Eikon eikonoklastes

[Gordon Fitch]

Chip Berlet wrote:
>> I was just at a meeting on legal defense of protestors and the discussion
>> turned to demonstration vandalism.
>>
>> The younger discussants called the question "to brick or not to brick," thus
>> the reference to Starbuck's windows (and even what to do with the brick) is
>> now not even considered needed but is merely implied.

Chuck0:
> Yup, property destruction is taken as a given now among most activists.
> I did a panel discussion on this topic several weeks ago at American
> University with Nadine Bloch of DAN and Michelle from the Plowshares.
> The audience seemed to be mostly into PD, but several had qualms about
> the black bloc. This wasn't surprising given that the event was
> sponsored by the Washington Peace Center.

This is interesting, but I was mostly concerned with the way
the incident was so rapidly iconofied by devotes of the _ancien_
_regime_.  Among radicals, it may be a term of art, but among
conservatives, who already have a very elaborate vocabulary
of violence, it must be something else.  What is it they see
and fear?  Why is breaking one store window so important to
people who shrug off the breaking of whole cities?  It might
be useful to know -- even if it's merely more propaganda.