Posted on 01/23/2021 12:19:17 PM PST by Uncle Miltie
SEATTLE — The original rallying point for a protest that began Wednesday night in Seattle's Occidental Park was to support calls to abolish the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office, but it transformed into what participants describe as a direct action event.
The protest resulted in the arrests of three people, several buildings tagged with graffiti and multiple shattered windows.
Sheena was one of those marchers participating in the Wednesday night protest.
“Direction action is beyond the picket signs in the streets," she said. "It's taking that a step further (and) it's willing to be confrontational, if needed.”
Sheena's has been participating for months in the direct action marches, along with others who all dress from head to toe in black and wear helmets so they are ready for a confrontation with counter protesters or law enforcement officers.
The group marches in a tight pack with the intent of staying within an arm’s length of each other for tactical reasons and protection.
“The reason people dress in black bloc is not to be scary,” she said. “If we are all (dressed) similar, then we are safer together. And people have legitimately had death threats made against them and threats against their family.”
Sheena said she has marched and demonstrated without black bloc during rallies for Black Lives Matter and Defunding SPD. There are several reasons why the participants are protesting, including because they are anti-Capitalism, want to defund police, support the Black Lives Matter movement and want immigration reform.
“Capitalism is not working,” she said.
But the direct marchers have gotten a reputation for the constant confrontations they have had with police along with the vandalism that follows their protests.
During Wednesday’s demonstration, the windows of Starbuck stores, Amazon Go shops and the federal courthouse in Seattle were vandalized.
There is no organizational leader for the march, and participants do so as individuals but take collective action as a group to make their point, which critics say usually ends in violence.
Sheena said they are disruptors.
“Sometimes you have to be willing to be uncomfortable and make others uncomfortable because that's where growth happens,” she said. "I don’t think you can be violent against a window.”
She said there is a deep distrust of the media among the group.
“It doesn’t matter what we do, we are going to be shown in a bad light,” she said. “You can't paint all Republicans and Democrats with the same brush, so you can't paint all activists with the same brush."
Sheena rejects the statement that she is participating in domestic terrorism.
“If you say everybody who does something that is perceived to be bad or makes me uncomfortable is a terrorist, I think people need to really need to take stock of why they think that,” she said.
What marks direct action marchers is their willingness to take the extra step that invites confrontation with police but it’s also the belief that it’s a necessary step to get their message across.
“I’m prepared to put my life on the line for black and brown bodies," she said.
Tragic. I wonder how many stories like that are repeated in towns and cities all over the 50 states. With the Communist Chinese coming back strong with America Last policies of the Dems.
There used to be Made in Michigan gift baskets with local fudge, candy, nuts, preserves, salad dressing and so on. So many things went to other states, or China, that the baskets were so empty they stopped putting them together.
Lists of Made in America will soon be short enough to go on a playing card, with extra inches paid for by MyPillow to keep the last vestiges of American pride going.
There are only two economic systems.
Voluntary exchange, and cracking the other guy’s head and taking his stuff.
People pretend middle grounds are something other than a mere blend in which a certain amount of head cracking is to their benefit.
Capitalism is working fine for George Soros, and the rest of the wealthy white people whose wealth earned via Capitalism, is keeping BLM and Antifa flush with funds.
infamous murderer Mao....
I had to work near a young woman in the early 1970s who absolutely idolized Mao. Quoted him frequently.
She got mad when someone exposed the truth that the swimming photo of the “vigorous” hero Mao was staged with men underwater holding him up to fake the swimming.
“Don’t do business with head crackers” is good policy.
Then leave.
And take your pals and pols with you
A win-win
“We have to work!”
Agree.
Typically said by sloths who are on the dole and don’t work while playing $300 video games on $700 TVs while wearing $600 jeans, $400 sneakers, and drinking $7 coffees.
And yet these are the people the corporations kowtow to ...freakin unbelievable!!!
What is not working are a bunch of spoiled slackers not raised properly. Smoking weed and popping percs since teens warped their brains and sucking away all their motivation.
Of course capitalism doesn’t work... You have to provide value to other people to get paid in a capitalist system.
We all want a system that gives you everything you want with no effort put in to obtain it.
Governance by ‘Rats not working.
yep
It’s hard to sympathize with these people given the tactics they are using and getting away with....
But to many people Capitalism isn’t working, I would argue that we aren’t practicing capitalism, we are practicing corporatism.....
How many factories across America have left for China and elsewhere destroying lives and towns all across America, is that Capitalism....
Was it capitalism that caused the housing crash in 2008 where Wall Street was bailed out and everyone else got screwed, plus no Wall Street Executives went to jail for their part in the crisis....
Capitalism works as we all know, but it doesn’t work without enforcing laws fairly and punishing those at the very top who continually break the law...
Until that happens if ever, capitalism to many people doesn’t work and they will seek out other alternatives, no matter how disastrous that might be....
Then get a job.
“So aside from a high standard of living, abundant food, telecommunications, the infrastructure, cars, electricity, computers, and choice about where we live what has capitalism done for us?” — the Population Front for Judaea circa 2021.
Idiots do not seem to comprehend that some form of “capitalism” is a major component of production beyond primitive agriculture and herding. Socialists and communists can’t operate factories or collective farms efficiently without the accumulation of capital to finance equipment, materials, seeds, fertilizer, etc. The Soviet Union practiced “State Capitalism” on a massive scale.
Absent capitalism, the sustainable global population would collapse to perhaps 5% of current levels. Whether that would be good or bad is a moral question. When the lovely Sheena screams to end capitalism, she advocates the death of billions. She and her fellow protesters should volunteer to go first.
Capitalism is not working for him for 2 reasons.
1 the protestor is not working
2 crony capitalism doesn’t work
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