Author: Slingshot Collective

Thanks to everyone who bought a 2003 Slingshot Organizer — they pay for this paper to be free all over the place. We’re already working on the 2004 Organizer, expected out October 1, 2003. Please don’t order until then — it’s confusing. If you have ideas for the 2004 version (or graphics or historical dates, etc.) send them to us by August 1 or sooner. We’re always looking for more listings for our radical contact list, so if you know of one in your area that isn’t listed, please send it. Contacts have to have a physical address and usually a phone number. Also, we just got a few 2003 Organizers returned, so you can still get one for $5 (includes shipping). Ignore the website which says we are out.

Rachel Corrie, 23, American — run over by an Israeli Army bulldozer and killed defending a doctor’s house from demolition.

Tom Hurndall, 21, British — shot in the back of the head by an Israeli sniper while he was trying to get children out of the line of fire.

Bryan Avery, 24, American — shot in the face by Israeli soldiers firing from an armored personnel carrier.

Rachel, Tom and Bryan were in Palestine working with the International Solidarity Movement when they were killed or wounded. All were clearly identified as ISM activists — they wore bright orange vests with reflective stripes.

Their names are western and familiar sounding here in the US. We don’t know the names of the hundreds of Palestinians killed by Israeli attacks in the occupied territories over the past months or years. Their names aren’t familiar. Because they are not white, their lives and deaths don’t seem to matter much to the US news media or the American political system.

The idea behind the ISM is that mostly white activists from powerful countries would not be killed by the Israeli military the way Palestinians are routinely killed. These western activists — living with Palestinians and participating in non-violent actions in the occupied territories and offering humanitarian assistance there — could help protect Palestinians and act as independent observers of Israeli atrocities.

The ISM isn’t backing down now that it is obvious that the Israelis will kill western activists just as savagely as they have always killed Palestinians. Instead, they are laying plans for Freedom Summer 2003 between July 1 – August 15:

“The International Solidarity Movement is urgently calling for international volunteers to come to the Occupied West Bank and Gaza to stand with Palestinians against attacks on their very existence. An international presence CAN make a difference. This Summer, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of concerned citizens from around the world will travel to Palestine to participate in nonviolent direct action in support of Palestinian human rights. Join us!”

In the face of the courage and persistence of the ISM, the Israeli military regime has stepped up attacks on the Palestinian-led human rights organization. On April 16, Army Chief of Staff, Lt. General Moshe Yaalon announced that he had given the order to “take the ISM out”, claiming that they “injure [the] freedom of action” of his troops.

True to their word, on May 9 dozens of police and soldiers, 20 army jeeps and an armored personnel carrier surrounded and raided the ISM media office in Beit Sahour, confiscating computers, photographs, files, destroying other equipment and arresting 3 activists. Two westerners were deported.

The western ISM activists killed in Israel over the past months wouldn’t have wanted an obituary because they understood that Palestinians — and other poor and non-white people around the world — are dying every day at the hands of western militarism and capitalism. The poor never get an obituary in the western press, even though all of us humans are equally valuable — equally capable of love, life, hope and pain.

We know that the ISM activists were brave, caring, committed activists. They left behind families and friends who loved them. They refused to sit passively and watch brutality. They stood up — powerfully and nonviolently — to do something about it, and for that, they were killed.

What the western ISM activists would have wanted is to know that others would have the courage to rush to fill their places. The struggle for the liberation of Palestinians and all people across the world must continue.

The ISM requests that people wishing to volunteer do so for at least 10 days. They plan to conduct trainings at least once a week from July 1 – Aug. 15 in Bethlehem. The ISM maintains a presence in Palestine year-round, not just during the summer. For more information, contact www.palsolidarity.org, +972-2-277-4602.

Poor cop deportment at the Oakland Port

The Oakland Police Department dealt with anti-war protesters this spring with the same brutal force it visits upon Oakland residents every day. The mainstream media widely reported an incident in which police fired “less than lethal” ammunition — shotgun bean bag rounds, wooden bullets and concussion grenades — at non-violent demonstrators. But the media ignored an earlier incident in which a phalanx of motorcycle cops rode directly into anti-war high school students marching in downtown Oakland, running over several students. And the media routinely ignores Oakland police violence against Oakland’s ordinary citizens.

Even when a spectacular case of police brutality surfaces — like the Riders scandal in which four officers framed over a hundred suspects, requiring Oakland to pay out $10 million in legal settlements — the media depicts it as an isolated incident. In fact, police corruption and violence is rampant in Oakland and other large cities. When more middle-class war protesters are the victims, it gets some press — when the victims are poor or non-white, the media turns the other way.

Below we’ve reprinted exerpts from public testimony given by Oakland resident Scott Fleming, who was shot five times with wooden bullets (4 in the back) while protesting the war on Iraq at the Port of Oakland. We need to struggle against police violence whether its against political demonstrators or the just regular folks.

“On the morning of April 7, a number of protesters gathered at the port and set up peaceful pickets in front of a handful of shipping lines. The protesters were doing nothing more than carrying signs and walking in circles. There was a brass band there which helped create what can only be described as a festive atmosphere. There were a number of middle-aged and senior citizens in the crowd. There was nothing about the tone of the protest or the actions of the protesters that could have led the Oakland Police Department to fear violence or confrontation.

