On Oct 25, 2024, the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) came to the campus of Emily Carr University of Art and Design to surveil a student demonstration in solidarity with people in Palestine.
Students and community members have been horrified by Israel’s militarized massacre of Palestinian people for over a year, with over 45,000 unarmed people, most commonly children, killed, and approximately two million people displaced from their homes. The police presence against unarmed students of conscience was not only an unnecessary waste of public funds and resources, but demonstrates disproportionate police targeting of racialized peoples in contrast to other issues that give rise to demonstrations. When asked why the VPD came to our campus, we were told that the police had been monitoring the students’ social media accounts. This use of surveillance to justify police mobilization is a disturbing abuse of power.
Based on photographs, it appears there were approximately 10 officers, both uniformed and under cover, deployed against about 30 art, media and design students. Since the university has not made a statement addressing how inappropriate and excessive the police presence on campus was and is, we as faculty must step up and support our students. We assert that the police surveillance of our students and of peaceful people of conscience more widely is an unacceptable act of anti-Palestinian racism.
As faculty, we are deeply disturbed by the police presence on campus, which makes all of us feel unsafe. When we say “unsafe,” we do not mean feeling uncomfortable about hearing people express opinions that we may disagree with; we mean that we feel that our physical safety is jeopardized by potentially trigger-happy police officers showing up, carrying guns and video recording students, faculty, and/or staff who are merely exercising their constitutional right to freedom of expression. The overbearing surveillance by the VPD at a peaceful protest on the university campus is an apparent show of force that is meant to intimidate people into silence about the unacceptable mass murders of our Palestinian kin and colleagues. This is why the BC Civil Liberties Association has filed a complaint regarding the police’s unacceptable use of mass surveillance against the solidarity movement with Palestine.
We feel that the zealousness of the VPD against solidarity with people experiencing a genocide endangers all students because of the way it normalizes armed force and surveillance against people of conscience. Instead of condemning the unjust military killings of thousands of people, the VPD appears to be trying to silence and intimidate those who speak up against these murders.
The purpose of universities in Canadian society is to provide a place for learning and research in which the free exchange of ideas and opinions is protected by both the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the founding principle of academic freedom. The police are fostering mistrust through their unfettered show of power against people’s exercise of basic democratic rights. We stand with students and all people of conscience speaking out against the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people by Israel, funded by American taxes and abetted by government complicity. Never again to genocide means never again for everyone.
— Faculty for Courage in Times of Occupation
