Please, step off the curb! (Some thoughts on last weekend's RAW meeting)

So the Rochester Against War (RAW) meeting wasn’t too bad this past Saturday. (I’ve gotten really frustrated and left a few times before.) It felt like a lot of people wanted workshops around knowing their rights and civil disobedience. (Of course it took a good hour to get to that discussion and then it was only about a half an hour long with at least one proposal to put off the discussion till the following week; I wasn’t having that.) Speaking of which, RAW will be hosting a longer discussion on civil disobedience and direct action this Saturday, April 5th, at noon. At least one individual said that he would have gone into the streets had he known about his rights and been able to assert them.

I was alarmed at a few suggestions.

Police: One suggestion was that we need to work with and respect police—this was raised by at least three people. As was eloquently noted by more than one person, the police are the domestic arm of the government—a government waging illegal wars and occupations around the world—the most visible being the Iraq war. Individual officers aren’t the problem necessarily (However, we could go back and look at the hate crime involving 10+ officers and homophobes from last summer as well as the myriad individual acts of police brutality coupled with whatever bigotry they fancy that day—but I digress.); the problem lies in systems of oppression enforced via threat of violence by police. If we’re against this war, then we’re saying we’re against this government and that means both its domestic and international agents. It was pretty disgusting to hear from people that we—the protesters and those arrested—were being “disrespectful” to the cops after they had “blocked the streets for us” so people could walk on the sidewalks (Why the fuck weren’t we in the streets?) and that the city and the police probably felt like they were “slapped across the face” for this kind of disobedience. Seriously, this is not a good analysis and is really disrespectful and hurtful to those that actually sacrificed their personal safety.

Politicians: Another suggestion was that we ask our congress people and legislators to join us. Why? If politicos want to join us, they will because they have no other choice. Forget pandering to them. Their interests are not ours and that’s been proven again and again. If they want to make an impact, they will be in the streets and at the jail following the demonstration. Otherwise, I don’t have time for their political doublespeak. However, I also believe in diversity of tactics. If this is where your strength is, then by all means go for it.

Horizontal Organizing vs. Hierarchical Organizing: This next criticism isn’t specifically about civil disobedience/direct action, but it could have far reaching effects on such actions depending on how authoritarian certain groups want to become. Apparently there were communication issues in regards to the actions on the 19th of March. The Rochester chapter of MoveOn.org and I believe IVAW (don’t quote me, I could be wrong) were upset that they were not privy to the information regarding the civil disobedience and I think I heard some grumbling about press releases. The suggestion came up that in that case, the organization that’s been working on the event the longest should be the body responsible for any kind of decisions or communications and those decisions would trickle down through the co-sponsors/coalition. So in the case of March 19th, the fact that RAW had put in a lot of time and energy leading up to events that day would mean that they would be the ones in charge of communications and the actual event. I guess this bothers me because it flies in the face of solidarity and autonomy. A coalition isn’t one group’s will enforced over other groups. That’s more of an authoritarian-based model. And no, every group in a coalition isn’t necessarily going to know about every direct action or act of civil disobedience and communication isn’t going to be perfect.

However, with things like spokes councils, representatives from the various organizations and affinity groups could speak on behalf of their group—perhaps not letting people know the vital details—especially about illegal or confrontational tactics, but just that a plan is in motion. Here would be a good time to talk about logistics—dynamics of the crowd, barriers, cops, strategic positions and how the action(s) could negatively or positively affect people. Decisions could be made using consensus—as is usual for spokes councils. For instance, what if the cops start arresting everyone? Or what if “spontaneous” direct action triggers mass direct action? Then what? This could be a time to work out those logistics. It would also be the time to coordinate things like jail support, bail, medical stuff, lawyers, legal observers, et al.

Declaration of Peace: As far as functional civil disobedience groups in town, Declaration of Peace is one group of individuals that have been risking their personal freedoms against the war. Their action on the 19th sparked other people to take action. That was an exciting moment. At least one person at the meeting suggested that folks should attend their meetings as they are doing civil disobedience and we should follow their lead. I acknowledge and appreciate the work they put in and the risks they take, but for me, I don’t agree with some of their principles regarding what’s called “nonviolence guidelines” and I find some of their targets dubious. Further, I admit to being a little insulted by the symbolic act of praying on an Amerikkkan flag on a coffin—but that’s me. For that reason and from what I’ve witnessed in the past, I don’t feel much affinity for the way they do things and therefore I, personally, am not interested in attending their meetings.

This would be a perfect time to get the NLG and ACLU and others involved through the hosting of mass direct action/knowing your rights trainings in order to give people the confidence and knowledge to step off the curb. More is always needed and I’m willing to help facilitate these ideas.

Jail Solidarity: I want to express my thanks to all the people who came down to the jail that evening to help out! I also want to thank E. G. for putting up the news on Indymedia that there had been arrests. We had food (c/o the storefront), balloons, flags (of the anarcho-syndicalist and colorful varieties) as well as good conversation and high spirits. I did hear a few stories of people asking if they should go to the jail and in fact being dissuaded from such things. The fact that a group of people were telling another group of people not worry and not go down to the jail was a tremendous slap in the face to solidarity and jail support. Seven people in the antiwar community are arrested on the 5th anniversary of the war; you better believe we need folks at the jail! Besides, it was a lot of fun, if such things can be had at jails.

As someone said in the meeting the other day, we’ve been too polite for too long.

Ted Forsyth