The Tree of Life

Monday, November 21, 2011

Panoramas of crowd at #occupyucdavis

Panoramas of crowd at #occupyucdavis

Crowd growing at #occupyucdavis

Crowd growing at #occupyucdavis

Crowd growing more #occupyucdavis

p988.mov Watch on Posterous

Crowd growing more #occupyucdavis

p988.mov Watch on Posterous

Crowd growing at #occupyucdavis

Crowd growing at #occupyucdavis

Although more media than protestors

Crowds starting to gather at #ucdavis quad #occupyicdavis

Open Letter to Chancellor Katehi from Women and Gender Studies Faculty re #OccupyUCDavis

Just got pointed to this by Amy Champ. Downloaded from here.

20TH November 2011.

Open Letter to the Chancellor

Dear Chancellor Katehi,

The faculty of the Women and Gender Studies program are writing to express our deep concern regarding the unjustifiable use of gratuitous force against UC Davis students on November 18, 2011. The administration has attempted to defend its actions by characterizing them as measures taken to protect the health and safety of Davis students. We do not see how pepper spraying students demonstrates concern for their well-being.

The campus community has been asked to accept disproportionate police action in the name of safety. To encourage the acceptance of that logic, the administration raises the specter of criminalized outsiders and mentions the risk of university “liability.” We do not accept the logic that outsiders, sitting on the ground, with their arms linked to our students, are more dangerous than the persons pointing weapons at them. In fact, sitting with linked arms has a long tradition in the Black Civil Rights and pacifist movements in this country and is understood as a non-violent means of exercising free speech rights. Furthermore we reject the implicit gendered logic of vulnerability that suggests that in order to protect vulnerable women from outsiders we must stifle protest.

Esp. for those not following on twitter: real time Twitter Search Feed for #OccupyUCDavis

Email re #UCDavis Graduate Student Assembly #OccupyUCDavis

Just received this email:

A demonstration and general assembly has been called on Monday Nov 21, at Noon in the Quad in response to the use of force by police on campus. Please send this announcement to your graduate group or department list serves.

As many have seen there have been multiple demonstrations at UC Davis and other UC campuses this week. At UCD on Thursday demonstrators set up a camp on the quad where about 25 tents and 60 people stayed the night. On Friday at around noon the Chancellor issued an order that the camp be disassembled. At 3 pm officers entered the quad to disperse the camp. Pepper spray was used liberally and arrests were made. News coverage shows part of this police action: http://www.fox40.com/news/headlines/ktxl-police-make-arrests-at-occupy-uc-davis-20111118,0,1876312.story

On Saturday, the Chancellor held a press conferencehttp://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2011/11/19/uc-davis-launches-probe-after-pepper-spray-incident/ where she called for a review and students held a silent vigil as she exitedhttp://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/11/20/142562402/video-after-pepper-spraying-a-powerfully-silent-protest-at-uc-davis. This situation is attracting national and international news attention.

These events and images are shocking and we want to make sure that all graduate students are aware of steps being taken by both students and the administration in its aftermath. Please share this announcement with your departments and graduate groups. These incidents will be on the Graduate Assembly agenda for the November 30th meeting.

Thank you,
--
Graduate Student Assembly
Executive Council

Video of #OccupyUCDavis pepper spray incident w/ a little more of the "before"

Letter to Chancellor Katehi from Emilio Bruna, #UCDavis PhD from 2001 now Prof. at U. Florida #OccupyUCDavis

Another letter - this one from UC Davis Alumnus Emilio Bruna, a Prof. at University of Florida. Bruna got his PhD from Davis in 2001.

Chancellor Katehi,

I am appalled by the images of the actions taken by police against student protestors. I fear you have lost sight of what is perhaps our most important responsibility as faculty members – to teach students to think critically and become engaged and responsible citizens. If our doing so leads them to a path of peaceful civil disobedience as a means to drawing attention to a cause in which they believe, then you of all people must ensure that they have the means to both do so safely. As Chancellor the responsibility for the violence perpetrated against students by the UCDPD is ultimately yours, as is the power to help our campus community recover. I encourage you to be bold – apologize at the least, resign if you must – but act, and do so quickly.

Even in the darkest times there is hope - Fiat Lux.

