The Message from Seattle

The news from the Yuppie capitol wasn't nearly as anarchic or confusing as much of the media has suggested (not surprisingly, they are already blaming the Net). In fact, it was angry, focused, and overdue. The big battle of the 21st century - corporatism vs. the individual - is now officially underway.

Much of America was surprised by the disturbances in Seattle this week, especially the sometimes violent street protests and confrontations over what seemed to be a mixed bag of environmental, technological, economic and social issues.

What were these protests really about?

It was widely suggested in the mainstream media that many of the demonstrators had no idea what they were protesting, that they were just acting out, or mimicking other protest movements. Three "anarchists" in ski masks named Spider, DangerZone and Nimo gave interviews all week to reporters, usually in shadowy light from secret locations.

Is there anything more endearing than watching reporters interview menacing Net-based anarchists with Web sites? Why does one get the sense these kids will be chuckling all the way back to their dorms? Finally, we know why Dr. Evil had his headquarters in a Starbucks in Seattle's famous needle.

All week, "analysts" have been zeroing on this alleged anarchism, hinting darkly of nihilistic conspiracists, union thugs and a wanna-be-like-the-60's generation that has no real knowledge of global politics or indigenous social issues to call its own.

But it seems more accurate to say that many journalists missed the point. They seemed to have no idea what they were seeing and covering in the streets. The protestors weren't aping the battles of the 60s, but raising new, in many ways much more complex ones. They relate to corporatism, humanism, Net regulation, the environment, globalization and technology.

Street brawling aside - the birth of political movements is usually neither pretty nor coherent - this new kind of leaderless, bottom-up movement could best be described as Techno-Idealism. Defined on the Net, this new movement has already launched its first red-hot idea - that corporatism has run amok.

There was, perhaps inevitably, the notion, not the first or last time this will be suggested in coming weeks, that all of this poorly-articulated, diffuse and anarchic anger could only have come from the Internet.

"The confusion about the protestors' political goals is understandable," wrote a New York Times columnist Thursday, "this is the first movement born of the anarchic pathways of the Internet. There is no top-down hierarchy, no universally recognized leaders, and nobody knows what is going to happen next."

The writer had a point. Perhaps one reason politicians and journalists have been so viscerally hostile to the Internet is that many of them foresaw this techno-driven political response to the rise of very big business: an era of absolutely unbridled, unprincipled and rapacious bigness, immorality, inhumanity and greed. The era of the mega-merger, takeover and acquisition without regard to consequence has created companies of unprecedented size and reach. Their rise has raised a host of social and moral issues, few of which have been seriously addressed - until Seattle.

Perhaps this political movement was inevitable coming from the children of the Boomers, who talked a lot about revolution but ended up doing a lot more business.

Protestors at the WTO conference were hardly vague. They were vocal and specific in citing the damage and suffering corporatism has caused all over the world - to human rights, working conditions, the environment and notions of security, privacy and personal and creative freedom.

Sorting through a wave of e-mail from Seattle and watching and reading shocked, increasingly angry accounts of the WTO protests, the message from Seattle is striking, especially when it gets past the media screen.

Apart from its physical targets - there were efforts to trash Starbucks, Nike, Gap and McDonald's stores and franchises in several days of near-rioting in Seattle - the most striking thing about the protestors was their diversity - all ages, all types, a lot of different causes.

But the causes weren't unrelated: they were nearly all connected, in one form or another, to perceptions of threats to freedom and to corporate greed and immorality, and to the failure of domestic or international governmental authorities to curb or respond to either.

If the protestors were lacking a single coherent 60's style political theme, (stop the War, racism is bad) the 90's version was impressive: a visceral, intensely political - and yes, increasingly Net-centered - response to Corporate Bigness is underway.

It's dangerous to generalize about all big corporations. And many of the Seattle protesters are enthusiastic free-marketeers. What they're opposed to is out-of-control business with no morality - the motto of our times. Some big businesses have advanced research, helped the environment, supported human rights, generated good jobs and economic opportunity, created valuable new products. But spontaneous social movements don't always draw fine distinctions.

In the past generation, corporatism - for which the WTO has become a metaphor - has been blamed for a daunting list of social wrongs, even crimes.

The institutions and entities that are supposed to be monitoring and regulating powerful corporations in America - government and journalism come to mind - have been, in different ways, muted and corrupted. They have failed to do their jobs or meet their historic obligations. Corporatism has invaded the workplace and transformed business with relatively little serious public discussion or oversight.

Small wonder the protesters were furious.

The Techno-Idealists can't look to Congress to monitor corporatism. Big business is now the dominant contributor to the political process. Journalism isn't about to do it. Most major national American media outlets have been corporatized and acquired by the very institutions they're supposed to be monitoring. Book publishing, now almost wholly owned by multi-national media conglomerates, isn't about to pick up the slack.

The protestors in Seattle seemed to articulate these issues with considerable clarity, even if many people in authority didn't want to hear it, preferring instead to huff about violence and irresponsibility.

Oppressive corporatism - foreseen and warned about by great writers from Orwell to Huxley to Sir Arthur Clarke to John Raulston Saul - has grown beyond even their imagination. Corporations have staggering resources and power to shape the modern world, despite the fact that they have no political agenda or ideology apart from dominating markets and maximizing profits.

But that's what makes these mega-entities so venal, even dangerous. By necessity, they exist in a moral vacuum in which almost everything is morally acceptable except making less money, and human and moral concerns are subordinate to profit. As corporations have become more global, and more and more of what they do occurs out of sight of democratic processes and scrutiny, they have become even less accountable, thus less moral.

"The WTO is Satan," e-mailed a Seattle protestor yesterday. "Not only because it threatens freedom by trying to help corporations damage human and labor rights, control property, tax the Net, corporatize technology, control intellectual content and ruin the environment, but because it's a stand in."

For what?

"Bigness. Indifference. Greed. Crummy jobs. Arrogance. Child labor. Being put on hold for hours when you call. Loss of freedom. The freedom of technology and commerce to grow unfettered. The WTO isn't responsible for all these things, but it's a pretty good focal point to start the fight. It's the tool of these companies, the mouthpiece."

"For the last 20 years," e-mailed a middle-aged Boomer, "ordinary Americans have been treated like toilet tissue by the 20 per cent that owns the whole damn country and its government."

And not just "ordinary" workers.

Middle-class and affluent workers have been down-sized, re-engineered, terminated, re-located and threatened by global corporations practicing new "flexible" (a/k/a: everyone is insecure, vulnerable and dispensable, everyone's role and mission is continously subject to change) personnel policies.

