Crackdown on flashmobs is another aspect of our right to free assembly being stepped on.

Yes, and pointing to “flash robs” will be how they justify passing resolutions to prevent people from assembling through flash mobs.

We know that there has been a crackdown of protests ever since the Battle of Seattle, but I’m not sure if this qualifies as BART riders know that there are valid safety concerns when there are protestors on TOP of the BART cars in the tunnel (as happened in the original protest) and lawsuits would abound should any one become injured – protester or commuter. Plus, any one who lives in SF is well aware that disrupting the commute is bound to ignite tempers on all sides of the debate and create division in lieu of unification. After all, the commuters are not the ones who have the power to change BART policy and certainly did not order the cell phone service to be shutoff. You state that “Commuters upset over the closing of stations by protests should complain to BART.” Well, using that same logic, the protesters should have held their protest at BART offices as well and not with the public that simply uses the service. For e.g., a commenter at SFGate was a disabled person who stated that not only was their commute completely disrupted, but their life as well since the extra commute time takes away from the time they use in the evening to recover from the toll that working takes each day on their body.

You say “BART took an action that collectively punished all who would be in those four stations during those few hours,” yet the protestors seemed to have done the same thing to commuters by collectively punishing them for the actions of BART officials.

Your post also seems to minimize any statements made by commuters who did have the experience of being negatively affected by the protest by labeling them “crotchety older men” and “soccer mom” yet, I’m sure you would take offense to the use of such stereotypical labels if someone were reporting about you.

You also only speak of the Anonymous’ physical protest at the station and fail to mention that the virtual protest in which Anonymous published the private information of 2,000 ordinary citizens. This also caused great disruption to the lives of ordinary individuals. This happened to someone I know who is not a crotchety old man or a soccer mom. In fact, she is a very progressive artist and posts:
“Thanks a-holes at Anonymous, for choosing to share my name, phone #, password and address as your protest against BART. Gee – I guess I deserve the calls I have already started to get from creepy phishing schemers as just dessert, since it was MY fault -and all the other private citizens – whose information you also gave away today – that BART shut off cell phone service last Thursday. I was in agreement with your p…”
Again, the “protest” was supposedly about free speech, but managed to violate the privacy of individuals.
I am not posting this to be a troll, but because there were real repercussions to ordinary people who did not have the authority which the protesters opposed and because I passionately support our free speech rights and don’t want to see misguided protests. These people deserved a truer representation than they received in the post – they were not simply “irritated” or “duped.”
That said, it’s good to see a discussion of preemptive police tactics regarding protests.

Good article, Kevin.

These crackdowns on protests are something that wax and wane over the years. We must constantly be vigilant and fighting for our democratic rights.

I well remember a protest against an onerous curfew implemented in Detroit some years ago, and how a demonstration I attended at Wayne State University campus was sealed off from students as it was surrounded (all two dozen or so demonstrators) by an armed phalanx of horse-mounted policemen.

Interestingly, since I work in downtown San Francisco, I have heard a number of people say that the protesters “shut down” the BART stations, and they seemed to be unaware or uncaring that it was BART management that did that.

What is lost in all the controversies over cell phones, demonstration tactics, free speech, the hacking of BART’s website (including the release of private individual info, which I think was a mistake, i.e., was wrong to do), etc., is the main point of the protest. BART police, like other police, continue to target young black men, and deadly violent force is used against them far more than other groups in this society. Such racist profiling and murderous treatment must stop.

You make some excellent points. I wonder how this protest would have been received had it occurred at an airport, say out at one of the gates, rather than at several of BART’s stations? Of course, the protesters would never have made it out to a gate to protest but would that be seen as denial of free speech? I rather doubt it. It seems likely that the protesters were there specifically to disrupt the travel of others but they really have no legal right to do that. If someone were standing in front of the door of a plane, pontificating and preventing you from boarding the plane, you’d call a cop, regardless of what the individual was protesting.

I also know a couple of people whose lives were disrupted by having to find alternate transportation rather than take a chance of being hurt at a BART station. Now sure how that’s fair to them.

Thanks for pushing back. My response:

1 - The shutdown on cell phone service was a pre-emptive tactic aimed at preventing or minimizing the success of the protest. For all intents and purposes, it worked. The shutdown could be viewed in isolation or in a wider context that notes how police have sought to pre-empt protest at least as far back as the “Battle of Seattle.” I choose to consider it in a wider context because I think it helps us understand this is not an entirely abnormal thing that BART did.

