Police pepper-spray students at UC Davis

It’s beginning again.

Yesterday UC Davis police pepper-sprayed students who were sitting on the ground protesting hikes in student fees. They also pointed guns at students. To anyone who was around in the Sixties and early Seventies, there is a sense of déjà vu about this. It is striking how quickly the political lines are hardening and how little the authorities have learnt from what happened last time. UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi, who ordered the police to clear the protesters and who defended the police actions was born in Greece in 1954. I have to wonder how familiar she is with events like Kent State and the need for restraint in situations like this. She isn’t backing down.

In the greater scheme of things, this was a minor event, but similar events have occurred in Portland and in cities where the Occupy Movement has been broken up forcibly and we have seen arrests at UCLA and protests at CSUN. But in the case of UC Davis, it seems like a clear case of excessive force. Just for the record, in addition to the First Amendment, the constitution protects us from unreasonable force. Last month the U.S. Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit found in two cases that police use of stun guns was excessive and it is hard to see how pepper spray directed into sitting protesters’ faces is any different. KCRA reported that one student had to leave in an ambulance with chemical burns. Worse, the pepper spray escalated the situation dramatically and the police were then encircled by hundreds of hostile students and forced to withdraw. This is dangerous stuff and it remains to be seen if the officers will be disciplined (for stupidity) and if the order came from higher up (what was Katehi thinking?). It will end up in the courts.

Will Los Angeles campuses see violence too?

I know that many police officers are assaulted in the line of duty and some are killed, often handling routine matters, but I have also seen plenty of examples of police harassment and abuse of power. Smart policing is about defusing tense situations, not escalating them. In the end, responsibility rests with the UC authorities and I hope they are learning from this PR disaster that such actions make the job of the police much harder. In the case of the students, they are being mocked online as spoiled rich kids and it is true that many are shocked when police turn violent, but it always has been the case that middle class kids start out naïve but they learn quickly. Now the Chancellor, police chief and the pepper sprayer are under attack (non-violently) via Twitter, Facebook, email, voicemail, Wikipedia vandalism and viral videos. At least that’s different from the Sixties.

I could make the case that students will play a major role in the political and economic upheavals that lie ahead and they will be smarter for having seen the over-reaction from authorities. They will have to confront the federalization of the police force by the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the Justice Department under the Patriot Act. A better point to make, though, is that students represent a society’s idealism; they are the canary in the coalmine. If things are going wrong with a nation’s young people, then the older generation might want to look in the mirror for an answer.

Photo: frame grab from a video shot by a student who wishes to remain anonymous.