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Title: Conflict in Oakland Author: dot matrix Language: en Topics: Greece, NIMBY, Oakland, riot Source: Anarchy: a journal of desire armed
Many people have been heartened by the December events in Greece, which,
along with France, seems like one of the few remaining places where
passion has not died in the hearts of resisters, where people will still
back up their outrage with fire and bricks. Anarchists around the
country responded variously but positively, some going far enough out of
their way to add their name to an open letter or a blog entry, while
others took to the streets in support.
So imagine the shock, then, when a mere two weeks after anarchists had
warmed themselves with pictures of fires in Greece, that there are such
very different responses to a riot in Oakland, California.
In the early hours of January 1^(st), a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART)
police officer lethally shot 22 year old Oscar Grant once in the back
while he was being detained on the platform of the Fruitvale BART
station in Oakland. Witnesses report that Grant was “lying on his
stomach with his hands out in a non-threatening position when he was
shot.”
On the afternoon of Grant’s funeral a week later, a protest was held at
the Fruitvale station to draw attention to the event. Protesters marched
to downtown Oakland, where the demonstration turned into a riot in which
a police car was totaled, and things were broken. Things broken included
the windows of some small businesses and windshields of cars (three went
up in flames) that were owned by residents of Oakland rather than by
megacorporations.
The commentaries on sites like SF Indymedia, infoshop.org, and
anarchistnews in response to the news of this smashing has been about
50/50 between people who are celebrating this riot and people
complaining because the riot was not the planned, strategic sortie that
they apparently think the Left should provide for them. The complaints
are worth paying some attention to, since they are indicative of
continuing, ugly trends:
property destruction (despite the images, videos, and participants
expressing that it was mostly people of color — some of whom were
reportedly anarchists — who were smashing so-called inappropriate
things).
Queensberry Rules of Proper Riot Procedure, because bystander businesses
and cars were smashed.
provocateurs) duped the anarchists/rioters into rioting, which alienates
the Normals.
controlling the situation so that the riot couldn’t happen. One
commenter posted: “If real anarchists are mixing with people destroying
small businesses they become them for all intents and purposes. They
could have walked away or tried to speak out to those who would listen
and educate them on the relevance of the targets .”
repression from the state.
innocent bystanders who had their stuff smashed.
individual just happens to agree with the commenter). An outstanding
example: “among many reasons not to engage in trashing African Bead
shops (!!!???) and Chinese restaurants is that the family of Oscar Grant
has denounced it and called clearly for it not to be repeated.”
These comments are merely the latest iterations of some classic Leftist
canards — property destruction equals violence; only white activists
want to smash things; the mystification of racial issues under the cloak
of language about “normal,” “innocent,” “working class,” “community,”
“neighborhood,” etc; our actions can (or do?!) control the actions of
the state; there is such a thing as innocence; activists are responsible
for controlling people’s rage; events are significant to the extent that
they satisfy or influence non-participants (especially through the
interface of corporate media).
Once these premises are made explicit, their falsity is obvious. People
of color are no more alienated by property destruction than white people
are. Non-anarchists do not need anarchists to show them the way to (or
the satisfaction in) property destruction. Property destruction is
different in several significant ways from violence that damages living
beings. The state has its own agenda and whims, and our activities may
sometimes be used as excuses, but are for the most part barely noticed.
Activists — to the extent that they seek to manage people’s anger — are
part of the problem, not part of a solution. Riots and similar events
are significant (to the extent that they are) because they allow the
participants to have some life-changing experiences, far more than
because of any message that might get out to spectators. Innocence is a
code word for a whole host of assumptions that have nothing to do with
life in the US. Some of the smarter commentators alluded to two
seemingly conflicting points: a) riots are about rage; the point is that
rioters are uncontrolled; b) the fact that is people attack targets that
don’t seem to be connected to the issue at hand probably means that they
perceive the problem differently.
No doubt there is something to learn from that different perspective.
— dot matrix