gadfly on zinelibrary

Vol 1.2 is also now available on the zine library. Get it by click on the image below

OUT NOW!

Download the latest printed edition of the Gadfly here!

Hard copies will be appearing around campus today and tomorrow!
They are available NOW at the following locations:
Ross Dining Hall
Proctor Dining Hall
Davis Library
Crossroads Café
The Gamut Room

The "hardcover" copies are going quickly, but there are some paper copies available as well!


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All copies were printed using donated student printing quotas. If you want to donate some of your leftover printing money next semester, please e-mail us! It would be greatly appreciated!

out monday

being released on monday.
volume 1.2 of the gadfly.

100 copies are hand-bound with screen printed covers on recycled cardboard.
Additional copies without the cardboard covers will be available.
and it will be available to download.

keep your eyes peeled.

Middlebury Dis/identifications: Building an Anti-Institution Campus Movement

I am writing this article to bring other activists into a conversation that has already begun among students who are working toward revolution and liberation, and who see all systems of oppression and privilege as irrevocably intertwined. I am writing this article for all of the radical activists who have ever felt disempowered or silenced after requesting institutional support for their causes. I am writing this article because, as an anti-oppression activist, I believe that the institution of Middlebury is systematically co-opting, regulating, neutralizing, silencing, and marginalizing our movements. When we want to make big waves at Middlebury, it can be nearly impossible to get authority figures to support us. The reason for this is that we are struggling for survival and liberation within an institution whose goals are often fundamentally at odds with our own. I am writing this article because I’m angry, and because, as Audre Lorde once wrote, “anger expressed and translated into action in the service of our vision and our future is a liberating and strengthening act of clarification, for it is in the painful process of this translation that we identify who are our allies with whom we have grave differences, and who are our genuine enemies.”

Let me start by defining what Middlebury is, exactly, because I think we students often forget. Middlebury is a corporation that disproportionately admits and hires heterosexual, able-bodied, cisgender, English-speaking white people with U.S. citizenship and no criminal background. It both benefits from and perpetuates oppressive ideologies of racism, sexism, capitalism, ableism, imperialism, and the gender binary. A corporation’s primary goal is to accumulate wealth. In a racist and sexist country, making profit typically requires perpetuating systems of power like white and male privilege. As a corporation, then, Middlebury would not exist today without oppressive systems like capitalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy. I am not arguing that Administrators intentionally perpetuate these systems. But first and foremost, Administrators are accountable to the corporation, and they want to preserve a particular image of this corporation that will lead to more profit. This means that for things like safety and access, Administrators typically will not go beyond compliance with government regulations. For example, why would they make old buildings more wheelchair accessible if the ADA doesn’t require it? The issue is not whether these are “nice people” who run our school; the issue is accountability, and the connections between Middlebury and the vast systems of power that structure all of our lives.

In the context of this corporate landscape, we cannot expect the institution to protect us from experiences of marginalization and violence in the classroom, in our dorms, and in the dining halls.

Think of the most successful activist campaigns in the past few years, and think of how they were presented to both the Administration, and to the general community: carbon neutrality, all-gender housing, and student printing budgets come to my mind. While these were all important victories that were achieved in spite of great institutional resistance, what these campaigns have in common is that they either save money for the corporation, or prevent potential lawsuits on the basis of discrimination (which also saves money). In order to be considered “successful” activists, we are often forced to perpetuate the common-sense logic of capitalism: goals like accumulating endless profit and competing with other higher-ed corporations are not questioned, and we ignore the human costs of exploited staff members and investments in unsustainable or oppressive markets.

