A different sort of nonviolent protest movement may be active here in St. Louis and surrounding suburbs. The acquittal in this city last week, of a killer cop, on a murder charge from 2011, unleashed a well planned and, so far, brilliantly executed torrent of mass, disruptive, civil disobedience. Protests keep happening — first downtown, then at this mall or that one, then in that park or on that popular street, or then downtown again, seemingly everywhere, every day, across an area spanning hundreds of square miles. Loosely organized, but enthusiastic and energetic flash mobs ranging from 200 to 2,000+ keep popping up, all over the area, day after day, temporarily blocking traffic and disrupting commerce, then melting away again.
For those unacquainted with our community, here is a pretty accurate, if decidedly snarky, Judgmental Map. FYI, I live in the area marked “Hipsters, Young and Ancient”. I myself am both, if we consider both spirit and body.
As this map shows, St. Louis is rich with targets of opportunity for a resourceful, agile and thoughtful protest movement, wanting to deliver short but stinging disruptions to business as usual on a sustained basis, across the length and breadth of what may be the most structurally racist municipality in America. In just the first week of protests, St. Louis protesters have covered five suburban shopping malls and as many other prime targets inside the more diverse city. Along the way, there have been highway ramp closures and street closures due to the movements of protestors. Don’t expect this to stop. Organizers have promised up to 300 days of sustained direct action.
The cops have found themselves engaged in asymmetrical warfare against the communities whom they supposedly protect and serve. Time after time, local law enforcement has responded to these flash mob protests with shock and awe, riot cop schtick, when there generally has not been a rioter anywhere to be found.
At the same time, the cops and shopkeepers insist upon doing the protesters’ work for them. If protesters might obstruct a street, the cops obligingly barricade the road themselves. That happened earlier this week on Brentwood Boulevard near the upscale Galleria Mall, in an exaggerated spectacle of brutish, military style policing.
H/T to rodwebber for the video.
Hey, thanks, Officer Krepke. Mission accomplished.
Likewise, when protesters put out the word to gather at a particular mall, the management, obligingly, closes early. Thanks, Cabela’s. Hope you enjoy the blip on your bottom line. Another sting has been delivered.
Some might think that these events are just flea bites and unlikely to contribute to the eventual dismantling of structural racism in St. Louis. But such bites, if sustained for a long period period, can grow into a serious affliction. It seems likely that continued protests will eventually create political pressure, either an outcry for justice or a backlash against the movement, probably both. The backlash will be strong, but the movement may be stronger.
Already, St. Louis businesses are complaining about loss of revenue and reduced customer traffic. U2 and other concert acts cancelled when the police overreaction to the protests left the department without the manpower needed to supply customary police presence for the shows. Meanwhile, the ACLU has sued the police for the belligerence and violence caused by their militaristic, riot cop responses to recurrences of overwhelmingly peaceful protests. That actually seems like a lot accomplished for the first of what could be 30 or 40 weeks of disruptive protests.
Notably, at one of these demonstrations this week, the cops showed a completely different face to the marchers. While Billy Joel fans poured into Busch Stadium downtown Thursday night, protesters gathered outside for a demonstration by white allies of the movement. From the St. Louis American —
They marched to the middle of Broadway as traffic buckled because of Joel’s show. They stood there holding signs. They chanted, “White silence is violence,” “black lives matter,” “no justice no peace,” “no justice, no profits,” “if we don’t get it, shut it down.”
Aside from police redirecting traffic, nothing happened. They marched down Broadway while repeating the chants. “Whose streets? Our streets!” Nothing happened. They stood in front of Busch Stadium as concertgoers made their way into the concert. Nothing happened.
There were riot cops and tanks hidden in several pockets downtown. None of them ever emerged from their respective stations to confront this enormous group of demonstrators. Instead, the white protestors were met with a long row of bike cops who stood between the barricades around Busch Stadium set up to block protesters from bombarding into the stadium.
A few protestors on the frontline yanked open the barricades. The bike cops acted quickly to keep the protestors out and secure the barricades again. But other than that, nothing happened. A few minutes after Billy Joel began performing, the protestors blocked Broadway again before calling it a night.
Compare the look of the riot policed demonstration on Brentwood Boulevard just the day before, with the white folks march the next night —
When all of the area cops, begin to appropriately police all of the marches, like the St. Louis PD policed the white folks march Thursday night, this movement will have reached an important milestone in the struggle.