G20-20 Vision

G20/20 Vision: This protest has been officially sanctioned and brought to you by Iron City Beer

POSTED: Friday, September 25, 2009, 10:15 PM

Filed Under: News | Protest | G20-20 Vision

Photo | Nate Boguszewski

For more of Nate's G20 photos, click the photo or here.

Matt Stroud is a Pittsburgh-based freelance writer. Heâs written for City Paper about porn star Stoya, subterranean Philadelphia, juvenile life sentences and anarchist newspaper The Defenestrator. He writes regularly at True/Slant (where this piece first appeared) and will be filing daily reports from the G20 Summit this week.

Today's protests seemed surprisingly peaceful. At least where I was — marching with I'd guess about 2,000 people along Fifth Avenue from Oakland toward the City County Building —the streets had been blocked off, police and military were posted on sidewalks and sidestreets, and no authority figure was (as far as I could see) instructed to intervene forcibly. This was, as advertised, a "sanctioned" rally — which apparently means no one gets gassed. Knowing this, one might ask: Why didn't Pittsburgh Organizing Group — the Anarchist group largely responsible for yesterday's gathering — get a permit to lawfully assemble yesterday?

A Post-Gazette article last week — working off a press release — implied POG's mission was to wreak havoc. But speaking to a few sources today — who asked not to be named (because that's what many young Anarchists tend to do) — POG applied for permits through the city and were denied.

"They go through the same horseshit at every political event like this," said my unidentified source. "[The City tells] every organizer a host of totally inconsistent things about what's required to get a permit, then they change their story consistently until the week before the event. They hand out permits seemingly at random and that's the plan — to disrupt and disorganize any semblance of unity."

Take what you will from that. Obviously, both the City of Pittsburgh and POG have interests in this regard:

First, it vilifies police if they're forced to violently repress "peaceful protesters." This morphs into positive marketing for POG — who can use the police's tear gas and fired pellets as activist ammunition for future anti-capitalist rallies.

On the other hand, it makes the city look supportive if they treat permitted protesters well; it makes them look strong if they have no trouble censuring groups who haven't filled out the proper forms.

If POG did, in fact, apply for and get denied for permits, why did the city refuse their application and support today's protest instead? Is it possible that was the best option for everyone?

Anyway. While we're on the topic of unclear messages: The legendary Dave Mansueto posted some interesting footage from the protests yesterday, where John Oliver, of Daily Show fame, made some pointed commentary about 1) Pittsburgh's ridiculous police presence and 2) the protests general lack of cohesion:

The police do, in fact, have their message straight.

Check next week's print issue for answers and commentary about G20 and Pittsburgh's moment in the international spotlight.

Posted by Matt Stroud @ 10:15 PM Permalink | Post a comment

G20/20 Vision: Day 2 gets the gas face

POSTED: Friday, September 25, 2009, 12:40 AM

Filed Under: Protest | G20-20 Vision

Matt Stroud is a Pittsburgh-based freelance writer. He's written for City Paper about porn star Stoya, subterranean Philadelphia, juvenile life sentences and anarchist newspaper The Defenestrator. He writes regularly at True/Slant (where this piece first appeared) and will be filing daily reports from the G20 Summit this week.

So perhaps I'll be the billionth newsperson to report I was tear gassed this afternoon, but maybe that's a good thing.

Interesting day.

Earlier this morning, as briefly discussed, I camped out at the New and Glimmering August Wilson Center. on Liberty Ave., about 300 feet from G20's host location, The David L. Lawrence Convention Center. Walk outside, into the empty corridor by the Convention Center — in the "red zone"; the second-to-highest security area in the city — and watch a group of Buddhist protesters, actual monks in robes, chanting and waving signs in an effort to Save Burma — or encourage G20 leaders to give a shit about Burma. Ethiopians show up next, file in across the street. They're here from Philadelphia to "free Africa from dictators!" "G20 stop assisting genocide in Africa!" I stop to talk with one of them and she tells me both of her brothers have been imprisoned by Meles Zenawi. There is a language barrier, but I'm gradually getting more of the story: her brother was imprisoned at a political protest in 2003... perhaps the Anuak Conflict? He remains incarcerated. I'm about to get more information but as this conversation is going on about 300 cops emerge out of nowhere, make a right off Smithfield and march down Liberty Ave. It's enough to make both of us stop and stare. The cops reach the giant metal fence that's been erected at Tenth St. and halt. They stand at attention in front of the monks, stay there for a full minute, threateningly, then turn around and leave.

