andrew Hund
>Sent: Wednesday, December 01, 1999 7:34 PM
>To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK
>Subject: Eyewitness account of nonviolent action at WTO
>
>
>
>WTO report from Peter Bergel:
>
>A committed activist named Peter Bergel has published the Oregon
>PeaceWorker (www. teleport.com/~opw) for some years, and has just sent this
>post from the streets of Seattle.
>
>-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
>
>Date: Wed, 1 Dec 1999 06:38:47 -0800 (PST)
>Subject: Peter Bergel's WTO Report
>
>Dear Friends,
>Here is an account of the WTO actions in Seattle from my perspective.   I
>have been doing nonviolence training for several days and I was on the
>street all day today.  -- Peter
>_________________
>
>Notes on 11-30-99 WTO Protest Actions
>
>Overall Impressions
>
>* The protests today represented a new beginning of cooperation between
>labor, environmental, peace, human rights and other groups.  Many were
>represented and worked together very well.
>* The direct action was carried out by mainly young activists who had been
>trained for the week before and handled themselves superbly, by and large.
>They were disciplined, radical, well-educated and had a good grasp of the
>value of nonviolence, at least as a tactic.  I found that they knew a
>remarkable amount about WTO, free trade, capitalism and related topics.
>* The City of Seattle's downtown area was completely shut down.  The people
>took over the streets and the police were not able to exercise more than
>token control over them.
>* For the most part, the police behaved well.  They were seriously
>outnumbered, stressed, provoked at times and probably felt frightened.
>Nevertheless, they used force sparingly and overstepped the need
>infrequently.
>* The protesters did a magnificent job of policing themselves.  The minor
>outbreaks of violent anger were contained by the demonstrators with
>surprising skill and commitment.
>* The WTO meetings were seriously impacted.  The opening was delayed, many
>delegates were prevented from attending at all, and those who did could not
>get to their meetings without running the gantlet of angry protesters
>making their message clear in both mass and invidual ways.
>* It was probably a very significant day in the history of people's power,
>"free" trade evolution and defense of democracy.
>
>Personal Experiences
>
>After gathering at Steinbrueck Park at 7 a.m. today, we marched downtown in
>a huge march which stretched for many blocks.  How many I couldn't tell
>from my position within it, but we were only half of the total since
>another march started from another location, converging on the WTO meeting
>place from another direction.
>
>Once downtown, we split into different sub-groups to occupy different parts
>of downtown.  The area around the WTO had been divided into thirteen
>sectors with clusters of affinity groups (small autonomous action groups)
>responsible for deciding upon > and carrying out > a blockade of their
>sector.  My group marched around downtown a bit and wound up in front of
>the Sheraton Hotel, where many delegates were staying.  Human blockades
>were set up by dedicated affinity groups at every entrance, including the
>parking garage.  Protesters lined up across the entrances, linked arms and
>stood their ground.  At several points there were face-to-face standoffs
>between protesters and police.  The police wore face shields, gas masks (at
>times) and body armor and carried long sticks, sidearms, pepper spray and
>sometimes plastic riot shields.  The protesters wore old clothes, rain
>protection and bandannas against tear gas.  Some were wildly costumed and a
>few had gas masks.
>
>There was some pushing and rough stuff now and then when delegates tried to
>get out of the hotel or get back in.  Protesters tried to prevent any entry
>or egress and sometimes the delegates tried to push through.  When they
>did, police interfered, if they were close by.
>
>About 10 a.m. tear gas was used by the police to clear the immediate area.
>By that time I had moved up the street and was not gassed.  When the gas
>dispersed, I went back down to find out what had occasioned the use of the
>gas.  It had been used to clear the intersection along Union to afford
>meeting access to some WTO delegates.  However, rather few of them appeared
>to be using it.  The police lined both sides of the intersection to keep it
>clear.  As the delegates walked through, the crowd booed them loudly and
>then began shouting "shame, shame."  A few minutes later, another tear gas
>attack back up the street drove people down toward my position and the gas
>followed them.  I was gassed slightly.
