Arrest leads to Rainbow riot
- added July 6, 2008
- 50 responses
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- Ogmin
- added this
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WYOMING - U.S. Forest Service officers pointed weapons at children and fired rubber bullets and pepper spray balls at Rainbow Family members while making arrests Thursday evening, according to witnesses.
According to the NYT, the American Civil Liberties Union said on Saturday that it would investigate the actions of federal officers who had arrested five members of the Rainbow Family in western Wyoming during the group’s annual gathering.
The federal Forest Service said a mob of about 400 members of the Rainbow Family, a group of hippie types and eccentrics who hold a weeklong national gathering on public land each year, threw rocks and sticks at Forest Service officers who tried to arrest a member of the group. The agency would not give a reason for the original arrest.
About 60 federal and local officers responded, Forest Service officials said, and fired pepper balls — pellets that disperse a pepper solution — at the crowd.
As many as 7,000 members of the Rainbow Family camped out this year on Forest Service land.
Linda Burt, executive director of the A.C.L.U.’s Wyoming affiliate, said on Saturday that the organization planned to accept collect calls from Rainbow Family members for the next two weeks to hear their version of events.
According to the NYT, the American Civil Liberties Union said on Saturday that it would investigate the actions of federal officers who had arrested five members of the Rainbow Family in western Wyoming during the group’s annual gathering.
The federal Forest Service said a mob of about 400 members of the Rainbow Family, a group of hippie types and eccentrics who hold a weeklong national gathering on public land each year, threw rocks and sticks at Forest Service officers who tried to arrest a member of the group. The agency would not give a reason for the original arrest.
About 60 federal and local officers responded, Forest Service officials said, and fired pepper balls — pellets that disperse a pepper solution — at the crowd.
As many as 7,000 members of the Rainbow Family camped out this year on Forest Service land.
Linda Burt, executive director of the A.C.L.U.’s Wyoming affiliate, said on Saturday that the organization planned to accept collect calls from Rainbow Family members for the next two weeks to hear their version of events.
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Just like our "legal (police state) system" to break up FREE GATHERING and anything that could lead to free thought or anti government sentiments.
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- ItzJuneBuggzJaM
- 2 months ago
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The confrontations just seem to get worse every year.
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Well, God bless America. We get a step closer to dictatorships and gestapo's every time an incident such as this goes uncontested.
"The stars are going out and the stripes are getting bent." -
lets hope our right to impeach isn't gone before we can use it.
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They were "hippie types." Said right there in black and white. I bet they were all high and had LSD on their breath.
If these brave storm-troopers were there at the original Woodstock, I bet there would have been no dancing in the mud!
We need to give more power to our Government to protect our agencies, government, mega-churches and corporations from people who are limiting their activities to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. -
This type of thing is happening more and more and it really disturbs me.
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- Ayahuasca2012
- 2 months ago
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I hope nobody was seriously hurt and that this doesn't effect these peacful gatherings from going on in the future.
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- squidteeth
- 2 months ago
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ogmin you rock! great stories..
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First of all, no one can comment without knowing the reason for the original arrest...what is the full story? Second of all the Forest Service is not a jaded militia after eccentric hippie types. 400 people is a lot, maybe the end up destroying some of the public property. Also, just because they are "hippie" types does not mean that they are unable to commit crimes. However, if indeed there were rubber bullets shot at kids...that's pretty disturbing and it seems as thought the forest department needs better training in handling this particular event.
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http://www.fs.fed.us/contactus/#email
I'm sure there's a better way of contacting them, but this is one way to let the US Forest Service know that this kind of action against a peaceful community and their families is unacceptable.-
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- squidteeth
- 2 months ago
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This is pretty lame, who knows what these hippies did.
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Here in SoCal we have drum circles, that I believe the Rainbow Family organizes, and last time I heard they've been getting raided by cops.
"closing of places of entertainment... all cinemas, theaters and other places of entertainment are to be closed immediately until further notice...
sports gatherings and all gatherings for purposes of entertainment or amusement, whether outdoor or indoor, which involves large numbers congregating together, are prohibited until further notice.
this refers especially to gatherings for purposes of entertainment. people are requested not to crowd together unnecessarily in any circumstances... "-
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- intercitty
- 2 months ago
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Historically, "Hippie Types" have never been treated peacefully by law enforcement as they are seen as promoting lawlessness in mass gatherings.
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yes well if you believe in free speech it does not exist in this country,
I myself was arrested for blocking the sidewalk with flowers in San Francisco and arrested in sprould plaza in Berkeley on top of the circle that states
"this space and the airspace extending above it shall not be a part of any nation nor be subject to any entities jurisdiction"
that placard commemorates the free speech movement in Berkeley ca in memory of Mario Savio
free speech does not exist we must demand it back...
“There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part, you can’t even passively take part, and you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop! And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!” -
Dr. King told us, "One who condones evil is just as guilty as the one who perpetrates it."
And "Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality."
Stand up against police state brutality perpertrated against everyone, even people with whom you disagree, or there may be no one to stand up when your rights are taken. -
well i mean yeah it seems totallly unfair to get them off your back when they blatantly disobey authority and cause harm to people trying to do their job. i wish i could have been there to throw rocks at rangers! terrible showing of those who share views with me, not helping us gain positive light.
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At best this is an impartial account of police brutality and at its worst its pure sensationalism. Until the particulars are reported I’m not going to take a side. I can say the mob mentality coupled with illicit drug use and understaffed, over zealous cops is always going to make for a bad situation.
