History grad student, junior faculty freak out, academic publishing disaster--it's all here: seven years of angst in academia.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Toronto police shoot aparently peaceful protestors with rubber bullets
Even though I know they do this kind of stuff--I have seen the NYC police cart people away in the midst of a peaceful march--this video shocked me. It's long, but try to catch the last two minutes.
the G20 meeting in Toronto was completely ridiculous. But I kinda feel like there's not very much special about this particular episode. The police clearly wanted the protesters to disperse, the protesters refused. The police responded with non-deadly force and the crowd dispersed.
My question is, when the confrontation was boiling over, where was the guy in the red shirt from the beginning (the one apparently organizing the march)? The one who said that if the cops tell them to disperse, they should respect that?
I didn't see what you saw. I saw the cops charge the crowd, not an order to disperse. The protesters are a wee bit confrontational after that, but given how violent the cops were, that's not a big surprise.
Keep in mind that the protesters--wisely--had planned not to run and to stay in groups, for safety. Given those constraints, sitting down in the street made some sense.
If the cops had told them to disperse instead of tackling someone, I think that the protesters would have dispersed, since that was their plan before the march. In light of that, I don't see that any force was warranted. People have a right to hold a peaceful demo in public.
At the same time, some incident must have triggered the cops, and the video doesn't catch it. I don't think they'd just attack like that for no reason. For a bad reason, sure, but not for no reason at all.
The guy in the red shirt is right at the front of the line of protesters.
4 comments:
the G20 meeting in Toronto was completely ridiculous. But I kinda feel like there's not very much special about this particular episode. The police clearly wanted the protesters to disperse, the protesters refused. The police responded with non-deadly force and the crowd dispersed.
My question is, when the confrontation was boiling over, where was the guy in the red shirt from the beginning (the one apparently organizing the march)? The one who said that if the cops tell them to disperse, they should respect that?
I didn't see what you saw. I saw the cops charge the crowd, not an order to disperse. The protesters are a wee bit confrontational after that, but given how violent the cops were, that's not a big surprise.
Keep in mind that the protesters--wisely--had planned not to run and to stay in groups, for safety. Given those constraints, sitting down in the street made some sense.
If the cops had told them to disperse instead of tackling someone, I think that the protesters would have dispersed, since that was their plan before the march. In light of that, I don't see that any force was warranted. People have a right to hold a peaceful demo in public.
At the same time, some incident must have triggered the cops, and the video doesn't catch it. I don't think they'd just attack like that for no reason. For a bad reason, sure, but not for no reason at all.
The guy in the red shirt is right at the front of the line of protesters.
It's at minute 3:20. I just watched it again.
If there was an order to disperse, it's been edited out of the video. The video editor claims there was no such order.
Ah, police. Who WON'T they shoot with rubber bullets?
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