Emilio Bruna
Ph.D., Center for Population Biology (2001)

_______________________________________________
Emilio M. Bruna, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Dept. of Wildlife Ecology & Conservation & Center for Latin American Studies
Associate Editor, Biotropica

Grand - Google Trends shows the link in searches between "pepper spray" and "UC Davis"

Definitely not the search engine trends UC Davis was hoping for.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

AggieTV (@AggieTV) video report on the press conference yesterday re #OccupyUCDavis

Aggie TV report on the Saturday Press Conference at UC Davis

Kudos to @AggieTV for the Scoop / Interview with #UCDavis Chancellor Katehi #OccupyUCDavis

Interview with UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi by AggieTV

Jason Bell - #UCDavis PostDoc continues his "Open Letter" re: #OccupyUCDavis incident #powerful

Text removed at the request of Jason Bell

Letter from Prof. Phil Ward to Chancellor Katehi re pepper spray incident #OccupyUCDavis

Another letter. This one from Prof. Phil Ward, ant guru from the Entomology Department. It was a follow up to the one I posted earlier from Prof. Art Shapiro.

Dear Chancellor Katehi,

I share Art Shapiro’s concerns about the damage this incident has done to UC Davis. This was the most widely read and widely shared story on BBC News online today, exceeding in “popularity” the protests in Cairo and the repeat neutrino experiment.

At a minimum I urge you to promptly assume responsibility for the police action and to offer a full, unreserved apology to the university community, as well as an assurance that there will not be a repeat of this shameful event. Beyond that there is much additional fence-mending to be done.

Respectfully,

Philip S. Ward
Professor of Entomology
Department of Entomology and
Center for Population Biology
University of California at Davis

Letter from Prof. Artyom Kopp to Chancellor Katehi re; #OccupyUCDavis Pepper Spray incident

Another open letter to the UC Davis Chancellor from a colleague. This one is from Artyom Kopp, an evo-devo guru, also in the Evolution and Ecology Department.

Dear Chancellor Katehi,

I live such a sheltered life that I was not even aware of Friday’s events until yesterday, when messages started piling up in my mailbox from students, faculty colleagues, and friends and colleagues at other universities. I did not support the student protests because I believed them to be misdirected and therefore ineffective. When I first saw references to “police brutality” at UC-Berkeley, I assumed in my cynical fashion that it was the usual attention-grabbing ploy by the protesters. I was wrong. I finally watched the videos last night and what I saw can only be described as outrageous and disgusting. Quite aside from being morally indefensible, cold-blooded use of excessive force against peaceful and essentially orderly protesters has done enormous damage to our university’s reputation and will undermine the trust between the administration, faculty, and students for a long time.

Special meeting of #UCDavis Graduate Student Association to be held Tuesday re #OccupyUCDavis

Just got forwarded this email and thought it would be worth posting. The UC Davis Graduate Student association is planning a meeting on Tuesday regarding the recent pepper spraying incident. Hope it is OK to post (one person said it was ...).
-----------------------------------------
Special Meeting of GSA Representatives

Tuesday November 22, 2011

6:00 – 7:30 p.m.

Location: TBA

There has been much activity by students, faculty and the
administration in response to the police action on campus. The GSA
executive committee met today to discuss how to develop a GSA response on behalf of graduate students. We are deeply concerned about these events and we have seen multiple calls for action from many different people and groups in response. The GSA must also respond to these events, address campus safety and bring attention to the broader concerns that have spurn demonstrations – the roll back of funding to public education and tuition hikes.

Letter from Prof. Art Shapiro to Chancellor Linda Katehi re #OccupyUCDavis

A lot of email flying around UC Davis right now. Some are from faculty who are sending copies of letters they have written to Chancellor Katehi regarding the current crisis on campus.

I am asking people if they are posting them anywhere not the web and if so I am posting links to them on Twitter. Art Shapiro a butterfly expert from the Evolution and Ecology Department sent this one around and said I could post it:
--------------------------------

Chancellor Katehi:

The image of the University of California, Davis has been damaged locally, nationally and internationally in a way that will be very difficult to repair. That was made clear to me when an old friend who is a member of the national media called me at home last night to talk about this. We talked for 20 minutes. He said --and I quote -- "This could be a game-changer, like Kent State, only thank God no one was killed!" Whatever decisions led to Friday's debacle and whoever made them, the time for mere "damage control" passed as soon as the video went viral. The video renders ludicrous the claim that the police felt threatened--by demonstrators sitting, arms linked, on the sidewalk! I have no doubt that a resolution of censure will be introduced and will pass, probably by acclamation, at an emergency meeting of the Representative Assembly of the Academic Senate.

