Support rabble | Advertise with us | Contact our staff | About rabble | Log-in or Register for a new account | Corrections | Privacy policy | Newsfeeds | Mailing lists
rabble: Features | Columnists | In Cahoots | Blogs | Books | Photos | What's Up | Polls
babble: Forum Topics | Active Topics
The rpn: Become a Podcaster | Find a Show
rabbleTV: Program Guide | Features | Indie Inside | Best of the net
Copyright © 2001-2012 the authors
Syndicate
Moved it into the activism forum, as it is hardly national news anymore, and it is about activism, and how differing activists approach it, which is leading to greater divisiveness in the activist community...the juvenile elite's wet dream coming true.
Maybe someone could post links to BB statements or press releases about their G20 activities - if any are available. I haven't seen any.
Here's one perspective. Note the caption on the first photo. That tells me pretty much everything I need to know about "diversity of tactics".
Good story Poluntac.
So it appears that some central organization is needed to determine which people can protest what government action or conference. I have some questions on this strategy.
Any ideas on who should lead this new innovative mass movement. It will obviously require a fair bit of coordination beginning with amassing a list of "responsible" groups that are good enough to protest anywhere.
With events like the G8/G20 should the rule be only social democrats and trade unionists can protest? Anyone else thinking of protesting the G8/G20 in unauthorized manners will have to choose another date to confront the police state openly on display?
What is the dress code to be and which groups get a say in the dress code for these social democratic demonstrations. Orange would obviously be allowed but what about blue? Will people be searched to ensure they are not concealing a bandanna when they join any properly authorized march? If no searches to weed out bandannas what will the protocol be if someone covers their face? Will they be tackled by two or three trade unionist and after being wrestled to the ground will they be merely expelled from the collective or will they be handed over to the police on the theory they must be police anyways?
Just a few questions so I know what kind of marches I can expect in the future. So whens the founding convention of your new mass protest movement? Where can I buy a membership so I can have my say over what I think is appropriate?
I move closure - Polunatic2's union's rules.
I second the motion.
..but my doing so may mean moderators now will not close till it reaches 200
No.
I posted that link because it's one of the more coherent and consistent theoretical & political analyses that I've seen (even if I disagree with part of the theory - particularly as it may apply to Canada 2010.) It's also less moralistic than a lot of stuff we've seen around the net about the BB tactic.
Maybe someone could post links to BB statements or press releases about their G20 activities - if any are available. I haven't seen any.
Southern Ontario Anarchist Resistance call out for the G20
No.
I posted that link because it's one of the more coherent and consistent theoretical & political analyses that I've seen (even if I disagree with part of the theory - particularly as it may apply to Canada 2010.) It's also less moralistic than a lot of stuff we've seen around the net about the BB tactic.
I thought it was pretty confused, actually. The most interesting thing about it was the conjectural hypothesis that the summit was located where it was to "showcase" Canada's "security" expertise. From then on, he offers no thorough analysis of how it came to be that the police completely abandoned Yonge Street to the Black Bloc, who ordered this to happen, and why the evolution of that event was not monitored and as it evolved and then supressed. I totally think this is our of the ordinary for the Toronto Police, who normally as they do during other "riots" (sports or event related) move in pretty much immdediatly to break up looting.
We know that the police had very strong information about the plans of the BB activities. We also know they were over prepared specifically to confront those tactics and had more than adequate crowd control infrastructure and perssonel to handle the issue, Front line officers told reporters from the Toronto SUN that they felt they could have dealt with the situation easily. We also know that front line officers were ordered to engage, and the disengage, and then order to engage again. This sounds like "confusion" but can easily be construed to be competing levels of command issuing different orders. The final level of command resided with the RCMP, the agency closely tied to the Prime Ministers office.
Once at that level of command, the number of people needed to willfully conspire in preventing the police from doing what the lower levels of command saw as their immediate duty is small enough to prevent general disclosure and leaks.
On the other hand I entirely agree with the author that the conspiracy theory (in particular those regarding the burning cop cars) are a bit of a red herring, and as people have pointed out before, not neccessary for damning indictment of police activity during the G20 weekend, both as incompetent and totalitarian.
