Recently, there was a protest at UC Berkeley, which led the loathsome Breitbart journalist Milo Yiannopoulos to cancel his talk. Some of you may have figured out by now, this is a local story to me. I saw the protest myself.
Well, I only really walked by the protest on my way home. There were maybe a hundred people at 5 pm, but UC Berkeley says it later grew to 1,500. Protestors were chanting “No Milo! No Trump!” There was someone holding a giant dove. I took a flyer, which was produced by refusefascism.org–and then being anti-social I went home and played video games.
Somebody managed to capture the dove. This photo is on the edge of the crowd so it doesn’t tell you how big it was. From Chicago Suntimes, who credits it to Ben Margot/Associated Press.
It was later I heard from Facebook that the protest had turned violent, and the university cancelled the talk. I heard that protestors attacked police, set a portable generator on fire, and then broke a bunch of windows nearby. There were few minor injuries.
Among my friends, many expressed sympathy for the protest, or were at the protest, but they condemned the violence. They were keen to highlight this particular part of the UC Berkeley statement:
The violence was instigated by a group of about 150 masked agitators who came onto campus and interrupted an otherwise non-violent protest.
They’re called “the black bloc”, but that’s just a generic term for people who do violent protest in masks. My impression is that people who are far away just ignore the black bloc dimension, perhaps assuming that violence is a natural outgrowth of the protest when feelings get particularly high. But to locals and participants, the distinction between the black bloc and peaceful protestors tends to be pretty important. Among other things, peaceful protestors are concerned about their personal safety, and don’t necessarily appreciate another group dominating the message of their protest.
I will say something in favor of violence before expressing ambivalence. Milo is known for harassing quite a number of people, both in general, and specifically at these talks. For instance, there was an incident where he outed and mocked a trans student. As far as would-be victims of harassment are concerned, I’m sure they’re glad that Milo’s talk got cancelled. That’s definitely worth breaking a few windows/laws! As far as Milo’s free speech goes, isn’t he a friggin’ journalist? Didn’t the chair of his rag go on to be the president’s Chief Strategist? The reason I don’t listen to Milo is that he’s a vacuous piece of shit, not because I am unable to google him.
If you want to defend some sort of free speech principle, talking about Milo is a shitty argument, and I don’t know why anyone bothers. “What’s the benefit of free speech?” “We get to listen to Milo Yiannopoulos!” “No I said ‘benefit’, not ‘bullshit’.”
Obviously free speech needs to be defended on some sort of procedural grounds. If we have procedures which make it easy to no-platform speakers, it would likely lead to no-platforming speakers that we like. If no-platforming is done on the basis of large protest, then that causes a chilling effect on minority speakers, which would seem to pertain to many social justice advocates and atheists. If no-platforming is done on the basis of some ideological principles (such as no hate speech), it’s likely that those ideological principles would be chosen and judged by people in power. Is no-platforming really a way to upset the balance of power? It seems more like a way for people who already have power to make use of it.
Which isn’t always a bad thing. For instance, at the moment Trump thinks he has all the power, but he doesn’t because power belongs to the people, and he is wildly unpopular. I look forward to the time when we express our power by ousting Trump. I’m not sure violence is an necessary part of that process but what do I know.
There’s also something to be said about reciprocity, or the lack thereof. If we do everything to respect the procedure, that doesn’t mean our opponents will do the same for us. For instance, it doesn’t really matter how much Obama “overreached” in his presidential power, because Trump would be doing what he’s doing regardless. I think we are trapped in this loop of hypocrisy, where we shut down opponents, and they cry “procedure!” And then opponents shut down us, and we cry “procedure!” And we take turns pointing out each other’s hypocrisy. Well, maybe if the procedures are so great, they should be enforced by coercion, and not merely by high-minded principles and complaints. Otherwise following procedure is just a way of shooting yourself in the foot and hoping your opponent follows suit, despite past experience.
