New York Minutes

Sunday, Bloody Sunday, Or a Walk in the Park?

By Nation contributors

A poll released yesterday found that an incredible 11 percent of New Yorkers planned to participate in the upcoming protests. Until yesterday afternoon, they had no idea where they'd be marching. Finally, at a well-attended press conference, representatives of United for Peace and Justice announced an agreement with the city: After marching past Madison Square Garden on Sunday, protesters would proceed to Fifth Avenue, then, via Broadway, down to Union Square Park, which has in recent years become symbolically significant to New Yorkers as the spot where many gathered after September 11 to mourn, protest, argue or simply commune.

UFPJ's Leslie Cagan spun the new march route as a partial victory, because demonstrators would march down the middle of Manhattan, rather than being exiled to the hot, peripheral, exhaust-drenched desert of the West Side Highway. It isn't a victory by any means, but UFPJ probably got the best deal they could given the city's intractability.

At the press conference, reporters yawned visibly when speakers veered into anti-Bush boilerplate rhetoric--as they did frequently--but most of the press did seem attentive to the free-speech issues. This, Cagan stressed, was a legal event that "everyone could participate in--kids, seniors."

Cagan stated emphatically that marchers should proceed to Union Square and not head for the park in a "breakaway march," which could provoke a mean police response. (Almost certainly, some will ignore this advice.) From Union Square, marchers will disperse, and UFPJ is "neither encouraging or discouraging" them from going to the park afterward. Of course, that's code for "encouraging"; anything less would be a concession to the Republican mayor and the rich elitists who run the Central Park Conservancy, who view the park as their backyard rather than public space.

But there will be no rally Sunday, not in Central Park, nor in Union Square. For those of us hoping to live in a functioning democracy someday, the city's refusal to let protesters rally in the park represents a troubling suppression of free speech. On the other hand, the rally is always the least exciting part of a large protest. While marching, demonstrators are creative and lively, advancing their own views through costumes or idiosyncratic signs. Stationary rallies put a damper on such enthusiasm, allowing the leaders of organizations to drone on repetitively and at length. Speakers are often selected with more regard for the internal politics of a coalition than for anyone who might be listening. In a protest era emphasizing participation and originality, the rally seems outmoded.

Still, yesterday brought disturbing affronts to more creative expression as well. Four activists arrested for dropping a banner in front of the Plaza Hotel are charged with felony assault because a police officer was injured trying to arrest them. The officer was nowhere near any of the protesters when he injured himself falling through a skylight; in fact, the protesters standing on the Plaza roof had warned him that the skylight was broken and not to stand on it. We hear that Dick Cheney was supposed to stay at the Plaza, so the Secret Service is upset with the NYPD for letting things get out of hand; embarrassed, the police are scapegoating the protesters with trumped-up charges. Let's hope they don't get away with it.

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August 27, 2004