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News :: Miscellaneous |
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"We're not paid to think..." |
Current rating: 0 |
by Kristian Knutsen, Madison IMC
Email: kfk_imc (nospam) yahoo.com (unverified!) |
03 Feb 2002
Modified: 11:47:19 PM |
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Repost from Madison IMC: Day two of this Madison IMC reporter's visit to New York City to cover the World Economic Forum protests. The computer I am publishing on froze mid-story last night, so this is actually version two. What was Saturday? A great march and interesting encounters with the corporate media. Get the full story at NYC Indymedia, http://nyc.indymedia.org |
After publishing the first installment on Friday night, John Hamilton, another Madison IMC reporter, and I went to the apartment we lucked upon for some much-needed sleep. Interested in the corporate media's coverage of Friday's events (mainly a protest at a Gap), we happened upon a broadcast of the AFL-CIO's "Working Families Economic Forum" panel discussion on C-SPAN 2. This forum, held in the city on Wednesday, presented various workers from around the world discussing the exploitative conditions of their workplaces as a result of neo-liberal economic policies. This forum, along with another Gap protest on Thursday sponsored by UNITE, represented organized labor's involvement in the week's events, if you don't count the forty or so labor leaders attending the World Economic Forum to "balance" the two-thousand plus corporate representatives. Anyways, it's worth noting that as inaccurate and sensational the corporate media can be, one can always count on C-SPAN to give some attention to economic justice issues.
The next morning (Saturday) began bright and early with a hike down to Park Ave. around 60th St. As we passed the southwest corner of Central Park (near the Plaza Hotel), we enjoyed the sight of about 150 police officers massing in front of a Trump building on 5th Ave. Turning onto Park, we encountered the protest pit structure, seemingly designed for maximum marginalization in terms of visibility and concentration.
The set-up was essentially a long and skinny line of pits on Park north of the Waldorf-Astoria. The pits were arrayed on the west side of Park, and were each a block long and about twenty feet wide stretching from 52nd to 58th. The pits were sequentially filled up with demonstraters starting at 52nd St., as the police filtered everybody in from the north. As a pit was filled with people (tightly), the next one was opened. It was not possible to move between pits or outside of them. One was only able to leave provided you could convince a cop to let you out.
The police at this morning "Meet and Greet" presented a stoic face and mostly avoided eye contact. Some officers were friendly and talkative (all women of color), but most provided curt and non-responsive answers to questions provided they spoke at all. Most were outfitted in light riot gear. Also present was a group of mounted officers.
We spent about an hour and a half in the second (53rd St.) protest pit interviewing various persons for audio and video uses. We also had the luck to run into a Milwaukee IMC reporter who spoke with us about the progress of that city's IMC and his impressions of the protests thus far. I also spent some time trying to interview corporate media persons present at the demonstration with a MD recorder.
The situation with the corporate media was typical. Anybody with press accreditation from the WEF (very difficult to receive) and the NYPD (actually easy provided a "professional-looking" letterhead) was permitted to move freely outside the pits on the sidewalks and street. Who was present? Quite a bit of European media (particularly television) outfits, New York local dallies, radio, and tv, and a CNN crew. The tv crews methods were par for the course, as well. They took no wide shots to show the breadth of the crowd(s), took many close-ups of demonstrators that either looked like your stereotypical "hippies" or "anarchists" (though there were not many of either), and focused questions primarily on issues of tactics (violence, police) rather than issues.
My (attempted) interviews were actually quite interesting. A French television reporter did speak with me, and discussed his frustration of how little access even WEF-accredited reporters had to the official and unofficial meetings. I also spoke with a Newsday reporter who gave the ubiquitous "no comment", but seemed sympathetic to my questions regarding corporate media's conflict of interest regarding their reporting of anti-corporate sentiment. On the other hand, a tv personality from a German business news network ignored me, as did a CNN crew who stood ramrod still as I asked a question regarding AOL Time Warner and conflict of interest repeatedly. That may not have been in vain, however, as several European television crews filmed me asking this question of CNN and its non-response. One can hope that will be broadcast over there, at least on the public networks (for obvious reasons).
After about two hours in the pits, John and I convinced a cop that we were leaving, and thus were able to head back to the Central Park area. The "Another World is Possible" coalition (mostly environmental and student" was gathering at the southwest Central Park, while the anti-capitalists, under the banner of "Reclaim the Streets", were gathering at Columbus Circle. The former had only a small crowd present at about 10 am, while there was a sizeable contingent at the latter.
We spent the next couple of hours at Columbus Circle gathering more interviews and working on our side projects (corporate media bird-dogging for me and "Democracy Now!" work for John). Two "interviews" of the corporate media were of note. One, I believed I pissed off a couple of NY Post "journalists" while questioning that paper's extreme bias regarding the protests recently documented by FAIR. Secondly, two Reuters reporters admitted to me that "we're not paid to think" when asked about corporate media's conflict of interest.
