Eyewitness account from an SF Occupier to last nights vandalism (and he's not happy).

[Luminous Animal]

http://scottrossi.tumblr.com/post/22184158717/notes-from-an-occupation-17-dolores-park-ruckus

So, rather than describe what happened (since 340958345 other blogs and news agencies will do just that), I think it is more important to point out who did this. But as I’m about to explain to you, I don’t know that I can do that. You see, I don’t know who, the people I’ll dub as the ‘ringleaders’ of the march were exactly. Nobody did. Yeah some of the aggro people we always have to deal with were there, but these guys weren’t it. You remember those asshole jock bullies in high school? Well that was who was leading the march tonight. Clean cut, athletic, commanding, gravitas not borne of charisma but of testosterone and intimidation. They were decked out in outfits typically attributed to those in the ‘black bloc’ spectrum of tactics, yet their clothes were too new, and something was just off about them. They were very combative and nearly physically violent with the livestreamers on site, and got ignorant with me, a medic, when I intervened and reminded them that I was there to fix them from police violence, not protester on protester violence.

...

Isn’t it funny too, that for the last 6 months of sustained protests, we couldn’t fart sideways without riot police raising their truncheons against us anywhere in the Bay Area, yet these cops weren’t around tonight when the convergence in Dolores Park turned into a march. the 2 squad cars and van that were following us did so at a snail’s pace while the boojie restaurants on 18th street got vandalized. Some more police units on Valencia just let the protest pass, despite it’s obviously destructive intent, and the cops were driving past laughing as their cars were pelted with paint. The laughter is really what betrays something seriously wrong about tonight’s march. For six months, we’re beaten, harassed and arrested at the slightest provocation, park and public lodging rules enforced to the very last dotted ‘i’ and crossed ‘t’, but tonight, they let a pack of vandals run riot down Valencia street.

...

We’ve spent months radicalizing and empowering the Mission, working with and learning from groups who have already been here for decades, trying to use our momentum, enthusiasm and appeal to energize moribound organizations and skittish and apathetic people. We’ve been encouraging people to feel empowered to organize themselves, to get unions for day laborers, to march for and bring attention to our terrible immigration practices, hell the list goes on and on. It’s just convenient that these so called ‘protesters’ acted in such a way to undermine and burn all those bridges we’ve been so carefully building. The destruction was too calculated and precise in it’s seeming randomness to be Black Bloc or even those fucking suburban scumbags who get an anarchist patch at Hot Topic and think that gives them license to come to Oakland or SF and burn shit down.

Like I said, I don’t know who did this, but I am 1000000% certain they were not OccupySF and they were not OccupyOakland. I know the action was marketed as an action against gentrification, but too many regular people suffered tonight. Too many car tires are slashed. An old, brown minivan on the corner of Valencia and Duboce has all the windows busted out and the tires are flat. How is the owner supposed to drive that to work? The point is, the Mission, my neighborhood, a working class neighborhood, albeit one infested with yuppies and hipsters, got fucked up tonight. All that work we’ve been doing is now jeopardized. All the interest in what we were doing that brought people in the Mission to ask OccupySF to help them organize is jeopardized. I’m sure the woman wondering how she’s getting to work in the morning because her car is jacked up now finds her job and way of life jeopardized.

[ck4829]

1. When you have constant police surveillance and then it just stops, isn't that at all weird?

I want to say there's nothing unusual about this, but it doesn't smell right.

[zeemike]

2. I don;t know why anyone should be surprised at this

they have been using this device for at least a century to control protest and undermine any attempt for justice and change.
Send in the agent provocateurs to cause trouble...and the cops are deep into it....it is all about control and they know how to do it....and no one in the media dare call them on it...because they are controlled too.
K&R

[saras]

3. If you let it happen, it's going to happen.You indicated it was obvious that the "leaders" were fake

But no one thought to stop them, or call them on it? If a bunch of people show up at your informal football game and say "fuck football, let's go tip some cars over,", do you all just go follow them? Do you let them talk your friends into it?

They were almost certainly agents, and needed to be stopped immediately. Whose job is it, and what tools are legitimate?

edit: looking back, I don't intend this to be personal. Obviously someone there as a medic is doing more than their fair share already. But there were a hell of a lot of OTHER people there. What was their reaction to the "leaders"?

