Despite Kenney’s Rittenhouse Tweets, “Toke Back the Wall” Protest Still On
Courtesy N.A. Poe
Though the battle against the Parks and Recreation Department, Friends of Rittenhouse Square, and city officials who enacted the Rittenhouse wall-sitting ban “due to continuous vandalism and marijuana smoking” looks like it could be over, marijuana activist N.A. Poe believes the war is not yet won.
He’s still planning a “Toke Back the Wall” smoke-in protest at 4 p.m. on Friday despite Mayor Jim Kenney‘s January 14th reversal-by-Twitter of the ban:
Regarding Rittenhouse Square, I'm frustrated too. This government is very large and at times things just get by you. Sit where you want. ✌️
— Jim Kenney (@JimFKenney) January 15, 2017
Along with my liberal view of park use, please don't litter, or graffiti the walls or smoke weed so obviously that you scare olds my age. 😆
— Jim Kenney (@JimFKenney) January 15, 2017
Poe called the controversial wall-sitting ban a called “a form of class warfare.”
“Police aren’t there to do the bidding of the wannabe bourgeois of Philadelphia,” he said. “Their job is to protect public spaces and make them safe.”
Poe said he’s not sure how many people will show up at the event this Friday, but he’s expecting crowds in the hundreds. Similar events held by Poe, like the “pop up weed garden” held outside the Art Museum in October, have drawn 300 to 400 people.
Another protest, which is called “Sittenhouse” and planned for noon tomorrow, is also still expected to unfold. Nearly 500 people have indicated on Facebook that they plan to attend.
Poe said the Friday protest will also function as an “inauguration event.” He referenced the D.C. Cannabis Campaign’s plans for the inauguration in Washington, D.C., where organizers plan to hand out roughly 4,200 joints to be smoked exactly 4 minutes and 20 seconds into president-elect Donald Trump‘s speech.
Folllow @ClaireSasko on Twitter.
