This is What Democracy Looks Like (Part II)

Go back to Part I

Part II

(live audio): George Becker, President of United Steelworkers of America: What I saw this morning… I stayed out there in the rain and I watched. I watched youngsters who were peacefully demonstrating, who weren’t doing a damn thing to hurt anybody, who went down the street and I watched them jackbooted [by] club holding [cops]... You were treated shabbily! If this was my city I would apologize to you for that happening in this city, and I want to welcome you -- this is where you belong – right here with labor...

Right on!

(interview): Bob Hasegawa: Then the rally ended and then there was no march!

(live audio): Come on down! Come on downtown! Come on downtown and shut it down! The WTO is downtown!

(interview): Bob Hasegawa: There was such a sense of disappointment at that point that we weren’t actually going to challenge this no protest order, so some of us got together and organized a follow-up march and we went from the pier and climbed the pike street hill climb there up from downtown.

(chanting) Who’s streets, our streets!

(sign): Harmonize Labor & the Environment

(interview): Bob Hasegawa: As we got to 2nd Avenue, there was a group of maybe 2,000 people and they were moving from our left to our right and it was obvious they were running from something

Peaceful protest!

(sign): Stop the WTO/New World Order
On Wednesday, protesters received word that the WTO trade negotiations were on shaky ground. With the world’s attention focused on Seattle, delegates from developing countries began openly criticizing the WTO’s anti-democratic process.

(interview): Juan Bocanegra: Malcom once said that riot is the voice of the people. This wasn’t a riot by any means of the word. But it was a manifestation of the people’s voice, and the [brutal] response by the police department was one of the most significant turning points because it told everybody that all of you are slaves and you better get back in your place.

(interview): Steelworker from Indiana: We had a rally down at the docks and we went through the Pike Market and came up to the corner and saw those police chasing the kids down the street, and these were the same kids that had been marching with us and they weren’t doing anything wrong

(interview): Ron Judd: People got pissed! And I had trade unionists who just a matter of days before were saying, ‘We shouldn’t be out there’ calling me up saying, ‘when are we protesting next? I want to be there cause what’s going on is wrong.’ And one thing you got to say about the labor movement, you know- when our sisters and brothers think something’s wrong, they will get engaged. Sometimes it takes a while to get there, we all have to connect the dots, but when they saw people that they had marched with on Tuesday, that they had developed relationships with on Tuesday, being beaten and gassed, that did it….

(interview): Steelworker from Indiana: I’m just so ashamed of my country right now. I’m crying because I got pepper gassed in my eyes, but I’d cry anyway. You know, it’s…

(interview): War Cry: It radicalized a lot of people, that when push came to shove that they were willing, in fact had a blueprint, for making war on their own people.

On Wednesday, a mayoral decree made it illegal to buy, sell, or possess a gas mask in the city of Seattle.

Nobody gave us any warning. They trapped us in this box and they doused us with tear gas. I have a seven year old child. I am out here to voice my opinions on how we should protect our environment for the future, and I have the right to assemble. And my rights have been taken away today.

They have a letter from Nick Licata, who’s a councilman, saying that she is no threat to the public and that she has the right to freely walk the streets in the city of Seattle, and she is showing that to the police now that Nick Licata says she should be able to walk the streets.

Get back !
We’re on the sidewalk!
I’ll use tear gas if you don’t get back!

(interview): Bob Hasegawa: What they’re telling us is that it’s OK for you to protest if you’re small in numbers and weak, but once you grow into a mass movement it’s not ok to protest. Our normal rights don’t apply this week in Seattle apparently.
Why’s that?
Uh, because we are winning!

Eight corporations own over 50% of all media in the US.

Pam McCammon joins us on the telephone right now - she is with the police department:
"Obviously, we feel we have handled things very well even though some people decided to be violent, uh, still, we have been and done things correctly. We have not made mistakes."

How many civilians were injured? Less than 20, less than 20

Now a democracy such as ours is tested on a routine basis. Obviously we are witnessing that here on the streets of Seattle as certain rights may or may not have been taken away due to the situation at hand….

(interview): Norm Stamper, Seattle Police Chief: Certainly, in the face of intense provocation our police officers responded very, very effectively. We too share in the anguish and the pain to see windows boarded up at dozens of businesses…

(interview): Paul Schell, Mayor of Seattle: And you [the media] need to help us with that because if they see themselves being made heroes or victims, then we are sending the wrong messages.

