No More "Business As Usual" at BART! Shut It Down To Demand Justice For Oscar Grant!

What can we do? How many people are willing to be there? Are the police going to get violent? How will the Black Panthers respond if the police turn violent? Glad everybody is still united around a common cause to end police executions and or abuse. All of us coming together like this especially in these hard economic times is what we really need. I really want things to change for the better not just for my self but everybody. I'm tired of the police state too. I'm tired of corporate greedy asshole and banks running our opportunities into the ground. I don't like the war either. I'm tired of hearing about police shooting innocent people of color beating up the homeless, tasing people to their death in front of their homes, and battering under-age girls while in custody. What in the hell has this country come too. Are we living in a horrible nightmare or what? And the media is so biased, and all the censorship, and cover-ups, and lies, and black outs and all the propaganda has just made me sick. That just about makes up the entire established order in general that I've had it up to hilt with. Things are just getting worse and worse by the day and sometimes I feel like I want to snap. I have no job, no car, no savings, no life, no future no hope and I see all of this happening and I'm really fucking angry and I don't want to talk I just want to act. Somebody needs to do something. Something needs to happen fast. Sorry for ranting but I'm fed up. I feel really bad for family and friends of Oscar Grant and I want to send my condolences. I really want to show up but in case I don't make it wish you all good luck out there. Go get those police! Don't let them bring you down. I know it's rough.

Gee, I notice you pay respect to Oscar's family.

And yet, they have said time and time again that they want peaceful protest. Yet this group supports amnesty for the vandals that hurt local AfAm owned businesses against the wishes of the family, and now plan a non-peaceful protest to disrupt BART service -- also against the wishes of the Grant family.


You posers. You don't care about Oscar Grant or you would not disrespect the wishes of his family. You just want to burn and break.

Stop confusing direct action with violence. Also, If police lay their hands on people at a demonstration do you expect them to allow it?

Don't try to come on here to confuse people by making them think that Oscar Grants death is an isolated event. People are deliberately being targeted by police and the police are trained in police academies to be bullies to control people that are unhappy with the entire establishment. You just want to support police because we scare the shit out of YOU! You have nothing to fear from the revolution unless you’re on the wrong side with the police or are a CEO of a big corporation or bank. We will not back down! Martin Luther King did public disruptions too so don't confuse service disruption with violence. There might be violence too but I don't give a damn because this shit has been going on way before Oscar Grants death. This is deeply rooted in American history full of racism and hate against the poor against people of color and those who have fallen through the cracks. For you to ever become a revolutionary would never work! You are too brainwashed by a rich white owned propaganda machine. Is that truth enough for you?

Asshole

It's tight that people are finally organizing to disrupt the normal flow of things. I was worried that Oakland was backing down. Anyhow, I feel like the most important point is that we CAN win this--and if we do, it'll be really amazing. Angry Anarchist is right, the system is guilty, Oscar Grant's death is just another expression of this system being based on oppression and racism. He wasn't the person killed by cops this year.

While I don't agree with vandalizing local businesses and peoples' cars, the violence doesn't justify resorting to passiveness. This system cares more about property than life. Ron Dellums wasn't even saying anything about Oscar Grant until folks started breaking windows.

And we can stay away from personal attacks. Not trying to "mediate" or anything, but it's beside the point. We all want the same things, just not everyone is clear on how to get there--which isn't their fault.

I agree with you “detour” about the vandalizing of small businesses and peoples cars being "BAD" but do you feel sorry for the Banks that were targeted by the Anarchists? Anarchists only attack Big Business. Those small time shops were hit by random angry protestors that just wanted to vent on anything with in their path. They don’t know who their enemy is yet but they are learning because we are teaching them. We are showing them where to direct their anger instead of at the small mom and pop shops. They're just not aware of what businesses are responsible for all the poverty and mess that we’re in right now. Hit List: Banks, Multi-National Corporations, Fox News Media Vans, and the Police who protect them with their cars, tanks, and stations! These are the targets of the Anarchist! We have been saying it since the Battle of Seattle that small businesses are not the enemy. These guys: Mc Donald’s, Gap, Old Navy, Nike Town, Banks, Government Buildings, Police cars, tanks, and stations are the enemy.

Not yelling just want people reading this to remember it.

I agree, IF PEOPLE do feel the need to vandalize they shouldn't be targeting small business or personal property. That's not to say that I believe that vandalizing makes for a good strategy in this situation, but I do believe in self-defense. Rather than focusing on kicking windows in, I think it's important for groups of friends to decide how they're going to disrupt business as usual, and what means will be necessary if the police decide to become violent. How will we defend ourselves, and the rest of the people at the shutdown? It's obvious that the police presence will be heavy.

