Arrest for Getting Out the Message at CCNY, and Outrage

May 20, 2016 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

Early on the morning of May 17, two young women in the NYC Revolution Club were arrested getting out the message Time To Get Organized for an ACTUAL Revolution: Message from the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA at City College of New York (CCNY)!

These young Revolution Club members were taking out a message that begins: “The Revolutionary Communist Party IS ORGANIZING NOW TO OVERTHROW THIS SYSTEM AT THE SOONEST POSSIBLE TIME. Preparing to lead an actual revolution to bring about a radically new and better society: the New Socialist Republic in North America.” It poses the problem—this system; the solution—revolution; and the leadership—Bob Avakian (BA), the leader of the RCP. As the message says "BA's leadership is a huge strength for the revolution: to follow, to learn from, to defend. " And the message gave people ways to move today to Prepare the ground, prepare the people and prepare the vanguard for the time when millions can be led in the all-out struggle for power.

They were accosted by someone who identified himself as a maintenance supervisor and told them he didn’t like the content of the message, claiming that nobody wanted to hear this, and that he would tear it down wherever he found it on campus (revealing that he wasn't really that confident that no one would want to hear the message). Immediately afterwards, the two were detained by campus police who turned them over to the NYPD. They were arrested and charged with criminal misdemeanor trespassing—a serious charge with a possible sentence of 90 days in jail. They were detained at a precinct station, and then transported down to the “Tombs”–the holding jail for people being arraigned in Manhattan.

That they were charged with criminal trespass—and the explicit verbal harassment denouncing communism and belittling the young women—makes crystal clear that campus authorities were arresting and turning them over to the NYPD because of the message's content. It is utterly outrageous that at NYC's premier public university, people cannot freely go on campus and disseminate political literature and speak with students. It is time that students, professors, administrators, and people more broadly not accept how thoroughly this system has turned its schools into institutions of indoctrination and discipline. They must not accept how the terms of what is acceptable “discourse” are being enforced, under penalty of arrest, to maintain the terrible state of the world today.

As these women were being held, other members of the Revolution Club were rallying support—including mobilizing students to express their outrage at this arrest and get deeper into the revolution themselves.

And this arrest poses sharply the need for organizing for revolution on colleges and universities, and fighting for the right of critical thinking that confronts the brutal reality and engages the solution to the horrors of today.

After being held in jail all day and night, the two women were finally arraigned just before 1 a.m. on the morning of the 18th. At that point, their case was “adjourned contemplating dismissal,” and they were finally released—but with a threat from the judge that their charges would only be dismissed, in six months, if they “stay out of trouble,” in the judge’s words, during that time.

 

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