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SPEECH FROM DECEMBER 10, 2003 RALLY & PRESS CONFERENCE “My name is Elise, and I’m going to tell you why I’m here and how important it is to me to demilitarize the police before the Republican National Convention in 2004. As an activist I have certainly experienced repressive military tactics employed by the police as a result of my participation in anti-war and anti-globalization protests. I’m sure all of you here who participated in the recent antiwar demonstrations have at the very least witnessed some of these military police tactics--whether it was being cordoned off in ‘free speech’ pens, being arrested for questionable reasons, being physically injured or beaten by police officers or their poor horses, or being assaulted with chemical weapons such as pepper spray. More recently, in Florida, people who were present in Miami during the FTAA protests can attest to even more brutal militarized assaults including assaults with tasers, concussion grenades, stun guns, and artillery spiked with chemical weapons. These tactics are born out of military close combat training, and are forged to strike strategic blows against enemy forces. They have no place in civil law enforcement. This militarization is meant to prevent us from exercising our right to dissent. For me, it is certainly an outrage to have my constitutional and democratic right to free speech, free expression, free assembly and freedom to dissent so forcibly violated. This is one detrimental effect of the militarization of the police. The other effect is the effect these military weapons and tactics have on our bodies. I am equally outraged by this imposition of the police and state upon my body. Earlier I referred to the police’s use of military accouterment such as chemical weapons and military close combat fighting techniques. Police pepper spray people of all colors and genders, and it’s wrong. But for people whose bodies have been marginalized, the wages of dissent against undemocratic rulers have so often been the control, damage, and destruction of our bodies. When I say “marginalized people” I am referring to those who are non-white, non-male, not of the propertied class, those whose sexual orientation or gender identity are not understood by others, and those who are disabled. It is well documented that the police have a history of targeting so-called marginalized people. Please bear this in mind as I go over but a few of the tactics and weapons the police are using. I want to address the use of so-called “non-lethal weapons”. The immediate and long term effects these weapons have on our bodies is not fully disclosed and in some cases not fully known. Take for example, exposure to the o.c. propellants in weaponized pepper spray, mace, and tear gas. There are indications that these chemical weapons have lasting effects on our immune systems. For people with already compromised immune systems you can imagine how grave the potential side effects could be. Moreover, It is not known what effects these weapons have on our reproductive systems, or on our unborn children. What right does the police department have to violate our bodies, or to risk violating the health of unborn children? I would like to repeat: use of these weapons may potentially function to harm or impede our ability to bear children. This is tantamount to forced sterilization and infanticide of specific marginalized populations. We can not allow this. We must demand that the police cease and desist from using weapons whose known effects can be quite serious, and whose unknown effects have such eugenic and culturally repressive implications. Another weapon used by the police during demonstrations are rubber coated bullets fired from the equivalent of a pump action shotgun. Rubber coated bullets--and I make the distinction that these bullets are rubber coated because in fact they are metal ammunition with a plastic or rubber coating; the name is misleading--these rubber coated bullets can and have caused serious injuries to their victims. You will hear further testimony of this from the street medics who will speak here today. In addition to manufactured military hardware and weapons, the police have used animals as weapons. In New York, the police have used horses as a part of their arsenal. During the anti-war marches, the NYPD weaponized these animals, using them to trample, intimidate, and provoke fear and panic in the crowds of demonstrators. In this country there is an ugly history of weaponizing animals to enforce racist laws, and as a form of terrorism against non-white people. Perhaps the NYPD has some dim awareness of this, and for this reason has not sicked the dogs on us yet. This weaponizing of animals is unacceptable both because of its excessive and dangerous nature, and because placing an animal in the lines of conflict also endangers the animal. In short, weaponizing animals is appalling from a human perspective, from an animal perspective, and from a historical perspective. It must be stopped. It is not only the weapons used by the police, it is the military tactics which must be addressed. Violations of our bodies are also carried out through militarized tactics. Detainment, or denial of freedom of movement is one such tactic. When people are detained by the police they are often subjected to further violations of their human rights. For those of you who are not familiar, it has been common practice during protests for the police to illegally detain protesters in metal barricades, often referred to sarcastically as ‘free speech pens’. This use of barricades prevents us from reaching demonstration sites, can prevent us from being visible to the public, and thus violates our right to freedom of speech, expression, and movement. For people with disabilities, this and many other police tactics violate the ADA, by not ensuring that there is access to and from such events. Why is the NYPD violating our human rights by detaining us in this fashion? Why is the police department discriminating against disabled people during demonstrations? This is unacceptable. We are here to demand that these unfair practices are stopped. Another form of detainment used by the police during protests are mass arrests without evidence of any wrongdoing on the part of the protesters. Once detained, some protesters have suffered further abuse. In order to round up as many people as possible, police have resorted to using plastic zip handcuffs. These plastic handcuffs can be tightened, but not loosened once placed on a person’s wrists. The plastic handcuffs used by police have caused permanent nerve and tissue damage to the hands and wrists of people bound with them. Their use is banned by international law. Amnesty International has condemned the United States Military for using these handcuffs on Iraqi detainees. Why is the NYPD using them? Sexual assault is also condemned by International law, yet during protests some women detained during protests experienced varying degrees of sexual assault at the hands of police. There are reports from female participants of anti-war demonstrations in Oakland California of illegal non-consensual body cavity searches. The women subjected to these body cavity searches did not qualify for such invasions by legal standards, and certainly such brutal violations of their bodies are an atrocity by all ethical standards. When hands or objects are forced into a woman’s body, it is rape. In Miami women who were peacefully demonstrating were detained, stripped, and denied access to any means of covering their naked bodies while detained in non private cells. This sexual violence must never occur again. This is not law enforcement, it is terrorism. We can not allow this. As a woman, as a human being, I am here to demand that these atrocities, these violations of our bodies, of our basic human rights are not repeated. All of these weapons and tactics of repression, targeted at dissenters and marginalized people violate our right to freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom to dissent, and freedom from bodily harm. They are illegal, and I would like to know how the police department plans to conduct itself both on a daily basis, and during the Republican National Convention in 2004. They must be held accountable for their actions, and must disclose how they plan to ensure that our human rights are not violated! I would like to know how the NYPD plans to ensure that it’s employees---employees who, in fact are our employees, remember they are public servants and we pay them---how do they plan to uphold the ‘courtesy, professionalism, and respect’ their patrol cars boast of? These abuses by the police will not be tolerated and must be stopped. Are not officers of the law---who in fact, are public servants, whose salaries we pay---are not these officers of the law to uphold standards of law, and common decency? We are here to present a list of demands to the NYPD which we expect to be met in a timely, courteous, professional, and respectful manner. Thank you. “ --Elise Miller, Campaign to Demilitarize the Police.

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