This leads to some strange moral possibilities. Perhaps violence is right, because your opponents would do the same. And perhaps at the same time, laws against violence should be strictly enforced.
Okay, but let’s suppose that there is no expectation of reciprocity. Whether “our” side commits violence has no influence on whether our opponents do the same. Is violence now worthwhile?
It’s very hard to judge the effectiveness of any kind of activism, and I’m not surprised that some people think violence is effective. But I would voice my baseless opinion that perhaps it isn’t. Among people I know, it seems to have served not as a galvanizing force against Trump, but a distraction. Peaceful protestors have to take a moment to condemn violence. Libertarians crow more about censorious liberals. Analytic people like myself waste time arguing philosophy. And maybe all of us responding in negative ways should be dismissed because we are terrible people. But this dismissal of reality just seems like a good way to deny honest evaluation of one’s activism.
I propose, for consideration, a model where violence is not just a way to make use of power, but a way to spend power. Black blocs spent a little power to prevent Milo from speaking. I think it wasn’t worth it.
I think it’s a shame that the violence was directed at material objects. That’s a waste of effort. Throwing rocks at cops is less of a wasted effort. But punching Yiannopolous would have been better, still.
Actions have consequences, and words are actions. If anyone has earned a good punch in the mouth it’s Yiannopolous. (shrug)
laws against violence should be strictly enforced.
At a certain point, doesn’t throwing a punch become civil disobedience?
My concern is the identity of the black bloc. By making peaceful protests violent, or by making all protests violent, these people are giving the administration an excuse to prohibit all protest in the name of security. It wasn’t the Jews who were violent on Kristallnacht.
@Marcus,
I am treating the violent protest as civil disobedience. But that doesn’t really argue for or against it.
@sherlock,
Most people say the black bloc are anarchists, whatever that means.
Personally, I would love to see Trump and Republicans squander their power trying to fight protests.
@Marcus
I think you should do some serious self reflection on your attitude towards violence.
I look on this from a tactical viewpoint. The question I want to ask isn’t whether or not Milo or the police deserve to have rocks thrown at them, or whether rock throwing is moral. Who cares? Right now, every decent person should agree that our overwhelming agenda MUST be to extricate Trump from the White House. After he’s gone, we can work on removing the rest of the stinking mess of Republicans, but getting rid of him is the first thing. So with every action we take, we must ask ourselves whether it helps or hinders that goal. And I’m convinced that violence hinders it.
We’re still a democracy, which means our first means of effecting change has got to be getting votes. (And, in the modern era, polls which motivate politicians almost as much as votes do.) According to Nate Silver, if 1 out of 100 voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida and Ohio had changed their votes, we would have President Clinton right now. Those voters (the ones who voted for Obama in 2008 and 2012, and voted for Trump last year) literally may determine the fate of the world.
The Nazis love it when we riot and throw punches. They know they’re a minority – the only way they’ll be allowed to gain power is to stoke fear and chaos. It’s like the two kids in the backseat – the one goads the other until his sibling punches him, so that the punching sibling will get punished by the parents. In this analogy, the voters are the parents. The Nazis are hoping the liberals will take this kind of action that the black block is taking, because then they can portray all liberals as anarchist hooligans and tell those voters that only the alt right can keep them safe. They control the Fox media machine that will gladly magnify every punch into a murder attempt, every isolated riot into nationwide anarchy. The more we punch Nazis, the more the Nazis hope they will win the hearts and minds of those key voters.
Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi didn’t promote non-violence because they were such chill guys. They did it because they knew that, for non-political people (that is, most people), sympathy and votes always flow to the punchee and not the puncher. They recommended non-violence, not just because they thought it was right, but because they thought it would help them win. And they were right.
Jessie Foster@#4:
I think you should do some serious self reflection on your attitude towards violence.
I think you shouldn’t assume I haven’t.
brucegee1962:
And I’m convinced that violence hinders it.
Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi didn’t promote non-violence because they were such chill guys.
