I've been arguing for some time now that the graphic reports of police brutality across the country, against peaceful protesters of the Occupy movement, is a double-edge sword. On the one hand (or edge), reporting the use of brutal and excessive force by police-cum-corporate goons, generates such an outrage in the community, that it helps to rally people to the cause--a just cause.
On the other, every blow, every instance of torture (like spraying pepper spray straight into the face of young students), every time a protester is grabbed by her hair, slammed into the ground, and held down by the fascist boots of these criminals, every time they take out a baton (thinking they are not being recorded by a camera) and go "to work" on a young man, beating him with brutal force, it creates a very dangerous precedence.
Whether we like it or not, it somehow has an effect of desensitizing a large segment of the population, who have not awaken to the reality of the situation, still under the cognitive fog of the most powerful propaganda machine the world has ever seen (in the form of the U.S. media), to these brutal actions in the name of keeping order.
Collectively, we must all make it clear to these government agencies, to the security apparatus, that we consider every single act of unnecessary and unjustified aggression against a peaceful protester exercising her constitutional right of freedom assembly, a grave offense, an extremely serious matter, and something that will not be taken lightly, or tolerated, ever.
We should all, collectively conceptualize the notion that there is no graver offense when it comes to human interaction, than the act of putting your hands on another human being, in aggression.
No one has the right to commit assault and battery against another human being, especially if there is no immediate danger of grave bodily harm, or in self-defense. And especially, when it comes to police forces, if they find it necessary to use force because of an extreme situation, they must not use unnecessary and excessive force.
And it should be clear that vague justifications to use excessive force, are not acceptable.
Context is very important... If I'm acting as an individual, and I'm violating a law, and a police officer stops me and interferes, unless I represent a clear and present threat of violence, he must first talk to me and request that I cease and desist; if I don't, he must then warn me, and tell me that if I don't desist, I will be placed under arrest. At that point, after having clearly notified me of the violation of the law I'm engaging in, he may proceed to arrest me. If I don't resist the arrest, that police officer cannot use excessive force against me.
But that's in the case of an individual... When it comes to the First Amendment which clearly states that the people have a constitutional right of freedom of assembly in order to petition their government, the police and the authorities need to exercise even more restrain. Being purposely obtuse, like some scumbag school administrator saying that "locking arms in an act of civil disobedience is a violent act" does not absolves such scumbag from their responsibility. To the contrary, it opens them up to ridicule.
For the obtuse, sadistic, fascistic official out there, and the police-cum-corporate goon who would abuse the citizenry, it should not take too much of brain power or intelligence to understand that when thousands of people rise up to protest in every single state of this country, that there is indeed something very wrong going on; something that has prompted thousands of people to rise up in protest.
And that is precisely when the state, the city, the country, the police, need to exercise the greatest level of restrain. That is when these officials, instead of arranging conference call at a national level, planning on ways to squash the protests, they should be having those goddamned conference calls to address the issues that led to the protests: Rampant corruption, thievery, subjugation and exploitation of the citizenry, the denial of access to education, health care.
And if these things are too complicated, at least start with the easy ones, like properly prosecuting the fucking bastard banksters thieves who ruined the economy, dismantling the too-big-to-fail banks, enacting legislation to put millions of people back to work by rebuilding this country's crumbling infrastructure, and making education from all the way to college, free. At least start with those easy ones... We the people will then see that you are acting in good faith.
And speaking of intelligence, or lack thereof, part of the problem is that a large portion of the security apparatus (including police departments) have been indoctrinated with training that could easily be defined as sadistic, fascistic, racist, ethnocentric. Yes, a lot of this is the legacy of the Bush years, but this type of crap has been going on for many, many years....
And so they get trained by wack-jobs nut cases teaching police officers and FBI agents across the country that certain groups of people are inherently more violent or have a higher propensity to commit acts of terror (which is total bullshit).
It almost becomes like a gang... They start to see the outside world as the enemy. And, within the (security) system, there is a particular disdain for activists, liberals, progressives, civil rights organizations, because in every era those are the groups that always stand up against corporate power and oppression.
Let me clarify that I'm not saying that all police officers are BAD who would pepper spray (torture) young college students in the face, at close range, and unprovoked. No, they are not all bad, but within their ranks, there are plenty of them, who would (and do) torture, who abuse their power, who get off on punching and beating up peaceful protesters in the face, on dragging them by their hair and slamming them against the ground, and on putting their fascist boots on the necks of protesters, who are already on the ground.
They are out there, members of every single security force. But ultimately, the responsibility of unleashing these rabid dogs (the ones that are sadistic) on innocent and peaceful protesters rests on the civilian leadership who sends them out without proper guidance.
So again, let there be known to all the authorities, that we the people of this country, who have the constitutional right to rise in protest and occupy any goddamned (public) space we want until our grievances are properly addressed, do consider any use of unnecessary and excessive force against us a very grave, extreme offense that will not be overlooked.