Here’s how it went down from my perspective:
The crowd downtown had swelled in the DLG Plaza incredibly when word was out that the cops were on the way. We had taken a task force to walk around the State St. side of the block with signs and chants of "People arrrrrre not corrrrrporations!" The reaction on State was surprise with some waves or people joining in with the chanters.
Upon returning we found that the numbers of occupiers in the public square had definitely multiplied further. People were walking into the square from all sides. Some walking in with purpose (occasionally hollerin' welcomes and chants, or just exclaiming at the sight of the group), while others lingered in little collectives around the outside of the park. Not sure what the exact size was but let’s just ballpark between 80-100 or so, and I think that is a conservative estimate? too tired to count
The vast majority of people were younger, extremely warm, eyes filled wide with surprise and excitement. The air smelled like purpose. A very significant group of UCSB students suddenly appeared. It became clear that something was happening. The projected documentary was suddenly being projected back onto the side of City Hall. Music was playing from multiple cars. Congregations of people began talking to each other....tigers, and lions, and freedom, oh my!
We called general assembly around 9pm and, with a little encouragement, (even the folks for whom activism seemed to probably be a first experience), crowded in so that everyone could hear each other. We explained to everyone the situation with the two city ordinances that the SBPD had made us aware in the morning and delivered a presentation of at the park around 6pm-ish earlier that day. People in the group all listened to everyone while respectfully indicating their need to speak.
Eventually/organically, it was decided that there would be two general courses of action: For those who did not feel like getting a ride to chilly-hungry-sleepless-ville, (even though it would probably be allot more tolerable than usual considering the circumstances), we would wait until we were asked personally to leave the square grounds. Following that we would line up along the adjecent sidewalks to support our fellow occupiers with media, vocal support, love, and an amazing legal observer, (who on-the-spot volunteered to cross-train a group of four or five other 99%’ers so that they could also legally observe what transpired).
For the rest of the small group of heroes who had committed to being arrested for their overriding belief that our 1st Amendment rights under our U. S. Constitution trump local town ordinances that had been written to keep people without homes from sleeping in public parks, they were all obviously very determined, (on a side note, it’s amazing how a house is required to be considered part of the “public”…whoops, sorry, wandering a bit from bliss-ed out sleep depraved). Our one friend who had been there since the beginning, (and had coincidentally read one of the best slam poetry pieces ever during our opening-of-the-occupation day), had ankle-cuffed himself to a very tough looking chain anchored to the base of the American flagpole.
The sheer image of it was so iconic that it set off a deep penetrating earthquake of feeling within me. A range of emotions so pure…pride in others is beyond inspirational. It made any other excitement that I have ever felt, for any other collective human experience I have ever experienced, pale in comparison (and I’ve been around just a wee bit).
Time passed in the occupation-made-real. People occasionally chanted but it just seemed like the number one thing going on was sheer interaction. Ideas flew threw the air nearly faster than tweets. During this time I was just flowing around interacting with people and trading thoughts. Sadly enough for me I barely got a couple grainy images on my too-quickly dying phone, (my fault for buying a battery-draining speedster). There were a middle-aged couple who were enjoying it, watching the screen projection, while glancing around and sneaking smiles.
Sometime after the police didn’t show at 10pm, another compatriot suggested we call them. So I called the night Lt. who I had been speaking with during the day to discuss what actions they were planning on taking and relayed what advice we had received from our legal team (the note detailing our interactions during the day can be found in my FB notes section….updates coming to that timeline for this evening soon). The conversation was both mutually respectful and, I’d like to think more than a bit sympathetic. The communication boiled down to, him seeming to understand that we were a leaderless mass of people that felt a need to gather and express ourselves.
He also wanted to emphasize that anyone in the park past ten would indeed be asked to leave, then get a citation, and finally be arrested (per the documentation provided earlier). I updated him on rough numbers of our occupation, reminded him that there were literally tens of current occupations currently underway, (last number I heard was 160, but I haven’t checked that yet) that were being allowed to proceed unabated, and also mentioned that the SBPD might end up being the first PD in CA who have arrested anyone who wasn’t on private property, (such as a bank lobby).