"It's not an issue of left or right," e-mailed Mark, a college student arrested during the first day of the protests. "It's an issue of top to bottom."

This idea is, of course, instantly familiar to anyone who's spent any time on the Internet, perhaps the most radically lateral, that is to say, many-to-many rather than top-to-bottom, social and economic system in the world.

The protestors in Seattle made some telling, nearly irrefutable arguments. Corporatism has, in fact, damaged the environment by creating incalculable amounts of products that pollute and trash the earth. Corporations have increasingly acquired and sought to monopolize whole elements of culture, from movies to books to the press. This has sparked an epidemic homogenization of popular culture - not a dumbing down, but a dulling down - as controversial, profane, sexual or other "controversial" cultural offerings from books to movies to music are eliminated or pushed to the margins so that safer products can be mass-marketed.

In the United States, corporatism is celebrated for generating a booming economy in which profits are greater than ever, but work for most people is much worse: transient, poorly paid, unrewarding.

Younger workers are forced into dead-end and poorly paid positions with little chance of advancement or meaningful work, while older workers are down-sized, re-engineered, laid off in droves. Countless millions of workers - from kids to the elderly - have been victimized and brutalized worldwide by modern corporatism and the ruthless way it competes.

The protest movement that popped up in Seattle isn't anti-globalism.

It's distinctly and specifically anti-corporate.

The roots of the demonstrations lie in the notion that companies are behaving immorally: Nike, which has been accused of making products in sweatshops, the human rights campaign that targets Royal Dutch/Shell in Nigeria. Or Microsoft, which has been accused of monopolizing software and information markets for years, but which is only now facing tepid government regulation. Ironically, some of Microsoft's employees joined in the demonstrations in Seattle.

There have also been protests against Monsanto's genetically engineered foods in Europe; individualistic (mostly geek-generated) struggles against the recording industry's cabalistic efforts to control music.

Other issues cited by the protestors: individual liberty, economic dignity, patent control, the freedom of intellectual property, higher wages, job security, labor rights, environmental protection, and some check on the rise of corporate power and influence.

Does this protest movement have its roots in the "anarchic pathways of the Internet?"

Sure.

The political potential of the Net has always been pushed aside by obsessive preoccupations with pornography and business. On top of everything else, the eruption in Seattle demonstrates the ability of activists and ideologues to form their own grass-roots communications networks out of the sight of traditional institutions. The WTO protests didn't come out of nowhere, it was just that nobody in authority was in a position to see them coming.

Many of the protestors in Seattle are - using new technologies like the Net - beginning to do the work of politicians, regulatory agencies, legislators and journalists. Perhaps that's the real message to the WTO and the rest of the world.

But if you listen to many of the messages and e-mails, they aren't all that scattered. They do have a lot in common. They are challenging Bigness and asking whether or not increasingly powerful corporations shouldn't be held to a higher standard of moral behavior; whether government shouldn't act to preserve freedom and elevate human rights rather than conspire to suppress them.

These questions are not foolish. They're powerful and timely. Public discussion of them is long overdue. Corporatism is a civic menace. It pushes the individual aside. It spawns greed, passivity and conformity.

The demonstrators aren't raising old issues, but very new ones. The real question isn't why protestors exploded in anger, but what took them - and us - so long?

People seem to have a clue.

Despite all the media hype around the violence, I've been really excioted by the events in Seattle. Finally, it seems a large segment of the population has realized that fundamental issues, such as freedom of speech, freedom or assembly and the right to control their own government are what matter, not our own views on individual issues. The left and the right (outside of the mainstream) are both realizing that the ideas expressed in the Constitution should come before personal, moral and economic ideas.
Perhaps one of the most enlightening things I heard (on tuesday) was that a local militia was considering entering the protest are to defend the protesters' rights to assemble and to free speech.

Seatlle woes

I usually find JonKatz's articles to be quite thought-provoking. Even if the details aren't perfect, he clearly wants to get people thinking about the issues he brings up (a point apparently missed by his many detractors).

This article is no exception. However, he seems to be excusing the violent and destructive behavior of some of the "protesters" ("rioters" is more accurate in their cases). I don't care how angry you are over what the WTO is doing -- that does not give you justification to destroy others' property.

Sure, there are rare cases when violence is necessary, but protesting against the WTO and what it seems to represent is not one of them! The individuals who will feel the pain from the damage that was caused have done little, if anything, to hurt the public -- and the corporate leaders who the protesters should be angry at won't feel a bit of pain.

Let's face it; in any large grouping of people -- particularly people who are there to protest -- there will be some who can't control their impulses and do some things that are just plain wrong. And because of them, the real protesters' views get obscured behind the poor behavior of the others.

That's the real tragedy.

Powers&8^]

Wrong

I think it was anti-globalist. This is just one spoke in the globalist wheel. Those in power (read: big business) don't want seperate countries out there each having their own identity and making their own rules, they want a one world government (yeah, I know conspiricy theory sounding, but accurate) where coorporation run the world. Let's face it, they pretty much own the US government and many others, why not band them all together and make the rules for them. Of course, this brave new world will be very benifical to the companies that own it.

And of course, we little "citizen units" will ha happy with the life assigned to us, or else they will find us (since we will be totally monitered, and you KNOW encryption will be outlawed) and subject us to the government approved punishment.

The sad part is, I'm started writing this as a joke, but I'm not so sure I'm kidding anymore, this sounds possible. It certinly sounds like the direction we are heading.

It also sounds like I stole it from the script of the classic 70's B movie, Rollerball :)

Finkployd

Benefits and drawbacks

A lot of the protesters have been really upset about the some of the problems of the WTO. It may be dominated by the goals of the corporations, but this is true of most governments as well. The WTO is simply a larger-scale version of what happens in Washington, D.C.

I also have to wonder how many of the protesters who decry the "incrasing corporatism" aren't aware of how many benefits they get from the same corporations which they are attacking. This is more than asking how many protestors were wearing Nike shoes; did they drive to Seattle? Where did all of the gasoline come from; can they really say that they aren't part of our car-centric culture? Did they fly? Who made the airplane they flew in on? From how many countries did parts for that airplane come from?

This is a complicated issue, and it seems to me that many of the protesters weren't necessarily presenting a very thoughtful dissent to what the WTO is trying to do.

Consider...

Though it is easy to villify faceless corporations as the goons of the next century, consider that when it comes down to the wire, corporations are one of the mechanisms we have seen for allocating resources where they are wanted. Look at the box in front of you. Its Operating system may have been constructed by a loose-nit band of freewheelers, but you can bet that the CPU was produced on a multi-billion dollar fab plant. Even the great grand-father UNIX was invented by AT&T, back when they were a monopoly.

