Dangerous New Law Targets Women's Rights -- RW ONLINE\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n \r\nResistance in Occupied Miami\r\nThousands Protest the FTAA and Capitalist Globalization\r\n<\/p>
by Osage Bell<\/p>\r\n
Revolutionary Worker #1221, November 30, 2003<\/i>,\r\nposted at rwor.org<\/p>\r\n
During the week of November 17, officials from 34 countries of the Western \r\nHemisphere--from Canada to Chile (excluding Cuba)--met in Miami, Florida to \r\ndiscuss the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA). Like other gatherings \r\nof international exploiters in different cities of the world in recent years, \r\nthis FTAA event was met with mass resistance. Thousands of protesters from all \r\nover the U.S. and different countries of the world gathered to take a stand \r\nagainst the FTAA and capitalist globalization. A slogan during the week of \r\nprotests captured the spirit of many: \"The FTAA was born here, so let's bury it \r\nhere!\"<\/p>\r\n
Initiated in Miami in the mid-1990s under U.S. President Clinton's direction, \r\nthe FTAA is aimed at further expanding U.S. imperialism's ability to exploit all \r\nof Latin America. Some people call FTAA \"NAFTA on steroids.\" The North American \r\nFree Trade Agreement, which began in 1994, has devastated the lives of millions \r\nof people in Mexico, especially the peasants. The FTAA is designed to enable \r\nU.S. imperialism to exploit all<\/i> of Latin America even more deeply.\r\n(For background on the FTAA, see \r\naccompanying sidebar.)<\/p>\r\n
The anti-FTAA protesters faced unprecedented levels of repression and weapons \r\nused by the police. The city even passed a temporary ordinance that made things \r\nlike two people walking down a street together an illegal \"parade.\" The Miami \r\nmayor touted these police measures as blueprints for Bush's Department of \r\nHomeland Security. One indication of the attention that top levels of the U.S. \r\npower structure paid to the FTAA summit is that in the recent $87 billion bill \r\nto finance the ongoing occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, Congress included \r\n$8.5 million for security in Miami for the meeting.<\/p>\r\n
No doubt Miami was a testing ground for what the ruling class is planning in \r\norder to stifle dissent at future gatherings like the Republican and Democratic \r\nconventions next year. In total, the Miami police made over 200 arrests during \r\nthe week--including the day after the major protests when riot police \r\nsurrounded, brutalized, and arrested over 70 people who had gathered outside the \r\njail to protest the treatment of those already arrested.<\/p>\r\n
***<\/p>\r\n
When I arrived, the area of downtown Miami where the FTAA was going to meet \r\nwas completely surrounded by a tall black metal fence. Cops of various kinds \r\nwere everywhere--parked up on curbs, dressed in riot gear walking through \r\nshopping centers, undercovers, and those on horses and bikes.<\/p>\r\n
The rest of downtown was basically deserted. For days, the police and media \r\nhad been talking about the \"horrors of Seattle\"--referring to the huge protests \r\nthat shut down the 1999 World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting. So many \r\nbusinesses closed out of fear. In the evenings, downtown had a unique feel to \r\nit. If you've ever seen the movie The Handmaid's Tale<\/i> (based on the novel \r\nby Margaret Atwood), you can imagine. It was like a bleak future where the \r\ncities are lifeless wastelands inhabited only by fascist security forces and the \r\nfew others who manage to scurry around them strictly by permission. Of course, \r\nhere in Miami (as in the book\/movie), there are daring subversive elements.<\/p>\r\n
One reason for the deserted state of the downtown area was that many \r\nbusinesses are boarded up and abandoned. Another reason was the leap in \r\nrepression. Each night there were roadblocks and sirens and helicopters. An \r\nanti-war protester I know from Philly said, \"Can you imagine living in a place \r\nlike this 24\/7?\" She pointed out that people in many place of the world do<\/i> \r\nlive in similar situations: \"It's like this--with U.S. troops on every corner, \r\nharassing people.\"<\/p>\r\n
