UC Davis Pepper Spray Incident

Small coincidence, I just found this image showing the dose of US Grade pepper spray compared to actual peppers:

 

Or maybe they should respect the right to peaceably assemble.

 

Since when? I haven't read anything in the Constitution that marginalizes that right. Blocking traffic is one thing, but assembling in a space without excluding the right of others to be there is an entirely different issue. If we allow the police or governments to tell us where and when we can and cannot protest we might as well give up right now, because they will suppress that right to no end. We already have the mockery of free speech entitled "free speech zones", and i've already mentioned the many injustices inflicted upon protesters in our nations past. If the police demand the terminating of your rights, that does not give them any respected authority to be adhered to.

 

I don't believe I did. Assembling on private property, or in a public space after it closes, does not deny the same right to be there to others like blocking traffic does.

and it was excessive. if you've seen the videos the kids were just sitting there while the cop sprayed them all in a line.

 

While I'm not always a fan of the police, they did the correct thing. They were exercising their first amendment rights on someone else's property and that is not allowed and never has been allowed. They were ordered to disperse, they refused to so out came the pepper spray. In the old days they would have used batons and water cannons to break them up.

I think this has a lot of potential.

 

I don't believe that they did. Pepper spray is simply physical pain without any forced removal. It's like if you stood in my way and refused to move, and instead of a light push I punch you in the face. Excessive and doesn't do anything in itself to produce the desired effect.

I also never agreed with the marginalizing of first amendment rights. They are supposed to be inalienable. It doesn't say "the right to peaceably assemble but only when authority is okay with it". Don't get me wrong, I don't disagree with complying with the rules in principle, but history and current events have shown that you simply can not expect authority to be fair in their judgments when it comes to people who challenge the very system they are protecting. The West Borough Baptist Church does far more harm than they do, and you don't see them get beaten by police, even when they don't comply with the rules.

 

I have no right to sit in your living room and exercise my first amendment rights. I do have the right to do so in my living room. In public forums people have the right to exercise their rights as long as they have followed the rules. That is not squelching the first amendment it is just making sure that your exercise of the first amendment isn't interfering with my first amendment. You know the old "Your right to swing your fist ends where it hits my face." UC Davis is State property and there are rules. Think of the poor person in a wheelchair who couldn't get by because of them taking up the walkway.

That is another reason why the Tea Party supporters are threatening to sue the cities that are allowing the OWS people to just squat and ignore all the rules and fees that the cities made them follow when they had their protests.

 

The use of pepper spray is generally about the least harmful form of compliance there is (second only to harsh language ), though it should be noted that police grade products usually contain CS gas as well (the stuff that makes your mucous membranes discharge a bunch of nasty bile). Civilian spray is just capsaicin or whatever it's called.

I've experienced both and neither are fun, but they don't really hurt you, so I have a hard time thinking this was excessive in terms of the tools employed. I suppose the objection is that there should have been no forced compliance at all, but people are often so sensitive and ill-informed that even 'nice' measures offend them. If the police were left with idle theats, the protesters might not disperse. So what's next, arrest them? Now you're talking about putting your hands on people.

Big deal. From the video I saw, it looked like they warned them repeatedly before spraying them. That the protesters appeared docile is probably what the more tender-hearted out there find offensive. (In our minds eyes we no doubt all picture action-packed spraying incidents where officers only bravely spray an offender moments before he pulls the trigger of his gun with the intent to murder dozens of innocents, but that's not the real world). But as BTA asked, what's the alternative?

If the university here wants their cops to be reduced to the level of baby-sitters, they're on the right track with their suspensions and disciplinary inquiry. Good luck getting them to do anything when and if the real sh*t ever hits the fan. If your boss doesn't back you up on some pansy level spray 'incident,' what chance do you have on a firearms situation?

(Humorously, I've actually seen this done where the cops apply the capsaicin via treated q-tips applied to the eye, if you can believe that - sort of like how your doctor would get in there to try to get out a foreign object. Very gentle and tender-hearted and all that.)

Anyway, sorry but anyone who thinks this is a real 'incident' needs to get out more. This is rated G all the way.

[edit]

That's incorrect. It makes you inclined to obey orders, and if that doesn't work, it makes it easier to handle you physically. Cops don't gas you as punishment.

 

It's also an instinct to get out of the way when I point a gun and start shooting. That doesn't make it the correct course of action.

When the protesters occupy a space they aren't stopping others from being there. People who wanted to come into Zucotti park weren't blocked by the protesters if they weren't part of the occupy movement. Property owned by the state should especially be in compliance with constitutional rights. Just because authority is authority does not make it just. My allegiance is not to those with power, but to those on the side of justice. When police meet non-violence with violence and an expression of rights with a suppression of rights, I can not and will not abide by that.

Gaear- they most certainly have and do spray and use other things as punishment. Pretending police abuse of protesters has never happened is nonsense. This is not an isolated incident, this is essentially what is happening to every part of the occupy movement. In Berkeley a female professor was pulled by her hair when she was willfully allowing herself to be arrested, and i've spoken before about the abuses that happened in New York.

 

While I'm dubious that any of that ever actually happened in that context, what I actually mean is that the concept of punishment is not part of any formal police protocol.

e.g., they would not say "If you don't move, we'll pepper spray you for being bad! Then you'll be sorry!" They would say "If you don't move, we will compel you to move by pepper spraying you and then forcibly removing you if necessary."

 

I would have agreed with that until I learned that J.P Morgan Chase "donated" almost 5 million dollars to the NYPD on the eve of the protests. It may not be formally considered punishment, but it's clear who they are working for.

 

I guess the Japanese are working for them too:

JPMorgan Chase Commits $5 Million in Aid to Victims of Japan Earthquake

Anyway, according to the announcement that you can find here (scroll through the horizontal list near the top), the NYPD donation began back in 2010.

They must have really seen the whole OWS thing coming.

 

Hm. That is certainly strange, because this:

is what it said when it was first posted, which wasn't until September, the beginning of the protests. Which is rather odd considering most articles start with "J.P Morgan announced today". It seems they changed it, but you'll have to forgive me for maintaining my skepticism on a J.P Morgan Chase website, talking exclusively about their donations, as a valid source for the factual information on J.P Morgan Chase. "Beginning" in 2010 doesn't mean they haven't given anything like many are claiming, as that suggests a time period rather than a lump sum, and coupled with the fact that they posted it a year late at the time of the protests, then later changed it, makes it seem a tad disingenuous to me. Regardless, this has little to do with the subject of police brutality nor the OWS movement in general.

 

You know that for a fact? Were you monitoring the JP Morgan website news items ahead of time? Where did you get the image above, specifically?

Would you consider various blogs and message boards a more reliable source of hard data? Those are the only other places I've seen this story discussed, based on a casual Google search.

I have little doubt that they did, just like they donated to Japan's earthquake victims. Large corporations do this all the time. They also often spend tons of money on parks and neighborhood improvements in their communities, for example, among many other so-called outreach efforts.

Again, how do you know this - when they first posted it, when/if it was changed? Do you have cached pages from their website from months gone by? What are your sources?

Quite right. Assuming no one else gets involved in this tangent, I'll be happy to give you the last word on it.

 

You can use the Wayback Machine and check for yourself. There isn't any mention of it until very recently, and all the articles and such about it came from the beginning of October so i'm assuming it was around mid to late September that they put it up.