I do not oppose direct action to bring about not only Justice for Oscar Grant but to have at least a deterring effect on cops in the future .
But i have questions about the tactic of shuting down Fruitvale BART during evening rush hour . Practically every passenger will be returning home FROM work not en routet to work . So how does greatly delaying the mostly working class Latinos from arriving home help in our campaign for Justice ?
If CD is to take place at a BART Station wouldn't it make more sense to have it at 6 am as opposed to 4-6 Pm ? Preventing people from arriving at work (and with a pretty hard to challenge excuse even for the most hard headed boss ) would have a far greater (and potentially less alienating for commuters ) impact wouldn't it ?

most workers get paid according to how much time they work (i.e they are not salaried), so having an "excuse" for not getting to work still means not getting paid for that day, even if they have a generous boss that doesn't demand they find alternate transportation. what would most workers rather have, an unpaid day off or a bit of rigamarole to get home? I'll let you figure that one out

let's not go round and round on this again, k?

either contribute to what's going on by going to planning meetings, or stop trying to disrupt this demo via non-productive comments here

What you are saying is not right. NoJusticeNoBART does not support destruction or anything of the sort and that is why we our organizing shutdown of the BART station. We are trying to have a soild direct action protest that does not get violent. That is out intent. And as for Oscar Grant's family.... They have only come out and said they do not want anymore violence, not no more protest. I have not heard of them criticizing this protest publicly and we have been in contact with them through others who know the family.

Stop putting a spin on things and trying to make out that we are organizing another riot. That is the truth!

A local graphic designer has redesigned the BART logo for flyers, banners, and signs, and he's selling Tshirts and donating the proceeds to Oscar Grant's family.

don't worry, we will get there. this is a CAMPAIGN not a single action.

also, put it on your calendar:

NO JUSTICE NO BART! March 19th, ROCKRIDGE BART, 4-6PM.

This is an Alert!

We will be peaceful. We can't promise that nothing will happen though if the police try to confront us. People should come with protection for their heads, helmets, knee pads, shoulder pads, bullet proof vests, face masks to protect your identity because police spy on us all the time with their cameras and we bring our cameras to spy on them as well, bring gas masks or wet rags to cover your face and protect lugs incase they shoot tear gas at us, bring thick gloves to throw back tear gas canisters just incase they shoot them at us to disrupt our plan of disruption. You never know what the police might do. Preparation is always good. They prepare for us now we prepare them.


PREPARE YOUR SELVES!

It's not going to be a war, so just take a deep breath.

Wile no one can predict the future, cops most likely will not use gas to keep the station open -- kind of counter-productive to do so, eh, with commuters gagging and whatnot. Once the station is closed, there's no point in using gas to re-open it. Unless people start running around breaking shit, or somehow directly physically challenging the cops, there won't be gas.

My guess is that the cops will try to form lines with bikes or riot cops or whathaveyou to offer commuters a cop-gauntlet-path to enter or exit the station. Problem is, except for protestors in bandanas, they won't be able to tell who's a demonstrator and who is just a passer-by. Odds are it won't take much resistance to create enough of a hullabaloo to close the station. Then again, cops may just go ahead and pre-emptively close it to avoid the hassles and confusion of a forced shutdown. They've already shut down a number of stations on their own any time a protest got too close to a station because they didn't want demonstrators inside stations or trains, which is much harder for them to deal with logistically.

Perhaps, but better safe than sorry. Right?

never trust the police! they are intent on controlling,almost suicidal

Most of all PLEASE be safe, your actions are going to be watched, scrutinized, blogged, written, videoed, photographed and transmitted to all over this planet.....make sure you do your
best to be peaceful, yet persistent.

Even though we failed to shutdown Bart I noticed many Bart passengers walking back up to the platform to take the next train not wanting to walk through us all. We disrupted BART financially despite the mainstream media telling everybody our efforts where a complete failure.

We made only a partial victory and they don't like that, so of course they're trying to discourage potential participants in the near future by calling today’s actions a total failure with out highlighting the successes of today's gathering!

LET US NOT FORGET THE NEW MEDIA IS APART OF THE SAME CORRUPT SYSTEM THAT KILLED OSCAR GRANT! THE NEWS MEDIA LOVE THE POLICE AND THEY HATE ANYBODY WHO DISRUPTS COMMERCE IN ORDER TO PROVE A POINT SINCE IT IS BIG BUSINESS THAT PAYS THEIR SALERY TO BEGIN WITH. I HATE BIG BUSINESS ANYWAY. BIG BUSINESS IS THE REASON WHY WE LIVE IN A POLICE STATE AND ARE ALWAYS HAVING TO FIGHT OFF IN SOME WAR THAT WAS STARTED BY OUR GOVERNMENT IN THE FIRST PLACE. WHRAAARRR!