But in the days after the intense protests and clashes with the police, I was \r\nwith some Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade members and other youth when we \r\nwent through the Black neighborhood of Overtown. When people in the neighborhood \r\nsaw us, they raised their fists in solidarity. One person greeted us by saying, \r\n\"Fuck the police!\" One family called us over and gave us some hamburgers. We \r\ntalked about the police--about how they attacked the protesters and how we see \r\nthem as enforcers of an oppressive system. One of these folks told us, \"You all \r\nare talkin like you're Black.\" The police brutality against the protesters was \r\nobviously no aberration--people in oppressed communities face it on the daily. \r\nClearly, not all of Miami had feared our presence.<\/p>\r\n
***<\/p>\r\n
The big events of the week started off on Tuesday, November 18. Root Cause, a \r\ncoalition of south Florida-based organizations--like the Miami Workers Center, \r\nPower U Center for Social Change, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (farm \r\nworkers who are struggling to organize--see RW<\/i> #1137), and other \r\nactivists--were culminating a 34-mile People's March from Fort Lauderdale to \r\nMiami. The march stopped at the INS Miami office and the local Taco Bell to \r\nprotest the injustices of U.S. immigration policy and Taco Bell's continued \r\nexploitation of farmworkers. The march highlighted the disastrous impact of \r\ncapitalist free trade on poor and oppressed communities throughout the Americas.<\/p>\r\n
***<\/p>\r\n
On Wednesday night, a free concert was held by the Tell the Truth tour in \r\nsolidarity with the anti- FTAA protesters. Billy Bragg, Tom Morello, Steve Earl, \r\nBoots from the Coup, and Lester Chambers were the lead performers. The tour has \r\nbeen traveling around the country.<\/p>\r\n
The air was a lot cooler that night. Goose bumps decorated our skin, and it \r\nbegan to rain. The show was held in an amphitheatre in the shadow of the \r\nInterContinental Hotel where the capitalists were meeting to decide the \r\nhemisphere's fate. Someone cried out from the stage, \"If all this [FTAA] stuff \r\nis in our best interests, then why do they need to barricade themselves in? Why \r\ndo they need the fences and the cops?\"<\/p>\r\n
The musicians were simply amazing. They started off with Curtis Mayfield's \r\n\"People Get Ready\" and ended the evening with a version of the Chamber Brothers' \r\n\"Time Has Come Today.\" In between, they shared a righteous defiance against the \r\nway the world is set up, as well as a real appreciation for all those who fight \r\nagainst that. Their performances lifted the spirits and gave heart to many in \r\nthe crowd.<\/p>\r\n
The last performers of the night--not part of the Truth Tour--was Dead Prez. \r\nThousands of youth were suddenly standing on the benches with their fists in the \r\nair.\" This night was a great way to get people amped for the next day--the day \r\nof the main march and direct action.<\/p>\r\n
***<\/p>\r\n
Thursday began with a rush of activity as early as 7 a.m. Youth marched to \r\nthe fence for direct action and rowdy protest. Hundreds were surrounded by the \r\npolice--shoved, beaten with batons, and electrocuted with tasers. Police also \r\nused a concussion grenade.<\/p>\r\n
The youth fought back fearlessly, creating shields from discarded wood and \r\nusing their arms and slingshots to hurl back the rubber bullets and tear gas \r\nthat the cops shot at them. Bonfires were set in the streets. The scene was \r\nreminiscent of Palestine. These youth dared to proclaim that another world is \r\npossible and that it is worth risking whatever the police may do to go up \r\nagainst the horrors promised by the FTAA.<\/p>\r\n
In the afternoon, thousands of people gathered at the Bayfront Park, just \r\nblocks from the police fence, for a permitted rally by the AFL-CIO and other \r\nlabor unions. Estimates of the crowd ranged from around 10,000 to 20,000.<\/p>\r\n
Some protesters were dressed like dolphins or flowers or even a \r\nbutterfly--representing their defense of earth's ecology. There were thousands \r\nof youth dressed in black, with padding under their clothes and bandanas soaked \r\nin vinegar around their faces for protection. The Revolutionary Communist Youth \r\nBrigade came from different cities. There were activists from Students Against \r\nSweatshops, the Green Party, etc. Food Not Bombs and Radical Cheerleaders \r\nprovided actual and \"spiritual\" sustenance.<\/p>\r\n
Battalions of cops were on every side of the park area, trying to both \r\ninstigate and intimidate. In addition to pepper-spray guns, rubber bullet guns, \r\ntear gas, and tasers, they had a few armed personnel carriers--one of which had \r\na black-saucer\/satellite-type object on the roof. I did not know what it was or \r\nwhat it did.<\/p>\r\n
