File spoon-archives/anarchy-list.archive/anarchy-list_1999/anarchy-list.9912, message 682


Date: Wed, 15 Dec 1999 15:16:25 -0500
From: Chuck0 <chuck-AT-tao.ca>
Subject: Tim Ream letter to Eugene paper


Euegene Register Guard
http://www.registerguard.com/news/19991215/ed.letters.wednesday.1215.html

The system is violent

Larry Swisher's Dec. 12 column ignores the facts of the Nov. 30
anti-World Trade Organization protest. From his view on the East Coast,
Seattle police were told to "stand by and do nothing on the first day.
But masked 'anarchists' broke storefront windows. ... That prompted
(Mayor Paul) Schell to ... (turn) loose his police force with all too
predictable results." It is a safe and often told story, but it is
wrong.

Video evidence, corporate media from the streets that morning and tens
of thousands of witnesses all testify that the police use of pepper
spray, tear gas, batons and rubber bullets all transpired before the
window smashing began. This would be little surprise to those residing
in Eugene during a similar police performance on June 1, 1997.

The thousands on the streets in Seattle were the biggest threat to
profit and property this nation has faced in decades. The role of police
is, and has always been, to protect profit and property. Their means are
a continuum of force and a demand for absolute authority. When that
authority is challenged, they increase the use of force to the
state-sanctioned maximum. In Seattle that included broken bones and
chemical weapons paired with a suspension of constitutional rights.

In a nation where the middle class enjoys such prosperity, the reality
of the police state is too shocking to be easily believed. Even harder
is understanding that such prosperity requires the world's most powerful
police and military force to maintain it. It is the nature of the state
and is opposed by anarchists.

The rest of the nation may be fooled into believing the apologist
argument that Nov. 30 was an anomaly or a mistake. In Eugene we have
seen enough to know that it is, in fact, the system.

TIM REAM
Eugene


-- 
Chuck0

Mid-Atlantic Infoshop
http://www.infoshop.org/

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Executive Clemency For Peltier!
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