Occupy Melbourne ‘Tent Monster’ Stripped Down To Her Underwear In Park By Police

VIDEO

by Nando Di Fino | 8:32 am, December 6th, 2011

» 17 comments

Occupy Melbourne popped up on the national radar this week with their “Tent Monsters” — a group of protesters who re-worked tents as clothing in a Transformers-y kind of way: As police approached what looked like tents to remove them from the grounds, heads and arms popped out and about four protesters began running around the police, gleefully mocking them. They eventually followed the police out of the park and onto the sidewalk, openly antagonizing them as they went along.

On Tuesday in Australia, the protesters were told that they would no longer be able to wear the tents as clothing. According to Wayne Flower of The Herald Sun, they were even given time to prepare for the tent removal:

Police said they advised protesters that if they chose not to wear clothes under the tents, they would be given reasonable time to dress before the structures were seized.

‘Three of the four protesters co-operated and evacuated their tents. The fourth, a female, refused to comply with direction,’ police said.

That woman, identified so far only as “Sarah,” was then stripped of her tent by police — one policewoman had a knife, according to Flower — and left in the park in her underwear as police walked away with her tent.

One of her fellow protesters captured video of the incident. Sarah says several times as the police are dismantling her tent that she considers what the police are doing as a sexual assault and that it’s not consensual (Flower notes that an investigation is now open). She notes that she is naked underneath. As the dismantling is going on, the man videotaping screams “Shame!” over and over at the police.

So, the question arises: Is this an annoying protester who was given plenty of warning to take the tent off simply overreacting? Or an antagonized police force unnecessarily stripping a woman to her underwear in a park? Video of the incident (with lots of screaming, salty language, and woman in her underwear, so proceed with caution) can be found below, via Diane Sweet of Crooks and Liars:

Occupy Melbourne, OWS, Tent Monster

Pablo

Meanwhile, Occupy Baltimore gets all stabby.
Pablo

Sarah says several times as the police are dismantling her tent that she
considers what the police are doing as a sexual assault and that it’s
not consensual (Flower notes that an investigation is now open).

Sarah is demented. These people are just dying to be victimized.

Or an antagonized police force unnecessarily stripping a woman to her underwear in a park?

She got exactly what she was looking for.
Anonymous

where is that tea party huh?

2012–looks like we may have quite the turnout~
Pablo

Are you counting the felons, joe?
http://twitter.com/sourbrains sourbrains.org

Troll harder Pablo. Troll harder buddy. Just Keep Trollin’ Just Keep Trollin’
Lurch

BRILLIANT STREET THEATER… and of course the police over react… the video and music make it the ultimate statement on the plutocracy we live in.. bravo for utube so stuff like this can get out….
Jay Hanig

I find it amazing that the guy who kept screaming “SHAME!” wasn’t tazed or gassed. The whole bunch of them should have been tossed in the klink for creating a public disturbance.

It was predictable that the tents were going to be removed. To claim that she had no idea or that she was scared doesn’t have any credibility. If she didn’t want to be exposed, she should have worn something more appropriate.

Victims? I won’t be crying for you. You brought this all on yourselves. You talk big about all the cops going to prison but none will be going. Get over it. You are toothless. We all see it.
Pablo

Well, that’s an incisive, well considered rebuttal.
Pablo

Damn that Australian plutocracy, and their tent-clothes hating ways!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Theresa-Darklady-Reed/581698361 Theresa ‘Darklady’ Reed

Yeah, we need to keep women wearing tents off the streets at any cost! What if children had seen her and thought that wearing a tent was normal and acceptable? These deviants don’t deserve liberty or freedom, because they’d just use it!

Now, a sobbing woman dumped in a park wearing only her underwear? That’s a traditional family value the world can get behind! After all, women need to know their place, right?
http://twitter.com/TheNaysayer -

And if she complied with directions, didn’t mock the police for doing
their jobs and did as the three other ‘tent monsters’ did she wouldn’t
have been ‘victimised’. She was asking for it and she got it! I bet
she’s stoked!
Tan

No, coz in Australia we respect our rights. If that man had been pepper sprayed there would have been national outrage from EVERY corner. We believe everyone is owed a fair go no matter whether we agree or disagree. There would have been an investigation and many sackings let me tell you! You’re quite the authoritarian aren’t you? Reeks of fascism coming from your post here.

Victoria Police (the ones here) are well known to be our most trigger happy and corrupt too
(all the way from it’s beginnings and behaviour while chasing down Ned Kelly 130 years ago thru to today when every so often there is a case of an unneccessary death due to police brutality) so it’s not like you were seeing just softie cops.
http://www.facebook.com/bruce.kennedy3 Bruce Kennedy

This is what I find so amazing. Police here in the U.S. would be pepper spraying everyone and arresting as many as they could get. Austrailians seem so civilized. Their police are the most civilized group of law enforcement officials I’ve ever seen. U.S. police would be cracking heads. Hats off to the Aussies, their society appears to be much more civilized than ours.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_76F7SAA3N35X4IBY5BGVQML2YM James

What if she’d stayed at home and done something constructive instead of provoking an incident that reflected her predisposed view of the police?
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_76F7SAA3N35X4IBY5BGVQML2YM James

The kind where someone wearing a tent portrays the removal of that tent as sexual assualt? That’s a sense of humor all right.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_YCMVYTNKYCUX7BS4JRATO7CWCA ThisIs

“openly antagonizing them” ? You are such a great journalist aren’t you!
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_YCMVYTNKYCUX7BS4JRATO7CWCA ThisIs

Yeah, but unfortunately we dont have: A Bill Of Rights, or a Right To Silence in court. Our constitution is a tiny document, about the thickness of a thick advertising flyer, eg. one you might get from your insurance company. And any and all attempts to upset the status quo here generally fall on deaf ears, whereas over there you will receive a groundswell.