Category Archives: video

Darwin Eats Cake, Occupy Wall Street, video

Oakland PD will shoot you if you film them

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So, here is yet more incredibly disturbing footage from Occupy Oakland. The video is footage someone was shooting late Wednesday night / early Thursday morning. It seems to be a line of riot police. Then, for no apparent reason, one of the police casually raises his gun and shoots the cameraman. Fortunately, it was just a rubber bullet.

This, along with reports (and more footage) of arrests of reporters and legal observers. Seriously, what the hell is wrong with the Oakland PD? Do they have an arrest quotient? Do they just have complete disdain for the people of Oakland? Do they have such an overwhelming sense of entitlement that they feel completely justified in arresting or shooting anyone who dares to observe them? Or are they secretly trying to drum up sympathy for the occupiers?

In related news, here’s the most recent Darwin Eats Cake:

Best URL for sharing: http://www.darwineatscake.com/?id=69
Permanent image URL for hotlinking or embedding: http://www.darwineatscake.com/img/comic/69.jpg
Occupy Wall Street, video

Oakland PD hospitalizes another vet, releases man who deliberately ran down protesters

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So, you’ll remember Scott Olsen, the Marine who was hospitalized after being hit in the head with a non-lethal police projectile at the Oakland Occupy protests. Well, the Oakland PD has doubled down. According to this report from Reuters, Kayvan Sabeghi is now in the Intensive Care Unit after being severely beaten by the police:

Brian Kelly, who co-owns a brew pub with Sabeghi, said his business partner served as an Army Ranger in Iraq and Afghanistan. He said Sabeghi told him he was arrested and beaten by a group of policemen as he was leaving the protest to go home.

“He told me he was in the hospital with a lacerated spleen and that the cops had jumped him,” Kelly said. “They put him in jail, and he told them he was injured, and they denied him medical treatment for about 18 hours.”

via Boing Boing.

Meanwhile, here’s the video of the couple being deliberately run down at Occupy Oakland by a guy in a Mercedes:

Now, this is a good example of everyone acting like an idiot. What seems to happen is that the march is moving along and holding up traffic. The Mercedes guy gets frustrated. I mean, he seems to be an entitled asshole who thinks that his time is super important. So he starts inching his way through the crowd. One of the marchers gets pissed and stops in front of the car and bangs on the hood. So, he’s being sort of self righteous and stupid. And then Mercedes guy guns it, running marcher guy down, as well as a woman who wasn’t doing anything.

This is one of those situations that could have been avoided at any point if one of the parties had made an effort to be less dickish and entitled. The marchers were being a little bit dickish by not letting the cars through. The driver was being a little bit dickish by forcing his way through anyway. The one guy was being a little bit dickish when he started banging on the car.

But running someone down? That’s totally out of control.

There are two places where the Oakland Police failed here. First of all, managing the relationship between the marchers and the traffic would be a much better way to spend police resources than, say, throwing flash grenades at people who are trying to help an injured protester. From what I have seen, this is one of the things that the NYPD have been doing really well.

Second, you know the guy who was driving the car? They happily sent him on his way. Move along. Nothing to see here. Certainly not a two-tiered justice system.

Here are a just a couple of relevant shots from an excellent series of photos at The Frame:

One of the two people who got run down by the Mercedes.

Awww . . . don’t worry, Mister Mercedes Driver! The Oakland PD doesn’t arrest nice, rich, white guys!
Linkasaurolophus, music, philosophy, Politics, science, video

Sunday Linkasaurolophus: October 23, 2011

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So, welcome back to Sunday Linkasaurolophus.

Remember, it’s like the Winter Linkolympics, but on just one ski.

1. Philosopher of Biology, blogger, and awesome-name-winner John Wilkins is looking for help to bridge a financial lacuna. If you’re in a position to loan or donate, please do. He’s one of the good guys.

2. Who says high schools aren’t preparing kids to function in our society? One consequence of the decade-long War on Terror™ (a wholly owned subsidiary of Haliburton) is the proliferation of secret courts, which are able to pass down judgments with absolutely no public scrutiny or oversight. Well, the kids are getting in education in twenty-first century American Justice at Alice High School in Texas, where a student was kicked off the cheerleading squad and suspended. The student claims that he is being punished for a same-sex kiss that was caught on one of the school’s surveillance cameras. The school says,

The Alice I.S.D. has recently reviewed the recent removal of a student from the Alice High School Cheerleading Squad. After reviewing the Alice I.S.D. Student Code of Conduct and the Cheer Program Handbook, the removal will stay in effect. The student’s parents are in agreement with the district’s decision. The student code of conduct and cheer handbook are designed to improve conduct and encourage students to adhere to their responsibilities as members of the school community. The student and parents are clearly aware that the student was not removed from the squad for kissing another student at school. While the student is free to discuss certain aspects of his discipline in the media, the District cannot discuss the specifics of this incident and must respect the privacy rights of the students involved in this matter.

Except, that the student’s family is not in agreement, and still claims it is about the kiss. But, you know, privacy concerns, so I guess we’ll just have to trust them. Via Jezebel.

3. Did you know that Oral Roberts has a gay grandson? Me either. He sounds awesome. He’ll be giving a series of public lectures starting today. Read about it here. And no, it appears he is no longer invited to family functions.

4. Global warming is real. Now most people who are not ideologically committed to global warming NOT being true already knew that. So what’s the news here? Well, a group of researchers called Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature has done a careful reanalysis of the major temperature records, and has concluded that, yes, things are getting warmer. The results are important in part because the group is not made up of existing members of the climate-science community, and in fact approached the question with a degree of skepticism. In a rational world, that would satisfy climate deniers. Oh well. Via The Economist.

5. And finally, if you haven’t seen it yet, here’s Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, and a whole crowd of folks singing at Columbus Circle in support of the Occupy movement. Via Boing Boing.

Occupy Wall Street, Politics, video

NYPD will arrest you if you try to close your bank account

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So, this is pretty depressing. This is apparently a woman attempting to close her Citibank account when she is seized by a surprisingly large number of New York’s Finest.

Via Wonkette, who note:

Be patient through the first 90 seconds — haha, attention span of a gnat! — because a remarkable little drama unfolds with protesters inside the Citibank branch communicating with protesters outside, all very reserved, collecting names and birthdates of the people about to be arrested inside. And then, brutish cops seize a woman in a business suit who is saying, “I’m a customer, I’m a customer,” and showing her Citibank checkbook. Apparently she is here to close her account, and for that she is manhandled by a bunch of thug cops who should be careful where they go from now on. Anyway, closing your account is now a go-to-jail offense.

culture, media, music, video

%&#! $#!& Stack

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So, here’s a little something to relieve the monotony of the the Steve Jobs idolization that still has the internets in its grip.

The video is totally NSFW (for language) by the way, which is just one more reason why you need to walk out of your crappy office job and go join the nearest Occupy Wall Street protest. Mother Jones has an interactive map here.

Oh, and you can buy the shirt here.

via Topless Robot.