I have to admit we would have been able to shut it down had indybay.org done a better job promoting it. There were a few key things left out that could have been more effective in alerting Bay Area citizens.

Had indybay.org actually posted a real article on the top front page with Oscar Grants face right above the other article that said "Attorney General Holder Strongly Implies that Medical Cannabis Raids Are Over", you would hav seen a much greater turn out causing the Bart gate to come down and I would have been celebrating right now, but how much you put in is how much you receive back.

People just feel more obligated to show up at any event when they can actually see the person they're reading about and if you post a visible article at the top w/ a picture rather than a bunch of red hi-lighted links people would take it more seriously on top of taking more notice. You know the medical marijuana story could have been pushed downward so that it wouldn't draw so much attention away from this event. Where was indybay on that?

If we want to have a better turnout next time which will be on the "19th of March at Rockridge Bart", we ought to reflect back on the mistakes made this week leading up to tonight’s failure to completely shut it down.

I know some of you are getting over this tragedy since it was some 2 months ago and this is exactly what THEY count on everytime and that's how they stay in power and run our lives. Historically things always work out in their favor with the passing of time even though that's never our goal or intention.

Remember that Oscar Grants family still grieves in pain while you slowly forget about all of this returning to your normal life allowing tragedy to be another lost cause out of human selfishness until the next man get's shot in the back and it's back to the streets all of a sudden. When are we going to learn?

Apathy always wins; the same apathy that keeps us under police oppression while we bitch and moan about how fuck't up the justice system is.

Get back up off your asses and come attend our direct action rallies and indybay gurus get to work please!

There is another event and I want to see more than just 100 people. There should have been 500. We can do better than 100 people. At the rate were going we're only going to see 50 people the next time around if we don't shape up. It's all a matter of will-power ;) You can do it. I show up all the time. ACTION AT ROCKRIDGE BART STATION
(No Justice No BART)
Thursday, March 19, 2009
4:00pm – 6:30pm

The people have been saying we need to take this to Rockridge BART. We'll update the details as we get closer to the date.... this will be in solidarity with BART station mobilizations throughout the Bay Area that are observing the anniversary of the disastrous war in Iraq and linking issues together. There will generally be an action every Thursday 4-6 pm at a different BART station or at multiple stations. Details will be announced as the date approaches. These actions will continue, and escalate until our demands are met. More details at nojusticenobart.blogspot.com.

Let us keep this movement strong!

THAT MEANS NO MORE WEAKNESS!

R.I.P. Oscar Grant and all the other lives that were stolen!

you got time to critique, then you got time to volunteer. don't talk about it, be about it. volunteer with indybay. you move the announcement to the center column and add a photo. we're not short of ideas, we're short of volunteers who take the time to do editorial work. step up your game before rockridge.

I don't think it's fair to "blame" Indybay for turnout at a demo. It's just a news website. You might "blame" the people who didn't come, or the organizers. It's possible that there is a disconnect between the two groups, such as a disagreement about strategy/tactics.

Here's how to contact Indybay's editors to suggest a story: http://www.indybay.org/news/2004/12/1710518.php There is a link to that page from Indybay's Contact page, which you can get to by clicking Contact in the top bar on each page of this site.

It is best to pick out the picture's web address yourself AND write a short and long version yourself. Please recommend links.

Thanks!

-Mahtin

On the contrary the indybay editors do play a VERY Big Role in protest/direct action turnout. If indybay editors would share control over posting center column stories and events we the movement would be much more effective since everybody is willing to give an opinion and come back to reply to other peoples opinionated response. I would share indybay authority with the "No Bart No Justice" organization if I were one of the editors at indybay. I know an Oscar Grant Protest Blog has an indymedia link on their website. I'm sharing my thoughts with indybay.org editors right now. I know they monitor comments for racism and other bigotry remarks so they can edit them out if they have to. You guys know what exactly what I'm trying to accomplish here and that's taking things to the next level of activism; stepping it up a little. In these harsh times we need to get more aggressive. Just becasue we have a black president doesn't change a thing. We still live in a police state. Indybay editors need to share the whole apply pie. I mean if indybay is lacking editors then that may be good. Poor publicized events = small turnout of events. Until we make these changes which I'm demanding the movement for justice will always suffer these kinds of blows due to lack of volunteers or what ever the reason may be. Point is these small turnouts are already beginning to crush peoples morale and that's just gonna continue the spiral downward trend. If indybay editors advertised yesterdays demonstration as good as they did the marijuana article there would have been more people down to show up because the event would be staring at you smack dab in the face right after clicking enter after typing indybay.org in the address bar. I'm wondering if the editors are the one's in disagreement over strategies/tactics?

