Guarding Peace with Violence

national | miscellaneous | news report Tuesday May 07, 2002 16:48 by Mariel Deegan mariel.deegan2 at mail dot dcu dot ie

Police Brutality on Dame Street, May 6 - hit first, ask questions? - never.

As a regular party-goer, I couldn't wait to reclaim the streets, though I was surprised that there was no real political agenda behind it - at least that was the opinion of the average, run-of-the-mill person who turned up. I enjoyed the dancing, and the different types of music, and the costumes and colour. And when the time came to move along, I went with the crowd - after all, it was just a good laugh, and the Gardai seemed pretty mellow about it all. Here I document the unexpected and unjustified police brutality suffered by the partygoers at the hands of Ireland's police force.

I am not an anarchist. But yesterday I went along to a street party to enjoy the extraordinary celebration of diversity and freedom in Reclaim the Streets, made manifest through colour, music, dance and a pulsing vitality that allowed anyone to talk to anyone. It was a good afternoon, chilling on Eden quay.

About 6.30 or 7, as things were beginning to wind down, the partying pedestrians skirted round Gardai patrol cars, and danced and marched on down the quay, past O Connell Bridge, heading west, with the dying sun. That was when trouble showed its ugly head. I sat down with the crowd to blockade the gardai, but anarchy and crowd psychology being as they are, this didn't last for long, and the procession continued up Parliament street, and down Dame Street. And in fairness, it was pretty tame! Reclaiming the streets is one thing, but it was a bank holiday monday, traffic was light anyway, and we let most cars pass. Motorists didn't seem too put out.

Now it was a big crowd, so I cannot confirm exactly how the violence began - I can only document my own observations. I was dancing along the street, when suddenly I noticed a small group of 3 or 4, gathered around a young man in his 20s, who had blood streaming down his neck - he claimed to have been knocked off his bike when a police baton knocked him in the back of his head. I was horrified.

Along with a number of other RHSers, I sat down on the road. But you know, being the coward, and law-abiding citizen that I am, I went to stand up when I saw the Gardai approaching us. While getting up, my companion and I were pushed in the back. We looked around, thinking someone had accidently knocked into us, only to be faced with a garda, leering over us, and shoving us on. I was seething with anger - we, personally, hadn't done anything wrong! We wanted to avoid trouble, so we moved onto the footpath, where we eventually joined in a conversation of complaint with a garda who acted as a human barrier to pedestrians. It was a one-sided conversation: he adopted the dumb bouncer tactic - "I don't know anything - I'm just following orders" - don't you just love dumb bouncers! The only thing he drew our attention to - God bless him! - was the impossibility of filing a complaint against any of the gardai, except with actual footage of the event (which they were careful to avoid), because the identity numbers on their uniforms were all conveniently covered by their nice, yellow jackets! Now there's accountability for you!

Eventually reunited with one of my friends, we mellowed into the crowd heading toward Templebar, as he tried inconspicuously to take photos of the brutality with his digital camera: he got a nice portrait shot of a particularly thuggish garda, clad in leathers and helmet, but little violence could be documented. As I got out my mini-disc and microphone to interview a victim, a garda glaringly started towards me, so I put it away - I'm really not very brave! As we melted into Templebar, to survey the photographs, we came upon a young man whose face, neck and clothes were literally covered in blood - my curiosity got the better of me, and I had to ask him what had happened. He reported that he had stepped in to break up a violent confrontation between a demonstrator and a garda, and when he had stepped in, so had a load more gardai, all armed with batons, and a senseless brawl ensued.

I don't know what motivated the Gardai to lash out at peaceful citizens in such a violent manner. Perhaps it was boredom - after all, they had had to watch us party for 4 or 5 hours, and they didn't really have much to occupy them - I mean, how mutinous it would have been to have joined in! Or perhaps it was an inkling of threat - young, colourful and cheerful demonstrators, oozing diversity, on Dame Street, carried with them a whisper of change, which their Garda training course did not equip them to deal with. If there were maybe 30 hardliner protestors there, who did pose a serious threat to them - they had no idea how to target them - batons were lashed out at anyone who accidentally fell into their path. Part of me is realistic - forceful measures, or at least weighty threats, are sometimes needed to maintain 'law and order' - the League of Nations failed for a reason! But there was simply no method to the barbarism practiced by our 'Guardians of Peace' (yes, that is what Garda Siochana translates as!). For the first time, I could understand why street violence erupts - when that Garda pushed me, I was so angry, and frustrated, that a surge of aggression shot right through me - I almost imitated one of the other demonstrators - sat down on the side of the street, and meditated to restore myself to a state of calm - but I probably would've been forcefully removed!