For those who are or have been directly marginalized by capitalism, putting a dollar value on our activism can be degrading, oppressive, and marginalizing. But on a more systematic level, being forced to quantify our activism effectively silences radical or minority causes, whose goals may not save Middlebury enough money, or may not fit into this monetized system at all. The causes that lose out are the ones that overtly challenge Middlebury’s whiteness, male supremacy, and able-bodied privilege: causes with labels like “Diversity”, “Social Justice”, and “Sustainability” receive funding and institutional support because they lead to increased prestige and profits without forcing anyone to critically interrogate privilege and oppression. Ask yourself: if a top Administrator is presented with two campaigns – one that advertises experiences of racism in the classroom to incoming students of color, and one that advertises the racial diversity of our student body – whom do you think will get funding and support? Institutional support always comes with strings attached, which forces students to become accountable to the corporation, rather than to the political causes or marginalized populations we are supposed to be fighting for. Collaborating with Administrators limits our options in terms of the goals we can pursue and how we can achieve them. As someone who believes that capitalism is thoroughly enmeshed with all other systems of oppression, the goal of my activism is not to make Middlebury wealthier or more competitive, but rather to make it a more accessible environment with a more equitable power structure.

When activists work within Middlebury’s institutionalized avenues of change, we are forced to structure our organizations on a vertical-power model, like a corporation, with something mimicking a board of directors that makes decisions about how to spend money and what causes to support. This corporatized system of activism forces members of the same clubs to compete with one another for organizational power, which often silences and marginalizes those who do not win positions of authority. Corporatized activism also serves to pit entire clubs against each other in competition: environmentalists, prison abolitionists, and anti-racists compete for funding for symposia, speakers, parties, and club budgets, instead of collaborating to make the most effective, cross-cutting events and clubs possible. As a result, many radical activists who have been denied funding harbor resentment against students and organizations whose projects help Middlebury gain some “green prestige” or “diversity points”, but which don’t significantly improve the quality of our lives. The thing is, there is money at Middlebury, but most of it is spent on things like paint jobs and renovations. Our activism need not be a zero-sum game. We need to stop resenting the people whom the institution privileges, and start blaming the institution itself for pitting us against one another, for forcing us to see our causes as mutually exclusive, for spending money excessively and irresponsibly, and for using the empty promise of funding to neutralize radical critiques of power.

The lack of diversity among our organizing strategies shows that this institution not only structures and regulates our movements, but it has even limited the possibilities we can imagine for a better campus, and for a better world beyond Middlebury. I want to argue that the only way to combat the control that Middlebury has over our bodies, movements, and imaginations is through a radical dis-identification with the institution. In other words, we need to start thinking about what it would mean to work outside of these avenues that are designed to produce profit and prestige. While we should respect the efforts of institutional players like the Chief Diversity Officer and the Sexual Assault Oversight Committee, we should do so with extreme skepticism and distance, acknowledging that we are accountable to different causes.

Given that Administrators are accountable to the corporation, it is not surprising when they co-opt, exploit, and neutralize the efforts of radical student activists. Personally, I have routinely had my ideas co-opted by College employees, only to see them passed off as the gifts of a benevolent institution. I have been asked to put in long hours of unpaid labor for the goal of improving Middlebury – have completed research, staff workshops, and outreach campaigns that, frankly, are in the job descriptions of Administrators – and when my help was no longer needed or it was seen as forcing Middlebury beyond compliance, I have been told to be quiet and go home. In the classroom and in meetings with Administrators, I have been made to feel ridiculous, naïve, and immature for holding radical anti-capitalist and transfeminist views, and for making “impossible demands”. I know I am not the only one who has experienced this treatment. If this has been your experience, let’s vocalize and share our dissatisfaction, and turn it into something transformative.

We need to acknowledge that the revolution will not be funded – it will not come from the top-down, but from the ground-up. Instead of working with people who do not respect me and who want to keep me from dreaming big, I’d like to work directly with my communities to find ways of organizing outside the institution to build trust, love, accountability, and transformation in ways that aren’t defined by profit, prestige, and privilege. This is the conversation that I want us all to have.