it was highlighted prominently in the last Grant-related blurb on March 1st as an "upcoming event"

it was a highlighted red link at the top of the home page for well over 24 hours before the event. it's been on the calendar itself since March 1st

plus there were numerous posts about it in the newswire over the last week or so that drew a number of comments

in addition, I saw reports on it that morning and the night before on corporate TV news stations, and in print and online in the chron beforehand, so I don't think the issue was that people didn't know about it. just about anyone who follows corporate or independent media news knew it was coming

frankly, demos during normal work hours are tough to make for a lot of people, and there may be some exhaustion on the issue. the arrest of Mehserle seems to have taken some steam out of the movement (even though that is only a small first step towards what needs to be done). but speculation is just that, not science. don't be so sure of yourself that you can pinpoint exactly why there weren't 10x more people there

while I can't speak for them, I don't think NJNB would say that indybay has not been supportive of their (or other justice for Oscar Grant) efforts. NJNB can come on here and correct me if I am wrong about that. I'm sure they will be discussing the ups and downs of the Fruitvale action (and how to take those lessons and best promote/strategize for the coming Rockridge one) at their meeting this Saturday at 1pm - http://nojusticenobart.blogspot.com/. I believe those meetings are open to the public, which means you can participate directly if you want

I'd say look inward and toward the future, not back while screaming that other people didn't do enough. that is, be sure that you personally bring 10x more people yourself to the next one. if they each bring more people to the one after that, these demos can grow. this is a campaign pacing itself for the long haul, not premature hand-wringing, divisiveness, and burn-out on week one

I showed up at the March 5 rally but most of my friends didn't . Their reasons are worth mentioning . All think what happened to Oscar Grant was a terrible crime . They reject BART 's lawyers contention that it was a ''tragic accident ''. They think that Mehserle should have been charged with First degree Murder and they think that bail should have been denied . ("' If there ever was a flight risk it's this guy who was busted in Nevada ! "' said my union sister Bernandette )
But they weren't going to show up for what could have been a one sided violent confrontation with the cops in riot gear .(By one sided the cops could have kicked our assesand busted everyone )
These are working class people all who still are employed but nervously . A couple have had their hrs cut to 32 , a de facto 20 % wage decrease . Two of the women and one of the men are single parents . One guy is on probation .They all felt that as much as they symphasized with the rally they couldn't risk going to jail and then maybe losing their jobs , endangering their kids and so forth .
All commented that instead why can't we build for a really mass march (10, 000 plus ( to coincide with the start of Mehserle's trial ? They all said they would not only attend that but would work on it .
Food for thought.
PS Why did i attend the rally ? Because i'm now single and already have been laid off .

You make a very interesting point about your friends who wanted to show up and couldn't make it. Until enough people feel they've got nothing to lose people will always restrain them selves from doing what's right. As for those on probation, I'm on probation too and I still attend direct action rallies but that's just me. Call me dumb but that's how much I care not to say that those who don't jeopardize them selves in the same way don't care as much as I do but I'm a risk taker. Anytime you engage in direct action activity you are taking the risk of being arrested anyway. Anything that's un-permitted is risk taking. Sometimes we have to go around the law in order to be heard so we can change things. Thousands lose their jobs everyday and that's thousands more who have nothing to lose in taking matters into their own hands. That's exactly what we need. I mean nobody has the time or balls to take the risk of confronting the system because they rely on that system to survive financially and so the system lives on untouched keeping everybody in check at all times. As evil as this may sound to some of you, maybe the economic collapse as bad as it may sound is exactly what we need and will be the most positive thing for the future of humanity especially in the long-run of things if you care about the environment. With out the environment where the hell would you be? Not existing that's for sure. Once it all comes down with our help it will mean the end of capitalism. The end of slavery exploitation and war in the name of American profits worldwide. Perhaps it will play a huge role in opening the eyes of some people that have been blinded by patriotism and free their hands that have been shackled by money and material possessions. You’re never free to take control over your own life until you lose everything. I strongly believe in that. The fall of the dollar is our only hope because as long as we the sheeple are slaves to money slaving our lives away at work everyday; the war for empire which is a war against us all will rage on forever until humanity exterminates it self. Anything that triggers the end of the American Empire is good! I pray for things to get worse! Call me what ever you want. I happen to understand that our way of life is the true evil here at hand right now. People need to wake up. The death of Oscar Grant is part of a bigger problem; a police state problem and it must be stopped at all costs.

Organize Revolution Now!