OWS-A Discussion on Tactics

On Tactics

              I've been wondering why the show of force with the OWS protesters and not with the Tea Party protesters (and many of them had guns), and the only conclusion I can draw is that its not about "being prepared for any contingency" as many of the cops are told, but basically pure intimidation.

                The powers that be are afraid of us and want to do anything to disburse us including intimidation, infiltration, and propaganda.

                So, my conclusion is simple:  the language and tactics of left-leaning activism need to change.

                First some visuals:

(Un)Occupy Albuquerque



Thrill the World-Albuquerque

Notice the difference?  Not much...except that Thrill the World is a group dance of Michael Jackson's "Thriller."

             The other major difference, not pictured, is the police presence.   During the OWS march, pictured at top, when the protest was close to the scheduled time to end, a group of cops pulled over at Richmond, started donning body armor, helmets, and riot sticks in plain view of all the protesters, which were congregated at the corners and along the medians.   Immediately, the crowd grew visibly agitated, jaywalking by protesters increased, and people started to pack up and leave.   After about 15 tense minutes, the cops packed up and left never actively engaging the protesters.

 My first premise is that the cop's premise of "suiting up" is not to protect themselves from violent protesters but is deliberately and systematically provocative.   Who makes the decision to police protesters that way but dancers another?   Is the decision based on how the permit is filled out?   

 After the protest in 2003, when I got tear gassed by the Albuquerque police, I wrote, "I’m afraid, and effectively silenced," as part of a longer work recounting what happened that day.   In essence, what they hope to accomplish is to actually scare people away from protesting.   If just donning the gear doesn't do it, then they are prepared to wade into the crowd and win the confrontation by any means necessary.       

My sister, a cop in Denver (a Sex Crimes Unit Detective) occasionally updates her status about what's happening in regards to her job and her perspective is usually quite different than mine.   Recently, she had a post about the recent crackdown in Denver where the protesters pulled a motorcycle cop off his bike.  Here's how she characterized it, "I hope the officer that was pulled off his motorcycle and beat and the others that were assaulted are okay. The protestors attacked a couple of officers and that is what started the riot last night leading to the gas and pepper spray....don't start a fight with the police and expect them to play nice."  Now, I wasn't there so I don't actually know what transpired.   And when I tried to weigh in, "Actually David, I think they [the police] tend to overreact. From my perspective, the demonstration of force and superior fire power seems to escalate rather than de-escalate, but then again I've only been on one side of this," and didn't get any response.  Zero.  

My sister's FB friends did not want to engage in any discussion about what appropriate police response would look like.   But, in reality, that is not the most interesting thing about her post.   What I find the most interesting is this phrase, "don't start a fight with the police and expect them to play nice."   What it indicates to me is a sort of mindset, a way of looking at their jobs.   Like the military, the police see themselves as a unit so when a member of their unit  is "attacked" they respond as a group.   Thus, if you antagonize one, you antagonize all of them.   For unit cohesion and practicality they aren't taught to look at the situation, they are taught to respond, stick together.   In fact, the camaraderie and "esprit de corps" trains them to protect each other above all else.  So when a confrontation happens, they are responding the way that they are trained.   And they seem incapable of looking at a group of protesters as a collection of individuals, so all the protesters are implicated and punished by the actions of a few.  

 Thus, the most obvious tactic we need to use is non-violence.   By engaging in any tactics that can misconstrued as violent we are playing into their hands.  There are reports from Oakland that the reason the police force responded the way that they did was that some protesters were throwing rocks and bottles at the police. 

Now don't get me wrong and many people are troubled by the terminology I'm going to employ.   But, what is happening here is in fact a "war."   Unfortunately, "war" has become so synonymous with violence that we forget that it also means, "...a state of organized, armed, and often prolonged conflict carried on between states, nations, or other parties^."    Now "armed" suggests weapons but can't it also mean civil disobedience and other non-violent tactics?  

Gandhi and MLK didn't avoid confrontation.   If they avoided confrontation they wouldn't have been marching to the sea or linking arms and marching down the streets of Birmingham.   But what they did do was maintain a passionate and disciplined use of "non-violence."   In fact, non-violence may be the only tactic that can also be a strategy.   Thus, the strategy of our movement may be to effect change, radical, radical change "non-violently."

