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DOJ Targets Berkeley Foreign Students? – Threat of “Disappearance” (Photos)
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First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out because I was not a communist.
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the labor leaders, and I did not speak out because I was not a labor leader.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me.
(Pastor Martin Niemoller, spent seven years in a Nazi concentration camp.)
---
1. Description of Guerilla Theater Action with “Raid” Script.
2. Text from BSTW flier handed out to café patrons after performance
3. Links
(Much of the text on this page is excerpted from a Berkeley Stop The War Coalition flier)
---
1. Description of Guerilla Theater Action with “Raid” Script.
Berkeley Stop The War Coalition members debuted their guerilla theater “raid” at Free Speech Movement Café on UC Berkeley campus, hitting 5 more cafes on and around campus throughout the day.
Here’s how the performances went down:
First, café workers were discreetly told that a skit was about to be performed.
Three Berkeley Stop The War Coalition actors started the action by taking a seat…
---
SCRIPT
Improvised guerilla theater performance based loosely on this script (edited for length):
---
Three friends sit at a table in a café crowded with students studying for final exams. Sid starts talking about how a US attorney from San Francisco called him again.
Sid: He says he’s got a deadline and he needs to question me. He’s been calling me for weeks.
Matt (to Annie): (It’s about) this Ashcroft plan. He wants to question 5000 mid-eastern immigrants about terrorism. Sid’s one of them. He is here on a student visa.
Sid: Yeah, the attorney guy said it was voluntary, but he has been calling me A LOT and pressuring me to come in.
Annie: I heard they are going to ask you all sorts of personal shit, about the phone numbers you call and your politics. You should get a lawyer.
Sid: The guy said I don’t need a lawyer, because it’s voluntary. I talked to my Dad too, and he told me just to do what they say. He is worried they might hassle us.
Matt: Anyway, what’s the rush? You’ve got finals and shit.
Sid: I dunno, but this guy keeps talking about a deadline they gave him.
(Agent has been walking around with a Polaroid picture, trying to identify Sid in the café. He has just noticed Sid and walks over to the table.)
-When asked, “how did you even find me”, the agent explains, “I stopped by your place, and your roommate told me you’d be here. He even gave me this to help me out (shows photo)”
Matt: This is fucked up. Look, you need to leave Sid alone. I read about these interviews, they are voluntary. He’s really busy, and this is wrong, stalking…
Agent: This doesn’t concern you… You are just going to make trouble for your friend here. (to Sid) you better calm your friend down.
Agent: We talked on the phone Sid. We both know it’s better if you cooperate.
(to Sid’s friends) Look you two, I’m trying to help Sid out here. I came across the bay to meet him, and this can be really friendly, voluntary, or we can do this the hard way. (to Sid) Your friends don’t know about your Visa problem, do they?
Sid: (flustered) No.
Agent: (to Annie and Matt) You two should stay out of this. I checked Sid’s file at INS. Seems he failed to renew his visa and stayed two weeks over the expiration last year. He could be in some serious trouble, but I’ve been authorized to make that go away.
Sid: What are you saying?
Agent: I can be on the phone (takes out cell) to INS the second I walk out of here. This whole interview is going to look really different if it happens at an INS detention center. You don’t want that, I don’t want that, lets do this the easy way.
Agent: OK Sid, I’m going to step outside. MAKE UP YOUR MIND. You come outside, we take a walk, you sign some papers, show me some documents, and you can go back to being a student. Life goes back to normal. Or you stay here with your “friends”, and wait for INS to show up, and we chat in the back of a van.
(Agent walks out. Sid runs after him.)
Five or six other coalition members, sitting throughout the café, stand up in unison and begin handing out fliers to café patrons. During the performance these five or six did the job of focusing people’s attention on the skit by saying things to café patrons like: “do you know what’s going on?” “Should we do something?” “I wonder if that guy is an FBI agent or something?” etc.
Matt: (to everyone in café) In case you didn’t know this was a skit.
The skit you have just witnessed was performed by members of the Berkeley Stop The War Coalition, with the intention of provoking awareness of recent domestic policy in the “war on terror.”
Today in America, 5000 young male immigrants – mostly from Middle Eastern countries – are being singled out for investigation without proof of any wrongdoing. 1,200 human beings are being held in indefinite detention, a majority of them having committed no offense more serious than a minor violation of immigration law. Thank you.
---
2. (Partial) Text from BSTW flier handed out to café patrons after performance:
Today in America, we celebrate Human Rights Day, the 53rd anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document based largely on our own Constitutional Bill of Rights.
