Two weeks into Occupy Wall Street protests, movement is at a crossroads

No amount of logic will stop more articles denouncing OWS from being posted by some people here.

Cycloptichorn

wandeljw wrote:

It seems the damage was cumulative based on prolonged occupation.

On things like grass, of course it's cumulative. Such is the product of human traffic. The same problem exists here in DC. The people in McPherson Square try their best to not turn the place into a mud-pit, but that many feet simply do this. It's unfortunate, but unless someone wants to suggest that destroying the grass is a goal of the #occupy camps (a very dumb argument that would be), then what's more to be said other than: It's grass. It's dead.

Planting more grass is a pretty cheap price tag on democracy. Moreover, using things like the mess of a raid and grass as justification is super flimsy.

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stinki hippies getting a well deserved eye full of accountability and the rule of law.

H2O MAN wrote:

I think fido's words go over your head so let me be more specific. I think you are a stupid asshole who gets off on stirring ****. Much like waterman.

Better that resistence to economic tyranny should die so the grass might live!!!

I think fido's words go over your head so let me be more specific. I think you are a stupid asshole who gets off on stirring ****. Much like waterman.

You and Finn have criticised OWS many times but I dont intend to waste my time posting something you wont acknowledge anyway.

19 Occupy protesters arrested at Portland, Ore., park
(The Associated Press, December 4, 2011)

Riot police moved quickly to thwart efforts by Occupy Portland demonstrators to set up a new protest site, arresting nearly 20 people in a nighttime crackdown.

Officers moved protesters from South Park blocks around 8:30 p.m. Saturday, after the park was closed a half-hour early, Sgt. Pete Simpson said.

But 19 who refused to leave or resisted were arrested, held with flex cuffs and hauled away by police, he said.

He said the arrests came amid “reports of demonstrators setting up structures in what appeared to be an attempt take over the park.”

Occupy Portland protesters set up tents in a portion of the park that runs through Southwest Portland earlier Saturday and vowed to stay through the winter, defying city officials who said overnight camping will not be allowed.

They had been without an encampment since police swept through their downtown site three weeks ago, making arrests and dismantling tents.

The Occupy Portland website declared, “We have a park!” It said that “the kitchen is open” and invited the public to bring love, tents, sleeping bags and snacks.

Protest spokesman Jordan LeDoux earlier told the AP that having a camp provides a place for demonstrators to focus their efforts and engage the public.

Police moved in awhile later, dispersing the crowd and arresting the 19 people, who ranged in age from 17 to 60, Sgt. Simpson said in a statement released early Sunday.

Fourteen were cited to appear in court on charges of criminal trespass and interfering with a police officer and released. Five were booked into the Multnomah County Jail.

Sgt. Simpson estimated that at least a dozen structures, mainly tents, were dismantled by the officers in an area of South Park blocks, near the Portland Art Museum, known as Shermanski Park.

Sgt. Simpson said he didn’t know if protesters put up any resistance. KGW-TV reported that witnesses said there was some pushing and shoving between the protesters and police.

The Oregonian reported that dozens of protesters who weren’t arrested marched to City Hall and gathered there, as riot police assembled nearby. Later, the protesters began walking as a group along several area streets, followed by police on bicycles.

Sgt. Simpson said the protesters finally returning to the park where the arrests had been made.

“The Police Bureau will continue to monitor the small demonstration,” he said. “People remaining in the park after hours could be subject to arrest.”

(a) Assuming that overnight sleeping in connection with the demonstration is expressive conduct protected to some extent by the First Amendment, the regulation forbidding sleeping meets the requirements for a reasonable time, place, or manner restriction of expression, whether oral, written, or symbolized by conduct. The regulation is neutral with regard to the message presented, and leaves open ample alternative methods of communicating the intended message concerning the plight of the homeless. Moreover, the regulation narrowly focuses on the Government's substantial interest in maintaining the parks in the heart of the Capital in an attractive and intact condition, readily available to the millions of people who wish to see and enjoy them by their presence. To permit camping would be totally inimical to these purposes. The validity of the regulation need not be judged solely by reference to the demonstration at hand, and none of its provisions are unrelated to the ends that it was designed to serve.
(b) Similarly, the challenged regulation is also sustainable as meeting the standards for a valid regulation of expressive conduct. Aside from its impact on speech, a rule against camping or overnight sleeping in public parks is not beyond the constitutional power of the Government to enforce. And as noted above, there is a substantial Government interest, unrelated to suppression of expression, in conserving park property that is served by the proscription of sleeping.
--Clark v. Community Creative Non-Violence, 1984