This Is What It Felt Like to Get Arrested at Last Week’s Occupy Oakland Riots

A filmmaker at last week’s Oakland Occupy action just discovered some late night footage during which riot-geared cops charge into a crowd. “Activists are surrounded in front of the Oakland YMCA,” says Brandon Jourdan in the video’s description on YouTube. It was on January 28th, a violent night all around in the Bay Area. “Moments later police use batons on the crowd and make arrests.” The video’s not quite as jaw-dropping as those in last year’s pepper-spraying cop meme, but it sure looks like it hurt when they grabbed the one guy by the straps on his bike helmet. Somehow, hearing Jingle Bells in the background towards the end just makes the whole two-minutes haunting.

It’s hard to watch this video and not think about the increasingly visible race awareness within (and without) Occupy as a whole.

(Source: youtube.com)