Gandhi also said that the chief qualification for a soldier in the army of nonviolence was a willing to die for their beliefs. He chose nonviolence because the people would lose a head up confrontation with the British military, every time. In the end, having such a huge number of nonviolent resisters convinced the British that they’d have to slaughter everyone who stood up to them, as they did during the Sepoy Mutiny, and that it was too costly and not worth it (for logistical reasons, if not moral ones). But ultimately, Gandhi’s nonviolence worked because of numbers, i.e.: violence is just a force-multiplier that he chose not to deploy. He didn’t deploy it because, as he himself said, the Indians didn’t have weapons and had been thoroughly cowed by the British. Had the British begun violence, again, it would not have remained peaceful for long.
King, likewise. If you read the entire text of his “I have a dream” speech, it is not exactly conciliatory and there are implications as to what the number of marchers means. Like Gandhi, he was preaching non-violence because the time for violence hadn’t quite come, yet.
Peaceful protests (which I fully support) are what you do to show your numbers in other words your power before things get violent, in an attempt to dissuade the other side from getting violent. That’s all. The idea that nonviolent protests must always remain nonviolent simply gives a tyrant eternal blank check, and the tyrant takes that to the bank every time.
The Nazis love it when we riot and throw punches. They know they’re a minority – the only way they’ll be allowed to gain power is to stoke fear and chaos.
That’s self-contradictory. If they know they’re a minority, then – if they are remotely rational – they would back down faster if offered violence. The reason they gain power and wield power is because they know that – as a minority – they can stoke fear and chaos. The second they realize, “oh, shit, we are hugely outnumbered by people who are angry at us” they will relinquish power and run back under their rocks.
Yes, it’s best to accomplish change peacefully, but peaceful change does not have any leverage at all; it’s the awareness that numbers count and the alternative to peaceful change is violence.
Siggy@#3:
Most people say the black bloc are anarchists, whatever that means.
It means they are not respecting authority.
As an anarchist, I have to ask why anyone would respect authority, anyway, if authority no longer earns respect. I ask why anyone would follow laws, when the leaders don’t. I ask why anyone would obey police orders to follow laws that the police don’t follow.
Most to the point, why would anyone with a fully functioning brain peacefully protest in Berkeley when this is how California universities respond to peaceful protesters:
(sorry, I embedded a link to the famous picture of officer pork spraying pepper spray all over unresisting peaceful protesters
http://img.timeinc.net/time/daily/2011/1111/360_nat_davispepper_1121.jpg
)
@Marcus
Then I really think you should do some more.
“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral; begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”
-Martin Luther King Jr.
“Self-reflect more” doesn’t really strike me as a winning argument. Quoting famous people doesn’t really strike me as a form of self-reflection.
Jessie Foster@#10:
Basically, you’re saying you think you’re right and if you keep asking me to think harder eventually I’ll realize you’re right.
I’ve actually thought very hard about this, and I think I’m right.
Martin Luther King also wrote:
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
And let me ask you: which do you think had a greater effect on America:
1) King’s being shot and everyone felt bad about it
2) The riots that followed King’s being shot
I lived through that time. Did you? I say #2.
In my #7 I tried to explain some of the inner dynamics of why peaceful protest is just another form of display of force and I absolutely agree that it is a necessary step along a continuum of social responses to oppression.
Are you saying that the correct response to all oppression is to just keep taking it? And then take it some more? If you want to raise the flag and say “I’m a sheep for all time, you can shear me, abuse me, kill me, and I will never resist!” then you have given the forces of power an eternal blank check and they will not respect you. If you look at history, you’ll see that again and again, wading through the blood of unarmed peasants and protesters never bothers the police at all and it certainly does not bother the rulers.
King and Gandhi’s movements drew power from the sheer mass of the protests. Violence is a force multiplier. 10,000 protesters with guns will get more conciliatory treatment from a government than 100,000 unarmed peaceful protesters, especially if they are baaaa’ing sheep who have announced in advance “you can crush us, kill us, pepper spray us, and all we’ll do is whine about it on the internet.”
