There is the case of police abruptly cracking down on a protest to silence it, as happens in many parts of the world less free than the United States. Then there is the case of a group intentionally provoking law enforcement officers into making arrests in order to make a newsworthy scene. What happened during the early hours of Tuesday morning was the latter.
The arrest of over 100 Occupy Boston protesters two nights ago emerged as worldwide news, which was exactly the organizers' goal.
Boston Mayor Thomas Menino made his point succinctly in the Boston Globe yesterday, saying, "I agree with them on the issues. Foreclosure. Corporate greed. These are issues I've been working on my entire career. But you can't tie up a city."
We at the Daily agree: The causes the protesters were advocating for were entirely valid, and most importantly, they have a First Amendment right to assemble. However, they do not have the right to "tie up" the city by disturbing public order.
The arrests were overtly provoked. Protesters decided they had outgrown their Dewey Square site. They chose to expand from their original staging ground to an adjacent part of the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway, which had recently undergone a $150,000 landscaping project.
When the police began to arrest protesters around 1:20 a.m., they did not do so unexpectedly. Police had requested that protesters return to the original Dewey Square site for several hours before moving in, and officers also issued leaflets warning protesters not to occupy the Greenway. In response to these requests, Occupy Boston on its website called for more people to join the movement "as soon as possible."
Organizers were inviting a clash with police by disobeying a clear order to move back to the original protest site. When they invited more people to join them in disobeying the law, they knew exactly what was going to happen: Large numbers of people — 141 as of 7:00 p.m. last night, to be exact — were going to be arrested, the arrests were going to occur in front of cameras and the event was going to make headlines.
Law enforcement officials have already been gracious in allowing protesters to occupy Dewey Square for weeks and will continue to allow them to do so, according to Menino.
However, if the protesters continue to disobey clear warnings, they'll be arrested, and they'll have no one but themselves to blame.
