honest jacks automotive

rat couch

bike bloc

greatest painting. . . ever

thought Steven would get a kick out of these old inflatables

you should go to Honest Jacks automotive shop~ way down on Rainier ave. they sell oil paintings~ huh ?

NE!L~ behind the clouds

Solidarity statement from Members of Decolonize / Occupy Seattle

Early Tuesday morning, the Seattle Police Department raided the home of our friends, community members, and key organizers in Decolonize/Occupy Seattle and the Red Spark Collective. They were faced with assault rifles to their heads, flash bang grenades and an armed SWAT team.
The Seattle Police Department’s (SPD) harassment of our community has been ongoing. Only two weeks ago during Pride weekend, they attacked our friends. Before that, they arrested members of the Decolonize/Occupy community for disrupting the mayor’s bogus meet and greet, a continual shielding of the SPD’s record of police brutality. The continual harassment by SPD is not surprising. It is their modus operandi. Their lousy attempts at renewing their image with the “SPD 20/20” further disgusts us.
The violent raid against our friends this week, in search of “anarchist materials” did not happen in a vacuum. These are times of mass social movements around the world. People are resisting in Seattle, across this country, and across the world. The powers that be fear these struggles will spread and they do their best to intimidate and stifle our dynamism.
Global anti-capitalist forces face constant police terrorism from the global power elite. They will always find excuses to delegitimize us and to further prop themselves up as the bearers of public safety and welfare. Over the last few months, there have been several shootings in the city, in the Central District, the North end and South end. The police have used this as an excuse to militarize the streets. By overcompensating through extreme policing and tactics in the streets and at our homes, police forces legitimize their racial profiling and repression of people of color and poor folks. This is the story you’ll never hear about Seattle’s militarized racist police force. We remember John T Williams and Oscar Grant and are in solidarity with anyone who has experienced police and/or military repression and state violence.
We do not forget for a moment that the trauma and fear our friends experi-enced this past week takes place often in im/migrant communities during ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) raids. As radicals we understand the complexities of the legal system in relation to how the state reacts to resistance.
They scare us, intimidate us, arrest us, and dehumanize us, hoping that in the process that we, too, take out our anger on one another, so that our communities break down. We will not fall for that.
It is important for us to understand certain patterns in the police responses to the national Decolonize/Occupy movement. The police have justified their use of excessive force against many of us by claiming that we are all dangerous anarchists. In their book, anyone whose organizing is threatening to the status quo is depicted as “anarchists,” “black block,” and dangerous threats to public safety.
They want to divide us into good protesters and bad protesters. The “good” protesters, in their eyes, do not inherently create an ideological threat to the exploitative foundations of the existing system with their organizing. The “bad protesters” however, do not follow their rules of engagement. We threaten the status quo. It is in the interest of the state to affirm the “good protesters,” so as to upkeep a pretense of free speech and democracy. Given that the facade of democracy is the excuse that the US military uses in its war efforts, it would be a shame if there was not a pretense at keeping it in the home country. Failing to understand the ideological reasons why the state props up “good protesters” over “bad protesters,” through the tactics of “anarchist baiting,” will cause us to debate endlessly about which tactic is more effective than others in changing the system. This not only causes us to attack one another, but is also a distraction. Being used by the state to delegitimize other political forces is not a sign of strength. It is a sign of being manipulated. Hopefully, the broader Decolonize/Occupy Seattle community is smarter than that and this is not a trap we will fall for.
Even as we may disagree with one another’s politics and tactics, we will understand that an injury to one is an injury to all. We refuse to let our differences strengthen the legitimacy of police violence.
Generating fear and paranoia were the goals of the SPD on Tuesday, when the SWAT team broke the door with guns drawn, threw concussion grenades, and yanked people, including two female bodied people, out of their beds without allowing them to clothe themselves. Folks were held cuffed in a room while the police confiscated clothing and literature. The unnecessary trauma inflicted on these people through militarized police terrorism tactics was a result of the SPD’s goal to prevent further organizing. The organizing in this house involves building community gardens, holding community potlucks, organizing to shut down the juvenile prison (through healthy, supportive, healing alternatives), fighting gentrification, and hosting a completely free music, arts, and politics festival. The organizers in the house are resisting through creating and empowering. In opposition, the police are attempting to destroy through inflicting fear and trauma. Our community immediately mobilized to support the needs of our comrades as they dealt with the violence of the increasingly militarized Seattle Police. Our bonds and communities are only strengthening through this oppression.
We will continue to combat fear and trauma with love and resistance.