>
>As I walked around downtown, I found that practically every intersection
>was filled with people dancing, drumming and blockading and the numbers
>were truly amazing.  The police were mostly holding various lines and not
>letting people through them.  Then periodically they would use tear gas to
>clear an area.  People would leave the area, circle around to another block
>and come back when the gas dispersed.  The police would shortly abandon the
>intersection they had just secured and move to another one and the process
>would begin again.  The upshot of this was that the police were unable to
>protect much of anything at all, yet hey could not spare the manpower to
>arrest demonstrators without losing control of the areas they were trying
>to protect.  The downtown was firmly in the protesters' hands and it was
>clear that without the consent of the governed not much could be
>accomplished, if enough of the governed decided to resist.
>
>Some of the signs that impressed me included:
>* The Senators who ratified the WTO  Treaty should be tried for treason.
>* Do YOU remember voting for the WTO?
>* Keep the sweatshop in the sauna.
>* More health, less wealth.
>* I hope you can eat your money.
>* No legislation without representation.
>*
>
>I saw two police cars parked in the street as part of a police counter
>blockade.  One had a flat rear tire and both had such graffiti as "Pig" and
>"Fuck cops" spray-painted to them.  There was also some glass
>breakage,overturning of dumpsters and paper boxes and defacing of
>buildings, but the damage was trivial considering the huge numbers of
>people in the area, the anger that the tear-gassing triggered and the
>wealth of those against which the property damage was directed.  More
>important, though, was the response of the demonstrators to virtually every
>outbreak of property damage or hot-headedness.  Demonstrators moved
>immediately to quell property damage and equally determinedly to break up
>conflicts.  Others immediately began to chant "Nonviolent protest!
>Nonviolent protest!  The effect was to put the rowdier elements on notice
>that their tactics were not appreciated by the vast majority of those
>present.  I even saw a line of demonstrators link arms to successfully
>protect the windows of a VoiceStream Wireless store from window-breakers.
>
>The favorite chant of the day was "Hey, hey!  Ho, ho!  WTO has got to go!"
>Not too imaginitive, perhaps, but easy to learn and it had a good rhythm.
>At one point, a group sang the Star Spangled Banner.  When they got to the
>line about the land of the free, people stopped singing and went into wild
>applause.  Another favorite chant was "Whose streets?  Our streets!  Whose
>streets?  Our streets!"
>
>Crowd size estimates on the news seem to have been characteristically
>small:  one early report said there were 5,000 downtown in the morning.  I
>would guess the number at 4-6 times that, though that is only a guess.  All
>I can say is that all the streets I went to were full of people and I would
>guess that a tightly packed block would probably hold about 1,000 people.
>Even a loosely packed block would have to have 3-400 in it.  And there were
>blocks like that up and down many streets.  I can't imagine there were less
>than 10-20,000 downtown in the morning and possibly as many as 30,000.
>Then there must have been a good 40-50,000 in the "Big" labor march which
>came downtown in the afternoon.  That would boost the count to 50-60,000,
>maybe even as high as 70,000.  Honest estimates based on helicopter
>pictures could be made, but I don't know if they will be.
>
>In many intersections, protesters "locked down."  They connected themselves
>to each other and to heavy blocks or concrete-filled pipes to make it
>impossible for the police to move them.  This was another reason the cops
>didn't arrest people.  They just couldn't.  Some of those locked down were
>still in the intersections when the police used tear gas in the area and
>they just had to endure it.
>
>I spoke briefly to a WTO delegate from Trinidad and Tobago > a small
>country of less than 2,000 square miles > which has what he called
>"manageable debt."  He seemed to understand what we were protesting about
>quite well.  Especially he understood the trade-offs forced by the
>requirements of debt repayment.
>
>People on the streets were often very helpful towards one another, sharing
>water, helping them out of areas in which they didn't want to be, washing
>each other's eyes and so on.  A few medical types are carrying saline
>solution for severe tear gas victims.  There are also legal observers
>wearing specially printed white T-shirts and taking notes on what they see
>going on.
>
>Two kinds of tear gas seemed to be in use.  One was whitish-grey and seemed
>to remain relatively local where it was shot.  The other was dark, almost
>black, and seemed to blanket much larger areas quickly.  It obscures vision
>like smoke even if you don't get anywhere near it.
>
>I heard many fascinating conversations about the relative power of violence
>and nonviolence.  It was wonderful to hear so many people who weren't me
>carrying the defense of nonviolence in these circumstances.
>
>In some places there was plastic yellow tape marked "Police crime scene. Do
>not cross."  In many others there was identical looking tape which said
>instead, "Unseen crimes."