Today in America, 1,200 human beings are being held in indefinite detention, a majority of them having committed no offense more serious than a minor violation of immigration law. Only a handful of these individuals have been charged with an offense related to the attacks of Sept. 11th, and the government refuses to release any information about the identities of the detainees or the crimes with which they have been charged. Meanwhile, preparations are being made so that any of these individuals can face military trial and even execution – all in total secrecy!
Today in America, 5000 young male immigrants – mostly from Middle Eastern countries – are being singled out for investigation without proof of any wrongdoing. Although the Justice department calls their interrogation a “voluntary interview”, these men face threat of arbitrary and indefinite detention for even the slightest violation of immigration law. Base only on their ethnicity, sex, and age, the Justice Department has asked them to open up their personal lives to intensive scrutiny.
---
If we permit our government to erode our civil liberties and disrespect our civil rights, we rend the fabric of our own society. Human rights must fundamentally be guaranteed to all, and when they are surrendered by any of us, they are surrendered by all of us.
(from BSTW flier)
---
LINKS:
Berkeley Stop The War Coalition:
>Stop the War
>End Racist Scapegoating and Defend All Targeted Communities
>Defend Civil Liberties
http://www.berkeleystopthewar.org/
KNOW YOUR RIGHTS Pamphlet (in English, Spanish, Farsi, and Arabic) from the National Lawyers Guild:
http://www.nlg.org/post911/rightsinfo.htm
(Audio) Hear Actor Peter Coyote read from the KNOW YOUR RIGHTS pamphlet, from KPFA’s Flashpoints News Radio website (fast-forward to 23:20)
http://www.flashpoints.net/realaudio/fp20011121.ram
Read about the rights you should have. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html
American Civil Liberties Union:
http://www.aclu.org
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee:
http://www.adc.org
Details on Plan to Interview 5,000 Men:
http://www.adc.org/action/2001/24november2001.htm
“Guidelines for the Interviews Regarding International Terrorism - Memorandum For All United States Attorneys, All members of the Anti-Terrorism Task Forces - From: The Deputy Attorney General”:
http://www.detroitfreepress.com/gallery/2001/interviews/index.htm
Read about human rights violations at:
Human Rights Watch:
http://www.hrw.org
Amnesty International:
http://www.amnesty.org
___
Ethnic Profiling “Raids” - Guerilla Theater Performed in Cafes and Coffee Shops
by Members of the Berkeley Stop The War Coalition (BSTW)
One of several actions taken by BSTW to celebrate
Human Rights Day
The 53rd Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
December 10, 2001
Berkeley, CA USA
___
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the labor leaders, and I did not speak out because I was not a labor leader.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me.
(Pastor Martin Niemoller, spent seven years in a Nazi concentration camp.)
---
1. Description of Guerilla Theater Action with “Raid” Script.
2. Text from BSTW flier handed out to café patrons after performance
3. Links
(Much of the text on this page is excerpted from a Berkeley Stop The War Coalition flier)
---
1. Description of Guerilla Theater Action with “Raid” Script.
Berkeley Stop The War Coalition members debuted their guerilla theater “raid” at Free Speech Movement Café on UC Berkeley campus, hitting 5 more cafes on and around campus throughout the day.
Here’s how the performances went down:
First, café workers were discreetly told that a skit was about to be performed.
Three Berkeley Stop The War Coalition actors started the action by taking a seat…
---
SCRIPT
Improvised guerilla theater performance based loosely on this script (edited for length):
---
Three friends sit at a table in a café crowded with students studying for final exams. Sid starts talking about how a US attorney from San Francisco called him again.
Sid: He says he’s got a deadline and he needs to question me. He’s been calling me for weeks.
Matt (to Annie): (It’s about) this Ashcroft plan. He wants to question 5000 mid-eastern immigrants about terrorism. Sid’s one of them. He is here on a student visa.
Sid: Yeah, the attorney guy said it was voluntary, but he has been calling me A LOT and pressuring me to come in.
Annie: I heard they are going to ask you all sorts of personal shit, about the phone numbers you call and your politics. You should get a lawyer.
Sid: The guy said I don’t need a lawyer, because it’s voluntary. I talked to my Dad too, and he told me just to do what they say. He is worried they might hassle us.
Matt: Anyway, what’s the rush? You’ve got finals and shit.
Sid: I dunno, but this guy keeps talking about a deadline they gave him.
(Agent has been walking around with a Polaroid picture, trying to identify Sid in the café. He has just noticed Sid and walks over to the table.)
-When asked, “how did you even find me”, the agent explains, “I stopped by your place, and your roommate told me you’d be here. He even gave me this to help me out (shows photo)”
Matt: This is fucked up. Look, you need to leave Sid alone. I read about these interviews, they are voluntary. He’s really busy, and this is wrong, stalking…
Agent: This doesn’t concern you… You are just going to make trouble for your friend here. (to Sid) you better calm your friend down.