At the end of the day, we need specific knowledge of operations, and how they were conducted, and need to know who gave what orders to who in each of the main incidents, and to develop a comprehensive blow by blow account of what happened, in order establish some sembelance of truth, outside of theoretical musings.
That's where a fully empowered public inquiry comes in.
I don't see how letting a 100 or so people run up Yonge Street qualifies as a good "showcase" of the effectiveness of the Canadian security industry. Furthermore, if the real "showcase" was re-imposing order, in the manner of apprehended insurrection, as the author implies, all that means is that "conspiracy" to restrain the police from engaging in normal police operations against the Black Block, was systematized.
Indeed, and important distinction between the G20 operation and the Olympic demonstrations, is that the Toronto Police were put under the command of the RCMP through ISU directly, wereas it is my understanding that VPD never came under the direct command of the RCMP at the Olympics.
Here is one clue as to why operations seem to have been conducted more in the manner of suppression of incipient insurrection, as opposed to a the more mundane task of crowd control, which is a form of policing that the Toronto Police are experienced at.
I should have been more specific. I meant any post-G20 comments from the BB about their activities during the event? Any comments from the BB about effective (or not) their efforts were?
Maybe someone could post links to BB statements or press releases about their G20 activities - if any are available. I haven't seen any.
Countering Conspiracy Theories on Police Response to Black Bloc
By Zig Zag; July 8, 2010 - Vancouver Media Co-op
http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/story/countering-conspiracy-th...
Despite a $1 billion security budget and some 19,000 security personnel during the Toronto G20 Summit, police appeared incompetent and confused as militants inflicted extensive property damage and torched 4 police cars. While the protests failed to breach the 6km security fencing, the attacks were a significant victory for the resistance, which had vowed to 'humiliate' the security apparatus in the weeks prior to the summit.
......
Note: This is a revised excerpt from Fire and Flames: A Militant Report on the Toronto Anti-G20 Resistance.
-------------------------------
I should have been more specific. I meant any post-G20 comments from the BB about their activities during the event? Any comments from the BB about effective (or not) their efforts were?
Well, considering that anrachist organizations by their nature are genereally ad hoc and amorphous, it is unlikely that any formulated response from a "group" will be forthcoming.
I should have been more specific. I meant any post-G20 comments from the BB about their activities during the event? Any comments from the BB about effective (or not) their efforts were?
Well, considering that anrachist organizations by their nature are genereally ad hoc and amorphous, it is unlikely that any formulated response from a "group" will be forthcoming.
Boom Boom wrote:
Maybe someone could post links to BB statements or press releases about their G20 activities - if any are available. I haven't seen any.
Countering Conspiracy Theories on Police Response to Black Bloc
By Zig Zag; July 8, 2010 - Vancouver Media Co-op
http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/story/countering-conspiracy-th...
Despite a $1 billion security budget and some 19,000 security personnel during the Toronto G20 Summit, police appeared incompetent and confused as militants inflicted extensive property damage and torched 4 police cars. While the protests failed to breach the 6km security fencing, the attacks were a significant victory for the resistance, which had vowed to 'humiliate' the security apparatus in the weeks prior to the summit.
......
Note: This is a revised excerpt from Fire and Flames: A Militant Report on the Toronto Anti-G20 Resistance.
during the Toronto G20 Summit, police appeared incompetent and confused as militants inflicted extensive property damage and torched 4 police cars. While the protests failed to breach the 6km security fencing, the attacks were a significant victory for the resistance, which had vowed to 'humiliate' the security apparatus in the weeks prior to the summit.
That's one of the funniest things I've read this week! Thanks.
(bolding mine)
My guess it the outcome of that statement is entirely dependent on how effective we are at embarrassing the government in its hamfisted attempts to suppress civil liberties, and mobilize people against that.
At the very least this protest action showed that the authorities were incompetent, and even possibly malign in the management of their duties, and brutal in the means that they used to suppress completely unrelated actions by perfectly peaceful protesters.