I agree that corperations need to be kept in check (just like the government, unions, religion, and anything else with power and influence) but before we blast them as the Great Evil, look at some of the good they can do - ideally, a corporation wants money, it gains this by producing a product and selling it. it sells it by making its product something we want.

Of course, this usually gets muddled somewhere along the way, just like governments usually somehow forget to protect everyone's rights and freedoms and religions loose sight of their original intent, and what have you. This is the price we pay and the risk we take whenever humans decided to act together towards some goal.

My point is, coroprations have achieved some pretty spectaculary forms of efficency (things individuals simple could not have accomplished on their own), and they have done some pretty shoddy things as well. Keep this in mind before condemning.


Just my humble opinion

We're doing what we can...

"Many of the protestors in Seattle are - using new technologies like the Net - beginning to do the work of politicians, regulatory agencies, legislators and journalists. Perhaps that's the real message to the WTO and the rest of the world."

This is a valid point. The first time I personally heard the 'net advocated as a tool for social change was in a tent at the 1994 Glastonbury Festival; and it was a refreshing change; yes, computers can be used as tools to bring about social and environmental change; used properly they can be extremely effective for the purpose, despite their (current) exclusivity.

The network that brought the Seattle protests into being started as a meeting of about two dozen people in a London community centre in July 1998; from three groups; Reclaim the Streets [greennet.org.uk], Greenpeace (London) [mcspotlight.org] (no connection to Greenpeace International) - a group better known for the McLibel [mcspotlight.org] trial and People's Global Action [ymca.int].

We didn't know where it was going, but reckoned that it would be a damn good way of opposing the MAI [citizen.org]; to use the global nature of the 'net to provide a global counter to the WTO. We got in touch with groups like the Zapatistas and Karnataka State Farmer's Association in India; and suggested an action on June the 18th 1999; to coincide with the G8 meeting in Koln (in Germany).

As the records [j18.org] show, we managed to get about 43 countries onboard; and there was a good feeling about it; that we'd hit upon a good way of co-ordinating resistance to the WTO; which is why a repeat action was staged in Seattle on November the 30th.

If a popular resistance is to be mounted to the WTO, the our resistance has to be as transnational as capital.

- A London J18 activist, Debian fanatic and regular /.er

An Account of the Riots on Tuesday

I was in and out of downtown all day on tuesday. In the morning there was minimal activity downtown, a few intersections blocked but everything was pretty tame, so I headed to memorial stadium. The stadium was PACKED. Very impressive. I waited for the AFL-CIO march to start, and then followed it into downtown. Downtown was complete chaos. There was no organization whatsoever. The objective was simply to surround the places of meeting and the hotels to prevent entry and exit. All remained relatively peaceful. MANY MANY of the retail core shops were in bad shape. Anything on the ground floor was shattered. The insides of the shops were not looted, but there was glass and spraypaint everywhere. I saw this in the morning, and when I returned downtown with the protesters, it looked like no further damage had been caused, so it would appear that the violent demonstrations took place the day before. There were several people putting dumpsters in the middle of the road to form blockades, and anything loose (like the times/PI paper dispensers) was torn for the sidewalks. It wasn't clear if that had happened earlier or recently.

As you know there was a large dispensal of tear gas and pepper spray. For me, this came later. All day the police were trying to section of the crowd. They eventually contained most people to the pike pine corridor, and then to pine. I can't say this for sure because there was so much confusion, but I found no exit from pine street twords the end. The police then cut through the middle of pine street (don't know where), and then pushed half of the crowd twords the market and belltown, and the other half up the pine street overpass. The crowd (myself included) was sitting peacefully with some istance from the police when they decided to move us back. They wanted us out of downtown obviously from the looting (none of which I saw firsthand), but also because they initiated a 7PM curfew on downtown. NOBODY ever announced this to the crowds. I didn't find out about it until the 11 o'clock news. They never said "please withdraw" or leave or anything. Very suddenly the cops began to lob teargas into the crowds. They didn't aim twords the front to try to push the crowd ahead, they were simply filling the streets with it. I brought a gasmask, and promptly put it on. The crowd of course retreated up pine.

The teargas flowed, and the crowd retreated until we got to the I-5/Pine overpass. The crowd began to stop along with the gas. There was a 100 foot space in between the police and the crowd. There was a standoff for several minutes, until people started to throw bottles and empty tear gas cannisters at the police. Several people were also launching fireworks at them (smart move). In return the police started firing rubber bullets tipped with pepper spray. They also started firing MASSIVE rounds of CS gas (possibly pepper spray, I felt a burning on my skin, whereas what they used downtown only seemed to affect my lungs, minimally at that), again into the center of the crowd, not the front line. There was an all out stampede up pine street at this point. The police continued to fire until the crowd had (semi)dispersed. In the confusion I was hit with several of the rubber bullets, so if any media source has said they weren't firing them, they're LYING.

I went home and later went down to broadway (near seattle community college) where there was a scene of mindless desctruction FAR different from the almost entirely peaceful protests downtown. People were lighting dumpsters on fire, smashing up bus stops, throwing things, etc. The cops arrived, and not looking to get another whiff of tear gas, I decided to go home.

For the most part the crowd remained peaceful all day. There were a VERY SMALL minority of people throwing fireworks or bottles (mabey 10 out of 10,000). When the bottles were thrown, myself and others yelled out for them to stop (and they did). We as a whole remained peaceful, and our only crime was sitting. The fact that a few people decided to launch fireworks into the police probably set off the entire thing. I'm still trying to make sense of it all, as most of the night was filled with an air of complete chaos. -Ryan

It's a FIRST!!!

Notice: This article does NOT feature the word "geek". It does have the term "geek-oriented" but it's inside a parenthetical comment so we'll forgive it.

Guiness Book of World Records Entry: December 3, 1999 - Jon Katz writes an article without using the term "Geek" or referring to how helplessly misunderstood they are.

I suppose I'm a geek, but I've always felt a little uncomfortable with the way that Jon Katz approaches the topic of geeks. Debate however you want on whether he is actually a geek or not, but I don't feel that he is, and since I don't feel that he is, it sounds very strange always hearing characterizations of people like myself from somebody who's on the outside. I'm not trying to be elitist, just that if you're not a geek, your characterisations of geek behaviours should be just about as valid as, say, a politicians characterizations of geek behaviors, which is to say not at all.