This article was not meant to be an exhaustive critique of activism at Middlebury. But for those activists who have ever felt silenced and marginalized by the institution, I think we need to face some uncomfortable truths about our activism. First, we need to be more transparent about the fact that Middlebury would not be here without capitalism, white supremacy, and the stolen land it occupies. We need to question what it means to fight for acceptance, liberation, accessibility, and justice within such a corporation. We need to ask what it means that we, as anti-oppression activists, benefit from the social, cultural, and material capital that this oppressive institution hands to us. Second, we need to restructure our movements, and redefine political success as something more powerful and pervasive than a policy change or a Council. We need to rely less on institutional patronage as a means to our ends, and build community alternatives to colluding with authority, while being realistic about the fact that this community entirely renews itself every four years. Finally, and most importantly, we need to renegotiate the connections among our movements and the institution. In seeking out the radical possibilities for anti-institution collaboration, we need to demand – not request – that this experience we have purchased is not a damaging one. We need to turn our dissatisfaction with the institution into positive change by spreading guerilla art, staging sit-ins, storming Community Council meetings, organizing labor and academic strikes, speaking the truth to prospective students and Administrators, and shouting out our stories of how this institution has marginalized us.

What we need to do is stop trusting and identifying with Middlebury, Inc., and start being proud of our identities as wing-nuts, as rabble-rousers, and as pissed-off radicals.


(the gadfly )

RADICALISM & CURRICULUM: TWO WORDS YOU WILL NEVER SEE IN THE SAME SENTENCE

Anyone who takes a political science or philosophy course at Middlebury College and expects a balanced curriculum, with readings ranging from radicals like Emma Goldman and Pierre-Joseph Proudhon to liberals like John Rawls and Peter Singer to conservatives like Edmund Burke and Thomas Hobbes to fascists like Mussolini and Franco, will be sorely disappointed. Instead, you will find readings by theorists ranging from Rawls to Hobbes, staying almost entirely within the mainstream political binary that consists of only two options. If you’re lucky, maybe you will get three options, perhaps in the “suggested readings.” Professors proudly declare that they have shown both sides of the issue, when in reality, there are almost always more than just two sides to any given issue. If you are exposed to a radical viewpoint, it will probably be a cursory read of Marx’s Communist Manifesto, which your professor hastily dismisses as having not worked in reality. Your professor will conclude that you’ve covered all the radical viewpoints now (after all, Marxism is the only radical viewpoint, right?) and move on to the material that should be “taken seriously.” But more likely, you will not even be exposed to any radical viewpoints at all, as was the case in Murray Dry’s American Political Regime. You would never know from that class that radical labor unions had considerable power in the early 20^th century United States, the membership of the I.W.W. numbering over 100,000 in 1923, until the government cracked down on radicalism in the First Red Scare.

            Some departments, courses, and professors are better than others. You might read about prison abolition in a sociology course, and you might look at some radical views about art in an aesthetics course. But in most courses, especially those that are overtly about political issues, this is unlikely. Indeed, a survey of introductory political science courses reveals Marx’s Communist Manifesto and Capital as the only radical readings on the syllabi, and these in only two of six 100-level courses. Among the three 100-level philosophy courses offered, no readings presenting politically radical ideas appear on the syllabi. Between the two 100-level economics courses, again no readings presenting radical ideas appear on the syllabi…of course, economics courses don’t even pretend to represent radical viewpoints.

            This is an appeal for true balance in the curriculum. It is easy to ignore viewpoints outside the mainstream in the bubble that is Middlebury College, where we never have to come in contact with people outside of this insulated community. It is easy, but it is not right. When I chose to spend my undergraduate years at Middlebury, I expected an institution that values pluralism and encourages differing opinions. Instead, I found an institution that lives in a binary.

-BOS

pigs on campus

Saturday April 9 2011

Approximately 11:30AM, cop seen "talking to" (questioning?) people in Proctor Dining Hall.

A few minutes later, two cop cars parked behind a public safety vehicle in parking spots behind the library. 3 pigs and 1 pub safe officer were talking in a group behind the library.

There reason for being here is unknown. Keep your eyes and ears open.

Fuck all cops and cop collaborators. They have no purpose in our, or any, community.