Troopers march down Liberty Ave. in Pittsburgh

Troopers march down Liberty Ave. in Pittsburgh

"What is dis?" the Ethiopian woman asks me and I can do nothing but shrug. I have no idea. Where am I? Her colleagues begin yelling and I realize I've got tears in my eyes.

It was widely advertised that a major rally was being organized this afternoon at Arsenal Park in Lawrenceville. Much of the city has been shut down — the roads inaccessible and blocked by marines, state troopers, and metro police from as far away as Louisville — and I'm forced to bike a mile or so out of my way to get there. En route, I run into five kids standing around with those giant posters of bloody dead fetuses handing out pamphlets talking about the "shocking horror of abortion." They ask me if I've been saved and I tell them I have not been. I consider shadowing these kids but can't bring myself to focus all my coverage on the odd idiosyncrasies of the Faithful Soldier School of Evangelism. Maybe tomorrow. Onward.

The first things I notice biking up to the protest are that 1) Arsenal Park is encased in long stone walls, and 2) there are more journalists here than protesters; everyone seems to have either a camera or a notepad. Reverend Billy's Church of Stop Shopping is here and talking about the evils of capitalism — a topic so trite in this environment that it's comical. I meet up with some Colleagues and sit in the sun, waiting. Chants begin and die in all directions. The lamest of these is:

"Whose streets?

"Our Streets.

"Whose war?

"Their war!"

Another, perhaps misplaced, considering the protests economic bases, is this:

"One, two, three, for

"we dont want your racist war.

"Five, six, seven, eight,

"no more killing, no more hate."

An anarchist himself, aged and wise, perhaps a bit jaded, one of my colleagues begins his own chant:

"One, two,

"Three, four

"Five, six,

"Seven, eight!"

This one dies the fastest.

The actual protest begins around 2:30pm and my abortion friends have shown up with some of their elder friends and a megaphone. They battle for airspace with anarchists who have also brought megaphones. There's literal anarchy for a moment — made even worse when the Birthers I met earlier show up with their own goddamn megaphone — but regardless, marchers begin moving toward the exits chanting whatever.

The march has begun! And it's immediately stopped. Cops barricade the entrances with dogs and batons. The aforementioned colleague yells, extremely sarcastically, "Somebody call the police!" There's this weird twenty minutes or so where a couple hundred marchers ping pong from exit to exit, cops toying with them, until they're finally allowed to leave toward Liberty Ave.

Within two blocks of their Liberty entry point, police set up massive barriers with speakers atop giant military-style SWAT wagons and a recording blares out a notice that everyone — "regardless of your purposes here" — is part of an "unlawful assembly." The recording threatens that everyone will be forcefully detained or dealt with using "other police action" if they don't leave. Like now.

But the police have only blocked one street: Liberty Ave. So the crowd largely marches downhill toward Butler Street, and various arms of the march begin branching off onto other side streets. At one point, there's a kind of mutual gasp in the crowd (which is blocking several streets at this point) and everyone looks behind them to see a group of black clad protesters rolling a ten-foot-wide steel dumpster down a fairly steep hill. I bike behind them and follow down a side street where they're eventually stopped. The police recording blares once more, this time with a screeching warning tone. A few people around me say "Oh, shit" and then a cloud of smoke plumes upward from the street by the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church. The smell is like a charred house after a fire — strongly sour and filled with ammonia and ash. My eyes begin to well up with tears and my nose begins to tingle — initially a twinge, then a pain, heat attacking my nostrils and throat. I begin coughing and so does everyone around me. "Take your contacts out of your eye," someone yells, and we flee, head back up Penn Ave. To avoid various police blockades, most in attendance shoot off into different directions. Penn Ave. is clear within ten minutes.