The crowd slowly growing at Columbus Circle had quite a bit of creative puppetry and signs. One group had a large parachute-sized circle emblazoned with WEF and the universal circle-no symbol that they bounced an inflatable globe with. There were also three massive signs that were the faces of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Donald Rumsfeld; Rumsfeld's forehead featured lightning-bolt letters stating "3000 civilian deaths in Afghanistan", Cheney featured a jet-black dripping moustache and the slogan "Got Oil?", while a Frankensteinesque Bush just and the word "Enron" tattooed on his forehead. Other demonstrators appeared as "Radical Rockettes" dressed like Lady Liberty, a sizeable contingent of black bloc-ers, "Billionaires for the WEF", and mostly as themselves.
Shortly after noon, two groups headed out of Columbus Circle, combined quickly into one group, and marched across the south end of Central Park. It was at this point that the true number of protestors became appartent. It originally seemed that there were about 500-1000 persons originally at the Circle, but as the march got underway, the numbers increased to some 5000 plus marchers stretching across the park. There was apparently some trouble at the rear of the marchers between the police (who were out in force the whole morning at the Circle) and a group of shield-clad bloc-ers, but I did not see this.
By the time the march arrived at the other gathering at 5th Ave. and Central Park South (which had also grown considerably), the combined groups numbered 10-15,000. Much more puppetry, including an enormous dragon devouring a globe, was present at this location, as were signs shaped like pots and pans stating that the "WEF is Enron, We are all Argentina".
At about two, the march began heading east from the rallying point, and proceded along a long and convoluted route that made a giant loop around the Waldorf-Astoria that eventually ended on Park just north of Grand Central Station. The first ten blocks or so of the march were very impressionable, with some 15,000 persons marching en masse through the Upper East Side. Very quickly, however, the police began stopping the marchers at various point both along the march and among the marchers, resulting in several separated groups. Like the morning's protest pits, this tactic was meant to marginalize the protestors size and voice by making them appear fewer in number. Throughout the march we gathered audio and video clips from various marchers
The march ended on Park south of the Waldorf, where another series of much larger protest pits was established. At this point, there was quite a bit of waiting, at which the police opened an outlet near the Grand Central for persons to leave. The next hour or so was spent waiting for speakers and watching the NYPD and curious businessmen looking down from office buildings. The rally ended for many following a speech by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! and WBAI where she denounced the WEF, the NYPD's restrictions on the constitutionally-protected civil rights of protestors, and the continuing inability of the corporate media to report the global justice movement accurately. She also praised all of the demonstrators for displaying courage in standing against the WEF and the Independent Media Center's for providing accurate and detailed coverage of issues misreported by the corporate media.
We left the convergence soon after this (around 5 pm), though many people remained gathered for several more hours. John and I walked through a good part of Midtown, making special stops at Rockefeller Center and the FoxNews studios to check up on the "business of news".
Later that evening, myself, John, and two other Madison IMCistas traveled downtown to see Ground Zero and the adjacent memorial wall. We also took a roundabout path to the New York Stock Exchange, where the WEF has hosting a massive gala for attendees. Police presence was quite heavy despite the fact no protests were scheduled at this forum. We also had a fun little run-in with a couple of NY Post reporters who got an earful about our opinions of that particular tabloid. Apparently Amy Goodman was invited by the WEF to this gala, which she attended with one of Democracy Now!'s producers for footage of the global economic and political elite at play. Her invitation was, interestingly enough, extended following her speech at the end of the march, revealing that our voices did not go unheard in the Waldorf.
The night ended with a visit to the downtown IMC and and the first attempt at publishing this. I'll spend most of the day before we leave tonight at this IMC working on web radio.
My final thoughts on the day's events are fairly positive. Many more persons participated in the protests than I had anticipated, and there was very little antagonism on the part of both the NYPD and the more militant protestors. It seemed that everybody was interested in respecting the fragility of New York's collective psyche following September 11. However, this does not mean that the protest pit structures and the general tactics of the NYPD and local corporate media to frighten potential protestors and inhibit the movement of attending protestors violated both the letter and spirit of our civil rights.
In sum, I think the events yesterday demonstrated that the global justice movement is alive and well, ready once again to confront the global elites. While there is some anti-capitalist action today that is considered "red zone" activity that may result in police confrontations and more media sensationalism, the Saturday march showed the versatility and resiliency of the movement to changing public conditions. Moreover, the increasing importance of the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil continues to build upon a vision of globalism that is by, for, and of the citizens of this planet.
For a complete overview, visit the New York City Independent Media Center. Almost everybody I've spoken with out here comments that independent media is growing in size and quality, and will continue to inform and galvanize this growing movement for justice and democracy.
http://nyc.indymedia.org |
See also:
http://madison.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=2808&group=webcast
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