@Siggy
It’s not really meant to be an argument. And I don’t think it’s fair to categorize MLK just as a “famous person.” Brad Pitt is a famous person. MLK was a human rights champion and a great moral voice.
@Marcus
I think you’re wrong about MLK.
From his “The Other America” speech:
“Let me say as I’ve always said, and I will always continue to say, that riots are socially destructive and self-defeating. I’m still convinced that nonviolence is the most potent weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom and justice. I feel that violence will only create more social problems than they will solve. That in a real sense it is impracticable for the Negro to even think of mounting a violent revolution in the United States. So I will continue to condemn riots, and continue to say to my brothers and sisters that this is not the way. And continue to affirm that there is another way.
But at the same time, it is as necessary for me to be as vigorous in condemning the conditions which cause persons to feel that they must engage in riotous activities as it is for me to condemn riots.”
Jessie Foster:
Since all you’ve apparently got is quotes from famous people, how’s this:
Both King and Gandhi were hoping that insurrection would not be necessary, because the government would respond to the implicit force of the mass of protesters.
You seem to think that there’s some kind of magic in nonviolence. Ask… well, ask any nonviolent protesters who were crushed, how that worked for them. Yes, there have been plenty of situations where nonviolent protest has worked. It’s what you try, first. Violence is what you try when nonviolence doesn’t work. A face full of pepper spray or a bunch of broken teeth from a police billy club: that’s the feeling of nonviolence not working. That’s all.
And, yes, when protests turn into a general insurgency, it’s time for the pacifists to get out of the way because they’re just punching bags (which they have been all along) Being a punching bag isn’t magic. You seem to think that the forces of oppression are going to respect you for bleeding all over their shoes. Don’t you understand that that scenario you’re imagining never happens?? Tahrir square worked because the cops started to realize that eventually the protesters were going to turn on them; and the protesters were starting to. Tahrir square worked when the cops got afraid to show up and beat people Why did they get afraid? What made them afraid? Hint: it wasn’t the blood on their boots that scared them. The Maidan worked when the cops got afraid. Every protest, ever, only works when the forces of oppression realize that oppression is not going to work any more and then they step back and do the numbers and decide to negotiate.
I’m not saying “it’s time to start shooting cops” or anything close to it. I am saying “the cops aren’t scared enough, yet. But soon they are going to need to be.”
Why do you think that the cops were upset when veterans showed up at DAPL? Hint: it’s not because they like veterans and were afraid they were going to have to beat up trained soldiers.
You tell me I need to think harder. I think you need to sniff the realpolitik a bit. There’s a lot of realpolitik in the air right now.
MLK was a human rights champion and a great moral voice.
And they gunned him down. I already offered the observation that the riots that ensued after his killing probably had a greater effect than the establishment’s feeling bad about his death. A great moral voice and $1.60 will get you a cup of coffee.
Hey, how about another case: Nelson Mandela. Guess what? Great moral voice. Spent a lot of time in prison being a great moral voice. What made apartheid in South Africa break? It was the realization that the the people were arming themselves, there were sniper killings of cops, and hand grenades being thrown into police cars. The forces of oppression had no problem putting a great moral voice into prison for a very long time but they suddenly came around and started negotiating when they saw that they were vastly outnumbered, surrounded, and the opposition was tired of playing nice.
And since you like quotes from famous people, here’s someone who had a greater effect on more people than MLK ever did (for better and worse):
All power comes from the barrel of a gun – Mao Zedong.
Not that that’s an argument. But, since you like quotes, maybe you can think harder about that.
BTW, you quote MLK:
The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral; begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy.
MLK was manifestly wrong about this. Political violence is not used to “destroy violence.” It is used to destroy an unjust state, or to unjustly repress the people. Political violence certainly begets more political violence, but the aim of political violence is more violence until the opposing side comes to the negotiating table, or is eradicated. That dynamic applies regardless of which side is getting violent. If you accept even part of that reasoning, then you ought to be able to understand that political nonviolence is an extremely important opening move in a series of moves that ideally do not have to follow to their logical conclusion in either direction.
