LAPD Stands Down on Occupy LA

For days, OccupyLA had been told to evacuate its camp outside Los Angeles City Hall by 12:01 a.m. on Monday, November 28. Throughout Thanksgiving weekend, the deadline approached and tension increased.

When the police-led evacuation didn't happen, the movement moved into the streets where they were met by members of the Los Angeles Police Department armed with batons, helmets, and other riot gear.

Reason.tv spoke with Occupiers and fans of the movement from inside the encampment at City Hall and followed the police developments into the morning. There was no clearing of the Occupy camp this time, but Los Angeles authorities have said they are determined to clear the space sooner or later.

About 3:30 minutes.

Written, shot, and narrated by Paul Detrick.

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Go here to see Reason.tv's full Occupy playlist, featuring videos from New York, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and more.

Comments

[rather]

I love that they burned money-so LA

[rather not]

What's the difference between Rectal and a monkey?

Other than she eats her poop instead of flinging it, not much.

[rather]

I'm guessing your parents are still hoping you'll grow out of it 🙁

[rather not]

Your breath smells like shit.

[AlmightyJB]

Getting Serious About Ron Paul

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=47788

[USMJP]

http://occupylc.tk
Occupy Lake Champlain
http://wh.gov/jwh
White House Petition

[A Serious Man]

Don't ya know there's a sea monster in that lake? Champy is definitely the 1%.

[Auric Demonocles]

Dude's got a baseball team named after him and a statue.

[Kant feel Pietzsche]

This person is fucking hilarious.

[jtuf]

VERMONT IS THE ONLY STATE THAT ALLOWS
TREATED SEWAGE TO BE DUMPED INTO ITS
MAIN WATER RESERVOIR - LAKE CHAMPLAIN.

LOL, so now treating sewage is not enough. We still can't dump it after treatment. Every point on Earth is part of a watershed. What are we supposed to do, break down sewage to subatomic particles? The Occupiers should lead by example and stop producing sewage. They are under the impression that their own feces doesn't stink.

[Zeb]

Treated sewage. Isn't that also sometimes known as water? I doubt they dump the sludge in the lake.

[Auric Demonocles]

I've toured the Burlington wastewater facility. They aren't dumping turds into the lake (although the wild animals are).

[The Hamilton]

Meh. Bust their heads.

[Beloved Rev. Blue Moon]

Seriously, reason, the Occutards are not your friends. They destroy property and harm innocent people. Nobody gives a fuck about them, and neither should you. Stop wasting column inches and time on these bratty ne'er-do-wells.

[Tulpa]

+1 for the reverend.

[Beloved Rev. Blue Moon]

*eyes fishily*

That isn't one o' them thar fake +1s I see the kids giving to the Gambolin' Man, is it?

[k2000k]

I'm perplexed by the favorable coverage as well. While I sympathize with their general anger, just look at the Peter Schiff videos, many of them don't seem like they are friends to the cause of free markets. Not to mention that they are protesting illegally and hindering the free movement of other people. Things the Tea Party never did.

[Hugh Akston]

Not to mention that they are protesting illegally and hindering the free movement of other people.

Wait, how are they protesting illegally when the Constitution guarantees the rights to free speech and free assembly?

[Beloved Rev. Blue Moon]

Kind of tough to tell if you are serious or not.

Occupy Seattle, for example, blocked downtown traffic. You can talk about whether that should be legal or not, but the fact is that it is illegal to block traffic. In Libertopia, mind, the street owners would have shot them rather than "peaceably" removed them.

The Constitution guarantees the right to free speech and free assembly, this is true. The Constitution does not demand that the taxpayer subsidize those two actions for you. The public streets are not the Occutards private platform for their own exclusive use.

[Beloved Rev. Blue Moon]

More examples:

Zucotti Park is semi-private. Camping there is not permitted. OWS trashed a restaurant across the street from them.

Occupying Wal*Mart is trespassing. It is also (assuming that there were any perishables in those carts) destruction of property. And assholish to boot.

Occupy Oakland shut down the port with firebombs.

The Occutards in DC pushed a lady down the stairs.

[heller]

Nice collectivist thinking

[Beloved Rev. Blue Moon]

I can only assume that some chick you are trying to get with at college is an Occutard. Otherwise I cannot explain this level of dumb.

Do you ever say "Republicans say/do..." or "Democrats say/do..." or "The Media say/do..."? Or do you go "oh hey it's not all members of XYZ group so I am completely incapable of drawing a conclusion ever."

[Zeb]

Got to agree with Heller here. Sure I say things like "Republicans do X" or "liberals don't know shit about Y" from time to time. But if someone points out to me that that is sloppy collectivist thinking, I will agree and clarify what I mean. It is stupid and sloppy to generalize that way, even though we all do it sometimes.

[heller]

Republicans and Democrats necessarily say similar things. They don't necessarily do similar things. I would not use generalizations to blame the bad behavior of some individuals on their ideological group, regardless of my ideological disagreement with them.

We can all agree here that the shared ideology of the Occutards is wrong. There is no need to identify them with criminal activity when it is clear that such activity is not uniform among them.

[NAL]

I disagree. Once it became obvious that OWS was growing violent and destructive (i.e. attracting violent, destructive members), the good people in the OWS movement have an obligation to detach themselves from the movement (and to perhaps start a new movement standing for non-violent, non-destructive protest). If that is occurring, then good for them, but that makes the generalizations about the criminality of OWS more true (as the good people leave, higher percentage of bad people in OWS).

[Hugh Akston]

Well, to the extent that there is such a thing as public property like parks and streets, they are owned in common by everyone.

And yeah, municipalities can pass laws constricting the ways that the public can use public spaces, but fuck those guys. Seriously. There is no non-arbitrary line to draw between reasonable and unreasonable use of public spaces.