We notice people have begun sticking their heads out of windows. A colleague points out it's much like the Civil War — everyone coming outside to watch the battle go down.

We receive word that the protest has amped up again at 34th and Liberty. At least 200 cops gather. There's a stalemate for at least an hour. I leave to file this report. As far as I know the stalemate is still going on. It'll go on all week if today's security measures are any indication.

Related

Tear gas flies in Pittsburgh at the G20 conference (Digital Journal)
Teargas used on protesters at G20 summit in Pittsburgh (Guardian UK)
For Pittsburgh, G-20 Meeting Is a Mixed Blessing (New York Times)
Raw Video: An Up-Close View of the G20 Protests (The Associated Press)

Posted by Matt Stroud @ 12:40 AM Permalink | Post a comment

G20/20 Vision: Matt Stroud reports from G20 Summit in Pittsburgh

POSTED: Wednesday, September 23, 2009, 8:30 PM

Filed Under: G20-20 Vision

Matt Stroud is a Pittsburgh-based freelance writer. He's written for City Paper about porn star Stoya, subterranean Philadelphia, juvenile life sentences and anarchist newspaper The Defenestrator. He writes regularly at True/Slant (where this piece first appeared) and will be filing daily reports from the G20 Summit this week.

How far can activism go during a week of overexposure? What issues will garner attention? What issues will be forgotten?

It's typical journalistic discussion (What's worth editing? What's worth keeping?), but this week, as the City of Pittsburgh — and local police — attempt to toe that apparently delicate line between "keeping the peace" and "brutalizing people for no reason whatsoever," it's very pertinent. In honor/horror of G20, a ton of valid ideas and opinions are being dispersed en masse. And, from the street, it's going to be very difficult distinguishing one idea from another, particularly when most organizers take identical approaches to disseminating opinions.

For example: I work downtown and heard about a 2 p.m. rally yesterday commencing at Grant and Liberty. A friend and I dropped by to check it out. The protest's leaders called for $50 billion to be distributed internationally from the US to people with AIDS. And as we walked (marched?), another group assembled across the street to protest a housing issue. Nearby, they were protesting healthcare reform. And undoubtedly there were others. These rallies were noted in Pittsburgh's oldest and most widely-read newspaper (where I freelance from time to time), but in a way that only served to further confuse who's marching with whom and what ideas they're hoping to get across.

The amount of space Pittsburgh's mainstream media is willing to devote to protested issues during G20 is limited, so they end up doing what they do in the aforementioned story: which is mash together pleas for healthcare reform, medicinal funding for AIDS patients, cries against so-called "clean coal" and "mountaintop removal," as well as the travel schedules of people busing in from Philadelphia. And they do this in 500 words. As a colleague said during the march yesterday: "You end up praying for broken windows." In other words, the only way to get an an issue noticed is by fueling — or being fueled by — a clash.

Exhibit A is the Seeds of Peace fiasco I noted yesterday. Today it's getting even more coverage. Problem is, Seeds of Peace doesn't even highlight a specific issue; they're just here to hand out free food to activists and people who want it. So we're left discussing — over and over again — how fucked up the security situation is, how clueless the police appear to be, and how vehement the City appears to be against dissenters.

Which maybe is the point: Cut off the dissenters' free food supply (so they'll be forced to participate in the capitalist market), distract the conversation (so nothing substantial gets discussed), and then head over to Primanti's for a sammich and a Ahrn City Beer.

Hopefully the rest of the week won't pan out so predictably.

More from the front as things heat up (or fizzle away).

* For more on protests and dissent, check out G20 Bed and Breakfast, Mobile Broadcast News, and Pittsburgh IndyMedia.

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Posted by Matt Stroud @ 8:30 PM Permalink | Post a comment

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