Today In Oaxaca: Two Reports of Today's Action

[Wiley50]

The First is from a female US doctor (western/naturopath) now in Oaxaca
helping out where she can on the front lines.
The second is from a US film maker also in Oaxaca.

Today was the anniversary of the Mexican Revolution
and The Popular Assembly of The Peoples of Oaxaca
were feeling, well, revolutionary!

From Dr. Xochitl:
Once again, here I am as a witness of events in Oaxaca. The real struggle, the real risks, the real revolution is with the people of Oaxaca.

Nov 20, 2006

Greetings friends,

Today I needed to rest a bit, so things didn't started until a bit late for me.

As I approached Santo Domingo all was very tranquil. It was a beautiful day, with white/grey clouds floating above and the mountains surrounding the city with cloud-shrouds at their peaks. The temperature was absolutely perfect. People were out in the streets walking, doing shopping.

As I approached Santo Domingo I began to see more people, and hear occasional the occasional "pop!" from afar. The closer I got to Santo Domingo the more people I saw with face masks around their necks, prepared for tear gas. When I turned the corner to the planton, there were crowds of people, most looking down the hill, towards the line of police and the crowds of people who had recently marched into the city. Just then I saw an Canadian woman who is staying at the same hostel, and she looked at me, then down towards the chaos near the zocalo, and she asked "Do you know if I can get into the zocalo? I want ot get something to eat." It was surreal.

Today's march celebrated the Mexican Revolution and the National Strike called by the Zapatistas. The march was intended to be peaceful and tranquil, but nonetheless demanding the removal of URO (the corrupt governor, Ulisis Ruiz Ortiz) from power, demanding the departure of the PFP (federal police) from the city, and demanding justice for the people of the city and state.

When I arrived there was a bit of a standoff, with the police stationed about 2 blocks down the street at the entrance to the zocalo, and the people standing near a just-constructed barricade near Santo Domingo. People chanted and yelled, while the barricade was reinforced. The police occasionally shot tear gas canisters into the crowd from far away, and some police even used slingshots to shoot rocks at the people.

Alongside the new barricade there was a building being remodeled, with tall walls of corrugated metal around the construction site. After pulling and pulling and pulling the people pulled down one part of the wall and used the metal to reinforce the barricade.

Despite all of this, things were pretty calm, so I went up to the first aid station near Santo Domingo to see if there was anything I could do to help. When I arrived I saw two women sitting on a cot. The younger woman was pale, and looked very tired. Her companion explained to me that she hadn't eaten or drank much all day, hadn't been sleeping, and had been badly scared by something during the march. I sat down and talked with her, and offered some cookies I had just bought.

Her name was L, and she looked exhausted and stressed. I began to explain that I had some medicine that might help calm and relax her, and help her to gather her strength. I had trouble explaining flower essences to her, but after a moment she said "de Bach?" Hooray! She was familiar with them! I am still a little shy about offering flower essences to people, and time and time again when I offer them they are accepted with much appreciation. So bit by bit I am overcoming my own hesitation and offering medicine that can make an enormous difference for people.

So I gave her some, and she seemed to relax a bit. We sat and talked for a while, then I went across the room to talk with J, one of the people who had gone to the morgue with me the first day I was here. I returned to L and she was looking stressed again. I gave her some more Rescue Remedy and she lay down. While I rubbed her back, she fell asleep.

I headed back over to the new barricade near Santo Domingo, and found my friends there continuing the stand-off with the police. Young masked men wandered around with small rockets. Word came that there might be some trouble at the university, so I headed over there with some companeros.

After I left the Santo Domingo barricade things began to get more heated. Some people shot off rockets in the direction of the police, some even hit police. The police advanced toward Santo Domingo, shooting off tear gas directly at the crowd. Some people were hit directly and injured, how badly I do not know. I have heard (unconfirmed) that there were 11 people seriously injured.

Movement people responded with more rocks, slingshots and rockets. One friend of mine, J, saw old women (70 or 80 years old) gathering rocks to be thrown at the police. One woman commented to J, "look at all these men standing against the building watching. The women are doing the real work here."

Throughout today's events there were discussions about the use violence, and strategies for confronting the police. This is a diverse and complicated movement, with many different groups and even more different stategies. This march was planned as peaceful, but some used rockets, slingshots and rocks against the police. Did they use these weapons after tear gas was shot at the crowd? Or before? And what is the difference? Were they "violating" the plan? Who is responsible for deciding what people should and should not do? And does that obligate everyone to follow this plan? These are only some of the questions that were hotly debated today, and, I imagine, many other days.

By the time things got intense again at Santo Domingo, I had arrived at the University. Everything was calm when I arrived -- despite the rumors that the police were using the confrontation at Santo Domingo as a distraction to attack the University.

