[Rantman] The Obligation to Peacefully Disrupt in a Free Society

[rPauli]

Following her arrest the other night, Naomi Wolf authored a wonderful 
rant - video interview and article in Huffington Post.

Appearing on Keith Olbermans show...the day after NY Mayor Bloomberg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jghuMuCoC0U


  The First Amendment and the Obligation to Peacefully Disrupt in a Free
  Society


    Naomi Wolf <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/naomi-wolf>



- snip- 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/naomi-wolf/occupy-wall-street-bloomberg-free-speech-right-to-disruption-_b_1026535.html

...Some kinds of disruption in a free republic are not "optional extras" 
if the First Amendment governs the land, as it does ours, and are 
certainly not subject to the whims of mayors or local police, or even 
DHS. Just as protesters don't have a blanket right to do everything they 
want, there is absolutely no blanket right of mayors or even of other 
citizens to be free from the effect of certain kinds of disruption 
resulting from their fellow citizens exercising First Amendment rights. 
That notion, presented right now by Bloomberg and other vested 
interests, of a "disruption-free" social contract is pure invention -- 
just like the flat-out fabrication of the nonexistent permit cited in my 
own detention outside the Huffington Post Game Changers event this last 
Tuesday, when police told me, without the event organizers' knowledge 
and contrary to their intentions, that a private entity had "control of 
the sidewalks" for several hours. (In fact, the permit in question -- a 
red carpet event permit! -- actually/guarantees/citizens' rights to walk 
and even engage in political assembly on the streets if they do not 
block pedestrian traffic, as the OWS protesters were not.)

I want to address the issue of "disruption," as Bloomberg is sending 
this issue out as a talking point brought up on Keith 
Olbermann's/Coundown/last night: the neighbors around Zuccotti Square, 
says Bloomberg, are feeling "disrupted" by the noise and visitors to the 
OWS protest, so he is going to crack down to "strike a balance" to 
address their complaints. Other OWS organizers have let me know that the 
Parks Department and various municipalities are trying to find a way to 
eject other protesters from public space on a similar basis of argument.

Please, citizens of America -- please, OWS -- do not buy into this 
rhetorical framework: an absolute "right to be free of disruption" from 
First Amendment activity does not exist in a free republic. But the 
right to engage in peaceable disruption does exist.

Citizens who live or work near protest sites or marches have every right 
to be free of violence from protesters and they should never be 
subjected to destruction of property. This is why I am always saying to 
OWS and to anyone who wants to assemble: be PEACEFUL PEACEFUL PEACEFUL. 
Be respectful to police, do not yell at them; sing, don't chant; be 
civil to pedestrians and shop owners; don't escalate tensions; try to 
sit when there is tension rather than confront physically; be dignified 
and be nonviolent.

But the First Amendment means that it actually is not up to the mayor or 
the police of any municipality, or to the Parks Department, or to any 
local municipality to prohibit public assembly if the assembly is 
peaceful but/disruptive/in many ways.

Peaceful, lawful protest -- if it is effective -- IS innately disruptive 
of "business as usual." That is WHY it is effective.

The Soviet Union was brought down by/peaceful/mass protest that blocked 
the streets and filled public squares. Many white residents of 
Birmingham Alabama in the 1960s would have said it was very disruptive 
to have all these African Americans marching through Birmingham or 
protesting the murder of children in churches. The addresses by Dr. King 
on the Mall were disruptive of the daily life of D.C. King himself 
marched without permits when permits were unlawfully applied. It is 
disruptive to sit at a whites-only counter and refuse to move and be 
covered with soda and pelted with debris and dragged off by police. It 
disrupted the Birmingham bus system for African Americans in the Civil 
Rights movement to organize a bus boycott. It is disruptive when people 
refuse to sit at the back of the bus.

