#j395

(Or what went down at the BART Powell Station on September 8th and my reactions (read: opinions!) on it.)

  At some time past one this morning I wrote on Twitter: I can’t believe it’s been 9 hours since my 1st #nofare tweet. I can’t believe I posted over 100 tweets. I’m so tired yet too wired to sleep.

  That’s still my predominate state right now- tired, wired and disbelieving.

  There was a stark contrast between yesterday’s protest and the one on Monday, which I also attended. Monday’s featured two masked Anons, three naked men and a lot of media and police. It was chill, it was quiet, and it was near non-existent. I figured it was a mix of dying interest and Labor Day that made it that way.

  At 4:30 yesterday, I wasn’t so sure Labor Day had anything to do with the small turnout on Monday. The September 8th protest, as far as I could see, was shaping up to be pretty similar to Monday’s: a whole lot of media and police, and not much protesting. I even heard there were naked men about!

  By five, protesters had begun to arrive though, with signs that said, “Disarm Cops, Arm Feminists” and “Disband BART Cops,” as well as a sign proclaiming the protest was a peaceful one, and one sign listing the six men who had been killed by BART Police since 1992.

  The group continued to grow, and then the chanting started up. “Whose BART? Our BART!” protesters yelled.  Others shouted, “No justice, no peace, disband BART police.” A few anti-protesters argued with the group gathered, yelling back.  Most commuters ignored the protests beyond maybe snapping a picture or two.

  The group wandered about in a tight huddle, surrounded by media recording and documenting and reporting. I never once saw them make a move to block the single fare gate BART had left open (there was a big bubble of space created to let harried commuters in and out, as far as I saw). They were in a free-speech area the entire time, complying with BART rules.

  There was tension, sure (how could there not be, with dozens of BART Police in full riot gear, pockets overflowing with zip ties, hovering near every exit), and there was what could be argued as inflammatory language being shouted, but there wasn’t any real danger.

  There wasn’t a real trigger for what happened next.

  BART Police started ushering people out the front entrance of the station, into Hallidie Plaza, yelling at everyone, “leave now, or you’ll be arrested,” as they shut the gates.  When the gates closed a moment later, they moved to stand guard in front of them.

  I darted about, taking photographs, and said, “I’m going, I’m going,” numerous times as I was pointed towards the only exit left. Media and bystanders were being shepherded out through the exit near the Westfield Mall (they’d already closed down the entrance leading into the mall). At one point, Jim Allison, the BART Spokesperson who had been answering questions before the protests began, threatened me with arrest, and even followed me to the exit to be sure I was leaving. I lingered anyway. My hands shook the entire time.

  On the other side of the station, the police had swarmed the mass of protesters, not allowing any of them to leave.

  They weren’t just protestors though. Multiple journalists were stuck in that circle, unable to get out. There hadn’t been a warning for them to leave. They hadn’t had a chance.

  Seven SFSU journalism students were stuck in there too, though at the time, we had no clue how many.

  Finally, I was forced out with the rest of the stragglers (I waited until Justin Beck, our professor, was forced to leave as well) and they closed the gate behind us. We stayed there anyway, pressed up against it, waiting to learn who was still stuck inside, hoping to see what was being done to the protestors.

  Up top, police had blocked the escalator entrances down to Hallidie Plaza, but crowds had formed anyway, ringing the plaza to try and see what was happening inside. There were bewildered tourists and confused bystanders who didn’t understand the context of the protests, angry commuters being redirected and police lining up along the street. People were handing out flyers to explain what was going on.

  All of us were just waiting for what would happen next. No one had expected this to blow up in the way it had.

  Eventually they started going through those remained trapped inside, allowing those with proper journalist credentials to leave. Mostly, they were really just kicking all the media out.

  It was nerve-racking waiting outside, surrounded by journalists with their big television cameras and their microphones and their notepads, when all I had was a dSLR and a Twitter stream on my iPhone, waiting for news from inside, on arrests, the journalists still trapped there and our students- unaware if the tweets that were going out were verified or not, worried about the safety of our students and running up and down the steps to wherever Justin was to show him the latest tweet of relevance to us.

