Zatrzymac wojne! As I expected Saturdays demo was quite small starting
with 100-150 demonstrators, mostly political Polish
activists/anarchists
plus international representatives from Erasmus/Socrates student
programme. There was an initial low police presence and a degree of
concern among those present since this was another illegal gathering.
Once
the 'manifestation', as such events are known here, began it did
attract a
small crowd with proceedings enlivened by a very friendly dog intent on
becoming everyones friend. We did our usual once around the main square
then headed out towards a big ugly shopping complex located at a major
crossroads. There weren't enough of us to consider blocking the road, I
don't even know if that had been the plan but we set up in front of the
main entrance to the shopping centre thus getting the attention of the
hundreds of happy shoppers. 'Food Not Bombs' appeared from nowhere with
two great couldrons of steaming vegan stew and a table and began
serving
shoppers free stew to shoppers and demonstrators alike. It didn't take
long for the shopping complexes security to appear and begin talks with
the dozen or so 'officer friendly's' with us. It became clear that the
shopping complex manager thought we were spoiling the appearance of his
forecourt and he and the police tried to encourage 'Food Not Bombs' to
move on. In reply the good humoured crowd began chanting 'Feed the
police!' The mood was very relaxed, the weather was friendly, light
music
was being provided by a couple of drummers. The size of the
demonstration
was by this stage no bigger than the group of bored 'Nike' teenagers
usually gathered in front of the shopping centre. The a van load of
hired
thugs turned up, presumably called out by the shopping complex and
probably quite expensive. From what I understand these outfits which
provide 'security' often consist of former police and enjoy a dubious
status but one much relished by their number if their appearance is
anything to go by. ( I should emphasise that as with all the demos
I've
been on here there was no hostility from participants or attempts to
run
riot - Poles have got a pretty good idea of the numbers required to
create
conditions favourable to a popular uprising) Next 6-7 vans of
'officer-not-so-friendly's' appeared at which point it seemed sensible
to
start a slow amble in the direction of away. The new arrivals marched
into
the (you can't call it a demo or crowd by this stage because FNB had
finished serving and gone to do the washing up) gaggle of stragglers
and
shoppers and began to pick people out at random and drag them
protesting
to the waiting vans. Quite why they did this is open to debate. Perhaps
in
order to justify dispatching 6-7 vans of tooled up constables they need
bodies to book. Perhaps it was to do a favour to the shopping centre
manager. Or perhaps it was just intimidation and intelligence
gathering.
After all a couple of hundred people condemning the mass murder and war
crimes in which many of 'their' governments play an active or passive
role
contrasts with the sanitised bloodless Orwellian vision presented by
much
of the international media and encouraged by many politicians. The
message
is you've had your five minutes now return to your television sets and
shopping malls. The final inspired chant of the day was 'Lets go
shopping!' but the stoney faced security guards weren't going to let us
in, at least we considered becoming good consumers.