G8 Summit

This coming Thursday and Friday should be interesting around here, the G8 Summit will be hosted at Camp David and Frederick through Thurmont and Emmittsburg will see a significant increase in traffic, media and people.

They have closed the schools on Friday, but many area activities are still being held which in of themselves will bring many to the area.

The local Occupy Movement have several non-confrontational activities planned, including talks at the Frederick City Library and a ‘Block Party” planned at a large city park.

Some of the agencies at Ft. Detrick have decided to have their employees telecommute on Friday, so far for the NCI staff it is business as usual. Our program has employees who must work on Saturday; they changed some of the staffing so only people from the southern part of the county are scheduled to work that day in hopes of missing traffic issues between Frederick and Thurmont.

While the various LE agencies are fully staffed for the event, no real information on possible disruptions have been confirmed. Merchants have been advised not to have anything on the sidewalks that could be used as projectiles and to exercise caution, but other than that, it appears to be business as usual.

Our team will be on standby. Fire/Rescue stations, which in our county are all volunteer (some have career support), are being staffed, but no extraordinary plans have been made.

Most likely this will turn out to anything more than a media event, but if not I am sure things will be handled with minimal disruptions.

Time will tell-
Pete

Just occurs to me, Pete, how odd it is to be in DC and for once the commotion and gridlock will be elsewhere in the region.

I rarely go further up 270 than Germantown so this is one event that may not affect me.

Good luck to you and yours!

Thanks.

We are still trying to figure out from where significant numbers of protestors might be coming and staying, it is not like we are a big city where they could blending in with residents. Perhaps they will be gathering in Baltimore or DC and come up Thursday evening? Right now, Frederick and the surrounding areas are business as usual.

Pete

They are already in Chicago. So far they have not been much more than a very minor nuisance when they protested of at all places, the PHRASECENSOREDPOSTERSHOULDKNOWBETTER. campaign HQ.

I guess I used a dirty word.

I don't get it. Why would they protest at the [Censored] campaign HQ?

Jeanette Isabelle

Beats me. Its sort of like the Weathermen protesting the SDS.

Just goes to show there is no real way to tell where this kind of thing will lead. Best to just stay away IMO.

A lot of businesses in the area have taken that to heart and will be shut down for the worst of it. The city is still claiming that the city remains "open to business". Maybe the city is open for business but my guess is most of the businesses in the affected areas won't be.

Thank you everyone for avoiding going off on political rants with this thread. Preparing for the possibility of a riot is something worth discussing on this forum, so feel free to keep doing that.

The automatic censors are nailing a few words such as names of political parties even when the context would be allowable. Sorry about that, but it's the best we can do with free software and free labor.

Carry on.
-Blast

I know some people who are going to the protest, and I'd imagine that some people on this forum are going as well. We should keep this in mind in the interest of inclusion. I doubt they'd appreciate some of the things said in this thread. In the interest of productivity, here's a question: those people obviously can't prepare for a riot by avoidance. How should they prepare?

One could generalize this question to participating in a protest/parade of any sort that suddenly turns violent.

If just one or two people start throwing stuff, you could try to dissuade them from continuing and escalating, maybe.
If it's a large group that's having a confrontation with the police or things are just plain getting out of hand, I would try to leave the area. Get out of the main body of the group and certainly away from where the fight is going on.

I'm going with the theory that by being near the fight, you swell the perception of numbers of the group, causing the troublemakers to get bolder, the responders to think they have to respond harder (possibly catching you in the net as well) and greatly increase your odds of getting caught up in the fight. By clearing away from the fight, the troublemakers are more easily isolated and dealt with.

(Correct me where I'm wrong, I'm just trying to make my best guesses here.)

That seems very sensible to me.

Thank you.

Just a few thoughts:
Riots don't usually start without some escalation first.
Emotional-upset people make bad decisions.
Large groups of people together aren't always good for your health.

If you're at an emotionally charged event, just keep your wits about you. Funny how almost all good plans involve or require keeping your wits. Pay attention to how your group is behaving as well as any counter-protesters, third-parties, etc.
If it starts escalating, move away from the most angry parts of the group and the more tightly-packed parts. A crowd doesn't have to be angry to be bad for you, a panicked trample will be just as harmful as an angry one. Get to the edge and prepare to just leave. You may not have carried your sign as long as you wanted, but it may be time to call it a day and leave.

