1. Physical force exerted for the purpose of violating, damaging, or abusing: crimes of violence.
2. The act or an instance of violent action or behavior.
(http://www.thefreedictionary.com/violence)
(http://www.thefreedictionary.com/violence)
I have been dreading the G20. For the last week or so I've been listening to news coverage of all the security measures they've been putting in place downtown. On one hand I was worried about overzealous riot cops geared up to "show those activists a thing or two" and on the other hand I was dreading the inevitable reports about violent protesters. Ten years ago I would have been worried about the media exaggerating the violence of the protesters and invalidating the very real issues at hand. Now, with this new(ish)wave of anti-globalization activism it seems we can't get through an international summit without some faction of the protesters getting belligerent, offensive and flat out violent. This pisses me off so fucking much that I struggle to get the words out. So before I continue with that rant let me give you some of my background.
I grew up with a real hippy mom. Not a pot-smoking, free loving "groovy" hippy, no. I mean a strongly political, true pacifist who taught us to speak out and stand up for what we believed in. I went to environmental rallies and talked openly with my mom about sex, drugs and being weird. When I was in high school I joined the Environmental Youth Alliance and helped organize a peace rally during the first gulf war. Later, when I moved to Guelph I got involved with an activist teen 'zine. As a result of joining the 'zine I got involved with the International Socialists (if you know them I can only say I had yet to learn what they were really about). I joined this group thinking I had found a group of like-minded activists. It didn't take long for me to see that they were mostly bullies dressed in activists clothing. I never doubted their commitment but they were rigid, unimaginative, and frequently unkind. They believed that their way was the only way and there was no room for real discussion and exploration of the issues.
After I left I.S. I stayed in Guelph and went to school there. My years there, always in fairly close contact with "activisty types" I got more and more frustrated and fed-up with this brand of activism. Put simply I have no tolerance for violence, I have no tolerance for hate, and I have no tolerance for the belief that the ends justify the means. And let there be no confusion, violence is an act of hate. There can and will not be any positive change as a result of hateful actions.
I've heard a few people say about the madness that hit Toronto today that "There was no violence, only property damage. That can be fixed with money." Let's be perfectly clear, throwing bricks and rocks through store windows is violent. Throwing shit at a store (literally, they actually threw feces into a store) is violent. Destroying and setting on fire cop cars is violent. This is not something you do because you believe that it will create real change (if you do, you're fucking deluded). This is something you do because you like to "fuck shit up" and activism and anarchism give you some kind of thinly veiled excuse to be an asshole. And by the way, what kind of anti-capitalist use the argument that it's okay because "money can fix it." Last time I checked that was the attitude that got us into this fucking mess.
So let's break it down. A small faction (and I do mean small, like 1%) of the protesters broke off, fucked some shit up, and then tried to blend back into the crowd so they wouldn't be arrested. If you're going to disrupt an otherwise peaceful protest with this violent bullshit the least you can do is fucking own it. But no, you use the presence of the people whose protest you thoroughly fucking undermined to escape arrest. That's not courage, that's not commitment to the cause. The kind of activists I was raised to admire were the ones who were willing to get arrested and used passive resistance to emphasize the excessive nature of the police reaction. With morons like the "Black Bloc" running around it's pretty bloody hard to make the argument that the security measures are out of line.
Okay, so now that we've established that these people have no clit to speak of let's move on to the fact that they have completely overshadowed what the other 9,900 people had to say. Or how about the fact that the actions of the clueless few are endangering the safety of all those other protesters. Tear gas, sonic cannons and rubber bullets are indiscriminate and when the shit hits the fan it's not only the shit disturbers that get hit.
Simply put: if you don't want to live in a violent world, don't live a life of violence. If you don't want to life in a hateful world, don't act out of hatred. And if you think the ends justify the means, you're missing the point. Because one thing I know is that we are defined by our actions, the ends don't justify the means because the means are and end in themselves.
To paraphrase Forest Gump's mother, "violence is as violence does" so put down your rocks and bricks and chill the fuck out.
I grew up with a real hippy mom. Not a pot-smoking, free loving "groovy" hippy, no. I mean a strongly political, true pacifist who taught us to speak out and stand up for what we believed in. I went to environmental rallies and talked openly with my mom about sex, drugs and being weird. When I was in high school I joined the Environmental Youth Alliance and helped organize a peace rally during the first gulf war. Later, when I moved to Guelph I got involved with an activist teen 'zine. As a result of joining the 'zine I got involved with the International Socialists (if you know them I can only say I had yet to learn what they were really about). I joined this group thinking I had found a group of like-minded activists. It didn't take long for me to see that they were mostly bullies dressed in activists clothing. I never doubted their commitment but they were rigid, unimaginative, and frequently unkind. They believed that their way was the only way and there was no room for real discussion and exploration of the issues.
After I left I.S. I stayed in Guelph and went to school there. My years there, always in fairly close contact with "activisty types" I got more and more frustrated and fed-up with this brand of activism. Put simply I have no tolerance for violence, I have no tolerance for hate, and I have no tolerance for the belief that the ends justify the means. And let there be no confusion, violence is an act of hate. There can and will not be any positive change as a result of hateful actions.
I've heard a few people say about the madness that hit Toronto today that "There was no violence, only property damage. That can be fixed with money." Let's be perfectly clear, throwing bricks and rocks through store windows is violent. Throwing shit at a store (literally, they actually threw feces into a store) is violent. Destroying and setting on fire cop cars is violent. This is not something you do because you believe that it will create real change (if you do, you're fucking deluded). This is something you do because you like to "fuck shit up" and activism and anarchism give you some kind of thinly veiled excuse to be an asshole. And by the way, what kind of anti-capitalist use the argument that it's okay because "money can fix it." Last time I checked that was the attitude that got us into this fucking mess.
So let's break it down. A small faction (and I do mean small, like 1%) of the protesters broke off, fucked some shit up, and then tried to blend back into the crowd so they wouldn't be arrested. If you're going to disrupt an otherwise peaceful protest with this violent bullshit the least you can do is fucking own it. But no, you use the presence of the people whose protest you thoroughly fucking undermined to escape arrest. That's not courage, that's not commitment to the cause. The kind of activists I was raised to admire were the ones who were willing to get arrested and used passive resistance to emphasize the excessive nature of the police reaction. With morons like the "Black Bloc" running around it's pretty bloody hard to make the argument that the security measures are out of line.
Okay, so now that we've established that these people have no clit to speak of let's move on to the fact that they have completely overshadowed what the other 9,900 people had to say. Or how about the fact that the actions of the clueless few are endangering the safety of all those other protesters. Tear gas, sonic cannons and rubber bullets are indiscriminate and when the shit hits the fan it's not only the shit disturbers that get hit.
Simply put: if you don't want to live in a violent world, don't live a life of violence. If you don't want to life in a hateful world, don't act out of hatred. And if you think the ends justify the means, you're missing the point. Because one thing I know is that we are defined by our actions, the ends don't justify the means because the means are and end in themselves.
To paraphrase Forest Gump's mother, "violence is as violence does" so put down your rocks and bricks and chill the fuck out.
Foot note: I haven't posted about the PWPA which was secretly passed to allow cops to search people without cause because all I seem to be able to do about that is shake my head in frustration and disbelief.
ReplyDeleteStrong, sane and much needed commentary. "The clueless few" should be reading it. You express my frustration and, I'm sure, that of many others eloquently. (And thanks for the kind words!)
ReplyDelete