The next thing we will inevitably be blamed for is the actions of anarchists who destroy property and then get themselves gassed and fired upon with rubber bullets. Believe me, I’ve followed these anarchists and I know how they act. In September 2005 they went on a rampage in Washington DC during an anti-war rally. I followed them and replaced newspaper dispensers that they had thrown in the street. I thought I might get arrested for trying to clean up after them but the police seemed to understand what I was doing.
I’m agnostic about the best way to do crowd control. But when a group of people are in the midst of destroying property something needs to be done to stop them. These idiots probably are carrying anti-Bush signs which makes them appear to be representatives of the left. They’re not. They are idiots with no respect for anything. I’ve heard disturbing reports about preemptive actions the police are taking against peaceful protesters. But this incident appears to be justified.
Well stupid exists everywhere accross the political spectrum.
I have never witnessed anarchists in action, and I suspect that a real anarchist would take issue with the term being applied to these miscreants. Let’s call them what they really are: thugs.
That being said, this is a very small number that have engaged in these activities. The response by police, in my opinion, is completely heavy-handed. The police are arresting lawyers on the scene too, and let’s not forget what happened yesterday with mass arrests around the city.
At the risk of sounding hyperbolic, when police raid houses because the occupants are planning to protest, I believe we’ve officially entered a police state.
Live feed to the travesty taking place in St. Paul as we speak:
http://theuptake.org/en/
I’m hearing that Amy Goodman has been arrested.
A little slow. Delete if you want.
In just flipping through on both channels the reports on both said called them as an anarchists and made it clear that they had splintered from the larger protest of ‘peaceful liberal and anti-war groups’.
So that’s something.
I saw the online CNN report which did the same, noting the thousands of peaceful protesters first.
I’m flabbergasted the media is doing its job.
Call me a contrarian if you will, but I feel compelled to make a few points about the relative actions of my “anarchist” brothers and sisters, and the police.
Point one. When reviewing these exchanges between the “anarchists” and the “police,” please consider the actions that are being described as “violent.” I read over the diary that BooMan cited from Daily Kos, which sets out one persons view of this protest. I will not quote passages. If you are interested, read it for yourself. But you will note the witness to these events describing the protesters as “not peaceful” because they wore black colors and face masks and carried dumpsters in tow and chanted and dropped trash and overturned dumpsters. They threw bottles at the police (no context as to whom, how many, or under what conditions). I’m just not going to list the litany of what the witness described, but go read it. Critically. The witness goes on to describe how the “they” became “more violent” as “they” attacked unoccupied police vehicles. At this point, the witness was gassed by the police. The witness reports, essentially, being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
BooMan’s concern with how these “anarchists” will be connected with the left, because they are carrying anti-Bush signs, tells me that the frame of reference for “anarchist” protest that has been set forth by the authorities since Seattle and now (post 9/11) has taken full hold.
Statements like “these anarchists were not peaceful” and “these anarchists were violent” should be critically evaluated. I read nothing in the proffered statement of fact (the linked diary) that indicated any “anarchist” injured or offered to injure any person, animal, or blade of grass (with the possible exception of throwing a bottle at police officers, about which I’d like to know more). Some “anarchists” apparently engaged in the destruction of property (where people were not present or injured). No one was apparently injured by any “anarchist” action. Yet the conclusion must follow that the “anarchists” were “not peaceful” and “violent.” Post 9/11 laws have certainly been strengthened to go after “domestic terrorists” even for property damage. But this is a troubling development to people who consider vigorous dissent/protest. Consider the Boston Tea Party, with the Bostonians being charged as terrorists. Or consider these laws being stretched to squelch the Civil Rights movement. “Are you trespassing at this lunch counter, ma’am?” The “anarchists’ ” actions in trying to take back a street, a public space, while our 1st Amendment rights to assembly and redress are being herded into safe-protest zones, and their actions to protest for those who are threatened by pre-emptive search warrants to roust others from solidarity, falls in a long and honorable line of dissent and civil disobedience. Naturally, it may be looked upon unfavorably by the ruling class, and the ruling-class elect. But this is America. Political dissent should be allowed, property crimes should be prosecuted accordingly.