***<\/p>\r\n
The labor march was lively and warmly received by the few local residents we \r\nsaw. The streets that had been silent and emptied suddenly vibrated with echoes \r\nof our voices and footsteps. Police dressed like Darth Vadar were all around \r\nus--staring and looking like they wanted to get it on.<\/p>\r\n
At the end, people hung out in the park, waiting for musicians to perform, \r\nand some youth had run over to take down a part of the fence. That's when the \r\npolice started to move in. A solid line of them marched forward, pointing \r\nvarious weapons directly at people, forcing everyone from the park. Hundreds of \r\nus ran and walked down one side street--and noticed that bike cops were closing \r\nin. Then police behind us started randomly and massively shooting rubber bullets \r\nand other projectiles into the crowds. Some people got hit seven or eight times. \r\nSome were severely injured--bleeding from their ears or head--but continued \r\ntheir resistance. Even when injured, some of the fiercest fighters continued to \r\nput themselves on the front lines to keep the cops back and protect others.<\/p>\r\n
Police even attacked people who were recovering from their injuries in the \r\nvolunteer Wellness Center. They opened the door and pepper-sprayed the entire \r\nspace. Clearly the police weren't acting in \"self-defense.\" The authorities were \r\ntrying to send a message that if you go up against them, they will put a \r\nstranglehold on you. Everywhere we looked, more and more cops advanced toward \r\nus-- some slowly and menacingly and others at a fast clip.<\/p>\r\n
But what really shined through were the fearlessness and creative strength of \r\nthe protesters, as well as their heart and care for each other. People kept \r\ncoming toward us, telling us which ways were safe. Medics came from all over to \r\nmake sure everyone was okay. Food Not Bombs kids on their bikes passed out \r\noranges and water to people running from tear gas and low-flying helicopters, as \r\nwell as food to the homeless who were in the area. These are youth who couldn't \r\nlive with themselves if they didn't cause a ruckus against the crimes the U.S. \r\nis commiting all over the world. And I can really imagine how all this \r\ncreativity, fearlessness, and selflessness could be further strengthened and \r\nunleashed in a struggle to change the world in a fundamental way through \r\nrevolution.<\/p>\r\n
Dozens of people were arrested that day--including one lawyer, Marc Steier, \r\nwho was acting as a legal observer. Ironically, he was charged with \"obstruction \r\nof justice.\"<\/p>\r\n
Despite all the massive police preparations of the ruling class, their TV and \r\nnewspapers could not say that the FTAA met unopposed in Miami.<\/p>\r\n
Leading up to the week and even during the protests, Miami police officials \r\ndeclared over and over that they respected people's right to protest--as long as \r\npeople stayed within acceptable boundaries. What happened in Miami shows that \r\nunder this system's democracy, as soon as people step outside the acceptable \r\nboundaries set up by those in power, the velvet glove comes off the iron fist of \r\nthe state. And they come down hard with their police, courts, and laws. Here, \r\nand around the world, the capitalist rulers cannot allow their system and their \r\ninstitutions to be challenged in any fundamental way. As Miami showed, often the \r\npolice will even attack protesters who do stay within the supposedly acceptable \r\nconfines of the system.<\/p>\r\n
***<\/p>\r\n
From Miami, many of the activists planned to go to Fort Benning, Georgia, to \r\nprotest the School of the Americas (SOA). The SOA--or the School of Assassins, \r\nas many call it--trains soliders and police from pro-U.S. regimes throughout \r\nLatin America. The school says that part of its mission is \"protecting the \r\nsupply of strategic natural resources and access to markets\" in the Western \r\nHemisphere.<\/p>\r\n
The Miami anti-FTAA protests come just two months after defiant protests \r\nagainst the WTO in Cancun, Mexico--where people also went up against serious \r\npolice attacks. In Fortress Miami, people again stood fearlessly in the face of \r\nbrutality and repression, continuing to globalize resistance.<\/p>\r\n
Everywhere these institutions of capital go in the world, they are being met \r\nby opposition and resistance. These clashes highlight the confrontation of two \r\nopposing forces--those who control this dying and decrepit system of global \r\nexploitation and oppression, and those who are determined to fight for a \r\ndifferent future.<\/p>\r\n
This article is posted in English and Spanish on Revolutionary Worker \r\n Online
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