[Luminous Animal]

4. Plenty of people tried to stop them but the vandals threatened them with baseball bats

and metal rods. Live streamers were also threatened. Peaceful non-violent protesters will not arm themselves to battle agent provacatuers.

The police though, were well armed and did little to nothing.

[AnneD]

5. Smells....

like 3 day old fish.

[HiPointDem]

6. kick

[Bennyboy]

7. We need video and lots of it...

so we can identify these people...

[Luminous Animal]

8. Like I said, livestreamers were threatened with physical violence by the vandals.

[StarsInHerHair]

20. ok so why didn't real occupy scatter? like in NYC?

move away & put distance between them & your group

[Luminous Animal]

23. They did. Some hung back and cleaned up the trash from tipped over cans...

the rest went elsewhere.

[Roland99]

9. Not surprised but this is just un-freakin'-believable behavior

jack-booted thugs

[Javaman]

10. Agent Provocateurs. nt

[greytdemocrat]

13. Sure. It's always AP's.

[backscatter712]

27. Who do you think they were?

Looks like provocateurs, acts like provocateurs, all the way down to the way the uniformed cops were behaving around them.

Possibly cops, or maybe those scumfuck Pinkertons the banksters have been hiring lately.

[U4ikLefty]

28. Why do you come here to hate on Occupy?

Isn't there a puppy you can kick?

[Javaman]

30. Awww...

bless your heart.

[20score]

11. Somewhere there should be a cop who's brave enough to blow the whistle.

Of course it will take a lot courage. Whistle blowers doing the right thing are more mistreated than they have been in decades.

[tblue37]

12. Spread the word--BIG, LOUD, and OFTEN (endlessly, really).

We have social media now, so the media savvy young folks in OWS chapters everywhere should be screaming this info from the metaphorical rooftops, so that no one can go anywhere without hearing about it.

Put it on your Facebook pages. Twitter it. Post fliers about it. Write LTTEs. Blog it, and send the info to all the ploitical blogs you know--as well as to all the blogs or message boards you frequent that deal with other subbjects but that might be willing to ehar such news from regular posters.

Tell everyone you know in every way you know. Then, the next time somethinglike this happens, sspread the word some more.

[Luminous Animal]

14. One vandalized business tweets in support of OWS...

Four Barrel Coffee ‏ @fourbarrel

#OWS #OSF Occupiers: you are at risk of being guilty by association. Even though they are the ones that co-opted and are joyriding the cause

fourbarrel #OWS #OSF Occupiers: we fully realize that "splinter factions" don't fully represent you and what you're fighting for.

[annabanana]

15. k&r. .. n/t

[Generic Other]

16. Sounds identical to what happened in Seattle

Does make you wonder where, who, how this secret group organizes for events. Funny none of the Occupy people or GA's ever hear about violent plans ahead of time. I know if such plans were outlined at my town's GA's, there would be a lot of disagreement.

[JDPriestly]

17. That is why it is so important to videotape all of the GAs. Every minute of them.

Then you can show that the GA is not party to the violence -- which sounds planned.

[joshcryer]

18. A lot of people are unhappy.

I have seen comments from some Mission people who felt business owners should shoot the protesters.

I smell divide and conquer here.

[Luminous Animal]

21. How do you know those commenters live in the Mission?

[joshcryer]

24. They sound like they do.

I could be duped.

But SFGate never was one for civilized commentary...

What's important is that it's being used to divide and conquer.

"I don't know any of those guys."

No fucking shit, they're anonymous.

Anonymous brings out the worst in people.

[freshwest]

19. That is a powerful report from someone who really knows all about this and has been working so hard.

Thanks for providing this. I think anyone who reads it will understand what is being done there.

[Luminous Animal]

22. You're welcome, freshwest. There is a lot of rebuilding to be done.

[limpyhobbler]

25. Yeah they always do this. We need a strategy that works even in the face of this.

There is a lot of video online of globalization protests from toronto, pittsburgh,miami. There are always agents/plants that start violence either to make the movement look bad or to give an excuse to crack down. I don't know the answer but to be successful the movement needs some strategy that will work despite these hardball kinds of tactics by the other side.

