Alex WildCampuses aren't being rocked by protests.
They're being rocked by politicized administrators ordering students beaten and jailed to satisfy the political elite.
Let's be clear who is causing the violence.
Ivey Janette McClelland@alexwild They want to shut down campuses entirely. Just like during the civil rights movement.
Alan@alexwild And far from being bastions of leftist wokeness it seems like the universities are calling in tools of far right fascism while the right and left party elite spew propaganda about terrorism.
!JDA HAS MOVED!@alexwild as I read somewhere, there can't be riots without riot police
krunch 🌈🏳️⚧️@alexwild what politicians? Democrats?
Janis@alexwild As an organizer of a 100K-attendee Women's March: we arranged with the city police before we protested. They knew we would be there, we knew they would be there, we ordered porta-potties and garbage cans and we left the place spotless.
Biggest global march fucking ever. No police incidents to speak of.
Everyone conscious tenses up when there's unexpected shit going down. Everyone.
The kids aren't driving the violence, but they aren't using proven methods to mitigate it, either.
enoch_exe_inc@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild The date was 1/21/2017, the day After Trump's inauguration. It set off the MeToo movement, & then some.
According the CGP Grey, if you want to be king, you have to get the military on your side. That the military exists is not a question until all militaries don't exist.
Most of the St. Paul police were, at that point, Democrats. Look up Melvin Carter. Protesting violence, or Trump, or Israeli policy, is not equal to protesting government in its entirety.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Policing will never, ever go away, no matter where you go, there will be an establishment that is bumbling along at a losing attempt to suppress violence with violence.
If you want to protest violence, you do everything in your power to not instigate more of it, no matter who it's coming from. And you prove it by publishing believable attempts at violence mitigation, repeatedly. The problem is that violence & fear-mongering is what gets attention. Receipts are boring.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild All politics features violence of some kind. Politics, after all, is the distribution of power, and power is enforced with violence. So, protests against violence are not necessarily against violent acts in and of themselves, but rather against the legitimacy of that violence.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild There's legitimate violence, and illegitimate violence? Who gets to decide which is which?
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild The state, unfortunately, which (usually) has the monopoly on violence. For example, it’s not usually considered violent for the police to shoot people.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Right, because the established state usually decides what qualifies as legitimate violence. This is what makes a free press a functional part of democracy. It is to those trusted publishers our receipts of non-violence should go. it's a macrocosm of what happens in court, where publishers are lawyers, and the public is the jury.
But we don't trust our press, and we sure as hell aren't trusting most lawyers.
Either way the point is to make a solid case.
ChuffMeister@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild
[Quote] This is what makes a free press a functional part of democracy. [/Quote]
How might this even be conceptualised let alone administered, in a society where collective agreement is an invisible source of power?
You collectively agree to fight the enemy with words.
Which means you read what they say, and they read what you say. Ideally somewhere in the mire there is someone clever and charismatic enough to rally support for fresh solution. Mostly what happens is things get ugly enough the agreement comes in rallying against a common enemy.
In short, you keep writing.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Also, those who favour ‘peaceful’ or ‘nonviolent’ protest must know, at least subconsciously, that pacifism is an absurdly privileged position to take up. You can only protest as peacefully as the law allows you to, and when all peaceful means have been exhausted, violence is inevitable.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Women have been peacefully protesting for millennia, taking it up the ass and moving forward, and out of abusive situations without retaliation.
We are still fucking at it, and we're slowly getting it done.
No, the belief that violence is inevitable is exactly what perpetuates it.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild It is probably worth noting (and remembering) that many indigenous colonial resistance movements were led by women, and to make this long history short(er), accusations of witchcraft and witch-hunts were used to lower the relative power of women.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable”, said John F. Kennedy.
undead enby of the apocalypse@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild @janisf didn’t for example the suffragettes do lots of stuff that would be considered very violent?
@enby_of_the_apocalypse @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild @janisf Indeed, they were. In terms of tactics, I cannot agree, but in terms of throwing a fuсking hatchet at then-PM Winston Churchill’s face, well, that’s pretty hardcore.
@enby_of_the_apocalypse @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild What, wage war? Year to year, queens don't. Even Margaret Thatcher, as evil as she was. And before you argue, Victoria intervened too infrequently.
IMO, the lioness's share of what makes women's movements as effective as they've been it that the violence that does happen gets press coverage. It's statistically rare and relatively mild. It's unexpected. It'a patch of canvas without red paint on it.
@janisf @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc what??? I’m very confused about what you mean. And wasn’t Margaret thatcher famous for literally waging war? This makes literally no sense.