2 - The BART police have every right to remove people off the top of BART cars and defuse any protest that would get out of hand like that. But, preventing an entire protest is not a reasonable answer to keeping people off of cars. Stationing riot police on platforms to get people who try to disrupt service may be a much more reasonable answer. I’ll add that getting on top of cars would be a classic act of civil disobedience. The protesters would be under arrest but would be doing it to send a message.

3 - Commuters do have the power to influence BART policy. They ride BART on a daily basis. They can complain. They can say they ride daily and threaten to not use the service anymore. They can make phone calls. If enough BART riders complained, who knows what would happen? This would no longer be about protesters’ concerns but riders’ concerns.

4 - It is deeply unfortunate that a disabled person had trouble getting home from work and had his or her life disrupted. That probably wouldn’t have happened if BART had been more restrained in shutting down stations. What was going on that made it so BART had to close stations? 100 people were protesting, not 1000. The closing down of one station meant the protesters marched to other stations to assemble. BART created the mess.

5 - Your comment about protesters “collectively punishing” commuters for the “actions of BART officials” rests on your assumption that BART stations had to be closed because the protesters were present. The media and riot police almost outnumbered the protesters on the platform.

6 - The individuals whom I stereotypically label appear in what is clearly a propaganda video. They are being exploited for who they are. The first video had people who all had to get home to their families, including a black nurse still in her work attire. The older white gentleman and the “soccer mom” mobilize a demographic. There’s also a black woman who looks like the single mother with two kids who works a job. The producers are quite clearly using the image these people give off to elicit a response. So, I feel no desire to be politically correct in my characterization.

7 - The post is about physical protest. That is why a discussion of Anonymous’ virtual actions is left out. I do not support the release of private data of private citizens.

8 What happened to the progressive artist is sad news.

9 - I consider the protest in the BART stations to be separate from the online protest. A majority of people on the streets likely did not engage in the hacking of data from myBART.org. So, I do not see why I should discredit the entire protest in BART stations because a few people decided to release private citizens’ data.

You are correct. There are real repercussions to real people. I would ask, if the protesters went to BART offices to protest instead of the stations, would people pay attention?

I think BART is propagandizing the San Francisco Bay area community.

Thanks for adding your voice to the discussion.

At this point, in the land of amber waves of grain and the rockets’ red glare, it is ALLLLL about PR.

Truth and reality, and the communicating of them, is not to be tolerated.

That swirling noise you hear is your Right to Freely Assemble and your Right to Free Speech circling the drain.

Not to mention your right to ride BART

o/t [from Glenn Greenwald's Twitter feed]:

Does Obama camp see upside in pissing off the left?; Greg Sargent; 8/17/11

The story exploding on the left right now is that the Obama campaign’s state director in New Mexico sent out an email containing a blog post mocking Paul Krugman and the “firebagger liberal blogosphere”for criticizing the debt ceiling deal negotiated by the White House. Liberal bloggers are asking whether this is the latest sign that the Obama team sees percentage in dumping on the left — or “hippie punching,” as the blogospheric parlance has it.

The Obama official, Ray Sandoval, circulated the email just after the debt ceiling deal passed Congress, hammering lefty critics for deriding the deal as a surrender. Sandoval’s email included a blog post that derided Krugman as a “political rookie” and decried critics for “pure, fanatic, indomitable hysteria.”

The term “firebagger” appears to be a reference to Firedoglake, whose bloggers frequently hammer the White House for giving too much ground to Republicans. [...]

Right on, Kevin.
It’s been said before: “The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either.” — Ben Franklin

I agree with much of what you said in your post. Despite the propaganda and PR, there are legitimate safety and passenger concerns involved.

This in no way justifies shutting down free speech, which is awfully scary.

“BART pre-emptively chose to shut down stations Monday night even though protesters had done nothing to disrupt service.”

Other than those protesters threatening to disrupt service and having disrupted service during recent instances.

“7 – The post is about physical protest. That is why a discussion of Anonymous’ virtual actions is left out. I do not support the release of private data of private citizens. ”

Unless that private data is part of a massive leak of government cables orchestrated by a wayward Army Private in Iraq. The it’s OK.

Provide evidence that protesters intended to halt BART train service. If you have none, you are no better than spokesperson Linton Johnson, who makes up constitutional rights to justify authoritarianism. (i.e. there is no such thing as a constitutional right to safety).

Allegedly orchestrated. And exactly what does that have to do with the protest? You’re trying to start a strawman but you’re so bad at it that it failed before you even hit “Submit Comment.”

Here’s an idea.

Instead of shutting off cell phone networks and preemptively closing stations in case of possible protests, couldn’t BART adopt it’s usual policy for dealing with perceived problems – just kill the protestors?

And anyone they think might be planning to become a protestor?