"Il Faut Gagner"

I began writing this mid-February with intentions of writing more, but I let it drop as I started having more work to do for classes (something I’m not used to having to do in France…) Now it’s the beginning of April and Libya and Syria have added themselves to rebelling countries in the Muslim/North African world. –Laurice Fox, ‘12

“Il faut gagner!”

“…Sinon c’est la fin du monde!” I cried out jokingly—my competitive nature present. Directly across the table, Diego, poker faced—emotions well masked behind sunglasses…what I would consider a cheap way out—curtly and frankly followed my statement with: “Wikileaks est la fin du monde.” Yes; frank, unprecedented, unexplained. Everyone else around the table was having his or her own conversation before the next round commenced, but there I was immediately thrown back, and of course immediately prepared with a response. Kneeling on my chair, caipirinha in hand, I retorted, “Le fin du monde!? Ou peut-être wikileaks va faire le monde mieux!” I said it in a giddy matter—a little affected by the previous cocktails. Through the ring-clouds of cigarette smoke, cards, chips, Diego stared back at me still poker-faced, through his opaque sunglasses, leaning calmly on the edge of the table, arms crossed. He embodied the Pierce Brosnan/James Bond persona very well. And it was not until directly after my response that I actually thought about it…and thought some more about his statement and recent events.

So, still positioned on the chair on my knees and glass in hand, I drifted away from the playing table into my thoughts for a moment. What was my reasoning in my response? That Wikileaks has revealed how corrupt governments of countries are and therefore the citizens of these countries are actively demanding for political reform and so far succeeding if we look to Tunisia and Egypt as examples? Is that not a change better for the people—at least the over–looked and under- represented? So…where was Shady coming from letting his comment unfurl and blend in with the rest of the smoke rings over the table? Wikileaks: the end of the world. I assumed he was referring to what would happen after the people of these corrupt countries, which at the moment we can specify as North Africa, attained political reform. These countries may over-turn their corrupt governments, but what happens after? More political turmoil? Destabilized allies? More revolts? Interference from political super powers that could end badly? I streamed through these thoughts picturing corruption, countries at war, military verse civilian violence, and then I emerged from them and said to Diego: “En fait, t’as raison. Je pense que t’as raison.” He just stared back…

I don’t want to say that Wikileaks is the end of the world, though. Not yet at least. When I think of the end of the world I think of nuclear warfare or natural disasters of such a large scale that nearly the whole human race is effaced. For now, I can at least say that Wikileaks is the end of an era—or the beginning of one.

ANNOUNCEMENT

Miss the 18 march deadline but still want to submit an article to be included in our spring issue?

Well, you still have a chance. We are still accepting articles, but please get in contact with us as soon as possible to let us know that you are interested.

middlebury.gadfly [at] gmail [dot] com

- t h e g (A) d f l y

Border Tales

Since human greed and territorial nature created the idea of a border centuries ago, the world has become increasingly defined by borders and the policies that surround them. As natural borders—such as rivers—drastically change environments, artificial borders—such as the US-Mexico border—drastically change human existence. A look at the border policy of the most powerful nation in the world is a good exercise to connect with the vast implications and hypocrisy of border and immigration policy.

When the white man arrived in America, we (I am a white man) encountered the native population, who believed that like the air and the water, land was not something that could be owned. Exploiting this belief, we swept away cultures and civilizations from coast to coast, and then drew lines on the land to signify what was ours. As we defined ourselves to be a beacon of hope, the masses arrived, and increasingly, we have looked to those lines on the land to keep them away.

Our southern border, which was once abstract, has come to separate one of the wealthiest nations from one of the poorest nations in the world. Before the border existed, the man two feet north was no better than the man two feet south, but today, that difference of four feet might be the difference between wealth and poverty, food and starvation, hope and desperation. All because of a line and our laws to define its significance.