(demonstrator being interviewd) Cops just started running at us all of a sudden with canisters - I guess it was pepper spray - and just started attacking the crowd.

How do you feel right now?

A lot better, pretty calm. my eyes hurt and I can’t really open them without a lot of pain…

Good luck Natalie... she said her eyes are shut and she can’t see anything. That’s pretty much the story for people getting in the way down here…

What can I do?

I would stand on the side of the street and stay out of the way, ma’am.

For anyone who wants to stand down here and be in the way I guess they are inviting trouble on themselves.

(interview): Verlene Wilder: The police decided Wednesday night to do what I personally call just hunting people! And they literally pushed them from Pike Place Market down First Avenue, out of the no protest zone, they were out of the curfew zone. the curfew had not even happened yet, and here are the police marching down the street actually hunting them down.

(interview): Ron Judd: As the police surrounded this group of protestors, we gave refuge to them in the Labor Temple.

Outside the Labor Temple
(interview): Verlene Wilder: They just arrested people! And we had people that did nothing but come out of the Labor Temple building and followed the instructions that were given by the police who ended up in jail. So at that point, we said enough was enough!

The Seattle Police Department arrested 630 people on charges ranging from Failure to Disperse to Assaulting a Police Officer

(interview): Steelworker from Kansas: If we wanted to, we could of tore this city apart! There was 50,000 people in the streets yesterday and a handful of people broke a handful of windows… And now they are taking the peaceful protestors that out here and treating them really wrong. It’s wrong. They should realize that if we wanted to raise hell out here, it could of happened!

(voice over): From a cold war militarization that threatened humanity with one blow, we have moved to the militarization of every aspect of life, a militarization that threatens humanity with many blows, in many places, and in many ways. National armies created to defend against foreign enemies are turning their rifles inward.

(voice over): Global corporate power depends upon armies to protect it, jails to silence dissent, and violence to pave the way for its expansion. National repression is the necessary premise for corporate globalization. Every country, every city, every house, every person, everything is a battleground.

(voice over): We have got to take direct action (repeat from crowd). We have got to take direct action to get our people out of jail (repeat from crowd).

Dec. 2, Sandpoint Naval Station: We were peacefully assembled, and we have been arrested without being charged, and we are being detained here without being charged, and we’d like to speak with our lawyer! We are citizens with voices and we’d like our voices to be heard! Our constitutional rights have been suspended today!

(interview): Hop Hopkins: We had decided on the bus and prior to that in our own affinity groups that if we were to get arrested we would not give our name, we would not cooperate in any way, we would not be separated, we would all ask and make the same demands -- which were immediate release and all charges to be dropped. We are not getting off the bus until we have a meeting with our lawyer on the bus. Stay on the bus! It’s ok. They won’t take us - stay on the bus!

(interview): Lydia Cabasco,Community Organizer There were about four other buses that were parked beside us that were just trying to figure out what to do. We were posting messages up against the wall shouting at each other trying to pass on messages through the attorneys to figure out what’s going on…

(interview): Hop Hopkins: So after fourteen hours they decided it was time for us to go. We were told that we’d be moved to King County Jail, so the bus started to move and we weren’t taken to King County! We were taken out of the view of the media, we were taken around the back of Sandpoint and then we were unloaded. The cops got on, pepper sprayed a few people from the front of the bus and when you do something like that on the bus, it goes throughout the bus and everybody gets it. So at that point we were forcibly taken off of the bus and taken to Sandpoint… and some of us were taken to King County. This is what democracy looks like.

Outside the King County Courthouse

(interview): War Cry: People had a strategy about how they were going to deal, they were going to stick together in jail, and not let anyone be separated, or isolated, or intimidated, or punished, or threatened - and that really worked.

(interview): Bob Hasegawa: Our director of organizing was one of those arrested and that’s the wrong person you want to get into a jail cell with a bunch of other folks because he’s gonna organize the people. I will remain silent. (repeat) I want to speak to a lawyer. (repeat)

(interview): Lydia Cabasco: It was incredibly moving to hear that about 6,000 people had come and sat down in a lockdown so we could see our lawyers.

