APEC, riot police and barricades

I apologise for the rather ratty photos - I am not very experienced at taking photos at demos. Well, given that this was the first demo I have been to, I have no experience at all. I did my best.

I rode into town today to see what all the fuss was about. I needed to go for a ride, so going into town was the obvious choice. I am sick of going west and riding through that cesspit called Auburn. I'd love to tell you how far I went, but the battery on my bike computer decided to die in the morning (after 3 or 4 years of good service), so I will have to estimate 20 - 25km. It was a nothing ride - just a simple in and out in the drizzle. Not even enough to get the legs warmed up.

On the way in, I was just about over the ANZAC Bridge when a couple of motorcycle cops went zooming past in the opposite direction with sirens blaring. They were really moving. I figured they were the front riders for a cavalcade of some sort, so I stopped for a few minutes to see who came around the corner. Being the impatient guy that I am, I only stopped for about two minutes - if that. No enormous snake of vehicles appeared, so I gave up and kept on going. I did see a convoy heading back into town on my way home - but that is another story.

I took my normal route into the city - through Pyrmont and then around the back of Darling Harbour and then up George St. (Normally, I turn off George St to get onto Kent St, but today I kept on going straight down towards the Rocks. There was little traffic, so I figured it was worth the risk of sticking to George St. Besides, there was probably stuff-all to see down Kent St way.)

All the car parks under Darling Harbour were closed to cars, and there were plenty of Police at all the entrances to the entire conference centre. I even spotted some wet looking police standing at what looked like a metal detector outside one entrance. I also spotted a few police buses, which have mesh screens over the side windows - but none over the windscreen. They don't even appear to have a screen that can be pulled down over the windscreen if necessary. I don't see the point in that, but I am sure someone in the Riot Squad has a reason for it. I would have thought they'd be in a spot of bother if some prick threw a brick through the windscreen.

I did get an up close and personal look at a Police bus - I was zipping down George St in the bus lane when a bus pulled up behind me at a set of lights. I'm glad I didn't jump the lights, as I looked over my shoulder and saw that it was a police bus with a stack of police sitting in the back. It might have been possibly the stupidest way to get a traffic ticket imagineable. Well, maybe the second stupidest since David Hicks was asked, "Is that your tank?"



On the other hand, I reckon I could outrun an old bus full of cops, but then you have to think of the snipers. I doubt they would bother trying to shoot out a tyre that is 1 inch in diameter when they had a big red jacket with high visibility stripes down the back of it to aim at.

The bus stopped at Martin Place (which is where I took the above photo), but I kept on going towards The Rocks. I went around a corner and almost went pelting through a barricade at 40km/h. I managed to pull on the anchors hard enough to stop before I went crashing into a couple of Police that were inspecting the underside of cars, and decided it was a good time to do a U-turn and get out of there. I don't think anyone is in the mood for another "Chaser" style stunt. Especially by a bloke on a bike wearing a back pack. Hell, I didn't even think to stick a small fluttering flag on the handlebars.

I saw barricades down side streets, but none of it looked too onerous to me. By the look of it, all the talk this week about a "massive, intrusive fence" is just plain frogshit.

Martin Place was completely empty of people, except for the ubiquitous police up the top of the hill near the Reserve Bank building. I thought about going over and asking them where I could get a good coffee, but they didn't look in the mood for chit-chat. A ride without coffee is - well - a caffeine free ride.

From there, I headed up towards Hyde Park, since I figured that's where the ferals would be. And I was not to be disappointed.

The police had sequestered a small group across the road from Hyde Park. There was a bloke in this small group with a megaphone, and he was heckling the hippies and calling them idiots. I figured this was the pro-ANZUS alliance group. I crossed the road and had a look - I was right.



In the photo below, the 'sinister' black Landcruiser on the left is from the riot squad. Funny that they parked it near the only group most unlikely to cause a riot. I guess they figured they could leave it there with the windows down and the keys in the ignition and none of the ANZUS people would think about stealing it, trashing it or setting it on fire.

I just had to use the word 'sinister' there to feel like I am part of the Fairfax group. I also spent some time scanning the skies for black helicopters, but they must have had their cloaking devices turned on. I should have lined my helmet with tinfoil - that would neuter the mind control devices and make them visible to the naked eye.



Also funny that the ANZUS mob did not need any police near them to keep them under control. From what I read in the paper before I left, the police asked them to move away from the nutbags so that they wouldn't stir them up too much, and they complied. After that, the police didn't seem to feel the need to "actively monitor" them (ie, sit on them with hands on truncheons) in order to maintain public order.



