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'Vous etes tres mignon!' ( You're very cute!) : An Evian Tale
 national |
miscellaneous |
news report
 Wednesday June 11, 2003 12:20 by 4wolfatad
Fluffy police experiences: Found this account from an Irish G8 Protester on another IMC site. By Liz. Fluffy police experiences:
The mindblowing calm and unity, in Bourdonnet camp in Lausanne on June 1st, allowed many of the police to likewise step out of their roles.The ridiculousness of the situation was clear to all of us, the Swiss police removing their gas masks as they faced a peaceful circle, still holding a meeting being translated into three languages.We handed out water and shared food as a girl cartwheeled in front of the police line and a mime whistled at them.We all knew they were there for no reason, that this would be a long, pointless exercise. I found myself thinking: If they did nothing they'd be accused of standing by while Lausanne was smashed. If they reacted with too much force they'd be criticised and their heads were more likely to roll than the ones giving orders.What were they supposed to do?
The tense moment in the camp, for me, came when people at the back of the crowd started throwing plastic bottles at the police.One paving stone, one brick and we would have been charged. It could happen so easily.The police didn't stop it, we did.The blocs working together meant a feeling of safety, of watching each others backs and an atmosphere which took the edge off possible aggression.
Another world is possible means recognising other people's humanity and the unreality of our roles.
Just as the media portrayed the Black Bloc as young hooligans randomly looting , there's a danger of polarisation and lack of perspective if all police are branded as brutal thugs.Phrases like "police brutality" can lose all meaning when blanketly applied.These are people we're talking about.People whose job involves protecting the state,or heads of other states against the people but who are also the first on the scene of an accident or the ones to call when a person's missing.People dealing with bosses, politicians and muddled lines of communication It was clear to me in Lausanne that the police around me didn't want to be there anymore than I did and were hopefully rethinking their choice of career.That they were not the enemy, that we were fighting a mock battle while the real villains were at the G8 summit,sipping cocktails.
I understand the bitterness of anyone who has had a bad police experience , at the policeman who cut Martin, the British climber's rope, at the ones who shot teargas into a park full of women and kids at 11am on a sunny morning etc. but these reports have already been printed.
Here are some of the solidarity across the lines stories because only when people treat each other like people instead of symbols is communication possible.I saw that process in action with the different groups in the anti-war movement and saw it flower in France and Switzerland this June.
So here goes, cute police stories:
Two rows from the front line in Bourdonnet trying to amuse ourselves after hours in the sun I ask a friend if she thought any of the police were cute. She says she got into trouble at another demo for saying that.I choose the one in the middle, about 10 feet away.Guy on my right says, no way, the one on the far left is cuter. As they notice we're talking about them I shout "Vous etes tres mignon!" ( You're very cute!)He goes red, smiles and his colleague pokes him in the ribs.(forgetting to be a riot cop for a moment)?As I was led away later, I wasn't dragged away cos one of the police put out his hand to help me up and I took it,one of them said "It's your girlfriend!".I was imagining the slagging he'd get later.
The woman officer who patted me down kept telling me not to worry , everything would be fine, just an ID check.
Of the riot police I winked at on the Lausanne demo,one smile, several close ones.They were afraid too, more afraid than I was.I was with an affinity group, doing something I believed in.What were they doing?
One of the two guards I spent four and a half hours with, along with 14 others, in a van ,under the police HQ told us they hadn't eaten all day.They didn't know how long we'd there, the cells were full and their superiors didn't send them or us food or information.One, didn't get his name,asked us to make a lot of noise while he was on the phone to his boss so we could all get out of there.We obliged, stamping and yelling.Thumbs up.
The other,Tim, got involved in political discussions including one on ethical jobs,we suggested he get involved in a co-op or become a fireman among other suggestions.
On hearing I was Irish, one cop talked about seeing Riverdance another about Guinness.