Note, here on the left-leaning blog, the first cry on this issue is not about the actual violence used by the police. Tear gas. Rubber bullets. Used indiscriminately against those who may have been “in the wrong place at the wrong time” and those “anarchists” alike, regardless of individualized criminal suspicion. This is now, essentially, accepted practice. If you are an activist, you are now familiar with the sight of paid soldiers in full body armor with lethal and non-lethal force in tow. Stormtroopers. On the street for any political event of any import. To challenge the lawful dissent of the governed. Not really a problem. Not for those on the “left.” Just accepted. And I point it out, because I ask readers here to think critically. Those “anarchists” have the right and duty of all Americans, to stand up and oppose bad governance. Those that cross the line into “civil disobedience” and “property crime” will undoubtedly be prosecuted, along with many others who are detained and possibly prosecuted for being in the “wrong place at the wrong time.” Is this the America we want to embrace without question? For me, it is not. For me, I suspect that if there was not army of police, there would be young people in the street having their democratic say, without violence. That is my hunch. And I know the political powers that be would not like that. They are sheltered from the riff-raff who actually live and die under their governance. I find it somewhat sad that the “opposition party” couldn’t take a bit of the self-sacrificing spirit displayed by those “anarchists” who will be convicted criminals for standing up as voices of political dissent this week, and go back to Congress with it and start war-crimes’ prosecutions and various other forms of redress designed to restore all our freedoms.
Point two. I used the term “anarchist” in quotes above. It is the label applied by BooMan. It is not the label applied by the eye-witness account to which he links. The eye-witness account talks about the group as “protesters” and “they.” Two sub-points here. First, the term “anarchist” in general, seems to me to be so overly broad as to define almost nothing in particular. Some may call Noam Chomsky an “anarcho-syndicalist.” Some may apply the term “green anarchist” to primitivist John Zerzan. I call myself an “anarchist in theory,” a bastardization of the term (mostly due to my own inability to put into practice what I know to be true — that authority is contrary to liberty and must be challenged). The label “anarchist” has been used in this country as a scare tactic. Sacco & Vanzetti. A label associated with violence and terror. And not fairly so, if we talk of “anarchy” in any philosophical sense, at least in my view. To someone who reads anarchist thoughts, and thinks they have much potential application to our world, I hear the word “anarchist” used in the way it is by the BooMan here, much like a dog-whistle. Like the way Lou Dobbs uses the word “illegal immigrant worker.” This is an element of the left the BooMan would seemingly like to wish away at this convention, at least as I read it (and I’m sure I’ll stand corrected). These were a group of individuals taking direct action to challenge a government that we all know has failed them, and us. I haven’t heard from their “spokesperson” and I doubt I will, so I don’t know the label they’d like to apply. “Patriots.” “Citizens.” Free men and women. “Democrats.” I dunno. And, yes, maybe “anarchists.” Maybe proud, active “anarchists.” But for now, the underlying report used as a citation called them “protesters” and “they.” And I’ll stick with that until they clarify their own labels. Which leads me to sub-point two. The eye-witness identified the group as approaching or exceeding one-hundred individuals. And the account proceeds to recite the litany of what “they” did. They did this. And they did that. The eye-witness is careful to insist that he/she was gassed because he/she was just in the wrong place and wrong time with this band of roving riff-raff. My point would be this. I’m suspecting within the group of approximately one-hundred individuals, you would find a range of answers on a host of questions. Each individual acted. Each individual was motivated to act or not act according to his/her own personal view. As to his/her own personal politic will. Are members of this one-hundred there non-violent? Would others there not consider the extreme measure of committing open acts of property damage in response to police attacks? Mobs are interesting places. They are cauldrons of individual human action and emotion. Some good, some bad, some indifferent. My concern is for a country that insists on legitimizing a military occupational force within its own borders, to protect our politicians from political dissent. And for their use of semi-lethal and lethal weapons upon a crowd of people, with no direction of this force at any individualized actor based on reasonable suspicion or reasonable force. We (diaries like BooMan’s) continue to legitimize the use of police force in this way. When we uncritically cut loose those of the left who are actually in the streets, without forethought and support, for the greater good of making sure Obama is not blemished by this “action,” we legitimize our own future oppression.
StevenD has written eloquently about the police state. The use of force we are subjected to daily is appalling.
I am not so quick to judge the “anarchists” here. There may be those who will be convicted of crimes of conscience based on the evidence of their individual actions. But I’m willing to see that evidence first. And I’d be willing to listen to their statement of reasons for taking these actions. Because I sense there would be more in this statement that I would agree with than disagree. America has gone far astray. The corrective course, in conventional political terms, may not be painless. Nor short. Don’t rush to condemn those seemingly more willing to give personal sacrifice to their commitment because you fret so much about bad PR. Fox NEWS will surely skewer your presumptively elect party for the sin of having political roots with anarchists, as well as on any host of other issues with which you have no control. Your outspoken pastors. Etc. Stop throwing everyone under the bus as it drives along.
they’re idiots, Joe. I’ve marched behind them. They walk around without permits and break windows and throw things in the street and vandalize public and private property. And they don’t do it to end the war or to end poverty or for any discernible or articulated reason. Their actions lead to automatic use of force, as is the intent. My overall impression with them after watching them in action is that they should all be arrested and incarcerated and forced to pay restitution.
