Police Crack Down On 'Occupy Wall Street' Protests

The Occupy Wall Street protests. Photograph: Tina Fineberg/AP


New York Police Accused Of Heavy-Handed Tactics As 80 Anti-Capitalist Protesters On 'Occupy Wall Street' March Are Arrested

Courtesy Of "The Guardian"

The anti-capitalist protests that have become something of a fixture in Lower Manhattan over the past week or so have taken on a distinctly ugly turn.

Police have been accused of heavy-handed tactics after making 80 arrests on Saturday when protesters marched uptown from their makeshift camp in a private park in the financial district.

Footage has emerged on YouTube showing stocky police officers coralling a group of young female protesters and then spraying them with mace, despite being surrounded and apparently posing threats of only the verbal kind.

YouTube footage of protesters being pepper-sprayed

NYPD officers strung orange netting across the streets to trap groups of protesters, a tactic described by some of them as "kettling" – a term more commonly used by critics of a similar tactic deployed by police in London to contain potentially violent demonstrations there.

The media here in New York has been accused of being slow off the mark to cover the demonstrations, which have been going on for more than a week.

Here are some links to our coverage over the past week.

• This is a gallery of photographs taken by John Stuttle last weekend.
• Karen McVeigh visited the camp in Zuccotti Park on Monday
• Later in the week, Paul Harris recorded video interviews with some of the protesters.

Now, however, the local media has paid more attention – almost certainly because Saturday's protest became disruptive, bringing chaos to the busy Union Square area and forcing the closure of streets.

The New York Times quoted one protester, Kelly Brannon, 27, of Ridgewood, Queens:

They put up orange nets and tried to kettle us and we started running and they started tackling random people and handcuffing them. They were herding us like cattle.

The scenes are showing signs of attracting high-profile criticism. Anne-Marie Slaughter, who was director of policy planning, at the State Department from 2009 to 2011, said on Twitter: "Not the image or reality the US wants, at home or abroad," linking to a picture of a police officer kneeling on a protester pinned to the ground.

Here's an extract from a Reuters report, which said the demonstrators were protesting against "bank bailouts, the mortgage crisis and the US state of Georgia's execution of Troy Davis".

At Manhattan's Union Square, police tried to corral the demonstrators using orange plastic netting. Some of the arrests were filmed and activists posted the videos online.

Police say the arrests were mostly for blocking traffic. Charges include disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. But one demonstrator was charged with assaulting a police officer. Police say the officer involved suffered a shoulder injury.

Protest spokesman Patrick Bruner criticized the police response as "exceedingly violent" and said the protesters sought to remain peaceful

And this is a fuller take from Associated Press.

The marchers carried signs spelling out their goals: "Tax the rich," one placard said. "We Want Money for Healthcare not Corporate Welfare," read another.

The demonstrators were mostly college-age people carrying American flags and signs with anti-corporate slogans. Some beat drums, blew horns and chanted slogans as uniformed officers surrounded and videotaped them.

"Occupy Wall Street," they chanted, "all day, all week."

Organizers fell short of that goal. With metal barricades and swarms of police officers in front of the New York Stock Exchange, the closest protesters could get was Liberty Street, about three blocks away.

The Vancouver-based activist media group Adbusters organized the weeklong event. Word spread via social media, yet the throngs of protesters some participants had hoped for failed to show up.

"I was kind of disappointed with the turnout," said Itamar Lilienthal, 19, a New York University student and marcher.

Update: 11.30am ET Sunday

In the comments, there has been some debate about my description of the protesters as "anti-capitalist". Some commenters say this description is inaccurate.

Here's a typical comment, from kismequik:

The Occupy Wall Street protest isn't anti-capitalist – it's anti-unregulated capitalism.

And another, from NatalieNY:

I am disappointed to find you referring to this protest as anti-capitalist which has a negative and alienating connotation, and which is a dangerously false label.

This is about our broken system and taking our government back to a place of being about and for the people, not corporate interests.

Other commenters point out more media coverage today, including afront-page piece in the New York Daily News.

Keith Olbermann, Michael Moore Criticize Media For Ignoring 'Occupy Wall Street'

By Jack Mirkinson
First Posted: 9/23/11 12:56 PM ET
Updated: 9/23/11 03:06 PM ET
Courtesy Of "The Huffington Post"

Keith Olbermann and Michael Moore criticized the media for ignoring what they saw as an important new political movement currently forming on Wall Street.

The Occupy Wall Street group has been camped out in a plaza a block from the New York Stock Exchange for nearly a week. In a statement posted on its website, the group laid out why it is protesting:

We are unions, students, teachers, veterans, first responders, families, the unemployed and underemployed. We are all races, sexes and creeds. We are the majority. We are the 99 percent. And we will no longer be silent. As members of the 99 percent, we occupy Wall Street as a symbolic gesture of our discontent with the current economic and political climate and as an example of a better world to come.

Olbermann sent a producer and a camera to speak to people in the encampment. He played that footage on his Thursday show before speaking to Moore. Olbermann said that, for some reason, the protesters had been "Ignored by those who presumably support them, by those who oppose them, by those who seemingly should just be reporting on them."

He asked Moore, "that's 2,000 or 500 or 50 Tea Partiers there...it's on the evening news, isn't it?"

"Oh, absolutely," Moore responded. "It would be the top story." He said he couldn't understand why the networks and other media had not covered the story more fully, and called the movement "the very first attempt to take a real stand" in the years since the financial crisis.

Moore then referenced comments made by New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, who warned that persistent economic pain could lead to unrest and riots in the streets.

"The smart rich know they can only build the gate so high," he said. "And ... history proves that people, when they've had enough, aren't going to take it anymore. And much better to deal with it nonviolently now, through the political system, than what could possibly happen in the future, which nobody wants to see."

Olbermann again expressed puzzlement that the "left wing media" was seemingly brushing over the Occupy Wall Street story. He then turned to the execution of Troy Davis, who waskilled on Wednesday night.

"A man was murdered last night in our name," Moore said.