Double standards.

I've been on Slashdot and seen the following two positions come out on the same day. I know that there's no reason to believe that anyone individual made them, but it strikes me as entirely within the 90's geek gestalt to hold both these views at once:

1. Regarding the independent ISP whose business is endangered by flames and letters to customers - defensive "that's too bad - the Internet is a rough place" and "that's one ISP who well never buckle under to the Feds again" remarks. And lots of "that's just a small minority - Slashdot shouldn't be judged by the actions of a few" remarks. That line is very often repeated whenever stories about flame-avalanches directed at writers and journalists is brought up.

2. Regarding the attacks on Starbucks and McDonalds - "those punks have no respect for property;" "the protestors are just acting up without knowing what they're talking about." Little discrimination is made between the "flaming" few and the nonviolent thousands. Tears are shed for the insured, corporate-buck backed mega-franchises that have to replace their windows and lose a couple days of business.

I think this betrays a deep bias in geek thinking: non-physical "violence" is ok in a way that physical or direct confrontation is not, even if the former is more destructive to peoples' lives. Maybe because a lot of geeks are body-loathing recluses who posture themselves as pure intellect. (Hell, I used to be that way.)

Maybe the fact is that people in the high-tech field are a little incriminated by these protests has something to do with it. People who are getting what they want often tend to promote the ideology that people get what they deserve, and any reference to large-scale economic inequities compromises that stance.

Anyway, quite UNLIKE Columbine, I do see the WTO event as a sea-change of sorts. An interesting way to end a millenium.

I'm astonished.

Jon, I actually agree with you on this!

/me watches jaws drop

Yes: corporatism can be a bad thing. And yes, I think that a revolt against it was what the WTO Riots were largely about. You see, I believe that humans are intensely valuable. I believe that we are far more valuable than money, far more valuable than can ever be defined by "McWorld".

And so, it troubles me when I see the world turning to a dominant consumerism. When I see morals, ethics, and everything else replaced in public debate by "It's the economy, stupid". When I see the interests of anyone or anything subjected to the heartless, amoral desires of big business.

And there is a solution to this guys. It's called "break the cycle". We, as individuals (hopefully) interested in the worth of man beyond his pocket book, need to step out of consumerism.

What does this mean? Well, for starters, pay off your credit cards. And your car. And your house. That's right: be debt free. (I'm not, but I'm working on it as fast as my overpaid fingers can get me there). And don't think you always need the latest toy. Buy quality instead of the cheapest thing you can get that will look good. Trade in your plastic steak and frozen cake for a vegetable garden. Live small, think large.

Don't get me wrong: I don't have a problem with money or possessions. They are necessary, and it would be folly to eliminate them. But they are a dangerous servant and a terrible master. When we are dominated by our pocketbooks, we become moral wretches of the worst sort. We will do anything to maintain our illusory life-styles. Or, as the Book put it: "the love of Money is the source of much evil."

It's getting tiresome...

... to watch Katz continue to shoehorn whatever's in the news today into his standard schema of "geeks" and "tech" and whatnot, no matter how well the topics fit together.

"Techno-idealism"? How on Earth does what's been happening in Seattle have anything to do with technology? It has more to do with social science than computer science -- people feel threatened because a faceless Other is making rules that affect their lives, and they have no recourse if they don't like the world the Other is building for them. So they go to protest -- peacefully -- and then people on both sides overreact (as is common when crowds face police) and things get out of hand. Where in this description do the words "Internet" and "technology" fit? They don't. The growth of technology is one big story in the modern era, but it's not the only story, and we don't need to pretend somehow that all events in our lives spring from a Prime Mover called Mother Internet -- or that the only way to invest significance in an event is to somehow associate it with the tech world. To do so cheapens both the important changes that tech has wrought on the world, and the other movements and ideas that affect our lives and times.

Seattle is an important moment. It could very well mark the end of the political era we think of as the "90s", which began with the Gulf War and George Bush's New World Order, and the start of the next era, the backlash to the globalization, corporatization, and McDonaldization of the planet. That's the story that'll come out of the Battle of Seattle, not that some rioters had Web sites or carried PalmPilots or whatever. Of course some of them have Web sites. A percentage of any random sample of people these days will turn up some with Web sites -- but correlation does not imply causation, and those Web sites did not spark the flames in Seattle, Jon. Those flames were sparked by the anger and fear of people who feel themselves being stripped of their freedom and dignity by tiny elites and the social forces those elites command. Let's keep our eye on the ball.

-- Jason A. Lefkowitz

Time to /. Benjy Again!

Benjy "Monkeybagel [monkeybagel.com]" Feen has posted another account [monkeybagel.com] of the riots. He lives right on Capitol Hill in Seattle, where much of the rioting took place, and works for Amazon in the middle of the curfew zone. I understand his geek culture site got Slashdotted the first time it was mentioned here; wanna give it another shot?

Re:Anti-economic

It's well-established that free trade helps check corporatism and through comparative advantage, helps everyone.

It's a "well-established" theory, maybe. But actual applications of the theory are about as rare as actual applications of communist theory. When most corporate droids (or most WTO reps or most politicos) talk about "free trade", it doesn't mean what an (unowned) economist means when s/he talks about free trade.

The last thing in the world that a corporatist wants is free trade. They want to be able to trade freely, they don't want everybody to be able to.

The folks in the streets in Seattle understand that.