“Nevertheless, when the police arrived on the scene, all of them were wearing gas masks, and a number of them were armed with what we later learned were wooden bullets, beanbag-firing shotguns, and grenades. I have been to countless demonstrations over the years, and I cannot recall a single instance in which any Bay Area police agency has displayed these kinds of weapons or worn gas masks to a political demonstration. I can only surmise that the Oakland Police Department would not have arrived at the demonstration with this type of weaponry unless they had a pre-planned intent to use it.

“The officers lined up on Middle Harbor Road in front of the entrance to American Presidents Line. When they ordered the demonstrators to clear the intersection, the demonstrators complied and the entrance was cleared. Unfortunately, there was nowhere for the demonstrators to go after they cleared the intersection. By blocking Middle Harbor Road, the police denied the demonstrators the nearest and most direct route to leave the port.

“As the crowd milled about, it seemed that nobody knew what to do or where to go. Many of the protesters, including myself, had never been to the port before and were unfamiliar with the geography there.

“After a few minutes, and for no obvious or apparent reason, the morning quiet was pierced by explosions as the Oakland Police Department opened fire on the crowd. Neither I nor anyone else I have spoken to is aware of any act on the part of any demonstrator that could have provoked this violence.

“From this point on, the Oakland Police Department swept down Middle Harbor Road and Maritime Street firing repeated barrages, over and over again, into the crowd. They fired on the crowd for approximately an hour and a half to two hours as they pursued us for more than a mile. For much of this time, the Oakland Police Department repeatedly drove a line of large police motorcycles into the crowd.

“The munitions used upon us, especially the wooden and beanbag bullets, are extremely dangerous weapons, which was evidenced by the severity of the injuries that day. As we continued down the road, more and more people in the crowd were bleeding and bruised. A law student who was clearly identified as a legal observer by a bright green armband was shot in the head and had blood pouring down his face. A man who works as an environmental engineer for a federal agency was shot in the face and looked to me as if part of his nose was missing. I am told that one woman had tire tracks up her leg after being run down by a motorcycle officer. And [many of us have] seen the sickening and grotesque photograph of Sri Louise, the woman who was shot in the jaw and neck.

“I want to make clear that the use of these types of weapons against peaceful protesters is unacceptable under any circumstances. However, it is also clear that the severity of the injuries we saw that day was significantly increased because the Oakland Police Department disregarded the manufacturers safety warnings and misused these weapons. For example, we recovered a shell casing used to fire wooden bullets. The casing indicated that it was manufactured by Federal Laboratories in Casper, Wyoming, and fires 264W wooden baton rounds. The casing includes a very clear warning, which states: ‘Do not fire directly at persons or serious injury or death may result.’ The warning then admonishes officers to fire the weapons at the ground, from which they are intended to ricochet into peoples’ legs.

“The fact that so many people that day received injuries to their heads, arms, and torsos strongly indicates that the officers were not firing these weapons as the manufacturers intended. The fact that so many people, like myself, were shot in the back, underscores the fact that the Oakland Police Department was firing on people who were running away. As reported by the San Francisco Bay Guardian, the manufacturer’s training manual states that, ‘when firing wooden bullets, areas such as the head, neck, spine, and groin . . . should be avoided unless it is the intent to deliver deadly force.’

“Oakland Police Departmental General Order K-3, governing the use of force, similarly requires officers to avoid firing these weapons at these areas of the body. According to the Department’s use of force policy, beanbag (and presumably wooden) bullets are classified as the second most severe use of force in the police arsenal, second only to firearms. In fact, these weapons are classified as being more severe than a police canine bite. Therefore, according to the stated policy of the Oakland Police Department, if the police had been justified on April 7 in shooting us with wooden bullets, they would also have been justified in unleashing police dogs on the crowd. I think we all know exactly which images that evokes, and we all know exactly how wrong that would have been.

“Word told the Contra Costa Times that his decision to shoot at us was influenced by one of the shipping lines. According to the Times, Chief Word said that ‘APL told us, ‘You have to clear the property.’ This sounds frighteningly like Chief Word allowed American Presidents Line to assist him in deciding when to use force against the citizens of Oakland.”

Folks around the country are mobilizing against the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) ministerial meeting scheduled for November 17th – 21st in downtown Miami. The FTAA treaty would expand the corporate free trade policies of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) — which applied to Canada, Mexico and the USA — to North and South America. The FTAA would also go beyond the NAFTA rules — strengthening corporate control over workers and the environment and further weakening already pathetic civil society institutions like (corporate) democracy™ and (corporate) government labor and environmental regulations.

There is already widespread popular opposition to the FTAA throughout South America. After centuries of economic exploitation and poverty, the last thing South Americans need is a massive multinational corporate giveaway. FTAA summits in Canada and Equator were met by massive resistance, but FTAA’s architects are hoping they’ll have it easy in the apathetic old USA. They’re not counting on November in Miami resembling November in Seattle. It’s up to us to give them a little surprise greeting!