SPD swat team raids home for new outfit !

SWAT raid on organizers of Occupy Seattle & E4E

Posted by kasama on July 10, 2012

Door beaten in by SWAT police raid.

Kasama received this shortly after the police ended their ransacking of the Seattle apartment. We will cover events and statements as they emerge.
Early morning, July 10, SWAT police forced their way into the Seattle apartment of organizers from the Occupy movement. The sleeping residents scrambled to put on clothes as they were confronted with automatic weapons.
The neighbor Natalio Perez heard the attack from downstairs: “Suddenly we heard the bang of their grenade, and the crashing as police entered the apartment. The crashing and stomping continued for a long time as they tore the place apart.”
After the raid, the residents pored over the papers handed them by a detective. One explained: “This warrant says that they were specifically looking for ‘anarchist materials’ — which lays out the political police state nature of this right there. In addition they were looking for specific pieces of clothing supposedly connected with a May First incident.
When the police finally left, they did not arrest anyone.
This action targets well known activists from Occupy Seattle and the Red Spark Collective (part of the national Kasama network).
This apartment has been a hub for organizing the Everything 4 Everyone festival in August – to bring together West Coast forces for a cultural and political event building on the year of Occupy.

Room ransacked by police searching for “anarchist materials” and specific clothing.

The raid is a heavy-handed threat delivered by armed police aimed at intimidating specific people – but also st suppressing the work to continue the Occupy movement in Seattle, and create E4E as a space for radical gathering.
The E4E site will update this with more as we receive it, including hopefully statement from those involved. http://www.everythingforeveryone.org/
Contact: Liam Wright, Red Spark Collective, redsparkcollective@gmail.com

what if we tipped our teachers and closed the bars

painted these chalkboard /recycled /reusable skull-head protest signs


to fight the political powers within this city~ that want to raise 200 million dollars	to incarcerate our youth

plain chalk messages to be added ~ individually~ Monday~ i don't do rhetoric

NE!L~

Friday night solidarity ride with PDX Bike Swarm

PDX Bike Swarm press statement regarding M1 May Day police brutality.

by hart Posted on May 4, 2012

PDX Bike Swarm has remained committed to peaceful solidarity with Occupy Portland and the greater Occupy Wall Street movement. We have been open and honest about our intentions to ride our bikes legally to support peaceful marches, to lift spirits when needed, and to calm tensions between protestors and police whenever possible. We have strived to represent the very best of our local bike culture while committing our time and our hearts towards social progression.
With that mission in mind, it was deeply saddening to us to come under repeated attack by Portland Police Bureau officers on May 1st, 2012 during an “unpermitted” march through downtown Portland. Through the course of this action all of those involved, pedestrians and cyclists alike remained nonviolent and predominantly peaceful, yet came under violent assault by the PPB for what is nothing more than the traffic ‘crime’ of jaywalking, an offense that surely did not require the arresting and beating of some 39 individuals.
Of those 39 protesters that were thrown to the ground and in most cases injured, many were legally riding their bicycles at the time they were accosted and arrested. The police relentlessly broadcasted via public address system that the streets were open for “vehicular traffic” which undeniably includes bicycles.
Even more telling and shocking was the fact that not one cyclist arrested saw his or her bike removed from the scene by the police; they were yanked from their ride and were left to question if they would ever see their bicycle again. Theories have emerged that this was a deliberate attempt by the PPB to intentionally conceal the fact that these protesters were in fact not breaking any law at the time of their arrest.
It is for these reasons that the PDX Bike Swarm can no longer trust that the Portland Police Bureau has the intention of enforcing the law where it concerns cyclists. We have repeatedly attempted to communicate and cooperate with law enforcement officials during previous actions, and to make our intention to abide the law as bicycle riders abundantly clear.
On May 1st the police made it clear that the law means very little to them, and the future of our relationship with our police bureau is very much in question. It is our sincerest hope that this relationship can be resolved, and we look forward to a representative of the Portland Police Bureau making a similar statement of intent in the near future.