When Bonus Marches -- thousands of unemployed and desperate former 
veterans who had been promised and denied their bonus checks in the 
Depression, which they needed to feed their families -- camped out 
for/months/on the Mall in D.C. and sat daily (when this was possible) on 
the steps of Congress, they won, eventually, because of the disruption. 
Some of the power of real protest, which is peaceful and patient and 
civil but disruptive, comes from the emotional power of the human 
face-to-face: all those Congresspeople had to look those hungry men in 
the eyes on their way to legislate the decision about the bonus.

Most of us need to remember, or learn for the first time (since this 
information is usually concealed from us) that the First Amendment, and 
the Constitution in general, supersedes all the laws of municipalities 
in violation of the constitution, as stated in the 1925/Gitlow v. New 
York/ruling. So the First Amendment supersedes the restrictive permit 
laws now being invoked against protesters. The First Amendment was 
designed to allow for disruption of business as usual. It is not a quiet 
and subdued amendment or right.

Indeed, our nation's founding was a series of rowdy and intense 
protests, disrupting business as usual for tax collectors and 
mercenaries up and down the eastern seaboard. Even after the 
establishment of the new nation massive, highly disruptive protests of 
various laws, Congressional actions, and even of foreign policy were 
absolutely standard expressions of political speech, and whether they 
liked the opinions expressed or not, these protests were spoken of by 
Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Washington and others -- some of whom 
themselves were the subjects of these protests -- as part of the system 
they had set in place working, and the obligation of American citizens.

Dr. King, when asked about disruption, said that the disruption caused 
by/peaceful/protest is good and healthy in a society, because it is the 
result of festering problems that need to be addressed and that are 
buried being brought into light to be dealt with constructively.

But I would want to remind OWS, and any protesting group, that peaceful 
and dignified disruption of business as usual is very different from 
violence, anarchy or rioting, which must always be avoided. This is why 
I keep telling OWS and others:/be peaceful/./Don't march in a 
militaristic way/. Don't cover your faces or let anyone with you cover 
their faces. Bring old people. Bring kids. Bring instruments, form bands 
of musicians and singers. Don't fight. Don't destroy property.

If neighbors complain about mess, bring brooms (as the Egyptians did) 
and clean up, not just the park but the whole neighborhood. Bake cookies 
FOR the neighbors. Be the good examples of civil society that you want 
to spread. Bring whole families (good job with that family sleepover in 
Zuccotti Park last night). I would go further: emulate the Civil Rights 
movement and wear your Sunday best at key times when you protest. Wear 
suits and dresses when it is practical, or wear red, white and blue when 
conditions are rougher. Bring American flags. Bring the Constitution. 
Don't give the narrators any excuse to marginalize you because of the 
visuals or because of any individuals' erratic or anarchic behavior.

.....-snip-

This formality was partly to honor the great gift and great occasion 
that is the American gift of free assembly. And she always said: 
"Activism is the rent we must pay for the privilege of living in a 
democracy. Protest is how you pay your civic rent." (Tiny as she was, 
she also had no patience for people who were willing to be deterred from 
the path they knew was right by bullies.)

.... activism and petitioning government for redress of grievances is 
not a choice if you live in America. If you are American, it is an 
obligation. The Founders did not give this task to us as an option, but 
rather demanded it as an obligation: we are/compelled/by their social 
contract in the Constitution to protest and engage in free assembly when 
government has stopped listening to us. That is why the First Amendment 
comes first: everything else flows from it and is built upon it.

.... -snip-

Bloomberg is flat wrong, and he doubtless knows it but hopes you won't 
notice: New Yorkers have no right to be free of any disruption from the 
peaceful but disruptive free-speech actions of their fellow citizens, 
and how New Yorkers lawfully and peacefully assert their First Amendment 
rights is actually not up to him. There is a higher authority than 
Michael Bloomberg, or than the NYPD, or even than the guy in the white 
shirt who signaled to his colleagues to handcuff me earlier this week 
when I stood peacefully on a sidewalk, obeying what I had confirmed to 
be the law: and that higher authority is called the Constitution of the 
United States of America.

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