Agent: We talked on the phone Sid. We both know it’s better if you cooperate.
(to Sid’s friends) Look you two, I’m trying to help Sid out here. I came across the bay to meet him, and this can be really friendly, voluntary, or we can do this the hard way. (to Sid) Your friends don’t know about your Visa problem, do they?
Sid: (flustered) No.
Agent: (to Annie and Matt) You two should stay out of this. I checked Sid’s file at INS. Seems he failed to renew his visa and stayed two weeks over the expiration last year. He could be in some serious trouble, but I’ve been authorized to make that go away.
Sid: What are you saying?
Agent: I can be on the phone (takes out cell) to INS the second I walk out of here. This whole interview is going to look really different if it happens at an INS detention center. You don’t want that, I don’t want that, lets do this the easy way.
Agent: OK Sid, I’m going to step outside. MAKE UP YOUR MIND. You come outside, we take a walk, you sign some papers, show me some documents, and you can go back to being a student. Life goes back to normal. Or you stay here with your “friends”, and wait for INS to show up, and we chat in the back of a van.
(Agent walks out. Sid runs after him.)
Five or six other coalition members, sitting throughout the café, stand up in unison and begin handing out fliers to café patrons. During the performance these five or six did the job of focusing people’s attention on the skit by saying things to café patrons like: “do you know what’s going on?” “Should we do something?” “I wonder if that guy is an FBI agent or something?” etc.
Matt: (to everyone in café) In case you didn’t know this was a skit.
The skit you have just witnessed was performed by members of the Berkeley Stop The War Coalition, with the intention of provoking awareness of recent domestic policy in the “war on terror.”
Today in America, 5000 young male immigrants – mostly from Middle Eastern countries – are being singled out for investigation without proof of any wrongdoing. 1,200 human beings are being held in indefinite detention, a majority of them having committed no offense more serious than a minor violation of immigration law. Thank you.
---
2. (Partial) Text from BSTW flier handed out to café patrons after performance:
Today in America, we celebrate Human Rights Day, the 53rd anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document based largely on our own Constitutional Bill of Rights.
Today in America, 1,200 human beings are being held in indefinite detention, a majority of them having committed no offense more serious than a minor violation of immigration law. Only a handful of these individuals have been charged with an offense related to the attacks of Sept. 11th, and the government refuses to release any information about the identities of the detainees or the crimes with which they have been charged. Meanwhile, preparations are being made so that any of these individuals can face military trial and even execution – all in total secrecy!
Today in America, 5000 young male immigrants – mostly from Middle Eastern countries – are being singled out for investigation without proof of any wrongdoing. Although the Justice department calls their interrogation a “voluntary interview”, these men face threat of arbitrary and indefinite detention for even the slightest violation of immigration law. Base only on their ethnicity, sex, and age, the Justice Department has asked them to open up their personal lives to intensive scrutiny.
---
If we permit our government to erode our civil liberties and disrespect our civil rights, we rend the fabric of our own society. Human rights must fundamentally be guaranteed to all, and when they are surrendered by any of us, they are surrendered by all of us.
(from BSTW flier)
---
LINKS:
Berkeley Stop The War Coalition:
>Stop the War
>End Racist Scapegoating and Defend All Targeted Communities
>Defend Civil Liberties
http://www.berkeleystopthewar.org/
KNOW YOUR RIGHTS Pamphlet (in English, Spanish, Farsi, and Arabic) from the National Lawyers Guild:
http://www.nlg.org/post911/rightsinfo.htm
(Audio) Hear Actor Peter Coyote read from the KNOW YOUR RIGHTS pamphlet, from KPFA’s Flashpoints News Radio website (fast-forward to 23:20)
http://www.flashpoints.net/realaudio/fp20011121.ram
Read about the rights you should have. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html
American Civil Liberties Union:
http://www.aclu.org
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee:
http://www.adc.org
Details on Plan to Interview 5,000 Men:
http://www.adc.org/action/2001/24november2001.htm
“Guidelines for the Interviews Regarding International Terrorism - Memorandum For All United States Attorneys, All members of the Anti-Terrorism Task Forces - From: The Deputy Attorney General”:
http://www.detroitfreepress.com/gallery/2001/interviews/index.htm
Read about human rights violations at:
Human Rights Watch:
http://www.hrw.org
Amnesty International:
http://www.amnesty.org
___
Ethnic Profiling “Raids” - Guerilla Theater Performed in Cafes and Coffee Shops
by Members of the Berkeley Stop The War Coalition (BSTW)
One of several actions taken by BSTW to celebrate
Human Rights Day
The 53rd Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
December 10, 2001
Berkeley, CA USA
___
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