@enby_of_the_apocalypse @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc Women haven't been, writ large, as violent as men have been. 97% of domestic abuse is perpetrated by men. I can't get a number for wars waged by women heads-of-state. Fewer. Not perfect.
People don't expect women to be violent. That expectation on its own tends to render a less violent response.
@janisf @enby_of_the_apocalypse @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc That’s the patriarchy, in my view. Double standards and different expectations for how men and women are “supposed” to behave shape the “acceptable” use of violence among the genders.
@enoch_exe_inc @enby_of_the_apocalypse @alexwild I agree. They work under it, though. There's no point in trying to get through to them speaking another language. It's nearly the same as the argument to use violence as a means to revolution. Sometimes you have to do what works to get the job done.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @enby_of_the_apocalypse @alexwild And that is from where I’m approaching all this. A recurring theme in all my (particularly lefty) politics is strong sense of pragmatism, a trait I seem to have inherited from my father, who came of age around the time Deng Xiaoping became President of China. “It does not matter if a cat is black or white as long as it catches mice” is a sentiment I live by in all my politics.
@enoch_exe_inc @enby_of_the_apocalypse @alexwild It's so funny that in the last six months or so I somehow ended up conversing pest control with two people I know who *both* use catch & release traps for mice, and would drive many miles to drop off the critters.
My cat was grey. We didn't have a clue we had an issue until she died.
This is politics, though. Fighting for peace... wait... all I can say is f* 2/3 of this SCOTUS. We may be f*ed.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @enby_of_the_apocalypse @alexwild That quote is an English translation of something that Deng Xiaoping famously said and is usually taken to mean that it doesn’t matter how the economy should be run; as long as it works, it is a good economy. It has nothing to do with pest control.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild it’s a disastrous sentiment because it does matter a lot. If your means are contradictory to your ends, you will end up getting further and further away from those ends, it will be impossible to get closer to them in any way. Unless of course your actual goals do align with those ends, and you have been either lying the entire time or have changed so that now they do (our actions and experiences do tend to have a big impact on our thoughts, and many people will justify things after the fact, taking the easy route, trying to resolve the cognitive dissonance by adjusting their ends to their means)
@enby_of_the_apocalypse @janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild It’s a sentiment that I happen to agree in general with respect to my philosophical tendency towards consequentialist and utilitarian ethics, but it’s not one that I’ll stand behind all of the time.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Not privileged. Women die every.fucking.day. And then we get called stupid for doing it.
A full commitment to non-violence is the only way, live or die, that non-violence stands a chance.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Ah, but not all women occupy the same social, ethnical, or economic positions. What I’ve been saying holds true for the Civil Rights Movement, where the (relative) pacifism of Martin Luther King Jr. is remembered and cited much more frequently than the Black Panthers.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild the Black Panthers got a whole load of bullshit press coverage, and then silence. MLK's positive-spun legacy didn't get into common white discourse until the 80's. Presidents win political support when they declare a national holiday. Reagan knew he needed Black votes in '84.
And that's how you spin a narrative and gain power.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild If you’ve read MLK, then you know the problem is with the (white) moderates, who don’t oppose anti-racism, but aren’t willing to centre those who are most affected by a system of oppression and tend to position themselves as a vanguard to promote “the correct way” to protest, to effect change. Which is a remarkably colonial dynamic. This is what came to mind when I read your original post.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild I can totally see that. I literally can't police the students. I got no power on that. What I can do is chime in with my boots-on-the-ground experience in the hope it will fall on some ears that use it to boost effectiveness.
Yes, it matters if I've been out there, and continue to put what's valuable to me on the line.
I'm also an advocate of stinky things like fox urine, and general police discomfort that could come with, say, itching powder....
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild
I want this to work. I really don't want those arrests to be for nothing.
What King did to define silent moderates was spot on at the time. In the 70's I tried like hell to hold my parents' feet to the fire. Things are a whole lot messier, now. I'm pretty sure there weren't any Anarchist lawyers in the 60's. A *much* smaller population relied on Social Security (the establishment) for survival, and there was no way I could be talking to you like this. It's different.
I've got my ears open. Always.
I volunteer at an art studio on George Floyd Square. There's an Agape House upstairs. Two storefronts are now empty across the street. I'm lucky enough to have a credit score that would allow me to get a mortgage for one, but not lucky enough to do it without it making me a modest paycheck and paying the business bills. I'm looking for ideas.
What would breathe some life into that space? Should I try?
Mordantivore@enoch_exe_inc @janisf @alexwild they truly don't.
They are often culturally Christian and believe in the superior morality of suffering in the supposed name of struggle and redemption. They believe that nonviolence is always morally superior and will win out because it's blessed by God.
They don't acknowledge this and they absolutely do not acknowledge that nonviolence is a classicist position that only the most comfortable will espouse.
