• Awoo [she/her]
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    4 years ago

    Not if you're in a group of a hundred people they won't. Get slapped with a stick maybe but it's way too dangerous to yank out individuals from an angry group due to the threat the crowd poses. Yeah of course they're going to kill you when they can dogpile 5 cops on top of one fool on their own because a massive crowd of people just scattered to the wind when like 10-15 cops charged for literally the first time of the night... Every night.

    • mrbigcheese [he/him]
      hexagon
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      4 years ago

      i dont think people from other countries get how dehumanizing cops here are towards other people. its true youre safer in groups but people know if they resist or fight back even slightly theyll get the shit beat out of them and if they really fight back and resist theyre putting themselves in a situation they may very well not come out of alive. like police doesnt give a shit here and theyre well armed and equipped and these people just havent ever really had any sort of direct confrontation experience with police so its hard to train groups of random people in any meaningful way on the spot. these organizers should definitely teach these tactics tho

      • Awoo [she/her]
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        4 years ago

        Have you ever been hit by a horse? Those fuckers weigh a tonne, kick and bite. Our cops come in swinging batons, headwounds from baton attacks is not uncommon.

        https://youtu.be/hLWm60hEgRU

        Horse charge. Oh, people haven't actually scattered? Horse charge fails miserably to achieve its intended purpose and one cop is paralysed from the event.

        Police charges in Paris:

        https://youtu.be/4cgnEQ3Nf8Y?t=48

        Foiled by not scattering. Having barricades. Actually fighting back. Don't tell me the French cops are soft, they're absolutely not, they beat people to death whenever they get the chance.

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7isLhaNYgkU

        This charge/scatter attempt half-works but because protesters are actually fighting back and mounting a real defence the police are unable to continue pressing without reforming their line and protesters didn't realllly scatter, they just retreated in on single direction.

        One thought I'm having is that I can't actually tell who the hell is there to seriously protest and who just wants to have some fun shouting at police and recording video, this results in the protesters who are actually there on the scene not really knowing who is going to stay grouped -- the result of not knowing if you have group solidarity or not is that everyone scatters in self preservation. There's a whole lot of gawkers.

        Either way from what I've seen spectating often is that Seattle and Washington seem way better at their shit than the Portland crowd. Portland is out there every single night but when Seattle and Washington are out there they're out there for reals. I'm just dead surprised Portland don't seem to be getting better in any way or paying attention to how they're getting wrecked by the same tactic night after night with zero adaptation. Put up a small barricade they have to run around/split during a charge and they'll think twice about charging or something. Be more prepared, it's the same scatter over and over.

        • Baader [he/him]
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          4 years ago

          This! Us police doesn't use any new tactics. There is a reason for black block tactics.

        • LangdonAlger [any]
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          4 years ago

          Portland has struggled to keep numbers up. The city is much smaller than DC, Seattle, NYC, or just about any other metro area. Small numbers plus nightly dozens of arrests means fewer veteran protestors to hold the line.