Statement from #UCDavis Division of the Academic Senate re #OccupyUCDavis

Just got this email and thought it was worth posting/sharing:

Dear Colleagues,

The Executive Council of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate issues the following statement:

"The Executive Council, on behalf of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate, strongly supports the right of all campus citizens to assemble and protest peacefully. It is totally unacceptable to use excessive force against peaceful protesters. The UC Davis administration must assume full accountability for the actions taken on Friday, November 18, 2011. We must assure a campus environment that welcomes diverse perspectives and fosters freedom of expression. We are in full support of an investigation into recent events and a public accounting of all findings."

The Executive Council also approved the formation of a Special Committee to investigate in a thorough and timely manner the events leading to the use of force on Friday, November 18, 2011.

Finally, I am also calling a Special Meeting of the Representative Assembly.

Sincerely,
Linda Bisson
Linda F. Bisson,Chair, Davis Division of the Academic SenateProfessor, Department of Viticulture and EnologyUniversity of California, DavisDavis CA 95616

Compiling some links of interest relating to the #UCDavis Pepper Spray #OccupyUCDavis story

Links of interest in UC Davis Saga. In no particular order. Just trying to keep track of things somewhat

My posts

General stories

U.C. Davis Calls for Investigation After Pepper Spraying by Brian Stelter in the Lede Blog at the NY Times
Time Magazine "Online Furor After Police Pepper-Spray Demonstrators at UC Davis"
Alexis Madrigal on "Why I feel bad for the pepper-spraying policeman"
Daily Kos: Police pepper spray students at Occupy UC Davis, chancellor called on to resign
James Fallows at the Atlantic: bit.ly/u4f5td
AP shar.es/ogWBH
UC Davis Not an Isolated Incident, It's Part of the Culture War
With world watching, Katehi says she’ll ask for calm
The Roots of the UC-Davis pepper spraying by Glenn Greenwald at Salon

Letters to the Chancellor and/or commentary by faculty at UC Davis

Misc

Open Letter to University Presidents written by Matthew Smith wp.me/p1vTlG-my
An Open Letter to Chancellor Katehi from a UC Davis Postdoctoral Scientist
Statement from #UCDavis Division of the Academic Senate re #OccupyUCDavis
Special meeting of #UCDavis Graduate Student Association to be held Tuesday re #OccupyUCDavis
Letter to Chancellor Katehi from Emilio Bruna, #UCDavis PhD from 2001 now Prof. at U. Florida #OccupyUCDavis

Editorials

SacBee: Editorial: UC must make amends for use of excessive force
Davis Enterprise Editorial: Pepper spraying was an overreaction

Pepper Spray info from Deborah Blum: About Pepper Spray

Stories about Yudof response

Sacbee: shar.es/opRzE
Daily Cal: dailycal.org/2011/11/20/yud…

Police officers and police chief

About the Saturday Press Conference

shar.es/opABp
ow.ly/7zr31 NPR Story about Silent Treatment
boingboing.net/2011/11/19/one…
Protesters surround building, chancellor stays inside for three hours
Chancellor has safely left building
YouTube video of Katehi walk
AggieTV (@AggieTV) video report on the press conference yesterday re #OccupyUCDavis

Other Letters

Chancellor Responses and Interviews

The Chancellor's email response
Katehi call for review bit.ly/ukr81T
Kudos to @AggieTV for the Scoop / Interview with #UCDavis Chancellor Katehi #OccupyUCDavis

Stories about/by protestors

bit.ly/scfbVv - on Boing Boing

Group Pages of Interest

Local papers and Blogs

My accidental encounter with the #OccupyUCDavis crowd at #UCDavis #impressed

Well, yesterday was certainly interesting. In the morning I biked into Davis to go to the Farmer's Market to pick up some goodies. It was a spectacular fall day - crisp - clear - a bit chilly - and I great day to be on a bike.

I got to the market, wandered through the crowd and bumped into a few colleagues and friends and was a bit stunned to find out that none of them had even heard about the pepper spraying incident the day before on UC Davis Campus. Wow. It had taken over my life in a way all night - see my post about it here: A day of almost pure joy in #DavisCA and at #UCDavis, until ... #OccupyUCDavis

So I told them about the incident, and then did some shopping. It all seemed a bit surreal. I felt disconnected. So after filling up my panniers, I biked over to campus. The Quad at UC Davis - where the whole pepper spray incident had gone down - was eerily quiet.