My perspective would've been very different if the tear gas had done any lasting damage but as it was I appeared to be surrounded by affable cops, trying to be as friendly as possible under the stupid circumstances.We weren't giving any hate out and we weren't getting any back.I know other people had very different experiences with much more aggressive and abusive police, I'm just describing what happened in my van.
In "The Box", a holding cell with 2 of my van mates we decided to ask for water and tea. When I buzzed the intercom,I don't speak much French but better than my mates,and asked, they replied: "How about coffee? Would you like a croissant with that?"
This is not supposed to happen.We're dangerous radicals and they have no sense of humour.Hmm.
I asked for chocolate croissants.
"Milk or white chocolate?"
We asked for cappuccinos and they hung up, cracking up laughing.Course we didn't get anything..
In all that time I encountered one beaurocrat who told me to drink water from the tap in the toilets, teargas, lack of phones,toilets,food,blankets,legal rep.s and information but I wasn't hurt, manhandled or abused and generally treated in a more respectful way than I would expect from police in general but had heard about the Swiss.
The media spins,hypes and distorts. Can we be different? Can we tell the parts that don't fit? Where traditional enemies were decent humans? Where we messed up? Can we tell the whole story we know, handle the ironies and contradictions and avoid simplifying or spinning to our advantage? That's independent media.
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Comments (15 of 15)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15a nice story. Good apples & bad apples everywhere I guess.
Personal experience:
Sunday morning in Geneva, I passed about 20 Swiss riot cops standing up against a wall. One of them started to talk in French to an activist. A few seconds later, another cop joined in the conversation. They all started to laugh. Despite the riot squad wearing about 60+pounds of 'riot gear', gas masks, having 3 plastic bullet guns and a number of gas canisters, the Swiss police, (in my eyes) seemed very peaceful and passive. During the day, I didnt see ANY provoction towards the protesters.
It was only later on when more riot cops arrived with different uniforms (German riot police??), did the provoction start, and that violence occured. That, as far as I can see, was caused by the police overreacting.
I know other views are different, but thats just my encounter.
It sounds like the softly, softly approach works for some people. The pigs were detaining you, collecting information on you and holding you against your will and just because they didn't snarl suddenly they're "fluffy"?
If you had tried to resist and refused to allow them to physically detain you then it would have been a different story.
Smart policing operates on many levels of coercion -- you've been operated on by the first level: psychology.
don't get me wrong. I am glad none of yous were hurt, and I am not interested in random stupid violence against the cops, neither should they be stereotyped as thugs. But they are what they are: a the force which exercises the state's monopoly on violence.
and if they weren't there, it'd be unsafe to leave your home, the articel was humane, the macho element of anarchism is less so
I had one or two good experiences with the police there,
-the one officer who helped us hold on to the rope and told us he didn't cut it and just wanted to save our friend, calling all the time for his fellow officers to help,
-the translator lady who told me at the end how proud she was of me for doing what I believed in and hoped her sons would do the same,
-the policeman who gave us water, appearing with two bottles, sparkling or atill, while we waited in the police van,
But the majority I encountered were afraid and didnt want to be there, also hostile and cruel because of this.
They are the scapedgoats used to hide the people we were really there to fight - the g8
The police are the storm troopers for the G8 leaders, regardless of whether they are polite or rude. They would gladly crack your head open if ordered to do so by their masters. Their job is to perpetuate the system you guys went over there to reform/overthrow. In my personal opinion, the original article (above) was a monumental exercise in naivety. I'm not calling for people to launch unprovoked attacks on the police, just to realise that they are servants of the New World Order, whether they realise it or not.
THe Black Bloc are solely responsible for the violence.
MG, sounding like something from the Star or the Sun does nothing for your cause. EVERYONE has the potential and capacity to be the best that they can be, the kindest, most open, honest, warm, humane, whatever; or and the capacity to be the most cruel, distorted, repugnant, dishonest shit. the moment anyone forgets that they slip straight into arrogance and self-righteousness. eat a little humble pie.