The legislative line of order versus liberty is hopefully balanced, but it is more often stumbled over when defining the rules of our border. As immigration into the U.S. increases, citizens sometimes feel that we are losing order and that “our” land should not be “theirs” too. This ideology is often rooted in racism and fear. The notion of protecting “our” land has been given life through much legislation dating back to as early as the Chinese Exclusion Act or as recently as Arizona’s SB1070. Essentially, this type of legislation makes our borders less permeable, and allows us to send more and more immigrants across that line. The irony of this ideology—that has become the centerpiece of US immigration policy—is remarkable.

The U.S. is located on land that we stole through violence in the Mexican American War. The U.S. came to prosperity on the backs of stolen humans from another continent. One of the driving forces of our economy today is the cheap and hardworking undocumented labor force, a product of the line we drew so long ago. But still, despite all this, our policy towards immigrants is self-righteous and overtly seeks to protect “our” land for ourselves.

This hypocrisy expands beyond the line from Tijuana to the Gulf of Mexico. It exists in every border laid out on this earth. Can we truly own land? Can we acquire it fairly? Is the security that we feel from a line in the dirt worth the tremendous divide that it unequivocally creates among humans? The root question is whether borders are justified in their existence.

Food Insecurities

When food prices peaked in 2008 the developing world, as is the case in many economic disasters, was hit the hardest. Food insecurities in Asia and Africa were increased by the high prices, especially in places where drought had already made food production an impossibility. The outward flow of migration from the developing world provided remittances to some families, but migration also had negative effects on families. Even thought the price of food has slowly fallen since 2008, food prices at local levels have remained high. This, combined with the economic meltdown of the last couple years, will have devastating effects on developing world. The silent victim of this global crisis is women, the demographic that has been most severely affected. Women are the ones who have had to go without food most often, have the least diverse diet and who have had to make the greatest sacrifices in search of affordable food. In a world that already leaves women far behind men in terms of political power and autonomy, they are also the ones who must pay for the commodification of food, and who are made to starve when Western policies have made food impossible to buy.

            All over the world, women are the last to eat and eat the least. Women often have a low position in society in developing nations. Even before the 2008 crisis they were the last to eat. As men are migrating out of developing countries or to urban areas women are becoming the heads of households in traditionally patriarchal societies. Yet a woman who runs her own household is still as likely to eat last and least as in a male-run household. This is because women prioritize the needs of their children and husbands above their own. Not only do women eat less, but they eat less diverse and therefore less healthy diets. In a study done on food insecurity and gender in Ethiopia, at the peak of the food crisis men ate 4.1 different foods while women ate only 3.6.

            Women in these developing countries were inconvenienced and strained by high food prices. They had to spend more time searching for food at lower prices and oftentimes had to travel far distances in order to find affordable food. In Bangladesh, women were often stopped from travelling to different markets because female mobility is restricted. If one of the ways to measure autonomy is by access to mobility and resources, this is an example of the way the autonomy of women is stifled to the extent that they must fear starvation and the starvation of their children. 

            To cope with these harsh conditions women must often go without meals or limit the portions of their and their children’s meals. It is Western policies that can largely be blamed on these food insecurities.

            Price speculation and the commodification of food is one of the leading causes of these mounting prices. Another contributing factor is the trade-off occurring when crops such as cassava and maize are used for biofuels instead of food. The land used for biofuels as opposed to food production could also be a contribution to this trade-off. The International Food Policy

Research Institute predicts that if policies toward biofuels consumption remain as they are, the price of maize, sugar, wheat, cassava and oilseeds will dramatically increase.

            Perhaps the most devastating contributor to rising food prices is climate change, which is responsible for droughts in many parts of the world. Although the roots of climate change cannot be blamed entirely on the West and Western policies, it is a global challenge that must be met and solved by the world community, a challenge that so far few have risen to meet. The global community then is responsible for the food shortages and resulting high prices that changes to the environment necessarily bring about.