My second premise is that we need to police ourselves better.   

One of the tactics of numerous administrations was COINTELPRO.  Officially disbanded in the 70's, one of their major strategies was Infiltration.   Now I wish I could believe that my government no longer engages in those tactics, but it only makes sense.   If the government wants to silence dissent and the police are the willing stooges by showing up ready to use force, then how hard could it actually be to instigate a violent confrontation?   

 Thus, before any sort of protest is engaged the most basic tactic that has to be agreed upon is that all our actions are non-violent.   Any protester who engages in activities that can be construed as violent is not a part of the movement.   Any demonstration or protest that devolves into a violent confrontation needs an appropriate PR response.   We need to make sure we get "our" story out.   Frankly, since the strength of the movement is premised on "non-violence" we need to distance ourselves from any show of violence, no matter how justified.  My argument is that any sort verbal confrontation is also a form of provocation and should not be tolerated.   They want a reason to employ force.  If we give them no reason, then they can't employ force and, thus can't intimidate us into being silent.   There's a video of an Occupy protest in Berkeley that actually demonstrates some effective strategies.   Despite the fact that the protester who got hit first was wearing a bandana, there doesn't appear to be any physical provocation and the police are merely enforcing a "grass is closed policy."

 My third premise is the simple recognition that not everyone is going to be actively involved, but can still be supportive. Most people's lives are busy just trying to survive. Thus people should recognize that traditional activism was premised on a time when we weren't all struggling to survive and thus had a lot more free time. Basically, a lot people simply can't afford to be activists in the traditional sense. Nor do people want to sleep out, get gassed, possibly arrested, and spend the day in the jail. 

 Sounds kind of like I don't have the strength of my convictions, but basically, I don't want to lose my job because I protested about the fact that there aren't any jobs. I don't want to lose my house protesting the fact that people can't pay their mortgage and lose my house because I can't pay my mortgage because I lost my job.   We're too dependent on a corrupt system, so show me how I can work to change the system without sacrificing everything I've worked for and I'll be there. And, for the record, I've gone to a couple of general assembly meetings and teach-ins, emceed a teach-in, and written lots of letters to the editor and posts in support of OWS.

The system is now set up to squelch 60's style activism, in my opinion, and thus we need to be a bit more creative. There's certainly a perception (false I might add) that protests in the traditional sense don't work. I've heard many of my students say, "Well the Vietnam protests started in the '60s, but the war didn't end until 75, so protests don't work" or "The protests didn't stop us from invading Iraq."

  What that statement neglects is that no one ever said that protests were a "fast and easy solution" nor do we teach that protests actually did work...LBJ didn't seek reeelction because he didn't feel like he had a constituency because of his decisions regarding Vietnam. Nixon was elected (partly) on the premise of getting us out of Vietnam responsibly and when he actually expanded the war into Cambodia the country exploded again. Kent State was in 1970 and many of the protests were protesting into the war's expansion into Cambodia.
As a result the police apparatus learned a variety of techniques including fostering a belief system that protests don't work.  I think the police state has learned how to handle, intimidate, and diffuse a 60's style protest movement (took them a better part of 15 years), yet our methods haven't evolved very far. Up until the 2003 protests and the OWS protests there have not been very large protests that challenged the legitimacy of the government (yes there have been protests around Environmental issues, Women's Rights, Gay rights) but those didn't challenge the legitimacy of the system and thus didn't require the use of propaganda, intimidation, infiltration, etc. 

  I think the system also learned we can't have an "educated" population or a population that has too much leisure time or else we'll get disruptive. Thus, the moves that Reagan largely started in the '80s were moves that largely cut the rug out from any real effort for any real change and now we're seeing the results.

  The most basic tactic to employ is to educate people.   Many of the 99% don't know that the system is rigged against them.   Most still believe the myth that if they work hard, play by the rules they'll make it.   And there is enough evidence that that is the case.   But trying to change a corrupt system shouldn't be dependent upon people who merely have had rotten luck.   We need to actively engage people's lives who aren't that bad.  We need to give them a reason to support the movement.