Edit to add: If you are older or infirm or just don't get around that well, try to avoid getting into the more tightly-packed groups to begin with, at all times, not just when things look a little dicey.

If the police are there, co-operate with them and try not to impede their progress if they move to manage traffic or confront troublemakers.

An acquaintance who is in a position to know has said that the tactic the police may use is to arrest as many protesters as they can without much regard for whether they are especially violent or not to clog up the court system so badly that the protesters cannot get bonded out for 3-5 days.

I have been told by a jail supervisor that Cook County jail is sending thousands of its prisoners to other county jails across the state to make room for the thousands of protesters planned to be arrested. The feds are paying $45 a day per prisoner for the use of the facility and are also paying for the transportation costs involved.

I still think your best bet is avoidance if indeed the police tactic is to randomly arrest protesters primarily with deliberate aim to screw up the court systems to keep people locked up as long as possible. Since the vast majority of the protesters are not violent and probably are not even committing any crimes, if they ever make it to court they will likely be released without much in the way of bond and eventually the charges will be dropped or dismissed.

Hard to imagine a "riot" in Frederick, Maryland, let alone tiny Thurmont (population 5600). They are tens of miles away from the nearest metro stop.

That's very inconvenient for protestors and reporters.

To avoid such unpleasantness from the policymaker standpoint, it was very wise to move the summit to such a remote fortress as Camp David. They're even closing Cunningham Falls State Park.

Would be so much more easy, satisfying and newsworthy to protest in DC.

As a DC resident, I hope all such future protestor-magnet gatherings will be held in remote locations.

I don't want to get into politics, or even really address any one specific protest, but:
If you are at a gathering where this is a possibility, I'll recommend avoiding it. While you may be innocent of any actual wrongdoing, getting caught up in the net in such a way that you could be severely inconvienienced for a few days is something that you may well wish to avoid. Particularly if taking 3-5 days off from your routine could be detrimental to your family (you're not there to pick up Johnny from school tomorrow?) or your employment (miss a few days of work, possibly lose your job or at least some of your vacation days?).

I've never been to a protest before in my life, but this agrees with some of the things I've been told by politically active acquaintances. While some protestors make trouble, the police sometimes seems to arrest everyone in sight, even using rough tactics. This is scary stuff, and I'm not sure there's much you can do except to get out of there and hope you can get out.

So far, the Sheriff has met with both the Occupy Frederick and Occupy Baltimore representatives, has ensured them as long as they protest in a non-confrontational manner they are more than welcome to exercise their right to free speech and assemblage in Frederick County. The Occupy Frederick group will be holding seminars on globalization at the Frederick City Library and then march to Baker Park/Culler Lake for a “Block Party” with food, bands and talks. The Occupy Baltimore group (about 30 at last we heard) will be camping on private property in the Thurmont area and plan to protest in the Thurmont area. A guy with a drone model will be displaying his model around the area. For now, it sounds like the media may outnumber the protesters and we will have some traffic congestion.

Nothing today outside the gates of Ft. Detrick. There were some reports of some guy beating a drum, marching up and down Market Street (our Main Street) in downtown Frederick for awhile. Fire/Rescue Companies were issued a Special Order yesterday, reminding everyone to keep buildings and apparatus secure, pack some extra clothing, to be courteous and non-confrontational with protestors should we encounter any and to call for LE if necessary.

Pete

The G8 Summit turned out to be a non-event for the greater Frederick area. On Friday, there was handful of protesters in Thurmont. Frederick had maybe 30 or so, mostly local individuals who held a seminar at the library and then marched to the park.

On Saturday, Frederick had nothing; Thurmont did have a number of fairly well behaving protesters, then several bus loads of individuals from the Baltimore area came to protest issues regarding conditions in Ethiopia. The LEs knew there were coming and closed off part of the Main Street to allow them an area to stage. When they disembarked the buses, local LE requested the nearby State Police Strike Team and members of the Sheriff Department to assist. For the most part, the protesters were respectful and compliant with requests from LE and even cleaned up after they were done protesting. No arrests, no injuries, no damage.

Pete

Turned out the NATO event in Chicago was mostly a non-event. Some minor nonsense, but the cops almost outnumbered the protesters. The cops behaved themselves despite some minor incitement here and there, and there were none of the nasty incidents that some may have been hoping for.

It appears that moving G8 someplace else took the wind out of the sails of the protest.