Initially, I was disappointed that there only appeared to be 5 or 6 people in this group. I thought about having a yarn with them for a minute, but then figured that I didn't want to blow my cover with the ferals over the road. I also figured that this number was so small because the people that might normally support them either have a job, or are doing something capitalist on their day off like adding to the value of their home by building a patio out the back or re-tiling the bathroom.

Now, keep that number in your head (5 or 6) and check out the massive lack of media presence surrounding this group.

I then approached the "proper" protest from the rear. The police had blocked off the road out of Hyde Park to prevent the ferals from marching down to the restricted area. I came up behind the command group - there are four senior police at the back of the crowd here that were controlling everything. They all had lots of pips on shoulders. One of them however spent no time controlling his troops and all his time yapping on his mobile phone. I guess he had to report back to someone higher up the food chain. That's the curse of modern communications - the boss always wants to know exactly what is going on right now.



In front of the commanders are a couple of ranks of police on bicycles. They set the bikes up sideways across the road, and had a couple of ranks of them, so no one could get through. At first I thought it was a funny way of doing crowd control, but have you ever tried to walk across a couple of bikes that have fallen over? It's almost impossible. They are harder to get across than barbed wire.

A good tactic for the police would be to just drop the bikes, let them get all tangled up and then pound the hell out of anyone that tries to remove them. Of course if you have a solid phalanx of ferals coming at you, they won't be able to get the bikes out anyway, as they won't have any space to pass them back through the ranks. If you have tightly packed people, there is no way they could manouvere something with wide handlebars through the crowd.

With luck, the first rank trip over and break their ribs on the pedals and handlebars etc, and the screaming stops the crowd moving forward. It's a bit hard to claim "Police brutality" when you trip over and fall on an innocent bicycle.

Which is why I think the police need to mount knives on their bikes, like the Celts did back in about 300AD when they took on the Romans.

This next photo shows the bike police in a more detail. This shot is a bit blurry, but on the left hand side, you can see a cluster of overhead boom microphones. I counted four or five. I guess that ticks off all the TV stations.That is where the protest is.

The protest consisted of a handful of ferals with "blood on their hands" standing around in a circle chanting various things, like "how many kids did you kill today" etc etc. Just the bike police, without the commanders, outnumbered the protesters 2:1. The media easily outnumbered the bike police by 2:1 or 3:1. The media scrum was at least 3 or 4 deep around the protesters. It was the most miserable crowd imagineable. I was barely 20 yards away and I could hardly hear what they were saying. I doubt their message was audible down at the Intercontinental. It was so inane, I thought I had stumbled onto a Mormon picnic.

And for crying out loud - think up some new chants!

I read in the paper today that the organisers were upset about all the claims of 'potential violence'. I saw plenty of violence at this protest - mainly cameramen from rival stations elbowing each other in the guts in an attempt to get the best shot. Yes, events like this do provoke violence - from a feral media.



I noticed that a lot of the cameramen were aiming to get angled shots from low down - that way, they would only include the protesters and would not include the enormous pack of media all around them.

This is just another photo of the incredible media scrum around an incredibly small and useless stunt.



It's hard to take photos that convey just how pitiful this whole scene was. I didn't see any point in trying to penetrate the media scrum, as all I would have ended up with was photos of photographers heads - or the backs of them.

Here is a better shot of the police lines. By counting wheels, I reckon there are 14 bike cops in this photo. Keep that number - 14 - in mind.



Take a close look at the bloke in the middle of this photo in the green vest - he is not a cop. On the back, it says "Human Rights Monitor", and he has a video camera.

On my way in, I saw three of these clowns outside the Town Hall. I took one look at them initially and went "wierd beards". Then one turned around and I saw that caption on the back of their vest. I then changed my mind to "school teachers". You know the type of person that wears socks and sandals? Got a mental picture? Good, because I wasn't going to pull my camera out at the traffic lights and take a photo - you'll just have to imagine them.



Personally, this whole "human rights" thing bothers me - especially in Australia. In fact, I find this insulting. I laughed today when I first saw one of these clowns, but now it just makes me mad. I don't remember seeing any of these characters hanging around Tianamen Square a few years ago. Wankers.

Somewhere in this photo are the protesters. See if you can find them.



Given up? Well, I have circled the only two that I could find. Note the "blood" on them. (Bet it doesn't come from pigs. In fact it is probably tofu with food dye in it).



Juvenile is the best word for it.

Then there was rocketman and his sidekick. At least it makes a change from papier mache heads. Just where do they think up the ideas for stuff like this? Personally, I have not had the urge to get Mum to make a costume so that I could wear it in public since I was, oh, about 8 years old. Grow out of it chum!

I also have to say, the ape costume that Mum made me was of much better quality than these stupid rockets.