The reason Syria is such a mess is because (clearly) there are enough people who got sick of the government repressing them, after the government clearly and unambiguously said they would not back down and would increase the repression. Unfortunately for the Syrians, the forces of insurgency and the forces of repression appear to be more or less equally balanced (because of outside forces feeding the insurgency and the regime) In a more typical case, like Romania, once it became clear to the regime that the rioters were willing to go the distance, the regime broke and ran.
Are you perhaps laboring under the mistaken impression that the protests in Moscow during the anti-Yeltsin coup attempt were peaceful? Because if you are, let me correct you: you do not ever get that many angry Russians in one place, confronting tanks, unless they are willing to go the distance. And the reason the tank drivers went home was because they realized that. The reason that the protesters in Tianemen Square were gunned down ruthlessly was because the Chinese regime is more experienced and smarter, and used troops from another part of the country, who had fewer local ties and were more likely to be able to machine-gun a bunch of peaceful protesters. And the peaceful protesters are now just a memory. How did that work for them?
I opposed the violence at the UC Berkeley protest, but I don’t necessarily oppose violence in all situations. Under the model where violent protest is a way of spending power, there may very well be situations where the expense is worth it. And categorically refusing to spend power is like categorically refusing to spend money–you might as well not have the money at all. (I suppose this is more than analogy, since money is literally a form of power.)
@Jessie,
Well I like to designate my comments as a space for arguments. Saying you’re not arguing, and then offering poor faux arguments like an argument from Great Moral Voice, well. I’m going to stop responding to that.
@Marcus
Protestors weren’t being gunned down. This wasn’t a response to an oppressive regime, this was a response to a controversial speaker. Terrorism is not the appropriate response to a controversial speaker. Peaceful protest is.
Jessie Foster@#19:
Oh, it’s terrorism now? Let me take “false moral equivalence” for $100. Some fire and broken windows? Please, be serious.
I am not saying anywhere that protesters were being gunned down. And I withhold judgement on whether the police were attacked by protestors, or the protestors were attacked by police.
I do support people’s right to respond to aggressive police presence with violence. When cops with body armor and guns show up, they’re prepared for violence and protesters have every reason to expect that police may get violent; it’s not like that’s never happened before.
@Marcus
Yeah, it kinda is. Like, dictionary definition.
And the man beaten unconscious with metal poles. And the woman pepper-sprayed.
Lol. Assaulting police officers isn’t a “right.”
Jessie Foster@#21:
Yeah, it kinda is. Like, dictionary definition.
Very funny. It’s extremely hard to get a decent definition of “terrorism” – the FBI used to define it as “attempts to influence the political process by threats or violence” which, except that they pulled that definition down, I’d probably agree with. But – eh, this is nothing. However, by the dictionary definition of terrorism, police using pepper spray on political protesters is also terrorism. Anyway, I’m not interested in equivocating.
And with regard to your argument that the violence wasn’t in response to a repressive regime, excuse me, but isn’t Yiannopolous acting as a spokesperson for an oppressive regime? And aren’t the cops, who show up at a peaceful protest acting as enforcers for that regime? In fact, that’s the only reason the cops are there: they’re prepared to crack down on protesters. They should have been elsewhere – like, protecting the guy who was beaten, or protecting Yiannopolous.
Again, I am not saying that Yiannopolous or a guy wearing a Trump hat deserve a beating. I’m not even saying that the cops who show up ready for a protest deserve a beating. I am, however, observing that showing up for a protest dressed for a riot (on either side) prepared to do violence – you’re likely to get what you came for.
And the man beaten unconscious with metal poles. And the woman pepper-sprayed.
I’m not trying to defend his attackers’ actions. So I don’t understand why you are throwing that down like you think you’re scoring some sort of winning argument.