(interview): Ron Judd: I was told by the ILWU to deliver the message that if this wasn’t resolved that the ILWU was willing to shut down the ports in solidarity.

(interview): Verlene Wilder: It was an obligation for us to be out there. We had to be there. It was our role to be there.

(interview): Rice Baker-Yeboah: It created a sense of community because that was where the Steelworkers and the other unions were bringing food and blankets and water and taking care of people, and people were just taking care of people in what seemed to be the most natural way for human beings to function, but which we had never really seen before.

<<p>strong>(interview): Lydia Cabasco: And then to hear also from the legal team that people in Cuba, and Amsterdam, London, Africa and Mexico were rallying for our release was also quite amazing…

(interview): Kristine Wong, Community Coalition for Environmental Justice That first night everyone was out there so late, and then they had the spokesperson council and they had people talking on the bullhorn, repeat after me, this is what is going on… But what was amazing was that we did make a plan, through this whole consensus model, with a couple hundred people there. I had never seen anything like that before in my life, and I think that for me that was a turning point, because I started to look at everyone around me differently.

(interview): Lydia Cabasco: I think the whole jail experience really brought a lot of people together, because at that point it became very personal

(interview): Hop Hopkins: It was a good experience to be there in jail to recognize hey, no matter where these people are coming from, they decided that they had had enough and that they were willing to lay whatever they had, and at that point their body, for the cause. and to be with a group of people no matter where you were coming from, was a very powerful thing

(live audio): Katya Kumisarik, Midnight Special Law Collective: The other thing I have to do tonight is tell you some bad news. And I want you to promise that you will stay sitting down and hold your neighbors hand - to stay that way while I tell you - and stay that way afterwards - even though you may feel upset. Can you do that for me? Yes!

OK here’s the news. Some of the other lawyer and activists on the legal team and I went inside the jail today and we talked to some of the folks who’ve been in there. And some of the people have been beaten and some people were pepper sprayed at Sandpoint. We can’t let them stay in there! We need to get our people out! Each of us came to Seattle for different reasons - some of us out of desperation as much as out of hope. Some of us came for causes we had worked for our whole lives. Some came for reasons we cannot yet articulate.

When we filled the streets of Seattle, there was a power in our bodies that we didn’t know we had. In this city, for this moment, our lives were our own. Who can say at what precise location, and at what exact hour and date this global movement began? In Seattle we were a only a small part of the movement, but in the gas and bullets our memory returned. For a moment our history was made clear to us. We felt the edges of our skins marked by a global and historical struggle. We stopped waiting for our world to be legislated or prescribed to us. This time we did not ask for permission to be free.

(interview): Bob Hasegawa: We had to do more than just give lip service to this coalition building. If we’re going to mount an effective response to the events of the week and really coordinate an effective rally on Friday, we had to get out there and walk the talk.

(interview): Ron Judd: We’re going to do this, right! Let’s just be perfectly clear we’re gonna march back into that no protest zone! The question the Mayor and the Chief of Police had to ask was do they want to confront us?

(Signs and buttons): Peaceful protest!; No to WTO; Resist WTO; I am part of the student movement; I support locked out Kaiser-Steelworkers; Break the chain of debt; If it doesn’t work for working families it doesn’t work: We are the city - we can shut it down: WTO ends democracy; GI Joe has got to go!

This is what democracy looks like!

The WTO went against too many people, too many people at once. Labor, environmental movement, women rights, animal rights, every different type of, group of people that’s affected by this - and that’s their worst mistake ever. They pissed off too many people and now we’re going to fight back and we’re gonna fight back unified and that’s what gonna help us.

Mexico City – Amsterdam - New Delhi – Bangalore – Lisbon – Paris – Geneva – Berlin – Ankara – Rome – Baltimore – Iceland – Philadelphia – Nashville – Tucson – Manila – Boston – Australia – Wales – Israel – Milan - [Tokyo]

By the end of the week, demonstrations were being held around the world in solidarity with the protests in Seattle.

(music): 
It has to start somewhere -
it has to start sometime -
what better place than here -
what better time than now -
oh, hell, can’t stop us now!

We took the streets back! We took the streets!

Verlene Wilder: They shot us with tear gas and they couldn’t silence us! They shot us with silver bullets but they still couldn’t silence us! They set up curfews and zones and we broke right through them! We want to thank all of you for being here today. We couldn’t have had this victory without the solidarity all of you have shown! Give yourselves a hand!