            It is not just women who suffer from starvation, and all who must face the realities of food shortages deserve aid. However, in communities where food is being rationed and women are receiving the shortest end of the stick, it is time for global attitudes toward women and their place in society to shift. Women can no longer bear the brunt of global crises just because the society in which they are from treats them as second-class citizens. Food insecurity limits women’s abilities to demand higher statuses in life, as the worry about how to afford or find the next meal distracts women from seeking political and economic power. As the developed world struggles to deal with the best way to confront the food crisis and to aid those who are starving, it must consider the plight of women and the empowerment they must achieve before they are able to confront a society which tells them they are not worthy of having equal proportions of food as a man. 


- Amelia Furlong

Know Your Rights: Dealing with the Cops

I despise the existence of cops. Plain and simple. You know my bias from the beginning, but I will try not to let that bias come through too much. My purpose here is to pass along some useful information.

Cops are not your friends. An individual police officer may be friendly, but that’s more a testament of their personal character and forces me to wonder “Why the fuck did s/he become a cop!?” Cops do not serve the people; they are the enemies of freedom and individuality. Their purpose is to maintain a hierarchical system based on subordination and to reinforce capitalism. I do not dislike individual cops because of the individual, but because that individual chose to support a system that is flawed and serves only to help the richest white individuals and corporations.

Regardless of how much I dislike the cops; I know that when they confront me, I need to act meek. “Yes sir.” “No, ma’am.” “No, I have no idea why you’re pulling me over.” Interaction with the cops is virtually unavoidable. If you are ever in a car there’s a chance you will be pulled over. Don’t have a car? Well, you’ll probably be stopped for hitchhiking in the wrong place, or biking where you are not supposed to bike. Or maybe you will happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and a cop will stop you and ask what you know, why you’re at the scene of the crime. Or maybe because s/he doesn’t like the way you look. Or maybe… the list goes on. What’s most important is that you know your rights when being confronted by the police.

In general, there are two key phrases you need to know.

The first is: “I am going to remain silent. I want to see a lawyer.”

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Why would I advocate speaking to a lawyer? Well, this is an extenuating circumstance. Invoke your Miranda Rights [1] by not speaking and demanding a lawyer. This way, the cop cannot use you against yourself. Plus, a lawyer will know the law better than any given individual, no matter how well informed we try to be.

An officer may not use your refusal to speak as an admittance of guilt. Probably, the cop will continue to ask you seemingly harmless questions. Do not answer them! Just repeat that you are going to remain silent and that you want to see a lawyer. The only thing that will come of you talking to cops is giving them more information than they originally had. Remember “Anything you say can and WILL be used against you” (emphasis mine).

The second key phrase is: “I do not consent to a search.”

Even if they have a search warrant, still use this phrase. You will never lose anything by invoking your right not to be searched. Plus, if they have a search warrant, and things are not totally in order, or if they search you without a warrant anyways, anything they find will be inadmissible in court.

It is important to remember that you need to state clearly, politely, and firmly that you do not consent to a search. In those terms. If you are not clear and do not stand your ground on this, the cops will do their best to get a casual consent. If a cop comes to your house, quickly exit and close the door behind you, assess what they want from outside, then invoke your key phrases as needed. If a cop asks you to step out of your vehicle, remember to close the door, or it may be seen as a form of consenting to a search. And always remember key phrase number 1, “I am going to remain silent. I want to see a lawyer.” If you are being detained, the only information you must give them is your name, address, age, birthday, and social security number until a lawyer arrives and advises you what to say.

These two phrases will help a lot. Though, not all cops will honor your rights. In these instances, stand as firm as possible in your refusal to speak. Even if you started speaking, you may invoke your Miranda Rights at any moment, and from that point forward you do not have to answer anything until your lawyer arrives.

It is also helpful to understand the different type of interactions with police. Midnight Special suggest 3 types of interactions:

1 ) Conversation: the cops are trying to get info and can’t soundly connect you to anything.

2 )  Detention: the cops had reasonable suspicion to hold you for questioning and you cannot leave. “Reasonable suspicion” means that the cop must be able to logically articulate why they are holding you.