At least they had the courtesy to paint "Made in China" on the side. I didn't get what they were protesting about though. Went completely over my head. Maybe they launched themselves into giant papier mache heads later on? I don't know - I couldn't bear to stick around to find out.

It didn't get any better. I bumped into these two clowns seconds later. Notice the Coke bottle sticking out the top of his rocket. I don't know if that is supposed to be some sort of anti-Capitalist statement about Coke supporting the military-industrial complex, or just a convenient place to stash his favourite drink (oh the irony, the irony). I think the clown behind him is lugging a shield.



Note to clowns - an ABM shield is not actually like a shield that say the Spartans used to carry. it is not something that you can lug around. It is a system that stops things getting through.

This is my favourite though - after the protesters had finished chanting and mugging it up for the cameras, they walked over to another area. This is a photograph of the entire protest. Count them - they are the people in white T-shirts.



I count 8 of them. I have not included the bloke on the right, who is a cameraman, but I have included the person walking in front of the guy in black in the middle. I think I am being generous.

Eight. Eight. Half the media on the planet turned up to film 8 people chanting? If it was the Dalai Lama and 7 high ranking monks, I could understand the interest, but this was just 8 morons on their day off.

The priorities of the media really confuse me sometimes.

There were five pro-ANZUS protesters across the road. They attracted maybe two still photographers. There were seven anti-APEC protesters in the park. They attracted maybe 200 people from the media. Did anyone mention the word 'bias'?

I thought I'd also get some snaps of the banners. To begin with, the place had more skulls floating around than a Khmer Rouge holiday camp. What is it with these people and skulls and skeletons?



Note the banner on the left - an aboriginal flag blending into something green (snot perhaps? Slime?). I don't get why the aboriginal flag needs to be trotted out every time as well. I must admit that I did not walk around the entire event (I was lugging my bike - I was not going to chain it up somewhere and risk one of these bastards nicking it), but that part of the event that I saw did not contain a single black face. Not even a half-and-half aboriginal. Not even someone as dark as Nigel Mansell. It's another crock.

Then there was this banner - "reinvent democracy". I am not sure what they mean by that. Get rid of the Senate perhaps? Elect a committee of Elders to oversee parliament? Only allow green-certified people to stand for office?



I like how the southern cross motif has been dragged in as well. When you throw in the missiles, the skulls, the aboriginal stuff, you start to wonder whether the organisers now have this great long checklist of stuff that they have to include.

Didn't seen anything pink though, so I guess they left the poofs out this time. And the dolphins. (Oh no, we forgot the dolphins!) They're not thinking about the whales either.

The overwhelming feeling I got from the whole event was one of being utterly underwhelmed. The organisers had promised lots of action in the days leading up to the march, and then it just fizzled. Here is my take on the numbers that turned up...

Let's say you went to the MCG to watch a big footy match, and some clown announced the next day that 80,000 people turned up to play football.

80,000 people might have turned up, but that would have been made up of:

• 100 or so coaches, water carriers, runners, statisticians and club officials
• maybe 100 cops and private security people
• numerous ticket sellers, barrier attendants and MCG managers
• some commentators
• cameramen, producers, technicians and so on
• food and drink sellers
• cleaners
• groundsmen
• parking attendants
• 78,000 spectators
• 36 players, plus those on the bench

This protest rally was like that. If someone said 500 people turned up, I'd call them a complete liar. It appeared to me that a lot of those that were hanging around were like me - they weren't there to protest - they were there to smell the ferals. If you take away the organisers and the media and the police and the spectators, you'd be lucky to be left with a few dozen people. At most.

I presumably was counted as a protester. Those doing the counting don't ask if you are there to support the protest, oppose it or just ogle it - they just count your head and assume that you are on their team.

Well, they can just fuck off.

Post-script. As I was cycling home, I spotted one of the organisers leaving Hyde Park. Did she get on a train? No, she hailed a cab outside David Jones and took that instead. Imagine, an organiser of an anti-global warming rally taking a Gaia-raping, six cylinder monster home. Was it because it was raining? Oh diddums. Again, the irony just kills me.

I also noticed that I was the only person in the park (apart from the bike cops) to have come by bicycle. I figure the organisers must have used at least a couple of trucks to get all their equipment to Hyde Park, and everyone else looked like they drove. Imagine that. The only person on a nice clean machine is a member of the VRWC.

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Some thoughts on the media.

I didn't pay much attention to it at the time, but it was hard to tell the media apart from the protesters. Somehow, I don't think that was the media trying to blend in. Their standards have slipped. Most of the photographers and reporters looked like hobos with an expensive camera around their neck. Where is their pride? What happened to the days of reporters attending an event in a suit?