Feature Archives

A forum on the UC Berkeley campus called “We Witness: A Panel on Digital Video, Social Media, & Political Protest,” was held on Monday, December 10, and presented by the CITRIS Data and Democracy Initiative. It featured Witness, an NGO documenting human rights violations, The New Media Advocacy Project, and Ustream, a commercial service for live video streaming.

On November 22nd & 23rd, Walmart workers and supporters demonstrated at the Richmond and San Leandro Walmarts as part of the national Black Friday protests against the nation's largest retailer. In San Leandro on November 22nd, Walmart threatened the use of the police to remove the protesters, including their own workers. On November 23rd, demonstrations were held in San Leandro and Richmond. Walmart workers spoke about the intimidation and terrorism on the job to silence them from speaking out and organizing.

Occupy the Farm writes: "On Friday November 16, 2012, the University of California (UC) razed all of the publicly planted crops on the Gill Tract. Occupy the Farm is disappointed that the UC has unnecessarily destroyed the hard work of the community and food that could have fed it. The weekly distribution and harvest events could have continued that, over the course of the summer and early fall, have yielded over one ton of food from the crops planted during the occupation last Spring.

Attorney David E. Mastagni of the Sacramento law firm Mastagni, Holstedt, Amick, Miller & Johnsen has demanded that the San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center (Indybay) remove a post by Vallejo Copwatch. It is unclear on whose behalf the overly broad demand was made as it requests that Indybay "remove any and all information pertaining to public safety officers employed by the City of Vallejo." The specific Vallejo Copwatch post listed in the demand letter, though, identifies Vallejo police officer Dustin B. Joseph as the killer of Mario Romero on September 2nd of this year. The Indybay Collective has no intention of removing the post.

On a small hill next to Deer Hill Road in the City of Lafayette, over 6,000 crosses have been erected and displayed as an on-going tribute, and to memorialize the soldiers, who have been killed in Iraq or Afghanistan. The hillside has been marked with controversy, and has sparked anger and even attracted counter protests to its existence.

Occupy Oakland Anti-Repression Committee writes: "Over the past year, we have experienced many forms of overt police repression, from the camp eviction and night of tear gas on October 25th, to raids on the vigil, to snatch and grab squads on May Day. We have come to expect the riot-clad police, with their batons and chemical weapons, although repression comes in other forms as well. As a community, we have not been sufficiently attuned to these other faces of repression."

BayOfRage writes: "The spectre of state repression has been growing over Bay Area radical milieus. Grand juries in the Pacific Northwest and in Santa Cruz, threats by police of using gang enhancements against activists, the recent string of mass arrests, the profusion of political divisions and threats, abundant conspiracy theories, surveillance of our social spaces, FOIA paperwork that references a confidential informer--The list goes on and on and on. Even though everything we hear cannot be entirely proven or disproven, recent events underscore the importance of preparing for a possible crackdown."