[Brian D]

The intended purpose of streets is to allow for the flow of traffic, generally vehicular. The street wasn't built with the idea that people would stand around in it.

You can arrange for the city to assist in your temporary repurposing of streets for assembly by petitioning them, and they will provide official notice to the citizenry, and official personnel to show where the repurposed area is and for how long it will last.

People have no more right to impromptu assembly in the streets than I have to impromptu drive on the sidewalks, despite both being public land.

[jtuf]

+1

[jtuf]

The +1 is to Brian.

[Schmehicular]

The street wasn't built with the idea that people would stand around in it.

But walking in it is a valid use.

The next occupy event will be slow bicycles.

[cynical]

Peaceable assembly. Deliberately shutting down public infrastructure isn't a riot, but it isn't exactly peaceable either -- I would say it goes beyond protected expression into civil disobedience. And squatting on private property is just trespassing.

[Zeb]

What favorable coverage? Seems to me that earlier on, the Reason coverage was quite critical of the OWS crowd. Once the police started removing them, the coverage shifted to mostly commenting on interactions with police.

[Memestarter]

the Occutards

Repeat after me:
Freebaggers
Freebaggers
Freebaggers

[jtuf]

+1 to Rev.

[herpanoid]

At first I read the video title as "LAPD Stomps Down on Occupy LA" and was elated, then I reread and am now disappoint.

[nick]

Yes,i also think so

ip camera

[CockRoaches of the OWS]

The masses have been ignored for too long! Long live the revolution!

DEATH to the Great Satanistic Homeowner Tyrant!

Imperialist pig. Give us some Wheaties.

Long Live the Glorious Cockroach Rebellion Against the Great Suburban Bourgeois Oppressor Swine Pigs!

[anon]

Serious question:
Do you believe the shit that comes out of your mouth?

[nick]

Great,i like it
http://www.lktown.com/blog

[Mayor Bloomberg]

Imperialist pig. Give us some Wheaties

OK, I give but only salt-free, and not the frosted shit

[CockRoaches of the OWS]

Swine oppressor hypocrite. We'll lay a thousand eggs in your box of fruit loops!

[USDA]

If tomato paste makes a pizza = vegetable, then insect eggs = protein lunch.

Thanks for the idea!

[Fist of Etiquette]

The enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend, Reason.

[JeremyR]

Between the constant posts supporting the Occupy movement and all the posts supporting Global Warming alarmism, this place is turning into a lefty site.

[Hugh Akston]

I know, right? Like all the favorable coverage of the Tea Party protests and the those bleeding-heart commies Ron Paul and Gary Johnson, and that article last week about what a deluded twat Rachel Maddow is. I can barely tell the difference between reason and Mother Jones.

[MJ]

"Like all the favorable coverage of the Tea Party protests..."

The Tea Party never did anything to my knowledge that compares to the what the Occupy movement is trying to get away with. Apples and oranges comparison. Besides there has been plenty of angst here over how socially conservative the Tea Party may or may not be.

On the problems the Tea Party and the Occupy movement agree with Reason on, the Tea Party wants the more libertarian solution, the Occupiers want a more authoritarian solution, but the Occupiers are treated with kid gloves.

[rsi]

Opposing people getting the crap beat out them by the pigs is is not exactly supporting the the occupiers.

[MJ]

The Occupiers have overstayed their permit for the park and refuse to leave and are disrupting other citizen's lives by blocking the streets. How is the police moving in to disperse them unjustified?

The Occupiers give off a terrible aroma of lawlessness and entitlement.

[Old Soldier]

Exactly! Sure some of the police actions may not be appropriate - and Reason has reported the hell out of it - to the point where I wonder how many protestors have been killed by cops.

But not a peep from Reason on the cost of the protests to cities or local businesses. Nothing about the losses and inconvenience to people just trying to get to their jobs and make a living.

Is it their hate of cops that has clouded the reporting or some repressed lefty impulse?

[Entitled Soldier]

Give me convenience or give me death!

[Old Soldier]

Okay.

[sure thing]

"people getting the crap beat out them by the pigs"

Yeah, right. The police are really being tough with Occupy. Hell, the fascists will be taking over any time now.

Listening to the endless condemnation of the police simply trying to maintain public order and using minimal physical force while doing so is getting tiresome. Nobody is getting the crap beat out of them. A few bruises here and there, not much more. Occupy suffers more bruises from sleepy on the lumpy ground then it does from the police.

[Old Soldier]

Hell, our cops are worse the Syrians. Look at all the dead Occupiers.

[Zeb]

Oh, Jesus Christ. Yeah, if you disagree with anything, they must be secret leftists. That makes sense.

[mulberry handbags]

For humans, these important factors include
mulberry outlet

[free2booze]

The the members of the local community want these protests to end, then they should arrange a counter protest that is much bigger, and louder than OWS.

It seems like everyone just wants to sit back and wait for the government to save the day, instead of empowering themselves to handle their own shit.

[jtuf]

Dude, I picked up an occupier and removed him from the sidewalk. I encourage everyone else to do the same. If we all carry a bit, the load is not too great.

[Fatty Bolger]

Seems like Reason has some kind of Dharma & Greg thing going with OWS.

[Colin77]

So basically Occupy LA was stoked at the prospect of a confrontation with the cops, and it when it didn't happen they blocked the streets to get the confrontation they had been denied. It's like they have a baton fetish.

[jtuf]

+ 10

[jtuf]

Now that governments are conceding that people have a right to live on government owned green space, it's time for Occupy Earth. Who needs to wait for seasteading technology. Let's just start building towns in federal and state nature preserves. Am I free to cut down trees and farm the land, White Indian?