Pepper Spray Cop

2011

Date: 18 November 2011 · Place: University of California, Davis, Quad · Figures: Lieutenant John Pike, UC Davis Police · Linda P.B. Katehi, UC Davis chancellor at the time · Thomas K. Fowler, student videographer · Tags: Protest Image, Photoshop Cycle, Occupy 01. A Casual Walk Down A Line Of Seated Students On 18 November 2011 Lieutenant John Pike of the UC Davis Police walks down a line of seated Occupy protesters on the campus Quad in Davis, California, and discharges a canister of MK-9 pepper spray into their faces at point-blank range. Thomas K. Fowler and others film the scene from multiple angles. The video circulates within hours. The image of Pike, casual and unbothered, becomes the visual emblem of the Occupy movement's confrontation with institutional violence. 02. The Photoshop Cycle Within days Pike is composited into hundreds of historical and pop-culture scenes: spraying the seated subjects of Seurat's Sunday Afternoon, spraying the U.S. Constitution, spraying the dove from Picasso's Guernica. The composite cycle is a sustained collective political photoshop event. Pike sues UC Davis for workers' compensation and is awarded 38,000 dollars in 2013. UC Davis later pays 175,000 dollars to a public-relations firm to scrub the lieutenant's name from search results. The cover-up is itself reported and amplifies the original artifact. Sources • KnowYourMeme, 'Casually Pepper Spray Everything Cop' • Thomas K. Fowler, original video (18 November 2011) • The Sacramento Bee, 'UC Davis paid $175,000 to scrub pepper-spray references' (14 April 2016)