  I think we need to change the terms of the debate.   What if we stopped calling it a "protest?"   What if we framed the discussion as something other than a protest against the system but a rally for a better way?   What if we said, the "protest" was actually a "Pro-Democracy Rally?"   What if along side of the "rallyers" who are challenging UNM's rules, we actually used the permitting promise they already have?  If their permit requires that groups that are larger than 10 people (for example) get an additional permit to use a park, then we break the large group into smaller (10 or less groups).   If its the size that creates the restrictions, then we use it to our advantage.  If its the hours that create the restrictions, then we set up a system to work around that.   

  Let's face it, a well worded sign on Central is not going to change anybody's mind.   But, perhaps, a conversation over coffee, a small gathering at someone's house might.   Let's expand the movement by creating community and create it intentionally.   

 When we do want to get together as a group to "protest our government for a redress of grievances," we manipulate the permitting by calling what we are doing a "parade?"  Is what we are doing any different than the Dia de los Muertos parade?   Perhaps, we petition other organizers to let us take part and we play by their rules when we do.

Intellectual Interests

As an undergraduate some twenty years ago, I chose English as my major because I liked to read and write.   After a few years I left with a B. A. in English and no real clear direction of exactly what I wanted to do with it.   I still liked to write, so I plugged away at my own very bad version of the “Great American Novel,” the occasional short story, and even itinerant journalism.   Nothing seemed to be quite the real fit.  Meanwhile, I also obtained a teaching license and tried my hand at teaching middle school and high school.   I still loved English and wrote, but gave up ambitions of making it as a writer.   Instead, I became an educator and found myself tutoring and finally teaching English at the community college level. 

I like teaching, but I was also pursuing a slightly different tact with my writing.   In 1999, I became involved in a movement called the Poetry Slam.   Started in Chicago, the Poetry Slam is a literary competition that engages audiences and poets in a randomly judged event.   From its beginnings in the ‘80s in Chicago, it has spread to well over 500 slams internationally, with at least 4 different national competitions.  As I got involved, first as a competing poet, then as an organizer of events, I was intrigued by slam’s authenticity, explosive growth, and its ability to bring, for what many people is a solo endeavor, writers together.   Now for someone whose background is in English Literature, the poetry that is produced by Slam Poets is rarely innovative or groundbreaking.  Instead, slam’s emphasis on delivery has made modern poetry accessible, brought larger and more diverse audiences back into coffee shops and bars to listen to poetry.  With the rise of the internet and the personal computer, increasingly poets are no longer reliant on publishing as the way to further their reputations and increase their rewards.  

My interest in choosing the Cultural Studies program stems from my experiences in coffee shops and bars.   Specifically, I’m intrigued by what place a poetry reading has in popular culture and how art is constructed, consumed, and understood.   Generally, I’m interested in arts place in culture and how it shapes, transforms, and engages the larger culture/society it is a product of.

Whose Side are You On? Part 2

Despite the danger of turning what should be a debate about the merits, effectiveness, and facts regarding the use of UNM property for the Occupy Albuquerque protest, into a frivolous tit-for-tat, I want to clear up some things in regards to Jason Graves' letter, "‘Occupy’ protesters hinder UNM’s academic mission, violate rights," in the Wednesday edition of the Daily Lobo.


First, faculty is usually defined as "an educator who works at a college or university." So, yes Jason I do teach at UNM.


Second, I want to address this statement, "I get the sense that the goal of the institution is to educate; nowhere do I see anything, read anything, nor was I told at orientation that being a UNM student required tolerating activism or protesters on campus." UNM is a public institution. As a public institution, they are required to abide by the Constitution. Thus, since the Constitution explicitly states, "Congress shall make no law ...prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech...or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances," there is little UNM can do to prohibit it. The Occupy Albuquerque protesters are well within their rights to protest at UNM. So, Jason, get over it.


Third, you write, "the First Amendment as an excuse to occupy and intimidate just to get their point across." I argue that that is exactly why we have a First Amendment. If you feel intimidated by the protesters, then I suggest you talk to them. I believe at its most basic they are showing their displeasure with their Government. If you feel they are brow-beating you into hearing them when you just want to go on your merry way, then I suggest you find another way to class. When did freedom of speech have to be polite, convenient, or comply to everyone's definition? I hear things that make me feel uncomfortable every day, yet I will defend any one's right to say them. Indeed, that you are so cavalier in disregarding the First Amendment makes me a bit worried.

