Pagan/Wiccan police ask for tolerance at Occupy protests.

[Anymouse]

From the Officers of Avalon ( http://www.officersofavalon.com , a pagan and Wiccan fraternal, educational, and chartiable organisation of first-responders - police, fire, and EMTs), who note a rising anti-police tone on various pagan and Wiccan blogs about the Occupy protests.

Retrieved from Pagan Centered Podcast ( http://www.imbleedingprofusely.com ), a pagan-centered comedy broadcast and blog. (The podcast is a real hoot, I still listen to it even though I've deconverted; it is perhaps funnier being a former Wiccan.)

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Officers of Avalon

PRESS RELEASE

November 19, 2011

Over the past several days the membership of Officers of Avalon has become highly concerned with both the images of police actions at Occupy sites and the discussion within the Pagan community about theseevents. This leaves the organization in the precarious situation of having to find a way to support freedom of expression, arguably a Pagan value, and also support our fellow officers.

For most of the last two months police and the Occupy movement has coexisted in a mostly peaceable atmosphere. Over the last week political leaders across the country made decisions to confront the protesters by directing police departments to enforce curfew, sanitation and nuisance laws. This has resulted in confrontations where a few officers have crossed the line and used unreasonable force. Let us state clearly, Officers Of Avalon believes that the use of excessive force on peaceable protesters is a violation of the rights of protesters, clearly immoral and in extreme cases felonious.

That being said, we are highly concerned that much of the discourse within the Pagan community has become “Anti Police”. The vast majority of police officers in this country are middle class, hardworking, honest and interested serving the public in any way they can. As a group, police officers have also experienced the economic instability, uneven distribution of wealth and severe reduction of opportunity that the current economic situation has caused.

It is not the police who are the enemy of this movement. Many officers in fact support the Occupy movement. Certainly, Pagan police officers clearly support the rights of the protesters to openly express themselves. Holding local officers accountable for the decisions of politicians is both unreasonable and illogical. It is no more reasonable than blaming your local bank teller for the actions of their CEO’s on Wall Street.

Officers of Avalon would clearly like to se a more substantive debate around recent police actions. An example of this is noted in the following passage from a recent Democracy Now report:

"There are many compassionate, decent, competent police officers who do a terrific job day in and day out. There are others who are, quote, 'bad apples.' What both of them have in common is that they 'occupy,' as it were, a system, a structure that itself is rotten. And I am talking about the paramilitary bureaucracy."

While Officers Of Avalon takes no stand on the validity of such positions we do applaud the tone that does not vilify the police and leads to real debate.

We call on the community to continue to support your Pagan first responders and not participate in the unnecessary and wrongful vilification of an entire profession based on the actions of a few.

For the
Board of OoA,

Peter Dybing

President

Officers of Avalon

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-James.
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence, than it does knowledge." - Charles Darwin, English naturalist, 1809-1882.