Look at the faces of most of those kids in Pittsburgh -- they have no stomach for old school IWW action. They looked frightened and confused. Just where the state wants them, once they're cleared off the streets, that is.
...........
Let's not be too hasty.
Their scared reactions were natural and can change with experience and a modification of expectation/belief. At least for those who're really dedicated to their cause.
Note however that many of the students who were assaulted (beaten, tear gassed, shot with rubber bullets, blasted by LRAD generated audio waves) were only bystanders; they weren't the least bit prepared for what fell upon them.
Even some of the core protesters were people unaccustomed to the idea -- let alone the reality -- of officially delivered violence against citizens. Others, of course, knew precisely what they might be in for.
Our bodies and mind can be, and typically are, retrained via a realignment of our understanding of what we're up against and the dangers we're likely to face in a given situation. One of the last stories my grandfather told me was of his physical and mental retraining during his armored tour of Europe, 1944-45: from urine and shit stained recruit, trembling at the sound of distant Tiger tanks to the 'smooth cheeked killer' who lost his flinch reflex and put the barrel of his service pistol to the temple of a Waffen SS trooper, squeezing the trigger without remorse.
Not all the celebrated protesters of the 19th and early 20th century walked into lines of police and/or troop from the first with a certain knowledge of mayhem and death. Many people initially believed that since their demands were just, a sympathetic, democratic society would respond appropriately. Official violence *taught* them to expect the worst, to create forms of organization resilient in the face of savage attacks.
Those who hung in became the nexus of the tough-minded movements we laud.
.d.