Kevin, I was responding to your comment about keeping private information private. IMO, the names of Afghan informants that Manning ALLEGEDLY released to Wikileaks are examples of private information that should not be released. Since you’ve generally come out in favor of Manning, I thought that comment to be somewhat at odds with your support for him….

There is also no constitutional right to a clear cell signal while in a subway station.

Look, people protesting the ALLEGED abuses by BART security have disrupted service recently, including the instances where iditos climber on the top of trains and jammed platforms. Now, you’ll say that “it was not these same people” who were organizing this protest. Perhaps not, but there has been a history of these protests and BART is held to protecting the safety of everyone in their stations.

What are they supposed to do? Wait until the platforms are jammed and someone is hurt?

I don’t think so.

Except, if the informants were involved in psychological operations (psyops), as has been alleged, knowing their identities may be a necessary part of understanding the truth of the war in Afghanistan. More importantly, a harm minimization process was carried out and innocent informants’ names were redacted. See here.

BART imposed a prior restraint on speech. It doesn’t matter whether you buy into BART’s propaganda that violent protesters were going to run amok and make life hell for commuters. What they did was wrong.

The media has been minimizing, fabricating details, and mocking protesters for at least a generation. Thankfully, with social media the narrative is bound to change and will reflect a more accurate version of events.

Egyptians were talking about this protest and the implications of shutting down communication! The media as we have known it is dying and new, more democratic forms of news sharing may change the future of protest.

I hear “Vendetta masks” (as BART police called them on their radio Monday night) make good target practice. Sure some trigger-happy BART cops would have enjoyed taking out some Anons.

Amen

Nope, redaction took place AFTER Manning leaked (sorry, alledgedly leaked) the information. And many names got out and there is speculation that inoocent Afghans lives have been put in jeopardy. (Oh, by the by, I am sure that somehow knowing that their subsequent murders may shed light on the truths and horrors of war will assuage the grief their families are feeling.)

There has been plenty of commentary that what Manning did (sorry, alledgedly did) was reckless and that he did not know everything he was releasing. Just because someone cleaned up part of it after the fact does not not absolve him of these actions.

Let’s remind you of these “alleged” BART Cop incidents that are really driving the protests.

Observe as the cops shoot a man on the platform.

Prove it. Show me the evidence. Give me a link. You’re just repeating falsehoods you think you heard. And, in any case, we’re talking about protest and BART. Since you appear to have nothing to add to that discussion, you seem to have decided it would be good to rehash some argument over Afghan informants being revealed by WikiLeaks. It has nothing to do with the subject of this post but if you want to show off how good you are at rehashing this debate, go right ahead.

Thanks, Kelly. Yes — as I wrote: “Commuters can groan and moan about getting home late because of some protest, but what about the homeless men or the youth shot by BART police? Shouldn’t someone speak for them?”

How? Because the protest did not materialize? How can you say something that did not happen did not happen because of BART? Are we chasing ghosts now?

BART shut down their own private networks. They did not shut down the Internet. They did not JAM the Internet.

People OUTSIDE the stations could still communicate. They could still organize. They could still scream to their hearts’ content. They could hold up all of the artful signs, with snappy slogans, that they wanted. They could even use walkie talkies to coordinate a blitz on the platforms themselves. Hand signals. Semiphore. Smoke signals.

By your reasoning (?), if I expect a crowd of people to try to invade a government building and disrupt a trial or other event, I have to wait until they are inside causing trouble before I clear them out. I can’t do anything to control the crowd, keep people out who are clearly going to cause a mess, etc. I literally have to wait until they cause a riot?

Here you go. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_War_documents_leak#Informants_named

The leak reportedly names hundreds of Afghan informants. The Times offered as examples[51]

a 2008 report that includes a detailed interview with a Taliban fighter considering defection and ends with “[t]he meeting ended with [named person] agreeing to meet intel personnel.” Both his father’s name and village are also included in the report;
a report that read “[named person] said he would be killed if he got caught interacting with any coalition forces, which is why he hides when we go into [named location]“.
The paper also found that a man killed by the Taliban two years ago after being suspected of spying for American forces was named in the logs and described as “highly pro-Government of Afghanistan and Coalition Forces. He should be taken seriously in his claims of insurgent knowledge.” Another report gave the names, father’s names, tribe, village and GPS co-ordinates for homes of individual villagers while stating that “[named person] wanted to help us as much as possible… [but] they were afraid that the people in the next village would see them talking to Americans.”[52][clarification needed]

You keep lying about “they shut their own private networks.”

They did not. By their own admission, they walked over and shut off power to the carriers engineering cabinets, and told the carriers after the fact.

Wikipedia? Fail.