Another First-hand account

Here is an account by a friend-of-a-friend. I have sanitized out the names, I hope. :) > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > Date: Wed, 1 Dec 1999 11:00:00 -0800 (PST) > From: > Subject: What Tear Gas Smells Like > > I've decided to write up some stuff about my experiences yesterday during > the protests, because the media has completely dropped the ball (this is > why it's a bad idea to have all the major news networks controlled by > large corporations). If you feel comfortable doing it, please forward > this information on to anyone and everyone, so that the word can get out > that what happened yesterday was not what the major networks say it was. > > How I Learned What Tear Gas Smells Like: The Events of November 30th from > Another Perspective, by Beth Stevens > > Yesterday, I arrived at the National Lawyers Guild nerve center at around > 8:30. The NLG is one of the groups that sent out volunteer legal > observers to the WTO protests. LO's are not lawyers necessarily, they're > just people who were watching to ensure that there were objective > witnesses should anything go wrong. The nerve center was set up to take > phone calls from observers about arrests and other incidents, and to help > coordiate the placement of observers with the different protests going on. > The nerve center is located in a building on 4th Avenue and Union Street. > > We knew Tuesday was going to be a busy day, because the largest scheduled > march was going to be starting at 12:30, and because it was the opening > day of the official WTO sessions. We expected a large number of arrests, > because the city had set up a special system for processing large numbers > of arrestees, but we didn't expect there to be many violent confrontations > between the police and the protestors, since the vast majority of the > groups espoused a nonviolent viewpoint. > > Around 9:15, we began to receive phone calls from our LO's telling us that > police in riot gear were arriving at the protests around the Sheraton > Hotel, bringing with them tear gas, peppery spray and armored personal > carriers (or APC's, which the police and the media would later > euphamistically call "peacekeepers"). It wasn't until around 9:45 that we > began to get frantic phone calls from our LO's saying the police were > throwing tear gas canisters at the crowd and then spraying them with > pepper spray. At least one of our LO's told us that they heard no warning > from the police before the gassing began. > > After the first use of tear gas, the police seemed to believe that it was > appropriate to use tear gas on all protestors, whether they were peaceful > or not. The building we were in was locked down around 10:00 because of > the chaos outside, meaning we needed to vouch for any of our observers who > needed to go in our out. We received reports all morning from LO's asking > for more observers to be sent to their locations because they were being > sprayed with pepper spray and tear gas. One of our observers came in > carrying a rubber bullet he had picked up off the street after the police > shot rubber bullets at him and the protestors he was observing. > > It was about this time that we began talking to one of the local > newspapers, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. We were on the phone with one > of their editors when the observer came in with the rubber bullet, and the > editor told us that the Seattle Police were denying using rubber bullets. > We told her that we had one in our office. The bullet was about 3/4 of an > inch across and made of hard rubber that felt like plastic; I held it in > my hand and felt it. It also had white scrape marks on it, from bouncing > off the street. Later in the day, LO's brought in more rubber bullets, > some of them much smaller. The smaller ones, they reported, were used in > shotgun-type shells and sprayed out at the crowd more than the larger > ones. > > Around 11:45, a few of us went across the hall from the office were in to > another office because we heard the police were amassing a strike force in > the intersection just below us. We were on the 9th floor and had an > unobstructed view of the intersection. We could also see down 4th Avenue > about a block, and up Union about two blocks. The police had union > blocked off between 4th and 6th; there was an APC parked in the > intersection of 6th and Union, and there were mounted police at 5th and > Union. In addition, there was a line of police (all the police I saw all > day were in riot gear, including gas masks, helmets, bullet-proof vests, > face guards, and sometimes shields) standing at the intersection of 4th > and Union blocking protestors from moving up Union toward the Sheraton. > There were about 200 protestors in the intersection, playing drums and > chanting something we couldn't understand. A few of the protestors > brought dumpsters over to the intersection and knocked them over, creating > a partial baracade in the street. > > Around 11:50, we saw more police heading towards the intersection, > marching. It was clear to us that they were the reinforcements, and that > the police had decided to clear the intersection. The protestors must > have realized this too, because about a third of them decided to sit down. > There was nothing thrown at the police, nor did any of the protestors try > to come up to the police and confront them. The only act which the police > could have seen as threatening was the semi-baracade, and only a handful > of the protestors had built it. > > At noon, a police officer came out and said something to the crowd through > a megaphone. Later, an observer who was on the street at that point told > me that the officer had said the protestors were violating state law, and > had 2 minutes to leave the area, and then would be subject to arrest. > About fifteen to thirty seconds after the police made their announcement, > we saw tear gas canisters flying at the crowd. Then the line of police > began to advance, walking around the overturned dumpsters and spraying the > still-seated protestors with pepper spray. The protestors began to flee. > Some of the protestors threw tear gas canisters back at the police, but > since the police were wearing gas masks, they simply ignored the > canisters. Once all the protestors had run away, the police set up lines > on both sides of the intersection, leaving Union Street entirely empty of > protestors from 6th avenue through 3rd. > > The afternoon brought more of the same: the police threw tear gas at any > protestors who were beligerant, were breaking windows or damaging > property, or were in a location where the police didn't want them. Very > few people were arrested, despite the elaborate system of processing > arrestees that the city had developed; in the morning, we only heard about > 3 arrests, and by about 5:00, we had only heard of 19 total arrests. > > The scheduled AFL-CIO march had to change its route, because the police > had blocked off the streets. Any protestors who didn't want to comply > with the change in route were pepper sprayed or tear gassed. By then, it > was clear to us that the city had literally descended into complete chaos. > > The NLG attorneys drafted a letter to the mayor, which was also sent to > the city council and any news organization we could think of, demanding > that the tear gassing of peaceful protestors be stopped. The letter was > faxed out at about 2:30. It received some attention from the press; a few > news agencies called us to follow up on it, but the mayor obviously > ignored the letter entirely. > > About 4:30, we heard that the mayor was probably going to impose a curfew > on downtown. When the curfew was announced, we realized that we couldn't > keep the nerve center open that evening as we had planned. Instead, we > started to close up and go home. The phone wasn't ringing anymore, since > most of the protestors had been chased out of town both by the curfew and > by the tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets. > > An NLG attorney and I left the building at about 5:10. Since the buses > weren't running because of the street closures, the attorney had offered > to give me a ride home if we could get to his car, which was parked at the > north end of downtown near the Paramount Theater, where the opening > sessions were to have taken place. Since we couldn't cross Union Street > (which was to the north of us), we walked down 4th one block to University > Street, then over to 3rd Avenue. On the corner of 3rd Avenue and > University is an entrance to the bus tunnel which runs underneath > downtown. We asked the police officers stationed there if the tunnel was > open. They told us that buses were running through the tunnel, but that > only certain stops were open, and the stop nearest the car was closed. So > taking the bus wouldn't help us. > > Next, we walked about two blocks up Third before we came to an > intersection where there were police. We could see that further up 3rd, > there was tear gas. We asked one of the police who wasn't wearing a gas > mask which street we could go up to get to the north end of downtown. He > told us to take 2nd Avenue, so we walked over to 2nd, but there was a > large tear gas cloud visible up the street. So we headed over for 1st > Avenue. > > We managed to go about a half a block up 1st before we started to smell > tear gas. We tried to walk a little further, hoping the gas would > dissipate, but it only got stronger. We turned around and headed back to > the street we'd been on before, and followed it towards the waterfront, > which is two blocks west of 1st Avenue. We knew that the breeze off the > ocean would help dissipate any tear gas, and we figured that there > wouldn't be any protestors on the waterfront, since it's somewhat > seperated from the rest of downtown by staircases and cliffs. As we > headed towards the waterfront, we took some lost out-of-town protestors > with us, most of them very young and clearly shaken by their experience. > > The attorney with me decided to head back into downtown to try to get to > his car, and I decided to keep walking up the waterfront to try to get to > a bus. I ended up having to walk halfway around the city to find a bus > headed towards my house. I got home around 7:00. > > It was clear to me from my experiences yesterday that the rioting that > ensued last night didn't have to happen. Tear gas didn't need to be used > on peaceful protestors who posed no threat to the police or to WTO > delegates. The police chose to gas and spray protestors instead of > arresting them and removing them from the scene. The protests would have > been much easier to manage had the police followed normal procedures and > arrested protestors. Instead, they ended spending most of the day chasing > the same people around downtown with tear gas, peppery spray and rubber > bullets. The people who rioted all last night could have been arrested in > the morning and held away from downtown, and much of the property damage > and, more important, the injuries would have been prevented. > > I urge all of you to follow the coverage of these events by the Seattle > Independent Media Center. Their website is www.indymedia.org and their > reports are far more accurate than the ones the major networks are > producing. The CNN reporters don't even know where the bus tunnel goes, > let alone what actually went on in the crowds yesterday. There were no > major networks covering the clearing of 4th and Union that I witnessed, > but there were independent media cameras there. And the independent media > aren't owned by large corporations which have a vested interest in the > WTO. > > Remember, this could happen in your city too. All it takes is for a few > police officers to feel scared, and an entire city can become a war zone. > Be careful out there! > > ===== > > ************************************************** ********** > "I say let's put on some tunes > Sing a long and do little all day > Go down to the riverside take off our shoes > And wash these sins away..." Indigo Girls > ************************************************** **********