Many cops wish for a just and safe world, they just happen to be very mis-informed and brainwashed about how to go about it. Look around, many very very intelligent are sadly conditioned to believe that's what the police are for, alot of them cops.
these broad sweeping generalisations serve no-one. i've banged on this drum before. don't get me wrong, i've had my clothes pulled off (in public), been humiliated and ridiculed, several times had my head bounced off the tarmac, been stuck in a cell, had abuse scrEEEEEamed at me from a height, the works. but if you start to dehumanise and make yourself comfortable with these "they are all..." statements aren't you sounding a little like what we are supposed to be challenging? an oversimplification of any human being is a disservice to them but ultimately to you.
Until we are ALL liberated, we are ALL in bondage.
in other words, take your tar and your brush and stick it up your arse
the clock's an hour slow lads.
Given the way you have been treated by cops you are a veritable Gandhi! What will it take to change your mind? What about if they shot you?!
I'm inclined to agree that dehumanising anyone is a bad idea.
But cops are _volunteers_ not conscripts. They join up knowing that part of their role is to crack skulls when ordered to. In the story related above they had the power to decide to be nice or knock the shit out of the person concerned. This time they decided to be 'nice' but she was still in their power.
Also worth bearing in mind that some peoples experience of the cops goes beyond a bit of humilation and a bruise or two. Even in Ireland they have beated people to death in custody, I lived in London when the cops in the nearest station (Stoke Newington) were killing a person (nearly always black) a month in the station.
Ok lefty posturing about the cops can be tiresome but a couple of easygoing exchanges and some gentle crowd control doesn't amount to an analysis. I know fuck all about Swiss cops but the French police and the CRS in particular are one of the most widely disliked and racist police forces in Europe despite some stiff opposition. This is not because people are refusing to acknowledge their humanity but because of the way they behave and, sorry to come over all boring and ideological, the role they have been assigned in society. Unfortunately, for the most part they are more than happy to play this role even if does mean cracking skulls or needless harassment.
There is usually an observable correlation between how effective your form of protest is and the level of criminalisation and police harrassment you have to endure. As soon as groups or individuals even threaten to disrupt, let alone totally subvert, business as usual your average handsome gendarme will cancel the croissant and coffee date and start giving you a once over with a phone book. There are loads of examples- Algerians got it in the 60's in France, a generation of men and women suffered it during the 70's in Italy, the Heavy gang and the RUC dished it out in spades here ........enough said it is still going on.
i had a grat chat with the civil police guys around the geneva camp at about 4 in the morning,they were dead on,and i saw another guy with a bong,that was fantastic.
I wrote the original article because all the demonstrators'articles I saw focused on police brutality & the mainstream media on random looting & violence. I found these too black & white & neither of those were my experience.What's the point in setting up an us & them divide when the people we were really after weren't even there? There are regular cops & those sent in to inflict real damage. I dealt with the regular ones. There was a lot of property damage done throughout the protest, though no harm to people.We were doing an effective protest & being teargassed & detained was a pain but wasnt that surprising.These were circumstances under which police could have reacted a lot more violently.'There are plenty of examples of police brutality to choose from, showing instances where many chose restraint seems to me to be balanced.
I think the most important thing about the G8 demo in Lausanne was the unity between all the different groups. Each bloc had it's own tactics and all the tactics together worked, respected by the others.Everyone was needed and there was no one action that everyone "should " have taken. Whereas Left groups generally tend to split & target each other, in Lausanne there was co-operation. We weren't afraid. I don't know why a crowd of 2000 people were completely calm in the face of clearly nervous riot cops but we were.That shifted the power balance. We discovered that they weren't so powerful, organised or cohesive & that there's no such thing as a sealed off or military zone. A small group made it all the way to the harbour, straight through the red zone. In fact there was little they could do about us, the detentions were purely face-saving.