This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged arrest, bicycle, Bike Swarm, brutality, M1, May Day, Occupy Portland, Oregon, Portland, Portland Police Bureau, PPB. Bookmark the permalink.

4 Responses to PDX Bike Swarm press statement regarding M1 May Day police brutality.

revphil says:

May 5, 2012 at 8:50 pm

When I see that behavior I’m reminded of toddlers whose parents have never set boundries. Can we put these cops in Time-Out? At a minimum they should be striped of their toys.

Reply
jimmy says:

May 6, 2012 at 11:36 am

hi guys!
as always, heartwarming to see the swarm represent!
(“warning” contains material that may upset some sensitive readers. Please read the whole thing and then let me have it!)
hope you don’t mind a little constructive feedback, but I have to point out what I see in this picture, and it ain’t good. In fact, what I see in this picture is someone, on a bike, in the crosswalk. The fact of the matter is that bikes are in a grey area in crosswalks, made even greyer by the fact that bikes are not allowed on the sidewalks in the geographical area that this picture was taken in (north of Jefferson and between 13th and Naito). So, what is essentially happening in this pic is that someone is being grabbed by the cops, he may be attempting to flee, and he is in a spot that makes him a target for “legitimate” stop by the police. Not arrest, not beating, but simply being stopped. I hope you understand that I am not cheerleading for the cops here, but hoping to give feedback on the image that you are presenting and how it may or may not further your overall message. I am bummed that Neil got nabbed, but I am not sure that this pic is the one to illustrate your point, and it might even serve to water down your message. To the typical outsider, one who hasn’t been to these marches, etc. it might appear that you guys are complaining about nothing.
the PR battle is one we are losing…don’t let’s fall into that trap
Solid, Jimmy

Reply
- hart says:
  
  May 6, 2012 at 7:32 pm
  
  Neill was actually a few feet outside of the crosswalk, but what you can’t see from this angle is that he was actually legally inside of the cycle track that runs in the opposite direction. Regardless, he was moving to the curb as ordered by police at the time he was grabbed and thrown to the ground.
  Here’s a reverse angle showing the bike lane he was in, and the force with which the cop threw him to the ground: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=3824958544585&set=o.284344344909229&type=1&theater
  
  Reply
Lauriel says:

May 6, 2012 at 9:42 pm

The Bike Swarm is an amazing force for good in this world and it was so sad to see what happened to many of them on May Day. There is an amazing amount of video and still photography showing the brutality used by the PPB against peaceful people and I can’t wait to see the cops involved held responsible for their actions.

Reply

17 TH & Yesler, seattle WA 98122

So, from what I've heard~ from people on the street~ the people who were renting this space~ selling cars and fixing tires and whatever automobile related business they attempted ~ were stopped by annoyed, recently moved into the neighborhood home owners and the city of Seattle~ who have just finished the remodel of Langston Hughes Performing Art Center~ apparently the city came and told the small business people that they couldn't have cars in their parking lot !

this space has been a garage continually for the 9 years that i have lived here~ and a gas station since before fucking dinosaurs died


thus the shitty neighbors in conjunction with the dirty city drove them out of business and now~ will come the town-homes for privileged successful Americans with new cars and new ideas of what this place should be, look like and become.