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Events and Mass Protests Planned for RNC
by Andrew KennisA plethora of different coalitions and groups have been meeting for months to organize protests, alternative conferences and a whole slew of other events slated to take place during the Republican National Convention (RNC), which will be meeting for the first time in the Republican party’s history in New York City come this September.
Traditionally, the RNC has met during August and sometimes as early as July (as was the case in the last convention, which began in July in Philadelphia). But this year the party decided to purposefully back up its date to coincide with the anniversary of the September 11th attacks, a move that has considerably raised the ire of activist groups and community organizations alike.
Different estimates have been thrown out in terms of expected turnout ranging from 500,000 to a million.
United for Peace and Justice, a non-profit group that has been active in opposition to the war and Bush administration policies in general, is part of the many groups and coalitions that are coming together to plan protests during the RNC. UFPJ has about 800 groups and coalitions under its belt.
“A big part of our message is to link Bush’s war abroad with his war against the people at home,” said Beka Economopoulos, 29, who began working with UFPJ last spring and is one of six full time paid staff.
Unlike the general opposition to both parties during protests that were held at both major party’s conventions and the consistent message at the protests that neither party represents the American people, Economopoulos explained this time will be different.
“We’re going to be at the DNC as well, because we don’t really see any party representing ordinary working people. But many other groups won’t, there’s no cohesive message here as to whether to oppose just the Republicans or both the Republicans and the Democrats. Instead, there’s a wide variety of viewpoints that are being expressed and it’s actually inspiring to see folks who disagree working together so well.”
Other groups and coalitions organizing against the RNC include the Still We Rise Coalition, which is a coalition of community organizations (working on homelessness, housing, etc.) and the people of color network (including Critical Resistance). Not in Our Name, a mass coalition, put out a call for a million people to come to the streets during the day of the inauguration on the 2nd.A number of creative groups are organizing against the RNC as well, including Billionaires for Bush, a satirical group that dresses up in fancy clothes so as to mock Bush’s support for the wealthy. ‘Bill M. Moore,’ one of the members of the group, said that, “we just want to bring humor in to make a political point.” Jason Jones, of the No RNC Arts in Action Working group said that, “we’re trying to art activism much more than a decorative thing this time, and instead, we’d like to infuse an avenue of expression reflecting the general will of ordinary people of New York.”
Many groups and unaffiliated individuals attend RNC clearinghouse meetings at St. Mark’s Church (the next meeting is on the 11th). They can plug into any number of working groups where they will find other unaffiliated individuals and representatives from a variety of community organizations.Contact information for the different working groups can be found at:
http://www.rncnotwelcome.org/clearinghouse.htmlThe author of the article attended the protests against the Republican National Convention in 1999. He was arrested on the sidewalk while reporting for the Independent Media Center and spent five days in jail. All charges were dropped in his ensuing case. He can be reached at Andrew@riseup.net.