Insofar as they co-opt any message of the left, they are undermining the left and endangering people with real dissenting opinions.
In this case, they broke windows, slashed tires, strew garbage everywhere, assaulted police officers, and destroyed private property.
And they got treated like the rioters that they were.
As I said, I’m agnostic about the best way to disperse such a crowd. Rubber bullets and tear gas may or may not be necessary. I’m no expert in that field. But I’m more concerned with why Amy Goodman was hauled away in handcuffs and pepper sprayed than I am with these hoodlums getting gassed and hit with rubber bullets.
I saw that Amy Goodman video, and was throwing it in a diary before I saw your comment. She got arrested. She’s not an idiot? Is she an anarchist?
The other video I came across shows to other journalists, detained and told they were under arrest. Alongside of scores of others. The people don’t even look like the “black flag” kind of “anarchists” whom I believe you are referring to as those you’ve protested alongside and have such disdain for.
At this point, I’m not positive what is going on in St. Paul. Aside from the fact that it seems fairly well confirmed that police officers are firing rubber bullets, tear gas, and concussion grenades at protesters.
I’m not even necessarily defending the actions of those who are engaged in property destruction. But I’d like to hear more about how said property destruction occurred. Is it a response to over aggressive police tactics, for example?
Just thought you were a little pre-emptive on going after my philosophically kindred anarchists. The whole left is one. Don’t throw us under the bus. You might feel this is harmful to your message or image or party. But I’m telling you, I think we’re on the same side more than on opposite sides. And I believe it is long past time for action. When the Congress of your party fails to act, why would not the citizenry, some of the brave anyway, stand up in frustration and act as they can?
Your quest for Democratic rule, whatever means, sometimes makes me wonder that should you succeed, we may have an end that looks more center-right and still jails my kindred for their want to speak and act for a better world.
I think it would be obvious to nearly anyone that in St. Paul it is the police who initiated violence, preemptively remember, by violently raiding protest groups before they’de begun to protest in wide sweeps and arrests across the city. How then does anyone suppose to take the streets back. They do belong to the people, do they not. I think we’ll see fewer and fewer willing to passively stand by while the state unleashes it’s terror without cause and without mercy. And that is a good thing because it’s rapidly coming to that point.
Thank you Joe,
that’s the most eloquent and forceful defense of the rights of citizens to protest an abusive government as I’ve heard in a long, long time.
Thanks SuperMan. I liked it to. But, you know you just like it so much because you want to be charging up some hill with your flag in hand. 🙂
It’s not possible for me to be there now. My family needs me here. Otherwise I would be there. I know you would too.
In Genoa the “anarchist” turned out to be police infiltrators. Pull the masks off of them and take their picture. http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0geu5DZirxIkgABX3lXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTBybnZlZnRlBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMQRjb2xvA2Fj
MgR2dGlkAw–SIG=120q02nu5/EXP=1220402265**http%3a//www.workers.org/ww/2002/genoa0822.php
StrayRoots you speak to one of my questions regarding the “anarchists”. I am unsure of the actual facts here in the twin cities (I’m sitting in my living room in south Mpls. currently), but I am familiar with and aware of the age-old strategy of planting rowdy/violent protesters in order to create a ruckus and invite law enforcement to use (justified)force in squelching protests or demonstrations. Given the current political climate, erosion of rights and all the other screwed up junk going on in the name of Bush,I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to find that some of these “anarchists” are actually police infiltrators. I would expect to see these tactics. I also expect that at least some of the protesters are well-trained and know the strategies available to deal with infiltrators during a demonstration or protest. I am waiting to see and hear more…I also know that there are some people that will always think a protest is a great opportunity to act out for the hell of it. I think it is possible we will see both groups out there on the streets of the Twin Cities.
Gentlemen, you must read G.K. Chesterton’s novel “The Man Who Was Thursday” if you have not already read it. It explores the situation of an undercover policeman who becomes one of seven ruling members of an international anarchist conspiracy.
Brilliant and timely work…I cannot tell you more without spoiling it.
Greatferm
Booman,
I’ve seen many of these folks in action and I’m telling you that they work of the law.
I saw a man trying to kick in windows and minutes later whipping out plastic handcuffs to put on the fools who were incited.
ooops..work FOR the law