Last night on my new favorite PBS show, About Us, we watched 30 Frames a Second, a documentary about the WTO riots in Seattle. There wasn’t really much of a takeaway from that for me because, after all, I was here for it. Watching this film did bring it all back, it totally encapsulated the chaos of the event, even though the film didn’t reflect my experience.
I was working in Pioneer Square the week of the WTO. My friend L. was working just north of Pike Place Market. We both lived on Capitol Hill (where I still live) at the time, L. just across the I-5 bridge; I’d just moved into my place off 15th. We both traversed downtown at some point on our way to or from work.
Here are some of the things I remember about the WTO riots.
Every night at about 7, L. would call me and ask me how he should get home. I’d look at the TV and tell him where the riots and the blockades were and then suggest a way he could walk home safely.
Two clips on the news: One, a guy in one of those sea turtle costumes, being beaten by riot cops. Another, a 50s guy in a leather jacket, harassed by cops, yelling at them, “I’m just trying to get HOME! I LIVE HERE!”
The smell of tear gas in the streets every morning as I walked through the abandoned streets of downtown Seattle.
Lying in bed late at night when the worst of the riots were taking place. I was at my house and I could hear the rubber bullet guns firing, I could hear the helicopters, I could hear the shouting.
In Westlake Plaza, a van delivering box lunches to riot cops in full gear. More riot cops standing on every corner of First Avenue.
Wondering what would happen to the locked-out low-wage employees that pulled coffee and worked the mall stores. Wondering who would compensate them for their lost wages. Wondering what would happen to my lost wages on the day our building was in lockdown and I couldn’t go to work.
Feeling furious upon hearing from some privileged European that she’d be “the first one to throw a garbage can through a Starbucks window” if she’d been here at the time.
Feeling furious at the police profiling of rioters, which fit me, L, many of my friends, many of my neighbors, many people who were peacefully protesting the WTO.
Feeling furious that every night, the police would force the violent protests out of downtown, which was empty, up to my neighborhood, which is the highest-density populated neighborhood in the city.
Feeling furious at the violent thugs who hijacked the protests to turn them into an anarchist free for all.
Feeling furious at the governor for declaring martial law and curfew in my city.
Feeling furious.
After the film was over, J. said that we’d already forgotten the lessons of the WTO — the collective American we, not the we at my house. I said there’s no way anyone who was here could forget, but that I was disappointed that we didn’t turn out in the same numbers after the theft of the 2000 election.
While I was on my way to work this morning, I heard a story about how the courts had overturned a ruling and agreed that the police did indeed use excessive force during the riots. I don’t really have a point here. I was just remembering what it was like that November. It was cold, I remember that too. I wore a big sweater and a hat and whenever I walked through downtown, wrapped my scarf around my nose and mouth to keep out the smell of tear gas.