2010-06-26
Police lined the streets of Toronto in a show of force on Friday, holding in a sea of protesters united in their desire for greater freedoms.
As thousands of G20 protesters marched west on College St., Josh Hanson stayed behind in the Yonge St. intersection, staging a sit-in with a half-dozen others behind a row of police officers.
“I’m here to support people and their fight for their freedoms, their personal freedoms, every day,” said Hanson, a native of Red Deer, Alta. “And to protest the outrageous amount of spending, the cost to these people for this police state.”
Just an hour into the June 25 march, he decided to take a stand (or rather, a seat) for his beliefs. One reason, he explained, was the new designation of the G20 security zone as a public work, giving law officers greater power to search and arrest citizens there.
“Our rights have been completely stomped all over. … I really don’t believe in what’s happening.”
About 10 minutes later, he had to move after officers formed a line on the other side of the group. “It was just looking too much like we were just going to get detained,” he said afterward.
The demonstration, organized by No One is Illegal and the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty, attracted thousands of people from dozens of activist groups who spent more than three hours marching to and from Allan Gardens.
The group traversed Carlton St. and College St. to University Ave., then went south to Elm St. in an apparent attempt to head toward the G20 security zone. The police, numbering in the hundreds, refused to let the group go any further south than Dundas St. W., blocking protesters until they had no choice but to turn north again to College, where they headed back to Allan Gardens.
The group had several run-ins with police, including one major altercation just across from Toronto police headquarters, when officers allegedly detained a deaf person who had not complied with orders. The crowd swarmed when they saw the situation, forcing themselves into the wall of police bicycles and chanting “Let him go!”
People began to shove to get closer to the scene, wedging others against the police bicycles. One person tried to douse officers with water, though the officers remained calm after the small soaking.
One man went to check out the situation and was thrown into a scuffle, emerging with a bump on his forehead and a bloody nose. “I was just trying to see who they had,” he said as another protester wiped the blood from his face.
The day was riddled with minor disputes. As police formed a barricade in front of Mount Sinai Hospital on University Ave. to confiscate items that could be used as weapons, including an umbrella, one man was pushed aside by an officer after loudly questioning the action.
Tyler Kendall backed into a tree surrounded by a wall of people who had also pushed aside, but the officer, with a clear path to move forward with his bike, continued to demand Kendall move aside, even though he had nowhere to go.
“It’s not right,” a visibly angry Kendall said after the incident. “We’re human. We shouldn’t be treated like that. Where am I supposed to go if there’s a wall of people? If I’m being pushed and shoved by cops, where am I supposed to go? On the ground?”
Some officers, however, were openly friendly to anyone who walked by them, offering conversation and smiling constantly.
Street medics and legal advisers also lined the march to give assistance when necessary.
A paramedic from Vancouver named Rusty, who declined to give his last name, said street medics at events like this have different levels of training, and treat people based on their level of experience.
“I was on the West Coast for the Olympics, and a lot of folks from here came out to support us, so I decided to come out and support them,” he said.
So far during the G20, he has had to do only the basics — “just sunscreen and hydrations” — and said he hopes he doesn’t have to do any more than that. In the past he has helped treat blunt-force trauma from police nightsticks.
Poverty and migrant rights are the chief issues of the groups that organized the June 25 rally, but people marched for a variety of causes, including lessening drug restrictions, providing greater access to abortion and contraception, environmental accountability and an end to sexual oppression.
A flurry of pot smokers marched next to a group carrying a casket covered in coat hangers and labelled “Choice?” A marching band chimed along at Allan Gardens, with “Take us to the fake lake. Love, the dangerous anarchists” written on the tuba. A sign reading “I fuck for pleasure” showed up next to another that said “Stephen Harper is a Neo-Fascist.”
All of them chanted against the police blocking their way. “Whose streets? Our streets?” was sometimes overcome by calls of “Fuck the police!” Officers in uniform remained calm despite the ringing chorus.
Within the crowd was Maria Kasstan, a member of the Raging Grannies social justice group,
“I’m here because I am extremely upset that a G20 meeting like this would be held without taking into account the environment, because all of our rights and all of our resources come from the environment,” she said. “I empathize with Mother Earth. She is the mother that needs the most protection so that she can continue to nurture all the other mothers. We can’t do it without her.”
A mother of four and grandmother of three, Kasstan said, “I don’t understand how anybody can’t be an environmental activist.” She suspected at least two of her sons were also part of the march.
As she marched past Maple Leaf Gardens, she questioned the number of officers and dollars behind the security measures.
“They’re overqualified, let’s face it. They’re guarding us bunch of little old ladies —and they’re keeping us very safe, thanks — but, you know, it’s about the same amount of money that Canada has pledged for women’s health as what they spent on the security.”