JSalloum on Wed, 2 May 2001 11:21:11 +0200 (CEST) |
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<nettime> fuckin' revolution , man, i.e. Quebec City demo |
>From: "Vrinda Conroy" <vrindi@hotmail.com> >Subject: fuckin' revolution , man >Date: Wed, 25 Apr 2001 18:47:02 -0000 > >so, i guess i've missed out a bit on all the communications that have been >going on. my brain and body have been in a completly different place and >communicating with people on the internet has been one of the last things i >have been prepared to deal with. > i was a part of the madness in quebec city this last week and just got >home a couple days ago. i'm still attempting to sort out emotions and >figure out what exactly went on. > i was doing basic medical stuff within an affinity group of some friends >and everyone is fine, amazingly none of them, or me, got arrested or >seriously hurt. many others were not so lucky. Some other friends of mine >were working within street medic teams and had to deal with insane shit. an >older woman died in her apartment due to the amount of tear gas in the air, >and there are also rumers of two protesters dead as well as one officer. >this has not yet been confirmed, but apparently it was broadcast on cbc so >people are looking into it to find out for sure. > there were many serious injuries, a person got hit in the throat by a >plastic bullet and was sent to the hospital, near death, and had to get a >tracheotomy. there were broken bones, shattered feet and hands, people >getting stitched up in the peoples clinic that was set up. i won't get >into describing it all now but people are really shaken up. there are >others who are still being held in jail with no medical attention, no >outside contact, it's horrible and i don't feel words can describe justly >the trauma we all are dealing with. the healing and anger and rage will be >with us for a long time, perhaps the rest of our days. > there is a group of five kids staying with us who attempted to cross the >border by hiking through the mountains only to get picked up by the police >and spend three days in jail. a friend was leaving town and found them at >the bus station with nowhere to go so he brought them here. > police targeted and fired indiscriminantly at people with plastic bullets, >rubber bullets, tear gas canisters, ambulances would not come into the area >until it was considered "secure" by police. people had to be carried out >and some were sent to the hospital in taxi's, some of those were denied >medical attention because they didn't have health care. One woman whose >foot was shattered by a tear gas canister landing on it, was denied >attention, and sent back to the states on a bus, where upon arrival her >foot will have to be rebroken and reset. > people acting as medics were targeted and shot at. guns with laser sights >were used to target people. on saturday night the clinic was raided and >gassed, the medics and doctors that were working, along with their patients >were stripped of anything they had to protect themselves (scarves with >vinegar, gas masks, etc...) and forced to leave the clinic at gun point. >the police then fired several canisters down a set of stairs and then the >medics along with the patients were forced to leave with no choice but to >walk in the clouds of gas that had just been fired. > ambulances were used as 'trojan horses', they would drive into crowds of >people and out of the back, squads of riot cops would file out. > along with all the horrible things that went on there were many amazing >and inspiring things i saw and became a part off. people, some with no gas >masks and nothing but pieces of cloth to cover their noses and mouths, >continued throughout the whole thing to throw canisters back, to attack the >fence, as well as other activities that i will not get into over the >internet. > the sense of community and solidarity among everyone is amazing. close >friends are made extremely fast. > seeing this stuff and being gased in an extemely effective way of causing >people to examine larger issues and try to figure out why this shit is >happening to them and those they love. as more and more of these clashes >occur, more and more people become aware and feel they have no choice but >to participate in any way they can. > it becomes obvious that we live in a police state. >this is all i'm going to write for now, if any of you have questions, >please ask me and i'll answer them as best i can. > i love all of you and hope that you too are not believing what the fucking >corporate media has to say about this. people are throwing rocks, molotov >coctails, taking over the streets for justifiable reasons. > we have concrete reasons to be filled with rage, to be hostile, and also >to focus on loving eachother and attempting to change this world in our >everyday lives and with every choice we make. > love always vrinda # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net