Why I think this needed to happen......

Everything that was founded in the 1980's and beforehand seems to have come to a head now. Before the great leaders of the western nations decided to 'let go of the reins' of the corporations, we knew there was a clear defining line between what was political, what was ethical, what was moral, and what was financial. Companies and corporations called themselves such, and made no apologies for their behaviour. After all, this was the cut-throat world of business, and you kind of expected it.

Fast-forward to the 1980's, and the free-market boom. All of a sudden, the corporations start swallowing each other whole, and they grow, and mutate, until they are bloated multinationals (Yes, I know there were multinationals before the '80s, but...) or they have become part of the multinationals. By the '90s small businesses depend on partnership or buyout by a multinational as the only method of guranteeing success. Prior to this, multinationals were primarily for basic needs (food, chemicals et al). Now, in the '90s due to continuation of free market policy, multinationals have hit critical mass, hence we face multinationals that deal with everything, from music, to computers, to pretty much anything we have. Everything on my desk is owned/produced by a multinational at some stage. Problem is, the multinationals have the same business-above-all ethic as they have always had, which means standardising, dumbing-down and nipping innovation in the bud (if innovation refuses to be bought).
Everyone is expected to purchase multinational product, and is persuaded by a barrage of advertisements designed to extract money from them, sometimes in the most devious way. (Can anyone put their hand up and with a clear conscience say that advertising directly to children under the age of 10 is a Good Thing(tm)?)
But it's doesn't end with the erosion of people's choice and rights to choose what they eat, drink, listen to or watch. That is a crime in itself. Censorship is a bad thing in a totalitarian state, however, I think that censorship for profit is equally disturbing, if not more so. Companies censor for profit by deluging the public with the 'news' that their product is the ONLY one worth having, and because they have more money than a smaller rival, their product dominates the market, simply because the public are unaware that a choice exists.

What scares me the most, however is the fact that multinationals control the media. Jesus wept, they can actually control what people THINK!! (Bearing in mind most of the world's population will believe what they're told, if you say it loud and brash enough...) Corporations like News International are putting the personal beliefs of their CEO into print, TV and films and people are taking it as gospel. That's scary. (Example: By conjuring up images of WWII, and by repeating it over and over, over a period of months, The Sun (UK tabloid owned by Rupert Murdoch's News International) attempted (and pretty much succeeded) to persuade every one of thier readers that joining the European single currency was a bad idea. The real reason? Murdoch has so many $$ tied up in the US that anything that may weaken UK/US relations also weakens his financial position. It's amazing the number of people who haven't worked this out. And of course, every paragraph on why the euro was evil was followed by a long piece on how the US system was the one to emulate (Funny how it supports the system most friendly to global megacorps....)

Anyway, sorry, I'm ranting again. But think for a second. The global music industry is now effectively 3 companies (Sony, BMG and Universal) - The reason we get 3 different versions of the most successful thing of the time (Britney and Christina - 2 different multinationals)

The computing world is dominated by one company which (hopefully) has now bitten off more than it can chew.

Global book publishing is now owned by but a few companies

Scary, isn't it?

Re:hrm.

I was only using walmart as an example (as it's seems to be the one the most complained about with unfair business practices and loss leaders and other questionable practices). Anyway, true, they would be using domestic resources for many of their stores stock product. However, they also have centralized warehouse systems and cheap labour. Those don't particularly bode well for the domestic economy as well.

Some quotes from an article written by Kai Mander: former director of communications for the institute of culture and trade policy (so you don't think they are my own).
Wal-Mart: Global Retailer -- Kai Mander and Alex Boston

Mr. Sam Walton by the time of his death had amassed a fortune of over 23.5 billion.

"When it seeks the necessary permits to establish a new store, Wal-Mart portrays itself as a friendly addition to a local community. It contends a new giant superstore will provide good jobs and sorely needed income to a regional community and that local retailers will benifit from Wal-Marts lower prices. But study after studt confirms what hundreds of americans learn the hard way: Wal-Mart leads to a net loss of jobs, decreased income for the community ..."

"Typically, wal-mart locates at the outskirts of town and sets prices below cost to draw a customer away from the commercial center. It offers 2 for 1 deals, loss leaders, category killers, anything that will attract customers. From automotive supplies to clothing and pharmaceuticals to kitchenware, ... Big enough to sustain losses for a long time ..." Well you know what happens next.

"According to an Iowa state University Study quoted in Wal-Mart Watch (December 1994), five years after an opening of a new Wal-Mart, stores within a 20-mile-radius suffer an average of 19% loss in retail sales."

"Journalist Maria Gilardin reports that in Anamosa, Iowa, a JC Penny, two men's clothing stores, a shoe store, and a dime store closed shortly after a Wal-Mart opened."