Assaulting police officers isn’t a “right.”
It absolutely is, if the officers are using undue force in performing their duties. Which, in the case of cops using violence against nonviolent protesters, is the definition of undue force.
Sorry if you can’t wrap your brain around the idea that individuals have a moral right to self-defense against anyone, including cops or military.
Marcus, I think that you and I have a fundamental difference of opinion over why non-violence wins. You say of India:
You honestly think that the British would have been stopped by logistics? These were hardened soldiers, who, as you yourself point out, hadn’t had any difficulties with mowing down perceived enemies, both armed and unarmed, in previous decades. Do you think nonviolent resistance would have held up Roman soldiers? Of course not. Well, I doubt the British were any better. Look at the Peterloo Massacre of 1818 — these were soldiers who didn’t have any problem slaughtering their own countrymen and women, let alone a bunch of wogs.
What changed in the 20th century that allowed nonviolent protests to succeed when they would have failed in every previous century? One word: photography. There’s a big difference between reading dispatches about a bunch of people getting killed in a faraway place, and seeing the pictures of it happening. Also, a press corps that was following events and sending back regular info to the folks back home. And the third thing: 20th century Britain and America were more or less functional democracies, unlike previous Empires. Most people just don’t like being forced to view their representatives attacking unarmed people, and their governments can’t afford to ignore their qualms. That also wasn’t the case in the examples you give like China and Syria, where there is no non-government press to speak of.
Gandhi and MLKJr. understood the power of optics. And I’m not quite sure how you get that the riots after King’s death accomplished more than his activities during his life — the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other major Civil Rights legislation and Supreme Court victories were already in place when he was killed.
My view is that, in a democracy, all battles are propaganda battles. Non-violence is a tool that works because the majority of people will cheerfully support police clubbing and shooting and dropping bombs on anyone who looks like they are “rioting,” but start getting cold feet and changing their affiliations when the people being clubbed by the police aren’t fighting back.
Now, everything I said above only applies as long as the democracy still functions. Between gerrymandering and the ridiculous electoral college, ours feels stretched almost to the breaking point right now. If Trump figures out some way of shutting down the media completely, or uses the excuse of the protests to cancel elections, THAT’S when, as you say, only violence will work. If that day comes, Marcus — and I wish I could be confident that it won’t — I’ll be out there on the lines with you.
I’m generally in favor of giving everyone some degree of freedom of speech independent of the whims of the students – if Milo wants to grab a sign and a soapbox, he can stand on the sidewalk like every other street preacher can at a public university.
If he’s going to speak at a university facility and be paid some kind of honorarium funded by the students’ tuition, I think it’s a matter they should get the ability to veto if they so choose.
And, either way, I think they have the right to protest, even if this wasn’t necessarily the best way to do so.
BruceGee
That seems a pretty narrow goal to me – we should also be acting to reduce the harm he can do and to protect his victims, because we may not be able to remove him for some time, and because many of those suffering were already suffering before and will continue to suffer after. This is about more than one man.
Milo has previously outed trans students at his speeches, and was going to out undocumented students at this one. He is not just a “controversial speaker”: he was there to do real harm, and protests are legitimate self-defense.
Word is that the university could not cancel the talk, because Milo was invited by a student group. However, there was discussion of the possibility that Milo might harass students during his talk, which would be grounds for cancelling since the university has an obligation to protect its students. Unfortunately they couldn’t prove a clear threat from Milo, and we don’t really know whether it would have happened.
Does the student group receive any university funds? Because I’d still make them beholden to popular veto if so.
It’s a wonder, isn’t it, that it never seems to occur to either side that they could break the cycle by simply not being massive hypocrites.
@Vivec,
The university said they could not block the talk because they were legally prohibited. If they could prove a clear threat of harassment, that might have been a legal defense.
@sonofrojblake,
The point is that it’s not actually hypocritical to defect in a prisoner’s dilemma, people just say it is.
brucegee1962@#23:
You honestly think that the British would have been stopped by logistics?