Actually, this comes from the Times, a British national newspaper, as reported in Wikipedia. And you’re coming down on ME for questionable sources? Weren’t you the one who pulled some crappy blog about the FCC ane Verizon in one of your last posts on this subject? Oh yeah, I think you later called him a “hack” yourself…

What’s your point? I admitted I made a mistake. And now I have better proof to show BART likely violated a section of the Communications Act.

We obviously have a BART troll or two comment here, so be it.

First and foremost is the question of if the law was broken by BART.

Communications are heavily regulated by international agreements and treaties, THAT is what the FCC is required to investigate and prosecute, if the law was broken.

The social implications (which I think are authoritarian and therefore a titillation to the FOX news viewers) are meaningless to this question. The danger that passenger were subjected to by BART by cutting off emergency communications just to keep from being embarrassed, is unconscionable and hopefully illegal.

Good comment.

What private data was “part of a massive leak of government cables orchestrated by a wayward Army Private in Iraq?”

You obviously don’t know what a troll is.

Are you really going to equate vandals or perhaps even domestic terrorists to the protesters?

Question: Does BART have an office that liaisons with County, State and federal “emergency” and security agencies such as FEMA, or worse, DHS? There’s a feeling of response coordination with other agencies in this BART episode. A look at their internal phone book and organizational chart might find a coordinator getting tactical advice from outside agencies.

Great question. Here are three more questions worth asking (from the First Amendment Center):

Is a BART train station a public forum? The agency contends that it cut off cell-phone service only to prevent prohibited activity, but the planned protest may in fact have been protected as constitutionally guaranteed assembly. A California Supreme Court decision in 1967 found that a city could not ban peaceful political activity inside a railroad station.

Did BART intend to suppress speech by shutting off cell service or was it simply trying to run a railroad?
Was the agency’s restriction on communication content-neutral? Courts have frequently upheld actions of government designed to maintain public order or safety when all speech is affected and no point of view is singled out. Yet BART’s actions were designed to prevent people from talking about staging the protest, a specific subject.

Did BART have a right to limit incoming ideas? There’s a tendency to view freedom of speech as the right to share your opinions, but there’s also a First Amendment right to receive the ideas of others. BART points out that the agency only recently made cell service available. But once service is in place, can the agency cut off the free flow of texts, e-mails and messages flowing to passengers who had absolutely nothing to do with the protest? These days every cell phone with a Twitter feed or news app is in effect a self-contained digital printing press.

You obviously don’t know what a troll is.

There is a powerful tool to see someone here’s point of view, click on the name.

It’s interesting.

Evidence: you would know if you had been on a train at 5:15 PM that was delayed by nearly a half hour because of protestors standing and blocking the doorways from closing at the Civic Center station. The train finally could close its doors and proceed once some other commuters pushed the protestors out of the way. So the protestors did not merely intend to stop trains, they actually did.

This personal experience is also confirmed independently by someone else’s report:

“The protest began just before 5 p.m. when several dozen people convened on the platform at the Civic Center station. It remained calm for a while. Protesters carried signs and some held phones up to their ears, repeating, “Can you hear me now?”

The station shutdowns were triggered about half an hour later as crowds began to chant, “Disband the BART police!” Two protesters stood in the doorway of an East Bay-bound train for about a minute. As police were heading to remove them, a BART rider shoved the two people out of the doorway and the train shut its doors and departed.”

http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/2011/08/station-closures-stymie-bart-protest

You are witnessing the step from civil disobedience to civil disconvenience. It is no longer the authorities that suppress, it is the Have-somes that do not wish to have their authoritarian routines disturbed by a challenge to the status quo.

Litmus test: Imagine MLK and the civil rights movement, today.

The purpose of government is to overreact to challenge, to implement collective punishment – Sippenhaft – to any community that within itself retains explicit discontent. The purpose of the community is to police itself. That is how statism is bred. That it is unAmerican to the core is irrelevant. The People, obviously, have spoken. Tyranny succeeds once the majority is no longer silent, because the majority is always motivated by its constituents’ desparation to run with the majority, at all cost.

Sorry you were inconvenienced, but that’s how civil disobedience works. Unless your routine were somehow disrupted, would you have paid any attention to the protests at all? Would you know what they were about? Would you care?

(I’m using “you” in a universal sense, because I assume you, personally, are highly aware.)

Ultimately, if this series of ongoing protests is to be successful in changing the culture of an increasingly bloody Authoritarianism, it will have to seriously discommode the comfort and convenience of those in power. Already the BART board is getting antsy.

Was it the intent of the protesters to interfere with the movement of the trains? Some of them, yes. Obviously. That’s what has to be done.

Did BART cops overreact? Depends on your point of view, doesn’t it?