Ten years ago today, I hailed a cab out of a riot. It had been a long day. I smelled of teargas and pepper spray. I’d given away my gas mask and all of my medical supplies.
I had worked the barricades in downtown Seattle that day as a medic—pulling people out of the teargas and treating them for minor wounds, pepper-spray and gas burns.
- Police pepper spray a crowd in Seattle’s WTO protest
My companions and I gave the cabbie the address of the Direct Action Network’s headquarters—we were going to set up a triage there for people coming in from the mayhem. He pulled away just as the riot bore down, pursued by cops in black parkas hurtling concussion grenades.
Were you at the WTO protests? Tell us about it.
I was in 8th grade and, until I heard about the Seattle protests from a punk kid who was way too into the Ramones, I thought WTO was a band.
Wow, that takes me back to when I was still a punk ass kid and relatively new to PDX! I was there on the front lines of 4th & Pine (I think) for at least 8 hours. After the ordeal I picked up a Newsweek mag to find I was nearly on the front cover. I could recognize everyone I spent that long day with that made it on the page. Anyway, I had absolutely no sleep the night before and no idea how huge it was going to be. One of my favorite photographs I have ever taken was of an anarchist that hoisted himself 20 feet in the air using wood poles tepee style to hang and upside down flag from the top. That was I think 6am. That day was responsible for the many years of community activism leading up to Bush’s war and my resulting apathy that still resides. The world was so alive at that point. I really thought something BIG was on the verge. But I wasn’t sure what it was going to be. Then came 9/11 and those willing to civilly disobey the puppets of both international and domestic policy were labeled “terrorists” by our friends at FOX. But I don’t even want to get into the problems people had and still have for the WTO right now. From looking at the news it appears that Europe still has some spunk left. I haven’t felt that “what could have been” feeling for a long while. Thanks I guess.
Bravo, sir!
@sacklash
I think there are many that would echo your feelings of apathy since then. I know I’ve felt it.
I decided to head up on the spur of the moment. Once there,
I couldn’t believe how well organized people were. The amount of communication between total strangers, and how well decisions were made from it was really impressive. Later in the day I ran into a cafe to get away from tear gas, and the barista looked at me and said, ” I have two nude sculptures of you in my apartment.” I did not recognize him, but he must have been a student in a class I had modeled for. It was pretty surreal on top of the craziness of the day.
I came back to Portland and remembered my body buzzing for 3 entire days after the event. So much energy was there. I remember comparing it to childbirth in terms of it being an event that had so much energy and shattered the way you had perceived the world before.
I was managing a local political campaign here and remember watching the first two days of coverage with a sense that I was totally missing an historic event. I talked to my candidate and convinced her to let me head north to check it out. It was a pretty incredible. I saw Air Force One land as I drove in.
I was supposed to be delivering about a hundred or so sandwiches to one of the church groups up there, but downtown was so chaotic that I ended up given them out randomly. There was something really surreal about being in American city that had been basically shut down.
Anyway, like V., one of the things I remember most was how well-organized folks were. The organizers on bikes and walkie-talkies were able to outmaneuver the troops and tanks relatively easily. I also remember a lot of odd little details like a funny sign outside a strip club that read “Nude World Order.”
I had never been maced before. It struck me as the worst possible way to disperse a crowd; it basically gives you a surge of adreneline and makes folks a whole lot more pissed off. The crowd was restrained and impressive.
A fair amount of my time up there was spent with the Teamsters at their rally near the water. One of the most significant things about the WTO protests was the blue/green coalition stuff and how well labor and the enviros were working together. Initiatives like the Apollo Alliance can partially be attitubed to that.
It was historic, and I felt lucky to be able to check it out first-hand.
I was attending Seattle University and walked over to Pike/Pine around 8/9/10pm? on the first day.
people were throwing glass bottles at police and then the police started arresting everyone in the vicinity.
i was arrested along with some guys who were looking for Dick’s burgers after the sonics game and a couple other neighborhood folks.
they took my shoelaces and booked me and i spent the night in jail downtown.
they said they would release me but since there was a curfew on downtown that evening, i couldn’t go home and had to sleep in a jail cell.
in the morning they let me go. but i missed a presentation i was supposed to give at school.
then i got a fine for “failure to disperse”
I lived in Seattle at the time and have never seen a protest so massive before or since. Easily 20-30 city blocks absolutely jam packed with people. It really could have turned out pretty badly had riots REALLY started.
I was [sadly] into gaming back then and recall being annoyed that I couldn’t get to work/home fast enough to finish a round of Q3:A.
My dad pulled me out of school for the protest. He called it historic. I was 13. As the Lesbian Avengers marched past, my dad muttered “too bad only the ugly ones take their shirts off.” I smiled at them. They had political bumper stickers on their nipples. I didn’t say anything, but I wanted more than anything to run away with them, tear my shirt off and disappear into a haze of tear gas.
I lived and worked on Capital Hill at the time. That first day (the rowdiest, I believe) the AIDS non-prof. where I worked let some of us take off for the afternoon and head downtown. I was a budding photographer at the time so I grabbed my camera and my friend and took off. We passed people we knew, walked along with Michael Moore for a block or so. God, he was like a rock star in that crowd! I lost my friend and just began strolling around. The vibe changed from block to block. One corner could’ve had peaceful, interpretive dance while on another anarchists were defacing a Starbucks while cops screamed and started chasing them. Some cops were dicks, some were being unnecessarily berated by idiots who had no idea what the protests were all about. The collective energy was fucking electric. Haven’t experienced anything since and likely won’t. Check out some of my photogs here in the pic section labeled “published.”
http://www.myspace.com/6080246
I was in the summit with the world leaders. What a great group of guys. They pretty much just talked about baseball and made crude jokes about poor people in developing nations.
Oh yeah, one other thing. It was both the first and likely the last time I will ever see a police officer cry.
I was approaching Seattle by ferry on the morning of the second day. Everything looked normal but you could feel the tension radiating from downtown & most everyone on the boat was quiet as we docked at the pier.
The rest of the day is a kaleidoscope of disparate images in my memory:
A mustached cop telling me to “beat it” as I sat at the edge of the downtown cordon, smoking.
An elderly man facing down a line of riot police, one of which suddenly breaks rank to charge him. His fellow officers grab him & pull him back into line just before he cracks the old man with his baton.
Two huge columns of protesters converging down by the waterfront & the charged-up roar of joy and encouragement both groups let loose at the sight.
Getting hit by a baton for not moving when ordered (less out of bravery or defiance, but simply because there was nowhere I could move to in the mass of chaos).
My dad shaking my hand when I returned home safe the next day.