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Arrested for silently dancing at the Jefferson Memorial? You better believe it bud!
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Fact 1: Protests at the specific, space-limited locations of the memorials aren't allowed. This is because memorial space is limited, and free run of protests would essentially make it impossible to visit the memorials, as they'd be the obvious choice for most protests.
Fact 2: Some people started dancing in an organized fashion as a form of protest. A judge said, "Well, there is a blanket ban on protests in these spaces. These people tried to circumvent those bans by inventing a new form of protest. It's still protest, still no good."
Fact 3: Some more people decided to protest that ban on protests, then resisted arrest.
The only two things there are to debate are: 1. Should a ban on protests due to space limitations at memorials be allowable. and 2. Was the physical force used against people physically resisting arrest too extreme?
Park police, if part of the National Park Service, have to have graduated with a 4 year degree and go through a police academy style training program (450+hours of coursework here at Temple) before they can be hired, and more training if they want to be armed. Not exactly rent-a-cop there.
If it's a free speech issue, then it doesn't hinge on volume. If they were playing the bagpipes in protest of some issue, why would that be prohibited but not dancing? Bagpipes are aurally distracting, dancing is visually distracting.
As for public land, I can't even smoke a cigarette at most public beaches in my city. Or to make it a "speech" issue, I can't even smoke a cigarette that looks like an American flag at most beaches. I probably can't light up (either a tobacco product or an American flag) at the Jefferson either, being so very oppressed.
my unofficial autobio will be accompanied with tips on how to smile
cause I've found that when they don't see you frown, they never know that you're a threat
and they don't sweat you when you came around
And if they had lingered all day, they should be asked.to move along as well (assuming their behavior was truly unreasonable).
Of course, there's also the issue of expected disturbances versus unexpected...the latter will generally be more disruptive to normal people usb the former, even if the former would (in a vacuum) seem to be the bigger disruption. Think: popcorn in a movie theater. It's actually louder, in many cases, than some peoples conversation...yet the latter is generally more disturbing.
Tour groups are an expected disruption. Flash mobs of dancing protesters are not.
And that's still ignoring the unique nature of our national monuments, which are hardly just any park.
Edit: you also glossed over a question that I'd really like an answer to...if his dancing shit is so nondisruptive, if nobody has (or should have) an issue with it, why would protesters use it? The point of a protest is to draw attention.
Also, this. Obviously my answers are (1) of course and (2) perhaps.
I wanted to point this out because I think people are missing some important points here. There is a ban on protests/rallies in the memorial. Free speech dictates that in a public forum you should be allowed to have whatever protest/rally you want, so the government has decided that even though this memorial is owned by the state, it is not a public forum. Therefore the initial rally (in support of jefforson's ideals), and the subsequent protests, were illegal. End of story.
As a side note, they have banned dancing altogether in the memorial; which I'm not sure is legal. This is where I think most people are coming from. If you organize a bunch of people for a flash mob, or protest, that involves silently dancing, then you will be kicked out. However, what if (say before all this happened) I just felt like silently dancing in the memorial. It's not a protest/rally, it can't reasonably be argued that it's disturbing the peace, so it seems like it should be legal.
The fact that they were seeking to draw attention to themselves isn't under dispute, but whether the response by the police in knocking dancers to the ground and choking them out was proportional. There are many options that can be used before the prospect of physical coersion is even necessary, and it just seems to me like they skipped a whole bunch of them because these protesters didn't immediately become demure and cooperative in the face of police authority.
Temple University is like two steps below Barbazon Modeling School in reputation.
There also exists reasonable limits to the 1st Amendment.
Actually, several posters are making arguments in favor of the dancers that go beyond whether the use of police force to remove.them was propotional. Have you missed those posts?
Yes but this instance doesn't violate those limits. Dancing quietly at a national monument isn't comparable to shouting fire in a crowded theater.
News to me. Point being that even after you graduate college, from where ever you want, you have to THEN go and get trained at ANOTHER school/academy for something like 4-500 hours or coursework, and that's just to get hired at the base level. Not exactly the qualifications of a rent-a-cop.
Um, we restrict behavior in parks all the time. The only way dancing WOULD (potentially) be protected is if you define it as expression/speech. Once its 'just' dancing, the bar the government needs.to clear to ban it becomes that much LOWER, not higher.
You may argue that such a ban on 'just' dancing is UNNECESSARY, but its certainly not illegal/unconstitutional.
