Most protesters weren't from S.F.
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So to get their 200,000 (or was it 50,000?) in SF, they had to draw not on just the 760,000 of SF or 8 million of the Bay Area, BUT THE ENTIRE US WEST COAST AND PART OF CANADA!
That's gotta be 40 million people.
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DEMONSTRATORS EXPLAIN THEIR MOTIVES
By Dana Hull and Jessica Portner
Mercury News
A protestor is arrested in SF. Behind her, firefighters use a circular saw to cut through tubes that protesters used to join themselves together.
(AP Photo/Noah Berger)
A protestor is arrested in SF. Behind her, firefighters use a circular saw to cut through tubes that protesters used to join themselves together.
Nearly 2,300 anti-war demonstrators were arrested in San Francisco in the first few days of the U.S.-led war against Iraq, cementing the city's image as the epicenter of the anti-war movement in the United States.
But preliminary data from the San Francisco Police Department shows that at as many as 70 to 80 percent of those arrested for civil disobedience poured into the city from elsewhere: the South Bay, North Coast, New York, Seattle, Portland -- even Canada.
``There were contingents from all over,'' said Mike Menesini, an assistant district attorney. ``People came from all over the Bay Area, all over the state, and frankly, from all over the country.''
A full demographic analysis of those arrested will take weeks to compile, because city officials are still wading through a mound of citations that have yet to be entered into the court system's computer.
But the piles of citations spilling across Menesini's desk and stacked on the floor provide a fascinating snapshot of the people who created the largest civil unrest the nation has seen since Vietnam.
While many of those arrested appear to be 20-somethings and college students, others were middle-aged and older. One 70-year-old San Francisco priest was arrested five times. A group of 24 women, ages 18 to 64, wrote a letter explaining their actions and signed it ``From the Women in Holding Cell H-10.'' And 155 arrestees were juveniles.
``There were an equal number of boys and girls, and it seems like a lot of them were friends who went to the same school,'' said Ken Esposoto, an inspector for the juvenile division of the San Francisco Police Department. ``The youngest was 14. There were a lot from Marin County and the East Bay. They were all very well-behaved and very cooperative.''
The stacks of citations illustrate the geographic diversity: a 28-year-old man from Arcata; several 20-somethings from Santa Cruz; a 31-year-old man from Phoenix; a 29-year-old man from Charlotte, N.C.
On to the next stack: a 19-year-old woman from Los Angeles, three college-age women from Oakland, two 21-year-old women from Santa Rosa, a 22-year-old from Provo, Utah, and a 27-year-old man from Chicago.
``The reason that everyone came together in San Francisco is that it was being planned for there, and there was power in having one big mass action all together,'' said Blair Thedinger, 21, a junior at Santa Clara University, who was arrested March 20 -- and went right back on the streets as soon as he was released.
``It was a good idea to have all the anti-war activists come to S.F. for those days,'' Thedinger said. ``In the future maybe we'll do more in the South Bay.''
Brian DeRouen, 25, took a leave from his job at a coffee shop in Fairfield, adjacent to Travis Air Force Base, to head to San Francisco, which has a long history of mass protests.
The theology student was arrested at the Pacific Exchange in the days before the war started. On March 20, DeRouen joined a group of priests and nuns and used his motorcycle lock to chain himself to Bechtel's front door. He was unhinged with bolt cutters, carried to a van and then ushered to jail.
``The world sees Americans as cocky and not caring, and doing whatever we want anyway,'' DeRouen said. ``It's not good enough to say I disagree but then go along anyway. One reason I was on the streets was so the world will see that every American doesn't feel that way.''
The protesters included classmates, co-workers, friends and family members, many of whom formed their own ``affinity group'' -- a collection of five to 25 people who prepare for and plan specific actions, whether it's blocking a corporation or handing out free food to other demonstrators. Some affinity groups belong to a larger cluster.
``There's a Stanford cluster of about 100 students, and I'm in an affinity group with 15 people,'' said Valarie Kaur Brar, 22, a Stanford senior who was arrested March 20 for blocking the intersection at Third and Folsom streets. ``I'm really disappointed with the media coverage because they focused on just a few people. Our action was dignified, and some of the police were smiling. I was arrested with a Stanford professor.''
A group of students from Santa Clara University drove to San Francisco the night the war began and spent the night sleeping on the floor of a professor's house.
``We were up until 3 a.m. planning what we were going to do, and we were out at the intersection at 6:45 a.m.,'' said Jonathan Hunt, a lecturer in SCU's English department. ``It was fantastic. The students are very committed and knowledgeable people, and I felt confident that I could put myself in their hands.''
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