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Policing the Police at Climate Camp

FIT Watch | 18.08.2007 18:00 | Climate Camp 2007 | Climate Chaos | Repression | London

A personal account of FIT Watch

FIT Watch was set up a couple of months ago to oppose and monitor the activities of the Forward Intelligence Teams. These are cops who routinely harass and intimidate protesters (for full background see www.fitwatch.blogspot.com). Whilst we’ve had a presence at a couple of public meetings, Climate Camp has been our first opportunity to practice our tactics in a protest situation

And it’s been working. FIT are being made to feel uncomfortable. They’ve been forced into a reactive situation and it is empowering because we have seized the initiative.

FIT Watch can be done by anyone and can be as passive or as confrontational as you wish. Here are some tactics we have found to be effective:

1. Holding large banners in front of photographers. This is particularly effective with double sheets on sticks which can block a camera from a distance. This is the least confrontational way of blocking photography.
2. Taking photos of them. They really don’t like this but it isn’t illegal. With any photos it’s always good to either try and get the cop’s number in the shot, or note it down.
3. Following the FIT. Pick a team and tail them. Turn their tactics onto them – everything time they send a text message look over their shoulder, listen to their phone conversations, look at what they’re writing in their notebooks.
4. Watch out for group huddles, especially with senior officers and go and unobtrusively stand by them. This disrupts their briefings and there’s always the possibility you might learn some useful information.
5. Upload any information gathered about the FIT to www.fitwatch.blogspot.com or email to  defycops@yahoo.co.uk
6. Put yourself physically in the way of the camera men by standing constantly in front of the camera and constantly shadowing them. This has been the most confrontational tactic used so far and has therefore been the one people have been arrested for. However it has also been possible to do this without arrest.

CAUTIONARY NOTE: ANY ACTION INVOLVING THIS LEVEL OF PROXIMITY TO FIT TEAMS MEANS THEY WILL TRY AND ENGAGE YOU IN CONVERSATION. DO NOT ANSWER THEIR QUESTIONS.

Two people have been arrested for Obstructing the police in the course of their duty this week. They were both charged and pleaded not guilty. Any witnesses should contact  defycops@yahoo.co.uk

There have been many rumours as to why the FIT teams made their incursions into camp on Tuesday night. Some people say it was a response to being pissed off with FIT Watch, others that it was a test to see how we would react. Another theory is they were trying to kick something off as shown by the presence off vans of TSG and ambulances.

However they weren’t expecting the strong response from the camp and violently pushed, kicked and hit people. A combination of strength of numbers and people willing to push them back forced them off site and people felt empowered by this victory. However it was not the non violent victory reported in many places. People rightly acted in self defence and we would not have got them off site if we had simply walked towards them with our hands in the air as has been described in some places. Some people did raise their hands, but this was only after the cops had backed off the site.

FIT Watch is working, but we need more people. The next big event is DSEi and it’d be great if people carry on the FIT Watch tactics.

FIT Watch
- e-mail: defycops@yahoo.co.uk
- Homepage: http://www.fitwatch.blogspot.com

Additions

Intimidation

18.08.2007 22:31

I came down to the camp on Tuesday night and was photographed by the FIT. I found it a troubling and intimidating experience. I did come back on Saturday and found all the FIT to be gone, replaced by police in vans reading books. Well done FIT watch.

Jim Leicester


Just for the record.

19.08.2007 02:32

I have had my video of FitWatch in action removed from Indymedia. The original article is at  http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/08/378555.html

Doug


Comments

Hide the following 2 comments

(Non) Violence

18.08.2007 21:02

Whether the eviction with the police was violent or nonviolent is a matter for debate. I think it largely rests on how one defines nonviolence. Some people in the West Bank view stone-throwing as nonviolent, which is quite understandable in their situation. On the other hand, a lot of people in the peace movement would consider stone-throwing a violent act: however, these same people are prepared to push back at police who are physically preventing them from locking-on etc.

My own view of nonviolence is that it is most fundamentally a rejection of violence as a means of social change: rather than attempting to violently overthrow the state, nonviolence would suggest that other means, such as dialogue, be used. In this sense I think that the action taken by people to prevent police coming onto the camp can be fairly classed as nonviolent: asuming, of course, that what the copper at the end of the video says (officers on the ground being kicked, etc) is not true: it didn't appear in the video, but it could have been edited out.

Jim


about non-violence

28.08.2007 14:52

I'm not at all convinced of Jim's claim that some people in the West Bank see stone-throwing, I assume at soldiers, as non-violent. Certainly, ISM that is committed to non-violence and encouraging non-violent resistance to the occupation does not throw nor condone stone-throwing. Anyway, that's pretty much an aside.

Preventing the police, and pushing them off site that day was non-violent. The copper's claim of them being kicked or punched or whatever was untrue. We didn't keep it as calm at first as I think works best, but that didn't escalate to violence, despite the police throwing hard punches etc.

jimbo


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