As I posted before, CTV first called Saturday and then Sunday victories for the protesters, the ""Black Bloc "anarchists and the peaceful civil liberties types, against the Blue team -police/security. Saturday team Black Bloc had clear goals achieved them and left victorious. Protesers 1- Police --. That is how CTV saw it and I agreed with that call. Using sports analogies, Team Black Bloc took the offensive from the beginning, led in shots on goal and kicked the butt of the Blue Team, which was demoralized. leaderless and stuck in a losing defensive position. Sunday the Blue Team lost it, just fired the puck wherever they could and scored on their own net. I laughed hearing them attack people singing Kumbaya or O Canada. people who thought they had some right to protest if they were nice about it The protesters owned the podium-game,set and match to them.
The protesters owned the podium-game,set and match to them.
Must agree with you, peter .... no one, not even the marchers will remember the empassioned speeches and sturring invocations of the non-bloc marchers. They will remember the actions of the BB people.
Oddly enough, and has been pointed out above, the Polce knew what the Bloc had in mind. The Bloc knew what the reaction of the assembled forces would be. This was a dialectical dance where those dressed in black were the better dancers. (Even if Zig Zag seems to feel they made major mistakes.)
That Harper. McGinty and Co. would, in an off moment, pat the peaceful protesters on the head and say ... "What a good boy are you ..." and ignore them is only to be expected. Now another factor has been entered into the equasion, the authorities have been exposed for what they are, dazed and confused power weilders with only the authority of force, not any morality behind the. They cannot abide with co-ordinated resistance without lashing out, and lashing out in the wrong direction.
i think sometimes we end up being too influenced by all the mainstream hype and really play up the ACTUAL damage done to the protest movement by the bloc. Let's be honest, there was a lot of people who saw what happened and sided with the protesters.
I think sometimes we play it up too much. I don't agree that the vandalism was necessary, but regardless the police overreaction was going to be brutal, it was before the bloc did anything, they were breaking into peoples houses, CSIS visits, beating journalists, beating protesters, random search and seizure miles from the fence etc.
My feeling is i don't like it, i wouldn't do it, but in the end it's property damage, a pretty minimal crime (certainly not usually a justification for mass arrest) that happens every day in my city and i'm sure in yours, albeit more spread out across the city. I also find it hard to rag on broken windows when i love street art, skateboarding and graffiti which all involve what i think is rationally justified property damage.
Most likely all that will be remembered of the G20 is that some disreputable characters dressed in black broke some windows and burned a couple of police cars. Probably about 98% of the population will think that is terrible and that we are lucky to have police to stop people like that from getting even more out of hand.
Forgotten of course will be that Harper was under attack for wasting a billion dollars on this fiasco with its Fake Lake, and all the other boosts to his ego it involved. Also forgotten of course will be the issues of the thousands in peaceful groups who marched there. And the violations of civil rights which occured there.
The struggle of the G20 was not conducted on the streets. No one in power cares if a few windows were broken, or some reportedly aging police cars were burned. The struggle was conducted in the media, both main stream and new, and there it should be obvious even to the most delusional who won--Harper.
I would dispute that on the basis that it appears that the people who actually burned the police cars were probably not protestors at all, as has even been suggested by chief Blair. Indeed, I think there is a good case that those people who were just venting general anger at the police, once given the opportunity.
Dollars to donuts, if you left a police car in the inner court yard of a Jane and Finch tenament for more that an hour unattended, it would certainly be vanadalized and lit of fire. There are doubtless many, many people who would appreciate people lighting police cars on fire.
Indeed, I spoke with a Starbuck's employee just the other day and asked him what he thought about the Starbuck's in Toronto getting trashed, and he said that it was "kinda hilarious".
I am not going to claim that this kind of action has "mass" support, but I highly doubt that 98% of Canadians were offended. It might be the case that 98% of middle and upper class who are convinced that the police do them valuable service in protecting their wealth feel that way, but I also think there is a substantial part of the population that "appreciated" it.
Indeed, police cars often get trashed during civil disturbances that have no apparent political charachter, and when no anarchist are on site to give a political twist to the activity. A lot of people don't like cops.
What I find most humourous about these debates is that all the usual suspects crawl out of their holes to call people who burn police cars aimless vandals and hooligans, are the same ones who will turn around the next day and tell us that burning police cars in Tehran is a justified action of the opressed against opressor in Tehran.