After a while, Twitter wouldn’t let me post any more. I didn’t even know Twitter had limits. I had never wanted to tweet so badly in my life. It gave me a whole new appreciation for the medium, for live-blogging, for the fast paced, frenzied, somewhat terrifying atmosphere of it all.

  Finally, after about an hour, I could tweet again. By then, all but one of our students had been released and the doors had been opened.

  By 7:30, we had finally gotten all our students back and the station had been reopened. My phone was at 4% battery when I finally left.

  I had been nervous at the beginning of the protests. By the end I was terrified and horrified and so undeniably relieved that we’d all made it out safe (except for the 20-30 protestors still being held).

  I don’t know. The whole event has been absolutely bewildering. The more I think about it, the more confused I get. I thought I’d let myself sleep on it, so maybe I could approach writing this all out with some sort of coherence, but the more time I give myself, the more things I find to say and the more confused I am on BART’s actions.

  I won’t lie. I didn’t have much of an opinion on the protests before this. The BART Police shootings, although terribly wrong, didn’t actually affect me all that much. The shutdown of cell and wifi service angered me more, because that could have actually affected me if I’d been up in the city at the time. Seeing the actions last night though, was too much.

  I care now. A little late, but better late than never, yeah?

  The thing is, these protests must have been losing a little bit of steam. They’ve been going on for over a month now. Commuters were pissed, turnout had been slowing down. If BART had just let the protesters walk around with their signs and their chants this story wouldn’t be a story at all.

  They made the story. They gave all us journalists a story.

  They pissed off the media. They arrested and detained and cited journalists- even ones from the Chronicle- and journalism students who were just there to report. They locked out the media even though we had every right to be there. It was our job to be there. Journalists are meant to be the watchdogs of the government. We are what holds those in power accountable. They wouldn’t let us see what was happening. They wouldn’t give us any information. We couldn’t see what was being done to the protestors or those detained. We couldn’t see where they were taking those that were arrested. Who was going to hold them accountable if we couldn’t? All we had were the tweets from inside.

  In some ways, I’m glad we had students stuck in there. Our jobs had been to tweet, and if they hadn’t been tweeting, I would have known absolutely nothing. To be honest, and my parents would kill me for saying this, I wish I had been stuck in there too. We needed the information coming out of our students and other detainees. If this had been in a time before Twitter, or if the BART had been able to shut down cell or wifi service again (they agreed never to do that again after they received so much criticism for doing it, I believe) there would have been a near total media blackout by the end. They would have silenced those inside thoroughly, and without any in all of us outside would have had nothing of substance to report either, beyond the endless waiting.

  That’s a terrifying world to imagine. Twitter allowed us to share what was happening. It allowed us to connect with our friends and make sure they were safe, trapped inside or stuck outside. Someone from Australia tweeted me asking what was going on in San Francisco. What was #opBART? We allowed those who weren’t there to watch it all unfold. Twitter was such an amazing tool at this protest, because Twitter was all we really had. BART made sure of that by kicking all the media out.

  Of course, that was only the media they deemed credible. But why did BART Police get to have that power? Why did they get to choose who is and who isn’t a journalist? Why did you even need credentials to be considered the media? If you’re present and reporting and committed to telling the truth and holding those in power accountable for their actions, why wasn’t that enough to be considered a journalist? Why was a USF journalism student’s media pass for his college newspaper deemed not credible enough? How come our students with their Twitters and their ID’s and their teacher calling for their release were still considered protesters and not journalists?

At this point, I have more questions than answers.

  Like, wasn’t the BART Police’s actions unnecessary? What law was being broken? They cited journalists for violating section 369I of the California Penal Code, but how were we making the BART station unsafe? We were only peaceful protesters and journalists. We had complied with all their rules. Were the protesters detained because BART didn’t want them to move to other stations? Was the detainment planned? But then why were the reporters detained? Why were the reporters being forced out?

  Why did they close all the fare gates but one? That created more problems and traffic than anything protesters and journalists did. There was so much potential danger there. Why did they shut down the station? BART Police were the ones who blocked the fare gates. Protestors never did. How were we that dangerous? Did they just not want to listen to the negative opinions of the protestors? I don’t see any other reason for what BART did. 