Truth be told though, if you plan on celebrating your culture en masse, without permit and tagged as “hippies” you should probably be on your best behavior. Or you should at least be smart enough or man/woman enough to not run from the cops when you break the law. -
if this particular gathering posed an environmental threat which the forest service attempted to contain , then i'm with the forest service on this one - if this incident happened for any other reason , i'm against the forest service .
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Does anyone else find it really creepy the way that guy is looking at the naked kid?
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I just want to say hippie.
"HIPPIE"
Thank you. =) -
I've been to 10 to 15 Rainbow gatherings. All around the world even. They are very beautiful and have had a profound effect on my life. I'm sad that this happens.
Since around 1971 the rainbow family has gathered in OUR national forests. A prayer for PEACE on the 4th, silence till noon when the children come singing...
Lots of love, and positivity... As we know our govn't is anti-peace. They don't practice it or want the American people to buy into it ...
It's real guys, people are being killed. Most of us stand to the sidelines ... Will you do something to help????????????? -
I heard it all started over a confiscated hackysack.
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WHY couldn't law enforcement leave the hippies alone from the start & let them do their thing?! If the police were needed then ok, great that's what they should do, but there was no reason given for the initial arrest. Did the police just have it out for the hippies this year?
And, You do not shoot pepper pellets at hippies! It seems that the Rainbow Family was attacked by these 60 law enforcement officials with pepper guns. Of course they threw rocks and twigs in defense! Did anyone pull out a gun? Maybe its because im from Colorado, but this should never have happened, something isn't right here.
Hippies & Cops - are polar opposites, if they stay away from each other, then everything will be ok!!! -
I lived in Douglas County Oregon the year the Rainbow Family held their gathering there. I don't remember any problems at all. It was said one group went to a Laundromat to do laundry and only had the clothes they were wearing? I don't know if that is true or not. It was a huge gathering in the National Forest. They came did their thing, bothered no one, I'm sure smoked a little marijuana, made a little music, cleaned up any mess they made, reseeded with native grasses where they had been and left. Gave us something to talk about for a long time. I'd rather see them come to my town than Blackwater.
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the forest servicemen were attacked for doing their duty. the appropriate response was ordered and carried out. no more no less. riot control is nothing to gawk at and is taken very seriously
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Dick Cheney calls Wyoming home, no wonder the cowboy conservatives have adopted his martial law aspirations. I guess, Yellowstone is not in a "free speach zone". This whole episode is shameful. Who picks on hippies?? Seriously!?! Why don't they take those rubber bullets a few miles north in to Idaho or Montana and find a Freeman compound?? Oh yeah, I forgot, they'll shoot back!!
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Don't throw sticks and rocks. Really?
Is that less violent than shooting someone? Not really since it uses the same tone of aggression. It's just less injurious.
What happened to peace and love? Guess they don't have that as much as those that were the true hippies.
And as for the police and their idiotic notion of what they can do....those minority police persons that have egos surely make it bad for everyone else. -
Rainbow Gatherings and the "Rainbow Family of Living Light" are an expression of a Utopian impulse, combined with bohemianism and hippie culture, with roots clearly traceable to the 1960s counterculture. Mainstream society is viewed as "Babylon," connoting the participants' widely held belief that modern lifestyles and systems of government are unhealthy and out of harmony with the natural systems of planet Earth.
"When the earth is ravaged and the animals are dying, a new tribe of people shall come unto the earth from many colors, classes, creeds, and who by their actions and deeds shall make the earth green again. They will be known as the warriors of the Rainbow" -- Old Native American Prophecy -
Sad to read the "law and order" sound bites from the young people on current who parrot the Neo-Con propaganda line and think the order of the police state the U.S. has become is okay to control people with different believes and lifestyles like Hippies and Mormons.
Hopeful to read the wise words of the young people who see the threat of police state control in America and stand up for the Rainbow Family's right of peaceful assembly as free people. -
Part of Bush's last stand. I fear he'll pull something like Putin did to stay in power, or worse, declare marshall law! These things are on the books, in our laws!
It scares the crap out of me.
Some rights upheld, while others are trampled!
Stand UP!-
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- macdontcare
- 1 month ago
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Hippie!
To all you duds who can't dig it, up yours.
The revolution started forty years ago, is still with us and is ongoing, lots of work still to be done, just look at the filthy mess that Turtle Island is in!-
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- AntiFacistCanuck
- 1 month ago
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The armed militia was obviously using the "Sticks & stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me defense" against the children, giving them the right to shoot. It's all part of the current administration's expanded powers to safeguard its citizens-duh.
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- darkhorsejim
- 1 month ago
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i was once a dead-head , and i've been to many rainbow gatherings , in addition to having lived on communes at times - i'm all about the values rainbow gatherings represent , but i've also been to enough of them to have witnessed firsthand that not all the attendees pack out their trash - and when you have thousands of human beings in one place it means a lot of poop . the environment comes first for me .
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John Twiss has been placed in the position of chief of the law enforcement for Nat'l forest service for 3 years. and for those three years the harassment at the gathering has increased a lot.
my wasbund witnessed the police arresting someone in kid village. people called "fire in kid village" which is a call for any kind of help needed, about 400 people began running from main circle to kid village in response to find the police massed there with automatic weapons and they began firing randomly into the crowd, even at people on their knees asking them the stop, they shot them.
the police insited a riot and unfortunutely it almost worked. we'll be more prepared next year with a lot of non violent communication workshops and civil disobedience training.