Cop car burned at Montreal Hockey Riot this April. When is the Surete going to arrest the president of the Montreal Canadians Hockey organization for "conspiracy to commit mischief over $5000"
More police cars were trashed on that night than during the entire G20, but for some reason, people are entirely convinced that 98% of Canadians just love the police. If that is what you think Banjo, I think you should get outside more often. The real message that Canadian got was not "that is terrible and that we are lucky to have police to stop people like that ", it was that "oh my god 1 billion dollars and 20,000 cops can't even protect their own stuff, let alone anyone else."
The case that was clearly made was that massive police spending is just a panacea for an anxious population, that will not and can never truly do the job that it says it will do.
This is a rather good article on the Black Bloc in Vancouver. I believe it dovetails with my analysis of the BB as a fundamentalist movement that defines itself in opposition to the wider social justice movement, rather than in opposition to the corporate state that it stridently denounces:
http://resistrantrelax.wordpress.com/2010/07/13/comrades-and-not/
The struggle of the G20 was not conducted on the streets. No one in power cares if a few windows were broken, or some reportedly aging police cars were burned. The struggle was conducted in the media, both main stream and new, and there it should be obvious even to the most delusional who won--Harper.
In Burnaby the local biweekly rags are owned by Black Press. After the G8/G20 this newspaper ran an editorial that said the Black Bloc had destroyed the message of the other protesters and then they named some of the other worthy causes.
I thought that was a great editorial because it was the first time I could remember that newspaper mentioning any of the other issues in this kind of protest. Without the Black Bloc this newspaper would not have had an editorial that at least included some of the groups involved in peaceful protests. It just would not have been newsworthy enough to take up space.
Relying on getting fair coverage in the MSM media to win any change is naive IMO. Ask any trade unionist the kind of coverage they get when they are locked out for 18 months and standing by watching scabs do their jobs. It is not reported except in passing. So frankly this idea that without the BB the MSM would have disseminated our message is in my mind a rather bizarre concept.
The MSM is part of the fixed game that our rulers like to call democracy. If there had been no violence and the police had merely stood shoulder to shoulder three deep to protect the world overlords the MSM would have had columns and newscasts about how civilized we are in Canada and then would immediately cut to one of their talking heads to tell the viewers what an excellent idea deficit cutting for the world is especially when enhanced by IMF know how.
I've been off-rabble/babble for awhile - but considering the continuing enthusiasm for violent tactics from some quarters here in the context of left/green/indigenous/antiwar movements in richer countries currently, I thought I'd share a recent piece penned that outlines what I think is the essential contradiction between the 'state-hating' left and the electoral left:
The paralyzing struggle over purpose in the northern left
One of my principal contentions here is that state-hating and support for necessary left electoral movements are very definitely at cross-purposes, and the right suffers from no such contradiction, but rather enjoys a marriage of great convenience between 'social' and 'fiscal' conservatism.. (as we label them in Canada conventionally)
I also contend that violent tactics are an expectable/natural/organic outgrowth of state-hating politics.... which holds back left movement-building broadly speaking...
Banjo, the Toronto Sun has had a massive conversion as a result of that weekend. Some of the best criticism / analysis of the policing we saw comes from that publication. Personally, I never thought I'd live to see such a day. Truly amazing. Like watching Paul on the road to Damascus, at the moment the scales are falling from his eyes.
From an anarchist who has helped elect many a social democrat I found the article to be full of straw people with straw arguments. Convincing the thousands of young anarchists to become social democrats would not win a single seat in our FPTP system. Besides many young anarchists actually already work and support people like Bill and Libby. As for rioting in the streets and state violence I believe that in Canada it is clearly apolitical youth who cause the most public damage in any given year. Crowds in Canada are often peaceful until the police abandon their cars.
Young Canadians of NO political persuasion seem to have a hard time resisting the urge to smash the state. I am waiting for a social democrat to excite the 60% or more of people under 35 who are apolitical because that is the only place there is room for a left party to grow. That is the statistically important group if you want to talk about left electoral politics not young anarchists who are small in number and are usually well read on political issues.
Who is going to inspire the young people of Canada so they stop rioting in the streets over hockey games and instead take to social democratic electoral politics?