I wasn't the one who brought Seattle into the conversation. But, I was trying to piece together the phenomenon of a group like WWP getting so many people to come. The closest "anarchist" example I could think of was Seattle, but maybe that's not fair. As far as real comparisons, I hadn't really thought about them aside from that. I guess if the comparisons include consideration of outcomes, then the two events (though one was more "militant" and one was more "dull") were quite similar: the global capitalist system kept marching ahead, and the escalation towards war in Iraq also continues.
<<I still have yet to receive a satisfactory response to my question: Are these types of "street promenade" marches anything but a pep-rally for the already converted?>>
Pep-rally, maybe-- I don't see any sort of objective criteria available to make a reasoned judgement. Already converted? Not necessarily. The Post article pointed out that many of the people interviewed had never been to a demonstration before.
But, really, "already converted" seems to me a rather meaningless term, anyway. It's certainly a classless one.
> the fact that anarchists
> aid the bourgeoisie in creating a hole in serious,
> level-headed leadership
> for leftists.
<<Here we go. Any criticism of the WWP or a march is
OBJECTIVELY helping the bourgeoisie. "You are either
with us or with the enemy".>>
That wasn't a criticism of the WWP or "a march." It was a criticism of anarchists and the bourgeoisie! Due to the march's lack of any class character, it may actually be that the march aided the bourgeoisie in Washington, what with the elections and all, and they may refocus their attention to bombing starving people elsewhere..... North Korea maybe?
Nathan writes: <<Come on-- I've gone to plenty of protests that were larger than October 26.
The Webster pro-choice march was 500,000 people and I remember going to anti-homeless marches back then that were a couple of hundred thousand.>>
Was it organized by anarchists?
<<Plenty of bourgy groups have organized mass rallies in DC, so the WWP only looks good compared to the fractured nature of the rest of the left. But they also had an imminent war with Bush doing much of their organizing for them.>>
As the post article pointed out, why weren't the protests of the "imminent war" with Vietnam, in its early stages, with Kennedy doing much of their organizing, as popular? (I don't have an answer to this, I'm just wondering....)
<<But like the mass marches that proceeded the Gulf War, if the antiwar left doesn't figure out how to broaden its appeal, these pre-war marches will not be the beginning of the movement, but the high point.>>
So is the goal, then, just to create a "movement" and end a particular war?
Cuito writes: <<Why not an anti-globalization, mass protest type of mobilization against the war? In other words, get all the people and tactics that you would usually see at a WTO or IMF summit, and have them target the war machine for 1-2 days of protest, and literally try to shut things down like in Seattle and the People's Strike. Just imagine what it would have meant domestically and internationally if even half or a quarter of those present in DC on the 26th would have sat down around the White House and refused to move. >>
Well.... it probably would have meant very little. Several hundred-- maybe a thousand-- would get arrested, the rest would be dispersed, kind of like the D.C. IMF protests. Without mass work stoppages by laborers and large-scale refusal within the armed forces, little would truly "shut down". Not that I'm necessarily skeptical about these things happening.....
Best, David