"Wal-Mart Officials contend that when a new Wal-Mart opens, sales of nearby business increases. The Iowa State study confiremed the spillover traffic resulting from new Wal-Mart stores did increase the sales of adjacent businesses selling goods and services that were not available at Wal-Mart. However, many of these owners now fear for their livelihoods as Wal-Mart stores expand goods and services offered.

"Wal-Mart employs more than the big 3 auto makers combined. Company spokespeople proudly claim that in some parts of the United States a Wal-Mart exists for every thirty five thousand people, providing needed jobs to local economies. Contrary to company statements, however, the entry of Wal-Mart does not provide a net increase in a region's jobs. In fact, some studies have shown that for every job created by Wal-Mart, as many as 1.5 jobs are lost."

"The jobs Wal-Mart does provide are at the bottom end of the economic scale. Notorious for wringing the most work out of its employees for the least pay, Wal-Mart rarely pays its workers more than minimum wage. The average income for a full time worker at Wal-Mart in the United States, even with a well-publicized profit-sharing plan, hovers around $12,000 -- well below the poverty line." Blah blah, basically what mcdonalds does only hiring part-timers ... and some particularly humorous stuff about their employee dating policies to their company cheer...

"In a recent [1997] purchase of Canada's Woolco retail chain, its refusal to buy seven Woolcos that were unionized put one thousand Canadians out of work. Many of the remaining Woolco staff were forced to accept lower wages or lose their jobs. Wal-Mart converted Woolco auto-repair shops to more profitable oil and lube operations and cut mechanics' wages in half. IT fired 500 well-paid Woolco warehouse workers then charitibly offered to rehire them at minimum wage. Wal-Mart told 750 former Woolco supervisors they could keep their $28,000-per-year salaries only if they worked an extra 12 hours per week in addition to their regular 40.

Some more stuff -- interesting stuff like, all their mexican stores were supplied by a Laredo, Texas warehouse..

LOLOL. I didnt remember reading this, seriously -- but

"The telivision program Dateline NBC ran an expose on garment sweatshops of bangladesh, where nine-to-twelve year old boys and girls worked long into the night and were paid as litle as five cents an hour." Includes quotes about china and some other third world countries..

"NBC found that most of these garments in bins sporting glossy, bold "Made-In-America" sings.

should I go on? I have about 30 more pages in this article, as well as 5 reports on this topic -- as well as a book or two on similar companies. I think the WTO and GATT were talked about at least 30 times in this article. I'd be happy to provide whomever wants with more info.

The Seattle Riots and the Chicago Riots of '68

I agree that most of the protestors probably are clueless. For the most part, I support free trade and the goals of the WTO. But I am concerned about the jack-booted thuggish response that was received. By reading accounts in the independent media (as vs. the corporate-owned media such as ABC, NBC, or any major city newspaper), I have come to the following conclusions:

1. The police deliberately allowed a small group of perhaps 40 black-clad punks into the area and allowed them to smash windows and burn dumpsters in order to get an excuse to brand all protesters as "rioters".
2. Once they had their excuse, rioting was deliberately provoked by the police using tear gas, rubber bullets, and pepper spray in an effort to get an excuse to invoke martial law.
3. Once the corporate media had compliantly reported that all of the protesters were "rioters" (rather than the 40 or so black-clad punks who were the only rioters in the area), the mayor and governor declared martial law (or, rather, "a state of emergency"), and dispatched the National Guard to clear the streets. Possession of a gas mask was also declared criminal intent, and you were immediately arrested if you had one. National Guardsmen and police officers blocked all entrances and exits from the area and stopped all who wanted to get in to ask them for identification and about their business in the area (shades of USSR!).

It was not reported on the national media, but one of the so-called "riots" was actually residents of the Capitol Hill neighborhood protesting the police presence in their neighborhood. Nothing to do with the WTO at all, but that didn't matter, the cops were in full-bore panic mode and coming down with jack boots on anything that looked like it might be public expression.

To get leads on the "real scoop", follow Salon's links [salon.com] to various independent news sources from the OTHER (non-corporate press) side.

All in all, I think this may be the sort of turning point for labor activism in America that Mayor Dailey's violent breakup of the '68 protests in Chicago were for anti-war protests. The big difference is the way these were covered. In Chicago, the pre-corporate-media national news covered jack-booted thugs whacking peaceful protestors over the head with jacksticks. In Seatle, the corporate-owned national news media did not show those events, and instead showed the rare events where the forty or fifty black-clad thugs that the police had allowed into the area looted and vandalised things.

-E

Re:It's getting tiresome...

I generally stray away from Katz-bashing, but in this case he basically just summed up (or almost plagerized) the huge discussion here on Teusday night, I think it was. Around 800 posts. One of the best discussions I've seen here, as far as what I like to see.

In that discussion, most posters didn't overplay the importance of technology/internet in this issue. But indeed, as you say, Katz couldn't resist, and thats unfortunate.

Of course communications technology was an integral part of compaines ability to grow from small and local to international and controling incredible amounts of capital and resources. But that technology isn't directly related to the issue today.

The internet wasn't the catylist for this demonstration, the fact that the WTO can be accurately described (in my opinion) as evil was enough to get "apethetic" Americans back out in the streets and demanding rights for everyone.

The internet does have incredible potential for being a catylist for social change. Unfortunatly right now the internet for most people is chatting on AOL and buying stuff at *.com. Technology can't change this, the people have to want to change. Katz needs to review what technology can and can't do. Hopefully this protest really is the start of a new movement. But this is about the people, not the technology.

... and Wednesday

It's good to see that this topic hasn't just been allowed to scroll off the Current Items page. Here is an account of what I saw on Wednesday, followed by more of an analysis.

Note that while the police have (wisely) backed way off in the last 24 hours, they still have a lot of questions to answer. A black Seattle City Councilmember was pulled from his car last night and nearly arrested for attempting to go to a WTO reception. Fortunately there were other politicians there to witness it, so his complaints won't be ignored.

There is another rally tonight for protesting police aggression. Volunteer Park at 8. Hope to see some of you there.

Warning: the following is long and includes occassional profanity. Thank you for listening.

So I went to an impromptu demonstration tonight, the message of which was "get the fuck out of our neighborhood". While not as wild as Kevin's experiences yesterday (don't expect to see *me* on the cover of USA Today), I thought I'd let you all know about it.

Though the media has more or less ignored it, the police kicked ass on Capitol Hill, away from the convention center, both nights of the conference so far. Tonight I heard that they were beating up a gathering of people (one would almost hesitate to use the word "protesters"; they weren't doing much more than being a bit of a crowd) at Olive and Broadway. There was no mention of crowd violence, but people were being removed in ambulances, and I got angry. My reason for going was fear that the media might try to ignore it again. I felt that the more of us there were, the more likely it was to make headlines.