>
>A very disciplined drum corps with drums, cymbals, flags and a
>whistle-blowing majorette dressed in dark, revolutionary-looking clothing
>showed up from time to time throughout the day.  They would march in tight
>formation along the street, playing and responding to the whistled commands
>of the majorette.  Then, at a whistled signal, they would begin to deploy
>in various patterns.  They were entertaining, clever, humorous and good at
>what they do.  At one point, as they marched down a street, they suddenly
>veered sharply left and walked right into Starbucks, playing and marching
>around several times to the shock of the customers, some of which left at
>once.
>
>  The vanguard of the "Big" march arrived downtown about 1:30, occupying
>the
>whole street.  Although it came in fits and starts,  it flowed past my
>vantage point for 50 minutes before I found my Salem friends and  joined
>them.  We looped through a number of blocks of downtown and then began to
>head out of downtown a block over from where the march came in.
>To my amazement, we could see a steady stream still coming in!  It was
>2:45.   I left the march and stood on the corner to view the rest of the
>march.  By 3 p.m. the march's end had passed the point at which is could
>see it entering downtown a block up the street.   However, it was still
>another 20 minutes before the end passed my vantage point.  This means that
>a march that often filled the entire street took about an hour and a half
>to pass one point.  Could that be less than 50,000?
>
>I saw signs for at least these unions: steelworkers, electrical workers,
>teachers, bricklayers, ILWU (Longshoremen), painters, Stanford workers,
>service employees, teamsters, sheet metal workers, marine engineers,
>transit workers, boilermakers, plumbers steamfitters and refigerations
>workers, public service workers of Canada, cement masons, pulp paper and
>woodworkers, nurses, Canadian airways workers and carpenters.
>
>When the march had left, I went back to one of the lockdowns on 6th Avenue
>right next to the Sheraton Hotel.  There were still a lot of people
>downtown.  There were clearly less than before, but they still filled many
>blocks and the occupation continued.  At one point there was a disturbance
>as two men appeared to be trying to break though a line of protesters which
>was linked to prevent delegates from getting past.  Behind them was a line
>of police.  There was a scuffle and I went right over there to see if I
>could help maintain the peace.  One of the two fell down and immediately
>got up, very freaked out.  I began to calm him only to have my attention
>drawn to the other who was a few feet away.  His suit coat was open and he
>had a sidearm holster from which he had already removed the gun.  It was
>pointing down, but I had a moment of serious fear as I realized that,
>should he raise the weapon, I would be right in his immediate line of fire.
>However, he did not raise it.  Rather, he and the other man crossed through
>the police line and were gone.  The crowd had responded at once, shouting
>"He's got a gun.  He's got a gun."  and pointing.  The police responded by
>spraying the entire scene, including me, with pepper spray. Although I have
>seen tear gas a number of times before, I had never confronted pepper spray
>before.  It's pretty painful just to have on your
>skin.  It must be really awful to have in your eyes.
>
>At 5 p.m., the police moved to clear the entire area.  They began firing
>off large amounts of tear gas and people began to run down 6th.  A number
>of us shouted for them to walk to prevent panic and stampede.  Then we
>moved slowly out of the area.  The tear gas overtook us and I was gassed
>more heavily this time.  The stuff isn't as nasty as what they used to use
>in the 60s, but it's bad enough.  Shortly after that I left.  I later heard
>that the police used gas to clear most of the protesters out, but some
>remained and the day's first arrests took place that evening.   I heard
>numbers like 22 and 25 > a tiny number considering how many had been there
>during the day.
>Taken as a whole, the day was an unquestioned success.  The WTO could not
>help but get the message about how they were viewed by the many thousands
>present.  Moreover, they had not been able to agree on their agenda before
>they arrived for this meeting and then they lost a good deal of yesterday
>because the downtown area was so congested and even more of today due to
>delays and absence of delegates.
>
>Thanks for reading this far, if you have.  Please forward this to people
>who should be informed.
>
>Thank you.
>
>Peter Bergel
>
>-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
>
>***************************************
>Patrick G. Coy, Ph.D.
>Center for Applied Conflict Management
>Kent State University
>Box 5190
>Kent, OH 44242
>
>office phone: (330) 672-2875
>office fax:   (330) 672-3362
>Email: pcoy@kent.edu
>
>Home address: 6568 State Route 82
>               Hiram, OH 44234
>Home phone:   (330) 569-7642
>
>***************************************
>
>

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