Continuing Education

June 6, 2020

Schools let out early back in March due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Teachers and students worked hard to invent an online replacement on the fly and somehow managed to make it work. But this year, instead of proms and graduations to mark the completion of the school year there were rallies and marches. The killing of George Floyd by a cop in Minnesota was the last straw for millions of Americans and they hit the streets in numbers that, with a few exceptions, haven’t been seen since the Vietnam war. And now, just like then, the alliance between students and their teachers is a powerful bond.

Today that alliance was on the move downtown. After a short march past City Hall several thousand students and teachers rallied on the steps of the Tweed Courthouse on Chambers Street before marching up Broadway to Washington Square where they met up with other groups in filling the park and nearby streets. The overarching theme of this mobilization like all the others this past week, was the routine taking of black people’s lives by police who, more often than not, get away with it. But today’s mobe went deeper: activists called for defunding NYPD, reallocating those funds to unmet educational needs, ending the school to prison pipeline, expanding the curriculum to include the history of systemic racism, and to stop arresting students.

At the Tweed several student leaders spoke out on these topics and on the killing of (primarily) Black Americans by the police. Their words were greeted with enthusiasm by the marchers and by the occasional passing vehicle that honked in support. Overhead a police chopper kept an eye on the gathering but in light of the highly confrontational week we’ve had, there were few police on hand. We saw just two, on scooters.

At around 12:30 the group began its march up Broadway. Along the way several more police joined in but there wasn’t any evident tension with the marchers and they helped with traffic as the march crossed Canal Street. Passing through SoHo it was impossible not to notice the after effects of last week’s looting spree. Every business was closed – many due to the pandemic – and most were boarded up as if a hurricane was expected.

In fact a crime wave had swept through here and through midtown as well. Because it happened simultaneously with widespread protest activity it was naturally conflated into that by those generally opposed to BLM in the first place. It defies logic that any of the people who were moved to come out and demand less violence from cops would do something as certain to provoke more violence as looting and arson. More likely, these crimes were committed by opportunists who saw a chance to take a shot while PD was tied up with protest activity. Another, darker, possibility is that these acts were committed by agents provocateurs. Regardless, they hurt the cause.

Washington Square quickly filled up and overflowed onto 5th Avenue where it stretched for a few blocks. Alongside Washington Square North around 75-100 bicycle cops stood by but were not observed interacting with the protesters. As an aside, re the mask/social distancing aspect: inside the park masks were seen on the faces of approximately 100% of the protesters. They were generally closer than 6 feet apart. The NYPD bicycle brigade was nearly 100% mask-free and also within the 6 foot limit.

Based on Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren rallies that the Gazette has covered in this park with crowd estimates of 20 thousand, we estimate today’s mobilization at 20-25,000 given the park was filled to capacity and there was significant overflow onto 5th Avenue.

Notify NYC sent this alert several hours later:

Notification issued 6-6-2020 at 6:55 PM. Due to protest activity, expect traffic delays, road closures, mass transit disruptions, cancellations, delays and a heavy presence of emergency personnel in the area of the Manhattan Bridge, Brooklyn Bridge in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Participants are expected to march towards the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Consider alternate routes and allow for additional travel time.