What Would It Take For You to Join A Revolution?

M. Spector wrote:

I'm just trying to imagine what the babblers in Egypt were saying a couple of years ago.

Yeah, that does give me hope

From this article by Lawrence Martin:

"...Before this, Mr. Harper had shut down Parliament, an act that brought thousands of Canadians to the streets to protest against what he was doing to their democracy."

Taking the Whole Planet

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As food and water shortages expand across the globe, as mounting poverty and misery trigger street protests in the Middle East, Africa and Europe, the elites do what all elites do. They launch more wars, build grander monuments to themselves, plunge their nations deeper into debt, and as it all unravels they take it out on the backs of workers and the poor. The collapse of the global economy, which wiped out a staggering $40 trillion in wealth, was caused when our elites, after destroying our manufacturing base, sold massive quantities of fraudulent mortgage-backed securities to pension funds, small investors, banks, universities, state and foreign governments and shareholders. The elites, to cover the losses, then looted the public treasury to begin the speculation over again. They also, in the name of austerity, began dismantling basic social services, set out to break the last vestiges of unions, slashed jobs, froze wages, threw millions of people out of their homes, and stood by idly as we created a permanent underclass of unemployed and underemployed.

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The unrest in the Middle East, the implosion of national economies such as those of Ireland and Greece, the increasing anger of a beleaguered working class at home and abroad, the growing desperate human migrations and the refusal to halt our relentless destruction of the ecosystem on which life depends are the harbingers of our own collapse and the consequences of the idiocy of our elite and the folly of globalization. Protests that are not built around a complete reconfiguration of American society, including a rapid dismantling of empire and the corporate state, can only forestall the inevitable. We will be saved only with the birth of a new and militant radicalism which seeks to dethrone our corrupt elite from power, not negotiate for better terms.

It's slightly different than what existed a century ago.  The revolutionary consciousness, such as it is today, is not interested in political and economic change merely because of a preference for one system over another, or because of a disgust over hardships on the one hand, and wanton excess on the other.  The cumulative evidence from the past 100 years or so suggests that what people are people are engaged in today is a bare knuckled struggle to stave off extinction.  All of the other devastating hardships outlined in the article have been relegated to the status of openers for the main event.

There's no question about crisis connectivities.  The connectivities of the response are the main cause for concern however.

Good article, Former Soldier. I didn't know that about Japan's history and culture of peace. Very impressive.

I was just thinking of something I saw on the [url=http://preview.tinyurl.com/68avxsp]Toronto Maple Leafs[/url] website about nationalism and sports teams with a regard for national military themes. I don't think Canadians are falling for it.

My grandfather was mustard gassed somewhere in France during WW I. He had bad lungs for years and especially after working in coal pits for many years after. I remember my ma telling us how old Albert would go off whenever war was mentioned. He said something like, I won't be lifting a finger until they come busting down the front gate.

Police brutality has always been a factor when Canadians have gathered to protest and/or express a viewpoint critical of the ruling class.  What I've noticed over the past 25 years is that state-sponsored violence against citizens becomes more overt when police forces believe no one is watching, and that the people being brutalized have no voice, no power.

Police have been kicking the shit out of the poor, First Nations, people of colour - anyone they perceive to be of the "underclass" - with impunity for as long as there have been people questioning authority in Canada.  The more they get away with brutality, the less restraint they show.  The G20 protests are a prime example.  We really haven't seen that extent of police violence since the 1930s, when my grandparents took to the streets to protest depression-era gov't policies.

The security forces at the G20 must've been feeling pretty smug to be so blatantly brutal, to so openly trample on people's rights.  Maybe they thought socialists don't own cell phones, or maybe, just maybe, they kicked some white middle class ass and that caught the attention of the mainstream media and sparked the outrage of even apolitical people. 

Regardless, I think public demonstration is as important, or more so, than ever.  When we start rolling over for those who would exploit us, we become tools of the ruling class.

pragmaticidealist wrote:

As frustrating as it can be at times, it is far-cry from what most people in the world have to endure day-in and day-out.

Which is why being merely frustrated is an entirely inappropriate condition.  In that sense, it is the ones calling for afternoon protest strolls within designated zones, presided over by the ever so helpful state security guards, that should actually be seen as the bad apples who are bringing discredit upon those who elect a more convincing approach.  What we have now is a general reliance on something that was frozen in time years ago, although that too is on the wane in terms of whatever remains of its relevancy to people.

Rebecca West wrote:

Police brutality has always been a factor when Canadians have gathered to protest and/or express a viewpoint critical of the ruling class.  What I've noticed over the past 25 years is that state-sponsored violence against citizens becomes more overt when police forces believe no one is watching, and that the people being brutalized have no voice, no power.

The G20 protests were televised and otherwise recorded using a variety of means, published to youtube etc, and yet police violence was as overt then as it was in the past.  Certainly there was a time when the state preferred that the mask not fall entirely from the face of their brutality, but since they can no longer fully control what the public absorbs through its spokespersons or their media, they no longer care who is made aware of their capacity for violence against citizens.  In fact, knowledge of it within the public sphere now serves as a helpful deterrent against people by making them think twice about coming out for these events at all.  Nothing has changed through increased exposure of their tactics, except that what was once thought of by the left as a potentially powerful anti-oppression tool, namely the various ways and means of showcasing their violence, has been demonstrated as usual, as a misplaced hope.

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Police have been kicking the shit out of the poor, First Nations, people of colour - anyone they perceive to be of the "underclass" - with impunity for as long as there have been people questioning authority in Canada.  The more they get away with brutality, the less restraint they show.  The G20 protests are a prime example.  We really haven't seen that extent of police violence since the 1930s, when my grandparents took to the streets to protest depression-era gov't policies.

And they'll continue to do so with impunity, with today's extra bonus of being able to add anyone at all to the list of people to be kicked around, with the same impunity.

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The security forces at the G20 must've been feeling pretty smug to be so blatantly brutal, to so openly trample on people's rights.  Maybe they thought socialists don't own cell phones, or maybe, just maybe, they kicked some white middle class ass and that caught the attention of the mainstream media and sparked the outrage of even apolitical people.

That's the point isn't it?  Today anyone can capture anything at all of their violence, broadcast it, send it around to MPs, family, friends, the mainstream media etc.  A few token internal hand slaps might be the best that can be hoped for from the complaint processes, perhaps even individual charges for the worst of the brutes.  The fact of the matter is that the very next protest will likely result in a similar outcome, because they do not care.  Remember the Vancouver APEC summit, pepper spray, the beatings and arrests of innocent people, and the subsequent inquiry that changed nothing.

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Regardless, I think public demonstration is as important, or more so, than ever.  When we start rolling over for those who would exploit us, we become tools of the ruling class.

I don't believe it is important at all anymore, and frankly I believe it is irresponsible, in knowing of what has become all too evident of the habitual and rapid escalation toward arbituary and widespread police violence in the streets, for protest organizers to send unarmed citizens into phalanxes of heavily armed corporate protective services.  I find it a worthwhile exercise only for the police, who get to put into practical applicaton what they practice on army training bases.  Nowadays, an act of protest which is conveniently laid out before the police state is in fact a demonstration in rolling over.  They have you exactly where they want you, exactly where they permit you to be in the first place.