Indy Media Watch

San Francisco Indymedia is beside itself with happiness at the beating of a police officer.

During the Anti-G8 protest in San Francisco tonight, a police officer who attempted to arrest a protester was badly beaten. Here's the story: the cop was driving in his cruiser after a group of splinter protesters who were shooting off fireworks, putting barricades in the street and breaking windows. He then ran over one of the large styrofoam banners people were carrying. Somehow, this affected the forward movement of his car as the wheels spun. Then, some kind of projectile (maybe a firework) shot at his windshield. Infuriated, the cop leaped out of the car and started swinging. Unfortunately for him, this aggression was a bad move and he was physically beaten.

Unfortunately for him indeed! When oh when will police learn that enforcing the law simply isn't appropriate behaviour?

Interestingly, one of the Indymedia comments asked why the Bay Area news network KRON4 "leads when a cop gets hurt at a protest" but not a protester. Even more interestingly, KRON4 responded:

If you don't think there's a different standard between a police officer getting hurt and a protester getting hurt, you're just blind. We as citizens pay police officers to enforce the laws that we as citizens pass. If you don't agree with those laws, get them changed whether through legislative action or through NON-VIOLENT direct action. If you are met with violence, as King was with Bull Connor, that is not a justification for violence yourself. When a police officer is hurt, it's instantly news. When a protester is hurt, it's not.

I don't expect many of you to agree with me. But I hope you will give us at least the credit for listening and paying attention.

Brian Shields
Online News Manager
KRON-TV
shields@kron.com

This continued on Kron4's sister blog The Bay Area is Talking which points out that Indymedia is a great source for protest footage and photos. Interestingly, it seems some on Indymedia took exception to this material being retransmitted as "fair use".