Over the next twenty or so minutes (time estimation was really difficult for me this evening), our numbers began to dwindle a bit but they were somewhere in the 35-50 range. And then the young man, who had recently came from the Burn, yelled “Cops”. He quickly and accurately indicated the exact direction and description of the vehicles. The information was relayed. A group of 20-30 swelled in the middle of the park, in front of the two patriots who were chained to the flagpole, and a soon advancing line of about 8 SBPD dressed in regular blues.
What happened next is better captured on videos/images, since it was pretty fluid as the crowd didn’t back down when the first request was slowly and deliberately made via voice. Instead nearly every person in the front and second of the lines took turns engaging different officers in dialogue (and, at one point, even gently reminded people “only one at a time, please”). The cops wavered. A geniuenly nice Seargent begin to verbally engage the crowd. There were many emotions being expressed. Plenty of anger with folks who would site their right to occupy their public spaces. The cops did the whole wolf-pack move, slowly encircling and pressing their line forward. This continued to play out in slow motion until the police realized that, damn, these people really WERE occupying this space (in a non-violent way). At this point they halted. Another group of six or so (probably off-duty) officers arrived on the scene. The final warning was given and upon saying that citations would be written to which a young lady said “then write me one”. The police immediately begin to do so, guiding her from the rest of the occupation The first person to get arrested was a charismatic young anarchist (she’ll probably say I miscatigorized her, oh well) who has been travelling around with her family of friends. Resounding calls of “We love you!” and “You’re a hero!” echoed across the park square.
Everything was very hectic at this point with all people in the park either engaging in direct communication interaction with the officers saying things like, “Don’t you think our American Constitution is more important than your oath!”. Slowly each person was confronted methodically by an officer and given a final warning. There was only one incident during this time that I witnessed where there was any pulling or yanking, the crowd immediately scolding the cops in unison.
At some point a cop had crept over to where the two were chained (not sure if one of them were chained the entire time?) to the base of the flag pole. I could swear I saw the cop bend down, do a double-take, and bust out a grin in amusement.
One person near me, just next to beginning of the grassy square, said to a younger thick cop, “Do the right thing!” to which he responded “I am.” This kicked off a whole other wave of people trying to appeal to this young officer saying things such as, “Defend our Constitution!”
Within a couple minutes two fire trucks showed up with some folks welcoming them with cries of “I love you”. Plastic zip ties ended up on 8 patriot’s wrists. The firefighters got to work on cutting the chains. Everyone stood along the surrounding sidewalks verbally engaging on behalf of the 99%, waving signs, and cheering each time another person was lead away, while our legal observer and media team documented what needs to be documented, (at some point, per the later resulting live stream report, eye witnesses saw the legal observer being arrested, after a member of the SBPD force threw his notebook in the trash).
Right now we are all intimidated out of a citizen’s park (with the obvious exceptions of those who were heading for SB County Jail), due to Santa Barbara Municipal Code Section 15.16.205. I hugged, fist bumped, high-fived, threw some peace signs, danced a mini-jig, shouted some more, reiterated a couple of announcements for our 12:30 & 5:00 General Assemblies as well as our Saturday march, and left.
Honestly, the only thing I could think to do was to run home and write this blog. As I was walking a new friend-in-future-ness, whom I had met earlier that night, rolled up and offered to give me a ride over to my crib.
My personal take:
As you can probably guess, this is the singularly most incredible moment I’ve ever felt I’ve been a part of. I could feel the reverberating after effects of the human energy radiating in ways that have laid dormant for far too long. The blinders begin to slip from our faces to let us peek at the light of our own greatness. Possibilities, which had been buried like ancient shipwrecks, suddenly came rushing back on waves of people potential.
Destiny stands with us, my friend and fellow humans. We have a moment where we can build our momentum to realign the priorities on our planet to the benefit of us.
The 99%.
Join us. We love you.
Marshall Getto
OccupySB.org
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Occupy-Santa-Barbara/261202993919785
#OccupySantaBarbara
#OccupyWallStreet
4:04 PM PT: Video of our kickoff:
http://www.youtube.com/...!
Video of the arrests (including the legal observer being arrested):
http://www.youtube.com/...!