Yes they do. There was a court decision and everything.
'shouting fire's isn't the only valid justification for restricting expression. If allowing unrestricted protest at national memorials or monuments would render them useless to anybody for their intended purpose, we can restrict protest. And if we are going to restrict protest there, we have to restrict everybody.
Imagine, for a moment, what the Vietnam memorial would likely have looked like, on a near-daily basis, for the last eight years absent restrictions on protest at such sites.
I think it was classified as 'just' dancing in the context that the police were responding to it with unnecessary force, the dancing itself was still intended as a form of expression though.
The people in the video were all warned* prior to the video, and quite likely asked to stop or leave. Now you're not two people dancing inoffensively, you're two people disobeying a lawful request from a police officer. The police didn't see people dancing and say "Oh boy! Paperwork!" and start tackling everyone.
*The warning they all claim they hadn't heard, or had heard, but didn't think it applied to them dancing, just those other assholes.
We do restrict behavior, but there are rules about what can be restricted. You can't just ban whatever you feel like, it has to break a law, like disturbing the peace or public indecency. I can't think of any law that quietly dancing would break.
edit - I guess there is a more underlying question that I have. The court decision posted previously states that the memorial is not a public forum, therefore they can ban rallies/protests (which are protected under the 1st amendment), and therefore the dancing rally and subsequent protests were illegal. Since the memorial is a public place, but apparently not a public forum, can they ban whatever they feel like? Could they say ban non white people from coming in?
GT: batshido Hit me up on ME3.
Yeah but can you really think of any that would apply to the memorial? In your example I'm sure there is a law that bans you from standing/dancing/whatever on a freeway. I doubt there is a LAW that states that you cannot dance in a park. There is obviously now a rule, specific to the memorial, stating no dancing, but I doubt there is a law somewhere that prohibits the type of dancing seen in the video, in a public park.
To me the fault lies with the service cops for deciding that this was a form of "protest" that needed to be stopped. I think it's ridiculous on its face to say that this conduct would be disruptive to anyone's experience of the memorial, given the conduct that regularly goes on there (folks taking photos in the notable spots, walking around talking in normal voices, various wailing kids' groups.)
The other argument is that this dancing somehow detracts from the "solemnity" or "purpose} of the memorial, which leads us to ask what the purpose of a memorial featuring the frieze "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man" actually is.
What would it have looked like, precisely? Assuming we didn't let people actually deface the memorial or interfere with other people's observation/whatever of it, I'm not seeing the problem.
my unofficial autobio will be accompanied with tips on how to smile
cause I've found that when they don't see you frown, they never know that you're a threat
and they don't sweat you when you came around
I was responding to the bolded, though I'll admit I misread it (I blame the small phone screen).
You can argue that dancing (which is to say "just" dancing) should be legal at the Jefferson Memorial, but then you have no leg to stand on for arguing why it can't be illegal. If they can come up with even the thinnest of arguments for banning it, they can.
And I'll support them, because go dance somewhere else.
I mean, I can almost get behind somebody who is legitimately trying to express something through their dance...but at that point the need for memorials and monuments to be accessible as memorials and monuments outweighs it. Go protest somewhere else, too.
To ban non-whites (or women, or any other such group) they'd have to come up with an argument to get around Equal Protection. And the various other laws that require equal treatment of minorities and protected groups.
The protest ban evenly affects everybody equally. Blacks can't protest, whites can't protest, feminists can't protest, Christians can't protest, etc.
Same for dancing.
While you can make an argument for restricting expression at national monuments and memorials (which some here reject, of course), good luck making an argument for setting aside equal protection. I can't even see the Roberts Court accepting that one.
So I'm pretty much okay with it.
But, as has been stated again and again, our national monuments and memorials are not just any "public park."
Also, there is a rule saying you can't dance there. And as soon as a police officer comes over and tells you to stop doing so, there is now a law saying that you have to, you know, do that. If you fail to, then you are breaking all kinds of fun laws, and if you resist arrest you are breaking more.
Amazing how many laws can get involved when you break one little "rule."
It would likely have become a 24/7 anti-war protest*, rather than being a place for veterans of that war (or others) to memorialize the dead.
I see this as a problem.
I really don't care if you don't, and I'm quite satisfied with the fact that our courts agree with me (and likely always will).