Fourth, I'm amazed that you invoke the Civil Rights Act. Perhaps you should review the conditions that made the Civil Rights act necessary? But if you feel that the mere presence of the protest violates your rights to an undisturbed education, I suggest you really think about what education really is. Education can be disturbing, can force us to look at our own assumptions, can point out how little we do know, and can, at its best, challenge us to engage the world critically. I suspect your professors would argue that being critical of the subject matter, however disturbing that may be, is exactly what you should be doing as a college student.

In fact, I was actually pleased that you were critical of my letter. As part of my lesson for today, I had my students go over some of the issues I found problematic in my own letter. Indeed, I felt sort of hamstrung by not being allowed to go over 500 words and had to take unexpected leaps to get my larger point across.

My larger point was in not in arguing for the merits of the protest, its validity and effectiveness, but in how UNM (by letting it persist for a week) should be called out on not enforcing its own policies if it is going to use those policies as justification for pushing for the protests to end.

Likewise, UNM with its large dependence on tax revenues to fund its operations, should be just as upset as the protesters and at the risky behavior exercised by commercial enterprises that caused our economy to nearly collapse. Every public institution has suffered because private corporations gamed a system for their benefit and basically tanked our economy. Perhaps you should investigate what a mortgage fund derivative is, how hedge fund managers make money, and how higher education is funded? Perhaps then you might understand why the protesters are petitioning "their Government for a redress of grievances?" Perhaps then you might understand why I insist that you are either for the banks or for us. So, whose side are you on?

Whose Side are You On?

When did UNM become no better than a banana republic hiding behind the buzzwords of "safety" and lurking behind "proper permits?"   Sure, Karen Wentworth can hide behind University policy as justification for the removal of the protesters but weren't the protesters camping out on university property the whole week before?   So I guess the policy is only there when the University gets tired of the protesters?   How convenient.  I guess I’m supposed to be soothed by this bit of “bureaucratese” and disregard the fact that UNM is selectively enforcing its own policy like some sort of banana republic.  If UNM is going to hide behind policy than they should’ve done it last week.   

Now I’m supposed to be soothed by this quote, ““Central (Avenue) is just not a safe place,” she said.  Really?   Central Avenue is not safe?   Did it suddenly get more safe when the protesters we’re on the corner of Central and University?  

Finally, in what struck me as sort of “Kafkaesque” its reported, “Wentworth said protesters applied for a convention permit when they should have applied for an outdoor activities permit.”  Oh my, they got the wrong paperwork?   Would they have been allowed to stay had they gotten the right paperwork? 

Here’s my guess as to what happened.   Protesters camp out on University and Central for what administrators hope is a couple of days.  It turns out that it lasts a bit longer so the university asks if they would be willing to relocate from the pristine environs at University and Central to a more trodden location next to the bookstore.  The protesters relocate and when they don’t disperse after a couple of really crappy, rainy days, the administration starts to get a bit worried.  What if the protesters just don’t go away?  Haven’t we humored them long enough?   Haven’t they made their point?   Okay, well let’s get rid of them.   Let’s do it at midnight so no other students/community members see it.  Let’s hide behind the monster bureaucracy we’ve created and say it’s not “safe,” and it’s not “sanitary.”  Really?

So this is how much UNM supports the first amendment?   We’re here to educate and help create civil minded citizens but when it gets a tad bit ugly, let’s just dispense with it.   Here’s my suggestion.   You support the first amendment but you don’t want people defecating on the lawn, put up a Port-a-Pot.   You support the first amendment but you don’t want a ramshackle “shanty town” to make UNM look like a third world village, put up those nice, neat Lobo tents so the protesters can be protected from the elements.   There are numerous other ways UNM could show its support for the protesters, but as it is, they’ve shown that they support the banks, the corporations, the very elements that have caused a budgetary hardship on every department at UNM.   You’re either support the protesters or you support the banks.   Whose side are you on?

Don McIver

On Community

Now these two things are related, so you'll have to trust me that I'll pull them together.  I promise I will. 

1)  I was having a conversation with a friend and asking her about what it would take to finish her bachelor's degree. 

She stated that she needed one class and around two grand to pay off the university so she could register. 