I drove to Seattle and parked at the north end of Broadway. I didn't see much at first. People were talking about it some but there were no concussions or cheers that I could hear at first. As I walked south, I ran into an aquaintance. I asked if he knew what was going on and he said he'd been doing his best to avoid riot police (understandable...), so he didn't have any specific details. I got to the intersection where the initial altercation took place, and there were no cops or protesters visible. I kept walking south.

The crowd was at Pine and Broadway. At first it was hard to tell what was going on, but eventually the situation became clear. Riot police were stationed two blocks east at 10th and Pine. Behind them was the armored vehicle poice have been using to fire the concussion grenades and the tear gas cannisters. At Broadway, there was a large mass of people watching from what they percieved to be a safe distance. Then the next block and a half towards the police was filled sparsely with people, then about 10 yards from the police there was another smaller mass of people. A lot of people didn't really seem to know what was going on. I learned that the police had forced the crowd down Broadway (good thinking, police) and then had established their position here. I found a spot about halfway between Broadway and 10th where I could stand on a large stone and see things pretty well. at this point I estimate that there were about 5-600 protesters.

Shortly after I stationed myself, the Blackhawk helicopter arrived, with the brightest goddamn spotlight i've ever seen on a moving vehicle. It was clearly sweeping nearby buildingtpos for snipers or whatever, as well as the crowd. About 10 minutes later, the first round of gassing started. I should note for the out-of-towners that it is at this moment illegal to buy, sell, or posess a gas mask in public in Seattle. The police weren't moving, just dumping a lot of gas canisters in front of the front group of protesters. There were some people kicking canisters away. The police appeared to be using a lot more gas than they had been at other protest sites. It became impossible to see the police through the gas. There were also concussion grenades being used. More people were showing up to watch, though. Some idiots broke a car window on the other side of the street and were immediately surrounded by angry protesters. Some kids near me threw a rock into a window and then looked really sheepish (and dumb). Mostly we watched. A dumpster was rolled out into the street at the front of the crowd.

For a while, there would be a flurry of gas, then a pause; some of the gas would clear, and they would start again. It was very loud. The protesters were fairly quiet, which suprised me. It was pretty intense to watch, with the line of cops just standing there and a handful of protesters hanging out right in the gas cloud. It sounded like war, too; huge booming percussive blasts.

Another pause and then the police advanced. They volleyed gas and grenades farther out in front of them than before and the line of rito cops started moving. There was some initial panic. People were running. A number of people, including me, yelled for people to walk and people calmed down a lot. The police were paving their approace with a ton of gas. I walked north down a small street between 10th and Broadway, and got hit with a hefty dose of tear gas. I was breathing through my scarf, so it wasn't too bad in my lungs, but it was difficult to keep my eyes open. I cut through a parking lot over to Broadway, where it didn't appear the police had reached yet. I walked north on Broadway along Seattle Central Community College. There was tear gas here, too. I shared my scarf with someone next to me as we walked. The breeze was blowing in the direction I was walking.

I circled around the main building of the school and headed back to Broadway. By the time I got there, the police had fallen back somewhat and the crowd appeared to be substantially smaller. I found Joey and we talked about what had happened. It became apparent that the crowd had grown to several thousand, maybe more. The police were back to their original positions. We headed up to the front and I lost track of Joey. Shortly, the street between 10th and Broadway was filled with people, though not densely packed. I talked to several people around me who were angry at not being able to get home. The crowd started engaging in a fair amount of chanting. There were a lot of attempts by some protesters to get everyone to stand on the sidewalk. A lot of time passed. Rumors started circling that the national guard was coming.

Eventually the police made statements through a loud speaker. They told us we were all guilty of unlawful assembly and we must leave immediately. Everyone tensed up, as this has consistently been followed within seconds by teargas, rubber bullets, and police advances. But they didn't come. After a long while the hellicopter returned and circled. People were still anticipating action. I went and made sure the streets leading away weren't blocked. I was afraid they would trap everyone and make a mass arrest. The crowd had thinned quite a bit by now, maybe to less than a thousand. I hung for a while and then walked away to a vantage point about a block away. I watched as the crowd chanted loudly, then after a while I decided that it would end when all the cold, tired protesters realized that nothing was going to happen and left. About 5 minutes later I was at the Lillian visiting Kevin and Lanie when we head the loud concussive sounds that the teargas and grenade deployments make. One cable news station had the story about how it ended... They broke up the demonstration. I don't know if they arrested anybody. That's the end of the blow-by-blow.

Also, I posted the following to discussion groups at the New York Times and NPR web sites. It's not the most coherent thing I've ever written, but it's late and I had a long day.


I just returned from Capitol Hill, a dense residential area where, for the second night in a row, police used tear gas and rubber bullets (I got souveniers!) in an attempt to disperse a crowd that was peaceful and frustrated. I estimate that at it's peak there were at least 3,000 protesters, mostly neighborhood residents who were angry that they were being treated like criminals.

The police hospitalized a number of protesters, tear gassed virtually everyone, and repeatedly asserted that everyone there was guilty of "unlawful assembly", because some protesters were standing in the street (most of the standoff was spent on a quiet side street, though the early beatings occurred on the main street in the neighborhood). The protesters made it very clear that all they wanted was for the police to go home so that they could go home. They chanted "you go home, we go home" and "whose streets? our streets". A King County Council Member attempted to negotiate with the cops but was told that they had no interest in any resolution other than everyone dispersing immediately.

Whatever feelings I have about curfews and no-protest zones, I think this is intolerable. The word that best describes the scene in my mind was 'invasion'. To enter a residential neighborhood where a small crowd is peacefully gathered and create a sitution where hundreds of passers-by are tear-gassed and many people are prevented from going home (due to the arbitrary nature of where the police took up their position), and then to blame it on the protesters, is criminal. And the worst part is, I am afraid the media is going to ignore the story.

These are the things the police did wrong:
1. Sending riot cops
2. Initiating violence against protesters
3. Failing to realize that their withdrawl would put an immediate end to the situation
4. Tear-gassing eveything that moved

It was wonderful to see that there were many hundreds of people who came out to protest when they realized what was going on. I spoke to a number of locals who told me they didn't care about WTO protests, but they weren't going to stand for police telling them that the streets and sidewalks in front of their homes were off limits. This is two nights in a row that police have attacked peaceful protesters in this neighborhood, and I suspect that if it happens again the protesters may attempt to take direct action against the cops.