STANDING UP FOR FREE SPEECH

STANDING UP FOR FREE SPEECH
By Mike Rhodes
December 7, 2003

David Espinoza is a videographer who is producing a movie about shopping centers/malls and the experiences activists have had exercising free speech in them. He was in Fresno to talk with me about the May 2000 arrest of 19 anti-sweatshop activists by riot clad police in front of the Fashion Fair mall. David wanted to hear the story about how we stood up for our rights by first defending ourselves in court against the criminal trespass charges and how we turned this around and filed a civil action against the mall and City of Fresno for violating our civil liberties. It was a story I was happy to tell.

After an interview about this story at my home, David wanted to go to Fashion Fair and see the “scene of the crime” for himself. With digital video camera in hand David was standing in front of the mall, in the very spot where I had been arrested 3 ½ years earlier, and I started telling him about the incident. Within one minute we were accosted by a security guard who tells us that this is “private property” and that filming is not allowed. We tell him, of course, that it is our Constitutional right to be there and that he is attempting to violate our civil liberties. The security guard tells us to leave or he is going to call the police. Again, we try to explain to him that we have the right to be at the mall and video an interview. We are now joined by another security guard. They are NOT playing good cop/bad cop. These were two BAD rent-a-cops!

On the other hand, David and I could not have ordered two rent-a-cops like this out of “central casting.” These guys played their role up very well and David got the whole thing on video tape. The second security guard demands that David immediately turn off the camera, which he refuses to do. The security guard reaches for the camera and pushes it into David’s face. Ouch! We say something about threats, intimidation and assault and now we have these two guys really mad. They say they are going to have us arrested. You can just see the testosterone pumping in their blood. The second before all hell breaks out right there at the main entrance of the mall (on a huge pre-Christmas sale day, I might add) the two security guard’s supervisor shows up, and not a second too soon..

The supervisor immediately tells the most aggressive of the two rent-a cops to remove himself from the scene. There is a tense moment of hesitation. The guard remains, standing belligerently right in front of our faces. His supervisor again orders him to leave. Reluctantly, he is forced to back off. The other guard continues to stand menacingly on our other side. He too is told to stand back. When both security guards are a safe distance away the supervisor asks us what is going on. He is someone I remember from the many times we have held demonstrations at Fashion Fair mall. We explain that we are doing an interview about the Fashion Fair incident in which I and 18 others were arrested protesting against the Gap’s use of sweatshop labor. He said that was fine and told us we could continue.

After we were done at the mall entrance, David and I walked inside the mall and down to The Gap. Nobody tried to stop him videoing inside the mall. When we got inside The Gap, we were approached by the store manager who put her hand up to the camera lens and told us that filming was not allowed inside the store. Of course, David continued filming, more interested than ever to see how this drama would unfold. We talked to the manager for a while, filming the whole thing, and then left when we were ready.

This whole incident was a wonderful illustration of how things have changed (or not) at Fashion Fair. The front line security at Fashion Fair is aggressive and untrained. They will threaten and intimidate anyone exercising their First Amendment right to Free Speech. Most people, when confronted with one or two aggressive security guards who are threatening to have them arrested will leave. 99.9% of people when confronted with this situation will leave. The mall knows this and counts on the expected reaction. When arrested 99% of people will “plead out” instead of going to trial to challenge this violation of their civil liberties. When offered with a choice of 10 hours of community service time vs. 1 year and a $10,000 fine if convicted, most people will succumb to the pressure.

Fashion Fair mall knows that some people will stand up for their Free Speech rights. That is why they didn’t arrest us yesterday. Fashion Fair and the Fresno Police Department now know that people have a Constitutional Right to be at the mall and engage in Free Speech actions. That is why, if you stand up for your rights, they can’t legally arrest you. For more information about your free speech rights and the May 2000 incident at Fashion Fair, go to: http://www.fresnoalliance.com/home/GAP.htm

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The state can't give you free speech, and the state can't take it away. You're born with it, like your eyes, like your ears. Freedom is something you assume, then you wait for someone to try to take it away. The degree to which you resist is the degree to which you are free……
---Utah Phillips