  The thing is, BART’s actions are to blame for the things that have been blamed on the protests. They say protests have cost BART $300K, but the protests are the direct result of BART killings and BART policies. Their actions and their choices have cost them 300K. Angry commuters ask what’s the point of the protests? All they do is disrupt commutes. But that’s BART who disrupted their commutes. That’s BART who blocked off fare gates and shut down stations. The protestors were following regulations. It was a free speech zone.  It’s not the protestors’ faults BART makes these choices.

  I don’t understand the way people are reacting to this. BART Police have too much power. Why do they even need to carry guns? Why do they have the right to silence journalists? This is the safety of all BART users that thee protestors are fighting for. It’s all our civil rights guaranteed to us by the constitution that they are fighting to save. Inconvenience is a small price to pay for that safety and those rights.

  And I don’t understand the criticism aimed at journalist covering the event. I’ve seen people say good journalists never become part of the story and as a rule we try not to. But none of them asked to be arrested or detained. None of them deserved to be. That was BART’s doing. Why shouldn’t we report the arrests and detainments of journalists who were just doing their job? Why shouldn’t we report that SFSU journalism students were detained for doing a class assignment- tweeting. They didn’t hijack the story. The story isn’t just the BART killings anymore. It’s not the only reason for the protests. They shouldn’t be blamed for becoming a part of the story. They’re just a small piece in a much larger story. All of last night was. And no journalist created this story. BART did that when they decided it was a good idea to arrest journalists there to cover it.

I just can’t wrap my head around any of this. 

  I can’t wrap my head around how much my opinion has changed in the span of four days.

  On Monday, I was against the idea of disbanding the BART police- part of me still thinks of all the lost jobs and the perfectly civil BART police men and woman I met yesterday and still thinks maybe we shouldn't. On Monday, I wrote, “I don’t agree with [BART] shutting down wifi service and I don’t agree with them shutting down cell service, and I very much don’t agree with the fatal shootings that have happened in the last X years, but I don’t believe the absolute dissolution of the entire BART Police is the true answer for safety. I don’t know anymore. I’m much too idealistic for this world, probably.”

  Now all I see is a BART Police that is out of control. I see people in power who are abusing it. They've repeatedly infringed on our first amendment rights and put our safety in jeopardy, all under the guise of safety itself, and it's just not right.

  I’m not sure that I'm proud of all of my reactions last night. I got emotional, and caught up and a little mouthy and sarcastic at some moments, but you get caught up in it -your rights being taken away and your fellow journalists and classmates being detained. A part of me feels like I shouldn’t even be posting this at all because I did caught up in it and I can’t be objective, so I remind you now, this is my experience and my opinions. It is utterly biased. I feel deeply wronged and I need to express that, even if I am a journalism student.

  In some ways, I maybe can understand BART’s actions better than I like. I can see, maybe, how they thought the protesters were a threat to the station’s safety. I can maybe understand why our students and other journalists were confused as protestors. But I still think that BART preemptively shutting down all but one fare gate created the crowds. They made more danger than any protestor or journalist ever did. When the BART Police were just hanging around, I was nervous. When they started rounding up people and locking us in or out, I was terrified. BART Police scared me more than anything else. 

  I don’t know. In the end, maybe BART had just been aiming to squash the protests yesterday.

  Honestly, I think they just gave them a new life.

  On Monday, opBART’s fifth protest (yesterday’s was organized by No Justice, No Bart) will happen outside Civic Center Station. I’m excited and nervous and terrified to see what comes. I wouldn’t miss it for anything.

          (I wanted to just throw out some quick thank you’s right now.

  Firstly, to my professor Justin Beck. This was an amazing experience. I’m sore and I’m tired and I’m so grateful to have been a part of it. Thank you for allowing me to crash your class. Thank you for fighting for your students. It was inspiring.

  I am totally expecting insane extra-credit for this though. I figured you should know that.

  Also, XPRESS, for all the hard you put in following the story and helping us get Brad Wilson out.

  Thanks to #j395 for all your tweets throughout the night and #j226 for all your comments in our class discussion.

  Finally, thank you to everyone who followed me, talked to me, retweeted and just listened in. I fear I may never be this popular on Twitter ever again but I’m so thankful and proud of all the conversation we’ve started.)