> But splitting the difference and saying each group do it's own thing is just
> a ridiculous naive approach to politics. The issue is not militancy versus
> passive action but of collective responsibility for how one's actions effect
> others. What I object to among some of the Black Bloc is not really that
> they break windows, because there are windows in the world deserving
> breaking, but that they are so fundamentally anti-solidaristic towards other
> activists, that they oppose democratic accountability and coordination as a
> movement.
Sorry, Nathan, but it is simply not true that the black bloc tactic is anti-solidaristic towards other activists. There are accounts out of Quebec City about BB folks who helped other activists. The black bloc we did last year in Washington, DC for A16 received many thanks from the other activists for the solidarity work we did during that weekend of actions.
The anarchists who do the black bloc do not oppose democratic accountability or coordination. However, we do oppose those groups and individuals who seek to set the agenda for the movement or use calls for "unity" to justify their grabs for the top dog spot. We are already seeing examples of this in Australia, where DSP/Resistance (a socialist party grouping) is re-writing the recent history of the anti-capitalist movement to justify their brand of centralist, top down politics.
> In the short term, such laissez-faire activism can look spectacular on TV
> but leaves little chance to building the long-term strategy it takes to
> challenge corporate-backed state power. I recognize that this is the core
> political disagreement between socialists and anarchists, in that socialists
> generally believe that majority votes should be binding and that it takes
> broad-based organization to challenge power.
I don't see this as laissez-faire activism at all. There is a plan and purpose to all of this. I know what the long-term strategy is and I'm glad to see that we are on the road to some of my goals. There may not be any unifying strategy, but that's OK.
> Anarchists just think it's recreating the same oppressive structure with a
> nicer face, which is true to a certain extent, but the anarchist alternative
> of voluntarism, despite lots of noise and drama, doesn't deliver real change
> over the long term. It's too easy to divide and conquer, since it can't
> plan for the future since there is little long term accountability.
I guess we'll see about the long term. The way I look at it, the anarchists in the U.S. have achieved more in the short term than the Left has managed to accomplish in the past 20 years of newspaper selling. And I'm not just talking about our victories in conjunction with the "anti-globalization movement."
<< Chuck0 >>
Infoshop.org -> http://www.infoshop.org/ Alternative Press Review -> http://www.altpr.org/ Practical Anarchy Online -> http://www.practicalanarchy.org/ Homepage -> http://flag.blackened.net/chuck0/home/
INTERNATIONALISM IN PRACTICE
An American soldier in a hospital explained how he was wounded: He said, "I was told that the way to tell a hostile Vietnamese from a friendly Vietnamese was to shout ‘To hell with Ho Chi Minh!’ If he shoots, he’s unfriendly. So I saw this dude and yelled ‘To hell with Ho Chi Minh!’ and he yelled back, ‘To hell with President Johnson!’ We were shaking hands when a truck hit us."
(from 1,001 Ways to Beat the Draft, by Tuli Kupferburg).