WTO 2
Right, I went back to my Edit Entries page, hit "last 20" and found utter crap, so I deleted most of it. I left off telling you about a disgruntled hiphop club on capitol hill club (at Denny and Olive for those of you with maps) that had been busted and donated the entire space to WTO (World Trade Organization) protesters.
I was all aboot (canadian accent) fucking shit up, June, at the time had only known me for a little while, and while she HAD taught her 6 year old niece that whenever a police officer approaches you, the correct reaction is to throw yourself on the ground and scream "GET AWAY FROM ME, FASCIST!!!" I got the feeling she was new to the political... um... caring thing. We signed up to some email lists and attended a meeting at the empty club. It had a make shift vegan soup kitchen (blech, you have to cater to the highest common denominator at these things, the most absolutely stringent dietary philosophy is foisted upon everyone (granted: everyone is just the everyone that wants to eat free... but still, bacon never turned 3rd world countries into indentured servants serving under the boot of cultural imperialism. And it's tastier than soy). The place was absolutely filled, within a few minutes we met people from ALL OVER the country, some had hitch-hiked for days to get here. There were workshops posted on a variety of subjects. Non-violence and Consensus were the 2 that June and I attended.
Non-violence seemed straight forward to me, but a lot of people disagreed on whether or not throwing a brick through a window constituted "violence."
Consensus was much more interesting. The basics are: in consensus, everyone has to agree (or at least not disagree, which is a little different) on an action. But when you're talking about 20-30,000 people, you have to adapt. How you do this is "affinity groups." Everyone gets into a small group and discusses the issue, say, whether or not to flip off police officers. Everyone says their piece, if someone disagrees strongly with a course of action they "block" it. If you disagree but it's just their personal action they want to block, they step aside, which is basically an abstention. If you agree with it you "vote" for it. Every affinity group has a final decision: vote for, abstain or block and they send a representative to a "spoke council" which is just a group of delegates from affinity groups. Each spoke council does the same thing that the affinity groups just did. This keeps happening until a final spoke council gets to a decision.
The main issue was violence. Most people decided to leave property alone, a few people said "Fuck this" and went and did it anyway (but that comes later). Another thing that got brought up, which I think is profoundly relevant is that there WERE undercover police there. They knew every little thing we planned, we had no idea what they were planning, which really gave us a tactical disadvantage. Gandhi knew this, MLK knew this: when there are cameras rolling, you need to be a fucking saint, otherwise your message doesn't get out, you cannot give them a way to discredit you. The people you are trying to persuade are not lefty tofu fuckers. They are mid-range boring people with votes, you can't give them a reason to hate you personally because they won't listen with a critical ear to your argument. So, while burning down the nike warehouse might make me feel warm and fuzzy, nike is just going to get an insurance check and public sympathy. If nike hires pinkerton security to beat the shit out of me while I just sit there and get photographed, people see them as monsters. And that IS what we're trying to do, right? change things rather than feel correct. (tangent: So many people approach situations in a way that doesn't fundamentally change the issue, but makes them feel right. If something bothers you, think about what makes it bother you, consider if you can alter it, and do so. Don't start screaming invectives at strangers because you think you're right.... end tangent)
June and I bought gas masks. 3 days later, the possession of gas masks would be an offense worthy of incarceration.
I was all aboot (canadian accent) fucking shit up, June, at the time had only known me for a little while, and while she HAD taught her 6 year old niece that whenever a police officer approaches you, the correct reaction is to throw yourself on the ground and scream "GET AWAY FROM ME, FASCIST!!!" I got the feeling she was new to the political... um... caring thing. We signed up to some email lists and attended a meeting at the empty club. It had a make shift vegan soup kitchen (blech, you have to cater to the highest common denominator at these things, the most absolutely stringent dietary philosophy is foisted upon everyone (granted: everyone is just the everyone that wants to eat free... but still, bacon never turned 3rd world countries into indentured servants serving under the boot of cultural imperialism. And it's tastier than soy). The place was absolutely filled, within a few minutes we met people from ALL OVER the country, some had hitch-hiked for days to get here. There were workshops posted on a variety of subjects. Non-violence and Consensus were the 2 that June and I attended.
Non-violence seemed straight forward to me, but a lot of people disagreed on whether or not throwing a brick through a window constituted "violence."
Consensus was much more interesting. The basics are: in consensus, everyone has to agree (or at least not disagree, which is a little different) on an action. But when you're talking about 20-30,000 people, you have to adapt. How you do this is "affinity groups." Everyone gets into a small group and discusses the issue, say, whether or not to flip off police officers. Everyone says their piece, if someone disagrees strongly with a course of action they "block" it. If you disagree but it's just their personal action they want to block, they step aside, which is basically an abstention. If you agree with it you "vote" for it. Every affinity group has a final decision: vote for, abstain or block and they send a representative to a "spoke council" which is just a group of delegates from affinity groups. Each spoke council does the same thing that the affinity groups just did. This keeps happening until a final spoke council gets to a decision.
The main issue was violence. Most people decided to leave property alone, a few people said "Fuck this" and went and did it anyway (but that comes later). Another thing that got brought up, which I think is profoundly relevant is that there WERE undercover police there. They knew every little thing we planned, we had no idea what they were planning, which really gave us a tactical disadvantage. Gandhi knew this, MLK knew this: when there are cameras rolling, you need to be a fucking saint, otherwise your message doesn't get out, you cannot give them a way to discredit you. The people you are trying to persuade are not lefty tofu fuckers. They are mid-range boring people with votes, you can't give them a reason to hate you personally because they won't listen with a critical ear to your argument. So, while burning down the nike warehouse might make me feel warm and fuzzy, nike is just going to get an insurance check and public sympathy. If nike hires pinkerton security to beat the shit out of me while I just sit there and get photographed, people see them as monsters. And that IS what we're trying to do, right? change things rather than feel correct. (tangent: So many people approach situations in a way that doesn't fundamentally change the issue, but makes them feel right. If something bothers you, think about what makes it bother you, consider if you can alter it, and do so. Don't start screaming invectives at strangers because you think you're right.... end tangent)
June and I bought gas masks. 3 days later, the possession of gas masks would be an offense worthy of incarceration.