Occupy Oakland–Update

Pictures and footage from last night’s police action against the Occupy encampment in Oakland, CA.

This footage from the Associated Press isn’t terribly coherent, but you can see the classic tactic of crowding someone who is angry. Once one of her stray gestures touches an armored cop, the force used in return is startling.

https://youtu.be/CpO-lJr2BQY

Verification that rubber bullets were being used on the peaceful crowd:

Rubber Bullet

And a demonstration of the damage they do:

Shot by Rubber Bullet

A woman in a wheelchair in the tear gas:

Tear Gas and Wheelchair

Yes, including that last looks like a simple appeal to emotion, but I’m including it for a reason. I suggest you watch this video from KTVU that I can’t embed. Around the 1-minute mark, the “confrontation” with the police begins. At 3 minutes, the tear gassing starts. Shortly thereafter, you can see what happens when someone is injured (reports say by the explosive charge on one of the tear gas canisters, but I can’t vouch for that information) and others try to help. Oakland police–and the 15 other law enforcement agencies recruited to back them up–have created a situation in which you’d best not need any help if you want to protest.

A big thanks to Liz Henry, who is pulling together all this information in her Twitter feed. Sadly, she’s getting crap like this in return.

OWS Abuse

Update: The person on the ground at the end of the KTVU video has been identified as an Iraq war vet. He’s also in critical condition after his injury.

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Occupy Oakland–Update
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6 thoughts on “Occupy Oakland–Update

  1. 3

    Why do police, everywhere, have to behave like thugs? They want our support, indeed need it, to police the streets and yet they behave like this.

    The KTVU video is disgusting. Someone is lying injured on the ground and people rush to help. What do the police do? They casually throw a tear gas grenade into the middle of the group trying to help. Well done police, that was really brave and big of you.

  2. 4

    Let me see if I understand this correctly. The Oakland city government has been saying that the conditions in the protestors’ camp are unsanitary and that they cannot control petty thievery. Therefore, in an effort to help the protestors stay healthy and safe and their belongings secure, the riot police go in and beat them up.

  3. 5

    Holy shit. They throw tear gas into a group of people helping an injured protester?

    fuckers. I HATE cops. Law enforcement is completely out of control. I hope youtube and social networking and other internet outlets can help release us from the tyranny of law enforcement in this country. My sincerest hope is that it can do what TV did in the 60’s by bringing the Vietnam war into people’s living rooms.

  4. bob
    6

    Wish I could go, I will go to my local occupation instead. Everyone should go to their local occupation.

    The thing is, the media portrayal that you see here is also propaganda. They are showing stuff that will turn conservatives off mightily. They are trying to make this a liberal movement, and to show the protesters immediately before and after the attack, without bothering to show how they are totally reasonably people and non-violent and civil when not being viciously attacked. The occupation was totally non-violent and non-harmful to even property.

    They are trying to back it into a corner and marginalize this movement. Divide and conquer.

    Even these days with modern communications, assembling is an essential prerequisite for people to make change, that is why they are doing this. Even though we fight the occupation, it is not “the cops are only doing our publicity for us”. No. It prevents the GAs from occuring, it prevents the discussion, thinking, progress machine that is e.g. liberty square from occurring. It forces us a step backwards, ant they know it.

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