Yep. They never forgot the lessons of the zulu wars and the boer war. A;so, when Gandhi started causing trouble for them, they soon had their attention diverted by a fellow named Hitler. A fellow who did not believe in non-violence, BTW. The British also had profound prior experience with indian rebellions, from the 1800s on, and had discovered that they could suffer severe casualties and were trying to occupy a country that had a population sufficient that if every man, woman, and child in England went over and fought, they’d still lose. If that’s not a logistical problem, nothing it. Following WWII the British were broke and in debt and any government that attempted to hang onto India would have been laughed out of office.
Gandhi’s nonviolence is not why Britain let go of India, Hitler was.
What changed in the 20th century that allowed nonviolent protests to succeed when they would have failed in every previous century? One word: photography.
Bah.
Most people just don’t like being forced to view their representatives attacking unarmed people, and their governments can’t afford to ignore their qualms.
Are we talking about the same planet where WWI happened, and there were lots of photos of it, and WW2 happened and there were lots of photos of it, and the bonus army was crushed in Anacostia flats by the US army and there were lots of photos of it, and the Vietnam war was great television for dinner-time viewing? I remember those TV shows; that was how I learned of war. And people showing qualms. With all respect, I laughed out loud a bit when I read that. What qualms are you imagining people had when they saw the pictures of the holocaust survivors and victims? By your reasoning, fascism and genocide won’t happen again. Since Rwanda and Kosovo.
With regard to the war protests in the US during the Vietnam war – that only started when the draft started hitting middle class kids and the college-age sprigs of empire started to realize what was in store for them.
I like your theory – it’s very optimistic. But you’re not talking about this planet.
Gandhi and MLKJr. understood the power of optics. And I’m not quite sure how you get that the riots after King’s death accomplished more than his activities during his life — the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other major Civil Rights legislation and Supreme Court victories were already in place when he was killed.
Yeah, and slavery was outlawed, too. But the system of oppression remained in place. It’s still in place. The difference is that the establishment got better at playing along because they finally got scared. They didn’t give a rat’s ass and never do give a rat’s ass until something scares them. They’re perfectly happy to let people march. Saying “your speech is free” is another way of saying “your speech is worthless.”
Now, everything I said above only applies as long as the democracy still functions.
What is this “democracy” of which you speak? One in which rulers are selected by the popular vote?
Before it gets to the point where the president tries to cancel elections, that’s when the time will come. I won’t be on the barricades; those guys are going to get bombed to pieces. Those’ll be the formerly nonviolent crowd, who put zero preparation into the situation before them, because they kept expecting the establishment’s feelings to get hurt and for them to feel guilty and suddenly start playing by the rules that they never followed to begin with.
The main issue I have with a lot of arguments about the violence at the recent protests is that over 90% of the property destruction (and the accompanying threats/violence against those who tried to film or intervene) occurred well after the event had been cancelled.
(For reference, the protest started at 4pm, the black block arrived around 5:45, the student store windows were smashed with barricades and the light burned around 6pm, and the talk was cancelled by UCPD around 6:15 and Milo was announced to have been escorted out of the area. The rest of the damage didn’t even start until like an hour or two later after police issued dispersal orders and part of the group broke off to move through downtown Berkeley, which is where/when most of the rioting and smashing things and setting things on fire actually occurred.)
Like, the arguments put out that “violence was necessary to stop the Milo talk, where he could have endangered students” might be made for the first two incidents of destruction (I’m a bit doubtful even there), but the rest? From a strategic view, that didn’t do anything to stop the talks or protect anyone on campus, it just made people smash-happy and left a mess and bad press for the other protestors to deal with, and if anything put them at more risk in the future.
(Same for the threats and attacks on fellow protestors who tried to intervene against violence or who had cameras – that seems to be conveniently left out of all the “well, it’s just property destruction, and that’s necessary to protect actual people” narratives I’ve seen.)