3 ) Arrest: You can only be arrested when the cops have probable cause, meaning that they have more than reasonable suspicion. In other words, they have to be able to connect you to a crime to arrest you.

If you are arrested, you can still invoke your right to silence. At this point, the cops will do anything they can to get you to admit to committing a crime. They may use good cop/bad cop routine (remember, there is no such thing as a cop who is your friend), say they have some circumstantial evidence (which is most likely shaky at best; if it was a solid defense they would not have to question you), threaten a polygraph (lie detector) test, or one of their myriad other tactics. There is one surefire way to hold your ground, and that is to not speak.

Moreover, if you are involved in activism and direct action, be aware that a cop who has infiltrated your organization or who is undercover in the midst of protestors and activists does not have to identify him or herself. They can use many tactics to get you to get you to commit a crime without it being considered entrapment. (For instance, a Narc may take drugs so as to not blow their cover.) Just because they’re doing something illegal doesn’t mean they can’t and won’t nail you on the same activities. Be smart; don’t talk about illegal activity with those you don’t trust.

These may not apply to non-citizens or “illegal” immigrants. I am not totally sure and do not want to speak about anything I do not know about. There should be resources available on the internet regarding “illegal” immigrants’ rights when dealing with the cops. (If you do know resources, please post them in the comments!)

There are several resources available online concerning your rights when dealing with cops. Here are a few that I have consulted:

“Flex Your Rights” is a DVD you can purchase about knowing your rights when dealing with cops. However, there is also an FAQ on the website with concise chunks of information, as well as small video clips and some lectures about civilian rights when dealing with cops. You can check that out here: http://www.flexyourrights.com/

“Anarchist Survival Guide for Understanding Gestapo Swine Interrogation Mind Games” “Subtitle: Staying Free By Shutting the Fuck Up!” By Anarchist Author, Poet, Jailhouse Lawyer & Prisoner Harold H. Thompson. This is a pamphlet about, well about exactly what the title says. It stresses the importance of staying silent and goes over several police tactics.

“Dealing With Police” is a short, 4 page informational sheet from Midnight Special, a now-defunct legal collective. They have several resources available here: http://www.midnightspecial.net/materials/.

The Zine Library has a wide collection of articles, pamphlets, posters…etc. on prisons and police here: http://zinelibrary.info/english/prisons-and-police

A flyer from  The Zine Library: http://zinelibrary.info/files/enemies-police-v2.pdf

Injustice Everywhere: The National Police Misconduct Statistics and Reporting Project. http://www.injusticeeverywhere.com/

I realize that this article could cover many, many more aspects of dealing with cops. However, in most people’s daily lives, I feel that these key phrases and links will be the most useful. Feel free to suggest other tips for dealing with cops in the comments.

Oh yeah, and one final note, the key phrases above also work with any government agency (FBI, ICE, CIA…etc.).

[1] Interesting thing I learned about your Miranda Rights while looking up information about civilian rights when dealing with cops. Contrary to popular thought, a cop does not have to read you your Miranda Rights as soon as you are arrested. “The only time an officer must read a person his or her Miranda rights is when: (1) the person has been placed under arrest, AND (2) the officer is about to question the person about a crime” (http://flexyourrights.org/faq). Also, for those of you who may not recall exactly what the Miranda warning is, it reads, “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you. Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you?”


- t h e  g a d f l y


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March 15 is the International Day Against Police Brutality. In the US, we may have a day reserved on October 22nd, but that does not mean that we should not support others on this day. Fuck police brutality. And fuck police. The cops are not your friends. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cases_of_police_brutality

flyers

Feel free to print them out and post them. E-mail them. Reblog them. Do what you need to, but get the word out.

revival! revival! REVIVAL!

Hey all

This has been pretty dormant. But we're working on changing that. We're working on some new posts and generating some interested and interesting writers.

Are you interested in writing for the GADFLY? e-mail us. middlebury.gadfly [at] gmail [dot] com.