* - Mild exaggeration. Though looking at the constant revolving door of protests that happen in some locations (4th and Pine, I'm looking at you), and given the much higher profile of...well, pretty much any monument or memorial in D.C., I think it is just that...a mild exaggeration.
Go fucking protest somewhere else.
EDIT: And I say this as somebody who has actively attended anti-war protests, BTW.
I'm not trying to be argumentative, I just think your skipping around my point. There is obviously a distinction between the memorial and "any public park". The courts have decided that it is legal to suppress 1st amendment rights, in the memorial, in order to maintain peace and functionality of the memorial. I'm asking to what lengths this can be extended, and how they are drawing the lines.
If they make a rule denying equal rights, we seem to agree that that would still be unconstitutional. Therefore even if the police asked you to leave, for being asian (or whatever), and you got arrested for not complying, you would have broken no laws, as the original offense was an unconstitutional rule.
I'm just curious to what extent the original decision, to suppress 1st amendment rights, is extendable. Can they kick you out for expressing a viewpoint, not in the form of a protest/rally? For example, can they ban any clothing that expresses a viewpoint, even if you are clearly not protesting?
Pretty much. Any particular piece of public land is subject to its own rules as decided by whichever particular part of the government it belongs to. Hence why there is some public land that almost no one is allowed to go to at all for any reason.
Sorry for the repeated posts, but one more.
Having protesters there in general interferes with other people's "observation/whatever" of it. This is the point of protest. To draw attention. Or are we back to arguing that protesting doesn't actually detract from anybody's legitimate observation of memorials and monuments, where "anybody" apparently much means "Eat It. Eat it, You Nasty Pig and a minority of other people?"
"Let's go do something that we know to be illegal as a protest" type protests should be broken up; regardless of the nature of the illegal thing. I support the legalization of pot, but I don't think illegally smoking pot "in protest" is something the cops should ignore.
It also didn't look like the guy in the brown shirt or the guy in the 'disobey' shirt were going to be satisfied until they were in handcuffs. Later, they can use this story to seduce a hippy; so they've got that going for them.
Any such restriction would probably have to be content-neutral (banning all political campaign-related gear, for instance), but yes. The court seems to have given them a wide latitude to suppress expression in general, but I'd wager if they started discriminating based on content they'd have issues.
I think you have this backwards. Content is exactly what they have range to ban, not viewpoint. Like you said, they can ban all political signs, but not just one party's signs. The problem being the signs in general would be considered inappropriate.
my unofficial autobio will be accompanied with tips on how to smile
cause I've found that when they don't see you frown, they never know that you're a threat
and they don't sweat you when you came around
Dancing somewhere out of place would violate that.
GT: batshido Hit me up on ME3.
Yeah, that's what I meant, thanks for clearing it up a bit. Viewpoint-neutral.
me too
I should clarify that when I said "the cops" I didn't mean the actual officers who responded in this case, because they're just following the policy set by their employer. I should more properly have said "my problem is that this kind of "protest" is something the parks service feels they need to set policy against."
my unofficial autobio will be accompanied with tips on how to smile
cause I've found that when they don't see you frown, they never know that you're a threat
and they don't sweat you when you came around
We had protests every single week on main street in my town. A "city" of maybe 20K people. For years.
Maybe an hour or two each, mind you. But that's a small town in Montana.
Now make it a national monument. In a city of millions, in the middle of the eastern seaboard.
Yeah, I'm sure the protests there (and at other monuments and memorials) would be few and far between. Right. Sure. Really. Gettin' that sarcasm yet?
And if a group of hippies were hanging out at the Vietnam Memorial for hours, quietly hugging and swaying? My experience would be disrupted. So, are you trying to say I am not anyone?
I mean, when you say "hard time believing anyone's experience would be disrupted" I need only come up with a single person to refute that. And I have already made it clear that even if no other such person exists (which is so far from the truth it's ridiculous), I am that person.
So, you might want to reconsider that line.
But when you say that nobody (which is what "not anyone" equates to) would be disrupted by it, you are presuming to speak for me. Which, when I've made it quite clear that I would be disrupted by it, is....something.
Something goose-esque.
EDIT: By trying to hand-wave away the very idea that anybody would be disrupted by it, you're basically attempting to clear that side of the scale, reality be damned. Which might, to you at least, seem to bolster your argument...but it doesn't say much to anybody else about that honesty of that argument.