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News :: Miscellaneous |
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I WENT TO THE US MAYOR'S CONFERENCE AND ALL I GOT WERE THESE STUPID T-SHIRTS |
Current rating: 0 |
by Jon R. Pike
(No verified email address) |
19 Jun 2002
Modified: 06:49:41 PM |
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Wherein our intrepid reporter travels north to his homeland of Wisconsin and attends protest actions at the US Mayor's Conference, avoids getting arrested, meets some fellow radical journalists, gets two T-Shirts and doesn't meet any mayors. This is a completely subjective account of the happenings. For actual news coverage of the mayor's conference, including the arrest and incarceration of an IMCista from Chicago, go immediatley to the Madison IMC website at www.madison.indymedia.org |
...Well, okay, actually they were pretty neat t-shirts.
The two of us, started out early Sunday morning on the 16th to go to Madison, Wisconsin to attend the protests at the US Mayor's Conference. The point of the protest, which was organized by the Creative People's Resistance(www.resist-the-mayors.org/)and Cities For People http://prodane.org/citiesforpeople/) was to mobilize people for a progressive urban agenda. The weekend of action and education about urban issues was also supported by many organizations such as The South Central Wisconsin Local of the Socialist Party-USA (http://www.execpc.com/~spwis/), International Socialist Organization (http://www.internationalsocialist.org/), Progressive Dane (http://www.prodane.org/), The local Green Party (http://www.wisconsingreenparty.org/contacts-locals.shtml) and many other radical and politically progressive organizations.
A 6:30 A.M. start got us to Madison by about noon. Using a map povided by the monthly radical newspaper, The Madison Insurgent (www.themadisoninsurgent.org),
we quickly found the campus building that was serving as headquarters for the 'counter-conference(the Monona Terrace on Lake Monona was the headquarters for the mayors).' We attended a networking conference for radicals from which two members of the corporate media were asked to leave until our business was over. I guess that since I was a member of the radical media and genuinely interested in talking with other radicals, it was okay for me to stay. Here's what we accomplished: We agreed not to 'piss on each other's shoes' over ideological labels and decided that whatever would be accomplished would be done so under the more genral label of 'radical' rather than 'anarchist'. Since I consider myself more of a non-affiliated leftist than an anarchist, I was happy about this. The reources that we have avaialble to get our message out throughout the Midwest was drawn up on a list and some more informal networking was done over this. The only really big news to come out of this was that there may be an opportunity for people to organize skill-sharing sessions during the National Police Chiefs Convention in Minneapolis in October. Make your travel plans now!
After this, we headed over to the State Capitol for the beginning of the Sunday Night march. On the way to the Capitol, we counted thirty one uniformed police and lord knows how many undercovers. Besides all the sponsoring organizations and whoever else wanted to show up, I was happy to see many members of radical media organizations covering this event. Madison and Chicago IMC people were covering the march, as were reporters from the People's Weekly World, WYOU Community TV in Madison and WORT community radio in Madison. Oh sure, the members of the local corporate media were there and probably left unhappy when we didn't trash things or violently confront the police. The march was accompanied by Madison's finest and there were no confrontations whatsoever during this phase.
We disembarked at the University Mall at the other end of State Street and there were told by the protest peace-keepers that we were authorized by permit to be on the University mall and if we went closer to the Memorial union, where the mayors were, we did so at our own risk. Some did. More on this later.
Seeing that everything seemed to be going peaceably, and since I was eager to meet the IMCistas I had met two weeks before, we left for the temporary IMC headquarters, on the other side of the Capitol. The Madison IMC had managed to rent a store-front that was perfect for a headquarters for coverage by independent media of all stripes. It was also a stopping-off point for various and sundry protesters who were in town for the weekend from Anarchists to Greens
and all leftie persuasions in between. A webcast radio was set up to provide news, commentary, music and the occasional excerpt of George Carlin or Noam Chomsky. The deejay that set up the studio, who goes by the name, 'Wankstor X. Muzzlebutt' had me on to bring a first hand account of the march, much as I'm doing now. I remarked that the most creative T-shirt I saw at the demonstration was a 50-ish woman bearing a shirt that read, 'Ladies Sewing Circle And Terrorist Society.' It's good to see that some people aren't afraid to make politically incorrect jokes these days. I also gave some props to folk-singer David Rovicks,
who as far as I know, has written the only song to include the IMC movement in its lyrics.
...Well, okay, actually they were pretty neat t-shirts.
The two of us, started out early Sunday morning on the 16th to go to Madison, Wisconsin to attend the protests at the US Mayor's Conference. The point of the protest, which was organized by the Creative People's Resistance(www.resist-the-mayors.org/)and Cities For People http://prodane.org/citiesforpeople/) was to mobilize people for a progressive urban agenda. The weekend of action and education about urban issues was also supported by many organizations such as The South Central Wisconsin Local of the Socialist Party-USA (http://www.execpc.com/~spwis/), International Socialist Organization (http://www.internationalsocialist.org/), Progressive Dane (http://www.prodane.org/), The local Green Party (http://www.wisconsingreenparty.org/contacts-locals.shtml) and many other radical and politically progressive organizations.