Politics. Art. Culture. Sexuality. Gender. Economics. Campus. Local. Global. we want your articles.


-the GADFLY

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the GADFLY

The Limits of Peaceful Resistance

A few weeks ago (29 September 2010) I attended a lecture by Colman McCarthy. The posters and his Wikipedia page describe him as “an American journalist, teacher, lecturer, pacifist, an anarchist and long-time peace activist.” I was intrigued as to why an anarchist was speaking at Middlebury since there is no doubt that anarchy is an under represented viewpoint on this campus. I was also confused as to why the Newman club (a Catholic organization) was bringing an anarchist, but my views on religion and anarchy are the topic for a different paper.

Colman McCarthy’s speech was entitled “How to be a Peacemaker: Nonviolence in a Time of War.” The main point that I took away was that it is impossible to cultivate a culture of peace in a society that celebrates its war heroes and barely gives a footnote to its peacemakers. Sure, every American student knows about Martin Luther King Jr. and how he preached nonviolent civil disobedience, but that’s about the extent of my knowledge on peaceful figureheads. Chances are if you do not actively research peacemakers you could not name (m)any, yet if you were asked to name one war hero or authoritarian who used violence or describe who Robert E. Lee is, you most likely could.

So, what to do? McCarthy suggests that “Peace studies” should be taught starting in elementary school. I agree, peace should be taught, and I think that would be a positive thing for society as a whole. But I also think peace has its limits like everything else. Eventually people will be in a situation where they realize peace does not cut it anymore, no matter what they’ve been taught. And while I’d never advocate actively trying to hurt other people, I do think there is power in violence. That is, I believe there is power in violence that manifests itself against objects and symbols of oppression.

For instance, think about resistance to police brutality. I don’t think nonviolent action will do much to counteract a force that has authority over everyone yet indiscriminately uses violence to exert that authority. If you speak your mind about the true evils of the police force and our prison system, you will face police repression varying in severity from being handcuffed, fined, and held for a night in prison, all the way up to being beaten, potentially shot, by the cops. And that’s in our own country, where we supposedly have the right to free speech.  In other countries with more extreme versions of the police state, repression is worse, and a daily occurrence. Do you think nonviolent resistance to the police state in these places could bring about meaningful change? I highly doubt it.

When the cops are using violence left and right, be it in the form of a “nonlethal” taser, a good ol’ fashioned beating, or using their guns, it is hard to remain peaceful. Sure, the fact that a large proportion of the population has a phone with a camera on it and knowing that if they fuck up there will probably be a video of them on the internet within a few hours may keep some officers in check, but it certainly does not solve the problem. Often, people take to the streets and protest in nonviolent ways against things such as police brutality, and it gets no media coverage. Only those who search it out find it. Generally it’s not until the protesters severely outweigh the oppressors or until they start rioting that mainstream media will cover it. Often, the cops will provoke the violence and the media will spin it so the protestors look like the evildoers. This is when things get too radical for mainstream media and society; individuals and groups start burning cop cars, vandalizing police stations, and prisons (for example). This gets their message heard, albeit with some negative media spin. And this is where I come to an internal struggle: does the negative coverage outweigh the symbolic power of a cop car on fire?

I realize this is a bit convoluted and vague. I’m trying to think about this issue in the vaguest terms, trying to figure out if some general rule applies. I do not have an answer. I sincerely wish that peace could solve everything, but I know that is not possible. Not as long as those in power who are supposed to “protect and serve” have guns, batons, tasers, and other tools of violence at their disposal. What I do know is that seeing photos of a destroyed police station gives me hope. It shows me that people are as fed up with the tools of oppression as I am, and probably more. It shows me that if the police are going to be a violent force, they’re going to have to deal with the consequences that our judicial system cannot suppress.

the GADFLY

Comments fixed

hey everyone

it was brought to my attention that one could not post anonymous comments. That has now been changed and you should be able to. In fact, we encourage it! Happy commenting.

the GADFLY

THE GADFLY

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