Then I ran into L, who I had helped treat earlier at Santo Domingo. She said, "I have a song for you." I sat down next her and she started clapping her hands in a syncopated rhythm, and in a soft, sweet, beautiful voice she started singing a song about the strength and power of the people fighting for justice, the beauty of the flowers, and of the valor of the fight. As she sang she became more confident, singing with great emotion and passion. Others sitting near us turned and listened. She finished, turned to me, and said "A song for you."

We sat, we ate delicious mole and green beans and tortillas, we talked about the day's events and the tear gas, the pepper spray, and which was worse. They thought pepper spray was worse, I explained the long-term bad effects of tear gas. "And hey!" I said, "I have some herbal medicine that will help your body clean itself of the tear gas." I went and prepared some bottles, not sure if they would want it, if they would actually take it. When I got back to the table where we were eating I explained the medicine, and handed it to one companero. He took a dropperful, then passed it around to everyone at the table, each person taking some. I asked one person to keep the bottle, and keep giving it to companeros, three times a day.

Emboldened, I went over to the fence guarding the Radio Universidad compound, and offered the herbal medicine. Companeros/as lined up in front of me, opened their mouths like baby birds, and I gave them dropperfuls of the herbal remedy. And then we had a discussion about who should keep the bottle of medicine, to continue to give to our fighting friends.

The young people in the movement here are so amazingly kind and sweet. They are not hardened revolutionaries. I am sure that they fight like hell when they have to, but when they aren't fighting they are laughing, dancing, singing, playing soccer in front of the Radio Station, telling stories and debating philosophy.

So, that is all for today. Tomorrow, who knows what will happen?

Please hold the people of Oaxaca, and all those struggling for justice and dignity, in your hearts.

Cuidense,
Xochitl

If you don't want to receive these emails, or if you or someone you know should receive them directly (maybe you get them from a listserv...) please contact me.

Also, if you would like to donate money or medical supplies, we are working on a way to make this work. Please contact me about that too.

Here's the second from Jill Irene Friedburg:

i was there with the march when the first gases were fired), the part about the PFP responding to insults and yelling ain't quite how it happened. Infact, like it or not, the PFP responded to a fairly rowdy bunch of fellas who came well prepared with slingshots and rocks, and from where I stood, the kids launched the first blow. I saw rocks flying at the PFP and knew the gas would come shortly afterwards, as it did.

this felt different to me than the Nov 2nd stand-off at the University. In that case, the police were clearly advancing towards the university, and folks had to come out and defend the radio, as well as university autonomy. Today, there wasn't anything to defend. The PFP weren't on the offensive. Had the march passed by without incident, they probably would have just kept standing there. Or maybe not. Maybe it was only a matter of time before the PFP lost their temper. Yesterday they sprayed the women's street theater with chile water, and a few days before they gassed a teachers' march when a couple of folks threw plastic bottles. But the important distinction is that, in both those cases, the victims of the PFP agression responded by organizing themselves quickly and moving on, not by firing back. The movement had made a democratic decision not to physically confront the PFP, and folks stuck to that, even though they were real damn mad that the PFP gassed and sprayed them. They came away with the moral highground.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not defending the PFP. We all know that a few thousand riot cops with helicopters, water tanks, and high-powered fire arms don't need to react to a handful of chavos with slingshots. They are well-armored, with shields and helmets. They could have just stood there and waited for the kids with rocks to get bored and go away. But they are waiting for a provocation. Especially after three weeks of pretty limited "action." And I'm fairly certain that the kids with rocks knew what reaction they'd get too. Maybe they were porros actually sent to provoke a smackdown or maybe they were just kids looking for some action and (understandably) mad at the PFP. The results are the same...a bunch of people got injured, and an unconfirmed number of people were detained. Other people who had come in the march with their toddlers and their elderly mothers were there, not throwing rocks, and they got a good dose of gas too.

Very few people want the PFP in Oaxaca. Every day that they are here, the anger over their presence grows, and to be honest, I don't really blame the kids for being so mad that they decide to launch rocks at the PFP. But it's a tricky scenario when the movement has made a democratic decision not to physically confront the PFP, and then a small group of folks decide to do it anyway and everyone pays the consequences. The PFP almost took Santo Domingo, and I don't think anyone in the movement wants that to happen.

The root of the problem is that the PFP is in Oaxaca at all. If they weren't here, none of this would have happened.

But just wanted to set the record straight for whatever it's worth. The indymedia account, in my opinion, left some things out, and it's important, i think, to get the whole story.

Jill

[mike_c]

1. this is an amazing stuggle that could become a model...

...for resistance in the United States.