The movement, or movements, here in San Francisco are in motion, as many of you know. I had hoped that the stage would be open for people to discuss strategies. In my opinion, we really need to discuss how to escalate the movement...take it to the next level. Instead, we were treated to ANSWERS standard fare. Richard Becker, Gloria La Riva, and the usual host of boring speakers (save for a couple of non-ANSWER non-WWP speakers) discussing in moralistic terms the tragedy of the war.
No one attending this rally needs to be lectured on the war. Most of the people in attendance had just spent the past two days trying to shut down the war by shutting down the city!
ANSWER of course directed the demonstration into legal channels. First, they got a march permit (Remember San Francisco had been in revolt since Wednesday night..without any permits). At one point in the march, there was a breakaway...and the ANSWER people implored the crowd not to follow it or we could get in trouble with the police!!!
At the end of the march, we got the usual ANSWER request for money. I absolutely refused to pay a cent. Kids have been going out on the street all week to close this city down and they havent asked for money. I was so angry that I confronted a couple of the ANSWER people on this issue. We should not have to pay for the march permit, nor should we have to pay to watch the Becker Bros and Gloria La Riva pontificate on stage.
ANSWER really showed their true colors today...Up until now, it was mostly their political positions that I found distasteful. Now I know exactly what Chuck0 is expressing about their opportunism. They are really the policemen's friend and create a sort of movement ghetto. Gilles Deleuze spoke of how we go from one enclosed controlling institution to the other in this society: the family, school, the military, the factory, the corporation. ANSWER is providing just one more god-damn enclosed control mechanism. But the movements in San Francisco, having at last experienced their power in the streets, are no longer likely to submit to ANSWER's constraints. And if by chance ANSWERS appeals for "legalistic" demonstrations are followed by some, it will be to the detriment of the anti-war movement in San Francisco.
I will not rant against ANSWERs political positions, but their tactics, especially in light of current developments, need to be throughly exposed, criticized, and swept into the dustbin.
-Thomas
===== <<Be like me! The Primal Mother, eternally creative, eternally impelling into life,
eternally drawing satisfaction from the ceaseless flux of phenomena.>>
-Nietzsche, "The Birth of Tragedy"
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