A 6:30 A.M. start got us to Madison by about noon. Using a map povided by the monthly radical newspaper, The Madison Insurgent (www.themadisoninsurgent.org),
we quickly found the campus building that was serving as headquarters for the 'counter-conference(the Monona Terrace on Lake Monona was the headquarters for the mayors).' We attended a networking conference for radicals from which two members of the corporate media were asked to leave until our business was over. I guess that since I was a member of the radical media and genuinely interested in talking with other radicals, it was okay for me to stay. Here's what we accomplished: We agreed not to 'piss on each other's shoes' over ideological labels and decided that whatever would be accomplished would be done so under the more genral label of 'radical' rather than 'anarchist'. Since I consider myself more of a non-affiliated leftist than an anarchist, I was happy about this. The reources that we have avaialble to get our message out throughout the Midwest was drawn up on a list and some more informal networking was done over this. The only really big news to come out of this was that there may be an opportunity for people to organize skill-sharing sessions during the National Police Chiefs Convention in Minneapolis in October. Make your travel plans now!
After this, we headed over to the State Capitol for the beginning of the Sunday Night march. On the way to the Capitol, we counted thirty one uniformed police and lord knows how many undercovers. Besides all the sponsoring organizations and whoever else wanted to show up, I was happy to see many members of radical media organizations covering this event. Madison and Chicago IMC people were covering the march, as were reporters from the People's Weekly World, WYOU Community TV in Madison and WORT community radio in Madison. Oh sure, the members of the local corporate media were there and probably left unhappy when we didn't trash things or violently confront the police. The march was accompanied by Madison's finest and there were no confrontations whatsoever during this phase.
We disembarked at the University Mall at the other end of State Street and there were told by the protest peace-keepers that we were authorized by permit to be on the University mall and if we went closer to the Memorial union, where the mayors were, we did so at our own risk. Some did. More on this later.
Seeing that everything seemed to be going peaceably, and since I was eager to meet the IMCistas I had met two weeks before, we left for the temporary IMC headquarters, on the other side of the Capitol. The Madison IMC had managed to rent a store-front that was perfect for a headquarters for coverage by independent media of all stripes. It was also a stopping-off point for various and sundry protesters who were in town for the weekend from Anarchists to Greens
and all leftie persuasions in between. A webcast radio was set up to provide news, commentary, music and the occasional excerpt of George Carlin or Noam Chomsky. The deejay that set up the studio, who goes by the name, 'Wankstor X. Muzzlebutt' had me on to bring a first hand account of the march, much as I'm doing now. I remarked that the most creative T-shirt I saw at the demonstration was a 50-ish woman bearing a shirt that read, 'Ladies Sewing Circle And Terrorist Society.' It's good to see that some people aren't afraid to make politically incorrect jokes these days. I also gave some props to folk-singer David Rovicks,
who as far as I know, has written the only song to include the IMC movement in its lyrics. The lyrics were to the effect of , ''They have their CNN, We have our IMC.'' I also commented on the professional and non-confrontational decorum of the Madison Police who accompanied the march. I had no idea at this point what was to come.
About an hour after my radio interview, the skies over the Madison IMC's west- side headquarters opened up and and we got a pleasant summer downpour. A few minutes into it ,we got a frantic phone call from Madison IMC reporter, Kristian Knutson, who was reporting that following a confrontation, the police started arresting people. Those that the police nabbed included a reporter for the Chicago IMC, Chris Kaihatsu. Another reporter, who has done some freelance work for Madison's Capital Times newspaper, Michelle Godwin, was also arrested. She was not working as a reporter at the time. We attempted to bail out Chris, but found that we could not because of an oustanding warrant stemming from the 2000 Republicna National Convention. For a complete blow-by-blow of the arrests, including video and audio as well as updates on Chris' legal situation go immediately to Madison's IMC site (www.madison.indymedia.org).
After a couple of hours at the IMC headquarters I decided to go back down to the jail. Jennifer was still working to bail out the last person who could be bailed out. About 20 anarchist kids were gathered around waiting for their friend to be released. Jennifer got him released and he exited the building to a chorus of cheers and drum beats from his friends outside.
After determining that their was little else to do at this point, my comrade from St. Louis, Neil, and Chris's fellow IMC reporter, Suzanna Kim, and I left for the housing co-op that was putting us up for the night. It took close to an hour to drive the couple of miles due to Madison's myriad one ways, diagonal intersections and dearth of parking. But we got to the Hypatia housing co-op and slept well.
The following day I read Madison's daily newspapers (http://www.wisconsinstatejournal.com/, http://www.captimes.com/) and found that they had little concern beyond reporting the police accounts of the protests and arrests and surprisingly little concern about investigating the jailing of reporters. I guess sometimes these concerns don't go to far in the corporate media.
There was a final demonstration that day, but in the light of what happened the night before, it was a little anti-climactic and was sparsely attended. We were near the Monona Terrace headquarters of the mayor's conference and concrete barriers protected the police and the mayor's from the fifty of us. The demonstration was focusing on the civil rights fall out of the War on Terrorism. The Mayor's were there to hear from Homeland Security Director, Tom Ridge. A little ways into the demonstration, Ridge's helicopter lifted off from the terrace's helipad and flew over us. Some of us waved.
I just realized that I went through the entire artticle without once mentioning the T-shirts in the title. Late Saturday night, long-time Madison rabble rouser, Ben Masel dropped by the IMC headquarters with a couple of arm loads of t-shirts that he had over-printed for the demonstrations and was dispensing for free. One t-shirt had a megaphone printed on it with the caption, 'Can You Hear Us Now? I Got Loud At The US Mayor's Conference.' The other one was promoting the Fourth Amendment guarantees against warrantless searches and seizures. They were pretty great T-shirts. |