That was it?

That was it.  What was holding her up boiled down to having not only enough money to pay for the one class, but to pay off an outstanding debt so she could register for that class.   Now, having taught Freshmen Composition, I understand the bureaucratic nightmare that financing college has become.  When I was getting my bachelor's degree, it may have indeed been a little bureaucratic but it pails in comparison to what people have to do to finance their college education today.  Yes, many states have gotten better about helping people, but many times the restrictions, the regulations, the sheer volume and complication of negotiating the system means it is actually much easier to screw up.   Yet, the system is set up so that funding it via student loans is ridiculously easy.   In my college days, I actually walked away from a grant to help pay for my senior year because at the end of my junior year, my boss informed me that I had to cut back on my hours because I was in danger of making too much money.   Yet, I could actually handle the workload (about 30 hours a week) and was not really living extravagantly, but for about a month I had to cut way back because my grant (which I got six months before) stipulated that I only make so much.  Rebelling, I financed my senior year by taking out a Guaranteed Student Loan.   I was lucky.  As the NYTimes noted in 2009, the average amount a student will owe upon graduating is twenty grand, thus many students aren't so lucky and either graduate with a lot of student debt or, perhaps, don't even graduate at all but still carry the same amount of debt as if they had.

In my friend's case, she'd gotten a grant to cover her college expenses, but when she dropped below a certain amount of credits, the grant was rescinded.  Unfortunately, she'd already "spent" the money and thus now owed the university.   Now, I'm not some sort of financial wizard, nor am I particularly good at saving money, so for many years I pretty much lived from paycheck to paycheck.  Perhaps I could've saved, but more often than not I counted on my regular job to keep me clothed, housed, and fed.   What little was left over kept me from going insane by buying a new book, going to a concert, drinking beer, etc.   So, the daunting task of paying off a large debt just didn't happen.   And university debt, because they always have something you want, is pretty easy to ignore.  Yet, eventually, you find that you need your Official Transcript, want to register for a class so that you can explore other possible career choices, etc. and you scramble, beg, plead with family to pay it off.  

And maybe you do pay it off, jump back in, move on with your life and everything is hunky-dory?   But, I'm beginning to notice a disturbing trend.   What I'm noticing is that too often people's lives get sort of stuck, hung up on some sort of big financial hurdle that lurks, blocks, and sort of prevents people from getting off of the treadmill of bouncing from shitty job to shitty job.  And if they finance their college career using student loans, they end up perhaps working jobs that pay well, but make exorbitant demands on their time, their sanity, or both?  What happens is extremely talented people get sucked into a system of working jobs because they pay well, offer decent benefits, etc. but don't really fit, yet their stuck because they owe too much to get out and pursue what is their dream.  

There has got to be a better way.

2) A few months ago, I was talking with a friend.  She was just winding down a several month long poetry tour and was getting ready to head back to school.  She was broke because poetry tours, while possibly keeping you alive, aren't particularly lucrative.  She needed money so she could continue her studies, so she used the very same network for booking shows and put out a call for people to support her by donating directly or buying her product.

Still another example.   A poet had just finished the pre-planning for a new CD.   To fund the production of the CD, he created a Kickstarter Campaign and asked people to pitch in.  After about a month, he'd gotten enough money to produce his CD and is now touring in support of it.

And finally, one last example, an artist has this one-man show that he really wants to perform.   He creates a Kickstarter campaign to defray his travel expenses and asks people to contribute so that he can perform the show without having to dip into his own personal budget.   

Now what if we combined the power/energy of a local community with the powerful funding platforms available on the net?  Could we create a "foundation" for people who may just need a little push to finish a project, a goal?  What would it look like if we, as a community, chose to put our money where our collective mouths are?  If the artist I know and love could be supported by like minded individuals but is done in such a way as to not create any sort of financial hardship?   What if, for example, I could give someone thirty bucks towards their outstanding debt at the university and my contribution was, in essence, matched by thirty other people pitching in thirty bucks?  That's nine hundred bucks without asking anybody to do anything more than not buy 2 new books, or 2 new cds, or a couple of moderate nights at the bar? 

How would that work?  How could we leverage the power of our local community and the power of our extended virtual community?  I know my answer, but is this something that seems worthwhile to you?