(interview): Dr. Vandana Shiva: I think Seattle taught people that all these interests… not only can they live with each other, but they are necessary for each other, that no labor movement will really be strong and sustainable until it includes the environmental concerns and no environmental movement will have a relevance for the future unless it brings into the equation- how do people live, how do people survive, how do they eat, how do they get water?

There was a banner, you know, Teamsters and Turtles together at last. That was so wonderful! Of course, we belong together because the same people who exploit natural resources, exploit human resources.

This is something that is part of our prophecy - that it’s time for us to unite ourselves as common people throughout the world, crossing some of these barriers that have been created by corporations to keep us apart.

(interview): Hop Hopkins: Yeah, we gotta have solidarity around these things, but solidarity doesn’t mean we don’t talk about issues that separate us, and that’s the biggest change that I see happening. Not for us to buy into the whole Kumbaya, let’s sit around the fucking campfire idea and just march down the road together. That’s part of it, but you got to take it that step further. Race, class, gender, sexism, hetereosexism, the whole nine yards… if that not in your analysis then you’re only half-stepping and you’re not really working for the revolution.

(interview): Kristine Wong: In order to make a stronger movement we need to actually stop and say ok, let’s assess ourselves and see what we can do to get to know each other better.

(interview): Jeff Engels: Without being liberal and fake about it, figure out how to work with groups that are in struggle and who’ve been in struggle and not like say, ‘Come follow us’ but like, ‘Oh, we’re finally awake, oh, we’re kind of late, oh, let’s get something together here…’

I will absolutely never be the same again. I’ve never seen this before. I’ve never seen people stand up like this before, and I’m going to take this home and this is going to keep me going for a long time because it’s really opened my eyes to some amazing possibilities.

(interview): Dr. Vandana Shiva: We need to then make the circle full and not rest satisfied that the streets of Seattle were fully global, because they will not be fully global until the streets of Delhi and Travantrum and Kenya and in South Africa and in Bangkok and in Latin America we start to have the same expressions of solidarity and the same sense and buildup that we are together in this.

Isn’t this extraordinary? I’ve been around since the sixties and my dad in the thirties with the UAW and this is really happening for the first time… it’s great. OK, here’s our lawyer! Ron Sims has promised that nobody out here will get arrested as long as the negotiations are going on. You guys rock! The people inside can hear you. Let them go! Let them go! (repeat)

(interview): Tom Hayden, The Chicago 7:
(each sentence is repeated by crowd)
I never thought
the time would come
that a new generation of activists
would part the waters.
The waters in which your idealism is supposed to be drowned -
and come to the surface
smiling
fighting
laughing
dancing
marching
committing civil disobedience
renewing American democracy
concretely
expressing
solidarity.
Not only here in the United States
but in the far corners of the earth
beyond the eye of the media.
So you have
slowed the machinery of destruction
down.
But it can’t be about slowing the rate of destruction.
It has to be about
speeding the rate of creation
of a new world
a better place.


Thank you! Thank you!
(crowd repeats each sentence)
I’m reading this off my pager
this is direct information
a complete collapse
there will be no new millennium round!

We Win!
Call the Cops!

I was asked to make an announcement from the Independent Media Center. The Filipino representative [at the WTO meetings] stated that our presence here empowered third world representatives in helping the WTO come down.

(interview): Dr. Vandana Shiva: Not only will there be attempts from the Pat Buchanans, there will be an attempt from the Democrats and from the Republicans to ensure that the anti-[corporate] globalization movement ends up looking like and being a xenophobic movement in it’s most obvious articulation. And I think we have to ensure that that doesn’t happen because the anti-[corporate] globalization movement is about a universal shared humanity.

(interview): Ron Judd: We scared the shit out of them in Seattle! It’s absolutely, you know, they will sit back down now that they have had time to reflect and they are going to try to spin it different ways, but let me tell you, WTO Secretary General Michael Moore is talking different about global trade today than he did two weeks before.

(interview): Rice Baker-Yeboah: It’s time we come together. It’s time to stop feeling as though we are isolated entities leading lives of unsatisfactory consumption… it’s that we can do it!

(interview): War Cry: We have the capacity to re-mobilize and come together again. Which is good – because we will!

[top]