If you’ve been watching mainstream media over the past few days, you may think young anarchists are ruling the streets and creating chaos. The only group “ruling” the streets has been the police in riot gear. On Tuesday night, I was at the “March For Our lives.” The march started with a rally at Meers Park, St. Paul and then went though St. Paul. There were elderly people, babies, and children on the march. It was a diverse crowd of people that came together for a common cause, to fight for human rights. The speakers at the march were inspiring. I felt the group was one as we walked. We came from different backgrounds, different religions, different ethnicities, and so on. That night we came together to march for human rights.
As we wove through St. Paul we reached an underpass. The only audience we had was ourselves. The crowd chanted and sang as the sound reverberated in the underpass. It felt like a cosmic convergence of sound and energy. It felt like the birth of a new movement or at least for me a rebirth of energy to fight on. As we emerged the crowd cheered.
We marched on to the capitol lawn as the Ripple Effect concert was ending. Concertgoers joined the march. We marched from the capitol to the “pen area” at the Excel Center. Riot police were there at the end out the march route. People milled around trying to figure out how to get out and were to go. We walked down to St. Peter and 7th and where met by police in riot gear. We were pinned in at the intersection. Riot police blocked every intersection. The crowd chanted, "whose streets our streets." (This is a very common chant on marches.) Like the bible, the chant is not to be taken literally. Marchers put their fists in the air as a sign of solidarity not as a sign of violence. Of course the mainstream media would like to believe we were trying to take over Mickey’s Diner.
The sun had gone down and confusion set in. I never heard any police order to disperse or that gas would be used on the crowd. The peace team tried to tell the crowd to leave before the police started using gas. Peace teams ushered people to a small gap in the riot police line and away from downtown. The police fired on the crowd as they tried to leave with pepper spray and flash bombs. The noise echoed through the buildings. I couldn’t believe I was being fired on by the cops for doing nothing but expressing my first amendment rights. People screamed and ran to get out of the line of fire. I was maced repeatedly while my hands where in the air as I was trying to leave. Near the end, my friend and me ran through the street with our arms around each other so we didn’t get separated in the chaos. It felt like we were in a war.
More stories about the protest, pepper spray, and bombs.
Running from the Cops at the RNC
Poor Peoples Economic Human Rights Campaign Takes Cause to Streets Outside RNC
Running from the Cops at the RNC
Poor Peoples Economic Human Rights Campaign Takes Cause to Streets Outside RNC
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