I wonder if some of them could be private security hired by the banks? Hopefully there is a ton of video. And some of these people are going to be identified as plants.

But will it even matter if the average American watching on TV just sees the orgiginal headline story of the buring cars or whatever, but they never hear that it was really a setup?

Maybe there should be increased self policing or something? The worst thing is if innocent people are getting their stuff damaged by this.

Thanks to everyone out there protesting sensibly.

[G_j]

26. They do this because it works,

Tried and true, they will continue these tactics without a shade of doubt, as long as they work, much more effective than when they wear their uniforms and pepper spray and beat people.

[crazyjoe]

29. sorry, don't buy it.....

if the vandals were cops, and the uniformed cops were in on it, that means the cops are clearly on the side of the 1%, which may be true for some, but certainly not all.
but literally hundreds of people would have to know that the guys were cops, and to leave them alone to do their dirty work. not one whistle blower????with proof?
They may not have been OWS'ers, but they are not cops either....

[limpyhobbler]

31. Maybe not so much

Uniformed cops don't necessarily need to know which individuals in the crowd are planted. They just would need to receive instructions like when to start and stop enforcing laws, and which ones. There is no reason not to believe it since in has been a common occurence at all the globalization protests. Plants have sometimes been seen getting dropped off or picked up by police, and caught on video.

[crazyjoe]

34. Your not convincing me by a long shot. We can't just say

all disruptors are plants from local police, FBI, CIA, right wing supported operatives, ect....
It makes us look dumb and nobody's buying it.
Let's face it, there are plenty of bored college kids that aspire to be anarchists, because it's sounds cool and it's something to do. Accusing some right wind government agency is kinda silly, don't ya think ?

[limpyhobbler]

35. Some people are planted to make trouble. It's been proven in the past at various protests.

Don't believe it if you don't want to, no big deal.

I agree with you that fixating on it doesn't get us anywhere, because the general public doesn't believe it or doesn't care. Like I said upthread, we need a strategy that will work even in the face of this kind of disruption, or a better way to counter it somehow.

I don't know the answer to that. Maybe there is no better way to counter it beyond what is already being done.

Yes some of these disruptors are not planted, but are just angry people and they mistakenly think this is a good protest tactic. Maybe some are, as you said, "bored college kids" who just think it's cool. Just say I rebuke you and move on.

Also I really wish people wouldn't use the word 'anarchist' as if it is synonymous with violence. Anarchists are mostly peaceful people.

[U4ikLefty]

36. Thank for not tarring the "anarchists" with this trouble-making.

I have had the pleasure to meet & converse with many anarchists since Occupy started. Their outlook & behavior has (for the most part) been exemplary. Even the term "black bloc" is thrown around carelessly. I have changed my mind about how I view these terms.

I hope in the future we (as a progressive community) will get a little informed about our brothers/sisters in the movement for social justice, and not demonize them as a group.

Many of the folks in Food not Bombs are anarchists and they bring free, great-tasting, healthy food out to Occupy's GAs on a regular basis. Just as an example.

[joshcryer]

37. +1

I saw such terminology being used as a divide and conquer tactic, it's good that people recognize it's not a proper broad brush to use.

Occupy has been sustained by a lot of anarchists. FnB is a purely anarchist organization as well as ABC (anarchist black cross, ever get someone bringing milk to you to cleanse your eyes with mace, it's very likely ABC or someone trained by an ABCer, I've been involved in an ABC, it's a fantastic group when the cops get violent).

[freshwest]

32. Thom Hartmann video just posted agrees with the OP account:

Were the San Francisco Vandals Paid Provocateurs?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/101725821

[Luminous Animal]

33. "one restaurant owner said officers even appeared to be "escorting" the group"

Yep.

Some business owners said that given the extent of the damage, the arrest total should have been far higher.

J.H. Kostelni of Farina restaurant on 18th Street said he had seen squad cars at the front and the back of a group of about 30 people who threw paint and eggs at his windows and overturned his outdoor tables.

"It looked like police were escorting them," Kostelni said. "They didn't stop them."

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/05/01/BAQF1OBH55.DTL#ixzz1tmK87AfR