> I don't feel like commenting on the rest but, yes, stop that nonsense.
> It's so infantalised. A few years back every anarchist/dog-on-a-string
> and SWP-led protest in Ireland was led by bloody samba bands and
> (state funded) circus troupes. Having grown up in Belfast during the
> 1980s the difference between this form of play protest and real
> protest couldn't be clearer to me. Yawn.
Right. We should be spending our time selling the party newspaper on the streetcorner and at the factory gates.
> Protest as entertainment - give me a break. It reminds me of Stewar
> Home's criticism of 'anarchists' - foul-smelling super-liberals more
> like - who carve out little 'oppostional' niches for themselves that
> don't actually challenge anything. Canrnivals against capitalism
> indeed.
Yet those Carnivals Against Capitalism achieved more than all of the boring leftist organizing and hand-wringing that had been going on for 20 years.
I'm interested in what works. What doesn't work is protest that is always serious and dully sacrificial. That's the Left that Was. Join our parties because we have the correct line and help us organize the working class.
Boring. Doesn't work.
What does work is bringing creativity and a sense of fun to serious organizing and dissent.
Find me somebody who doesn't like puppets at protests and I'll show you a burned-out leftist who doesn't understand why people won't join their dreary political program.
I call these people "killjoy leftists." I believe Emma Goldman had these types in mind when she was talking about dancing.
Chuck