They firmly and genuinely believe that if enough people suffer in the right way then the system can be made to bend under guilt and that any actions to resist a violent system that threaten it undermine any potential victories, that a violent revolution is inherently damned. It's such a nonsensical position they take.
@Mordantivore @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild First, I have to be honest, I don't believe people who say, "they believe..." I even have trouble fully accepting it when people say, "I believe..." as that can be a ruse, change, or be mindlessly accepted propaganda.
I believe in MLK's, Ghandi's, and women's (mostly) non-violence. I also believe most people are deeply moved by verifiable images and effectively-told stories of violence, so deeply that beliefs shift.
@Mordantivore @enoch_exe_inc
@alexwild
Who told you it was OK to bring my mother into this? 😛
@Mordantivore @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild
Christian Nationalism scares the shit out of me. it should do that to everyone.
@ChuffMeister @janisf @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc While Gandhi did play a significant role in the eventual liberation of India, his pacifism was hardly the only form of resistance to British colonisers and was not universally popular. When he called off the non-cooperation movement in 1922, he had lost so much support that no one protested his subsequent arrest.
@ChuffMeister @janisf @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc The history of India’s liberation is complicated. In 1938 and 1939, the significantly more militant Subhas Chandras Bose was elected into the Indian National Congress (despite also collaborating with the Axis Powers). Revolutionaries like Chandrasekhar Azad or Bhagat Singh won support through acts of violent resistance.
@ChuffMeister @janisf @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc Yet, the idea that India’s liberation from centuries of colonial rule came from a single man’s hunger strike remains the popular historical narrative. The truth was, the British Empire was decidedly falling apart. It was the end of World War II. There just weren’t enough troops to maintain direct colonial rule.
@ChuffMeister @janisf @alexwild @enoch_exe_inc So, they wrote up a new constitution, handpicked their successors, and transferred the territory towards neo-colonial rule.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild Every woman will tell you if he starts getting weird or rough, you leave. Commitment to vacate, regroup, and figure out an effective way to deal with the situation, a.k.a. diplomacy, is gaining traction. The US penchant for prisons being a focus.
It's starting to sound as if we're fighting for the different revolutions.
@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild No, just different tactics. On the scale of domestic abuse, leaving is just about the only thing you can do. But, on the scale of the institutionalised sexism and the patriarchy, diversity of tactics is both a strength and a necessity.
@enoch_exe_inc @alexwild All around. All I'm saying is it takes one rogue soldier to spoil the implementation of a plan. In politics there are no second chances.
the_wiggler@janisf @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild this kind of rhetoric seems sneakily gross. The underlying implication that in order for protest to be legitimate, and specifically to not have an expectation of being assaulted, you have to first get permission from the institution you're protesting against is wrongheaded at best.
The state has a responsibility to not use its monopoly on violence unless it has extremely good reasoning for it. "You didn't fill out the form" does not and will never qualify.
@the_wiggler @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild I can't place that requirement. No institution would hire me for that kind of position. I do not have the power to police anyone from here--I'm not disciplining the use of a hashtag or w.e. might affect this space we're in.
All I can say is that the Women's Marches were incredibly successful in regard to not riling an official response. One thing we (painfully) made a point of doing is opening dialog with the authorities first. In that case, it worked.
@the_wiggler @enoch_exe_inc @alexwild No, and if they really want, they'll make up another gd form that didn't exist when you were purportedly supposed to fill it out.
The idea behind working with authority prior to protest is to do your best to make them not want that. And if they fuck with you anyway, you have the documentation to publish, and hopefully a writer or two who will help call out the bullshit.
@janisf I take it from your comment that you don’t know what happened this week at UT Austin.
@alexwild I got 50 arrests. Was there more?
There were 12 at U Chicago in February, but literally no one reported it. I had to hear it from my kid. The students were all release without charges, and were arrested for sitting on the floor "making Jewish students nervous." Apparently there is a single asshole Jewish kid who makes a point of "reporting" things.
@janisf They were protesting in a spot on campus where groups protest all the time, with a couple hundred people. Normally there’s a handful of UT police around, students walk by going to class, and admins don’t care.
No one was expecting dozens of riot cops for a bog-standard student protest. The overreaction was shocking.
What I’m saying is, the students had no reason to plan per your suggestion.
F*.
Well, you're right.
I went to Texas about ten years ago. I didn't feel safe there. I'm quite sure I wouldn't now.
My kid's got a new UC friend from TX who came back from home over spring break pretty rattled. We can't figure out why, or get it out of him. Something's brewing, I'm convinced.
@alexwild Oh s*. They suspended the whole group by name. That's a different beast altogether.