"While Monday’s ill-considered refusal was only enacted by a particular group of students, the administration’s desire to make their pain universal has worked. Thanks to Monday’s batons, surgical gloves, courage, and flashing cameras, the refusal of a few has begun sparking latent frustrations within the entire student body. It is up to those interested in the emergence of a genuine ‘student movement’ to nurture and channel this frustration respectfully and responsibly. We have an opening. Let’s use it."

Ill-considered? Lots of time went into the decision--to resist the administration's attempt to break up the community at night.

Does anyone dispute these facts? They are my understanding of what happened, as a Free Radio Santa Cruz programer on the scene who broadcast events that night and subsequently.

Tent U participants under threat from University administrators held an afternoon-long direct democracy session open to all participants.

After hours of discussion in a facilitated dialogue systematically infiltrated with UC administrators, they made a consensus decision to spend the night in a space accessible to the community.

Around 9:30 PM police from at least three jurisdictions arrived and announced a bogus "unlawful assembly". They vandalized tents, brutalized peaceful people with dangerous pressure holds on the neck in what was clearly an attempt to terrorize them into leaving, and struck some with batons. Those targeted were seated on the ground, determined to assert their First Amendment rights. Up to the present time, administration spokespeople have misrepresented these and other facts and decliend to be transparent or accountable for what happened.

This outrageous and selective behavior (no one else other than those seated were accused of "illegal assembly") provoked outrage, curiousity, and wonder throughout the campus and the city. More and more people began to show up and express their anger (again, non-violently though loudly).

This simple fact of people power and the spreading anger was more responsible than any subsequent negotiation for the decision of the administration to stop the arrests and withdraw the police. The police presence was radicalizing the campus.

At the same time, a small group of negotiators (reportedly from Students Against War) arranged a deal in violation of the previously arrived at consensus. Instead of supporting the participant victory or even taking their decision to the assembly there, the decision was made that Tent U participants would leave for the Quarry (this time with the administration allowing non-students to go as well if escorted).

Concerned about the fate of those arrested, a significant number (40-100) participants and organizers left to go to the jail to be in solidarity with those being held inside downtown.

The leadership generally urged and facilitated the backroom decision to abandon nighttime camping at the base of campus, with the exception of a small number of tent caretakers.

Tent University participants never resumed the proposed 24-hour open community at the base of the campus that had originally been planned and agreed upon. In the following days, there were direct democracy discussions, held under the shadow of the April 18th police action, that decided to move night-time camping to the Quarry.

The victory won on the evening of April 18th was abandoned within minutes, but its ramifications continue to reverberate. The community responded to dedicated peaceful sustained resistance to illegitimate authority with massive support. The administration, exposed as brutal and unreasonable, backed down. That lesson stands. It cannot truly be forgotten or obscured. "The people united will never be defeated"--unless they themselves surrender.