As usual, the FTAA is being negotiated without any meaningful public participation — except our voices and bodies in the streets, which the organizers can’t quite prevent (yet). The FTAA would curtail labor laws, push down wages, replace family and subsistence farmers with corporate agribusiness, promote privatization of public industries and cut government services. Corporations would be permitted to sue governments who tried to pass laws to protect the public. Ultimately, the FTAA is designed to concentrate wealth and power into a few corporate hands at the expense of everyone else.

There is already discussion of a Day of Action on November 19 and teach-ins, seminars, reality tours, concerts, forums, rallies and marches all week long. Moreover, the police in Miami have already been organizing their response for a few months, so it looks like the shit could fly in Miami.

Here are (generally liberal) contacts. Hopefully the radicals will show their hand and set up a contact point soon. 202 778-3320, 510 663-0888, www.ftaamiami.org.

Textile workers at the Behshahr’ Chintz-making factory in Behshahr, Mazandaran Province, Iran staged an angry protest on April 16, 2003 against the withholding of their wages over the past 26 months. They were eventually joined by nearly 30,000 workers from textile and other sectors as well as the city’s residents at large. The protesters faced harsh attacks by security forces, in which tear gas and other weapons were used against them.

Behshahr workers are not alone in their struggle for payment of delayed wages. According to the 2002 survey by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, at least one million workers in Iran have not been receiving their wages. Sit-ins, strike actions, demonstrations and blockage of roads are some of the methods used by protesting workers in their struggles against delayed payment of wages and for improved working conditions and better social and income security programs.

Workers in Iran are facing many challenges in their struggles for the realization of their rights and demands. One of the main barriers is the Islamic Republic of Iran’s repressive and anti-worker labour law, policies and practices, which encompass lack of the right to organize free and independent workers’ organizations and the right to strike, persecution of labour activists and political opponents, lay offs, cut backs, and privatizations and deregulations in pursuit of the “economic structural adjustment” policies of the international Monetary Fund, World Bank and global and national corporations.

Now that the war on Iraq is finished, Bush is already thinking about the next conquest: maybe Syria or Iran, or maybe somewhere else. Thus, it’s already time for those opposed to a US empire to figure out our next move.

The state has become extremely skilled at limiting the effectiveness of traditional, predictable oppositional movements and actions. Tame mass marches are ignored, while ordinary militant street actions get you arrested or shot at with rubber and wooden bullets. Sometimes, the most effective tactics are disruptive actions that the state couldn’t possible imagine and thus won’t know how to react to — surrealist, absurdist actions. Such actions are just too strange for the police to figure out what to do. Or maybe they aren’t even clearly protest tactics at all — they are just things that massively disrupt business as usual, cause chaos, sow confusion, and gradually rot out the empire’s ability to project power globally.

Here are a few examples, but really, you have to think up your own or else they won’t work. Be creative and remember, if you’re not having fun, you’re not doing it right.

America’s favorite problem solver: Duct Tape

It seems like every action these days has to have lock boxes. You know, pieces of pipe that people use to lock themselves together that have to be cut apart by the fire department. The problem is that the fire department is quickly learning how to handle the problem. The police magazines probably have whole articles written on this stuff by now, and maybe some company is making a “lock box cutter tool.” Why should we support a whole industry?

What about introducing some other kinds of materials that are intended just to confuse the fuck out of the authorities. For instance, what about at the next blockade, everyone shows up with a box of duct tape and just goes at it. Taping doors, locks, access points, people to cars, cars to trees, people to trees, etc. A few layers of duct tape is surprisingly difficult to cut because it is so gummy. The gum gets stuck in knives. Maybe we could layer some wire in with the tape or something.

Or what about using those wide roles of shrink wrap that shipping companies use to seal boxes together.

Best of all, duct tape and plastic wrap look so good together, so relevant — they are the official government solution to the threat of chemical and biological weapons. When the cops arrive, you can just say you wanted to have some homeland security.

Fake fear cuts both ways

With all the hype around SARS, and before that anthrax and even small pox, the average American is more than ready to believe in crazy health risks. Instead of trying to shut down, say, Bechtel by linking arms outside its front door, how about try something a little more interesting.

Picture this. A bunch of people wearing full white body protection suits and respirators emerge from a series of white vans. They have official looking picture ID badges, white buckets full of a fancy green colored soapy water and scrubby brooms. They tape off the Bechtel entrance with yellow caution tape and start soaping down all of the surfaces and posting official “Warning – Contamination Quarantine” stickers.

They probably shouldn’t answer any questions or talk to anyone — just act official. At the very least, this is going to create chaos and confusion. At best, the building will be shut down until someone can figure out what is going on.

The spokesperson for the California Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Center – a state agency – can’t define “terrorism.” But the center did feel justified in implying to the Oakland Police that the April 7 Oakland Port protests would involve terrorist activity – most likely encouraging the OPD to fire shotguns and throw grenades at the peaceful protest.

When asked to define terrorism, spokesman Mike Van Winkle said, “I’m not sure where to go with that.” But he was able to draw coherent, logical conclusions about terror: “You can make an easy kind of a link that, if you have a protest group protesting a war where the cause that’s being fought against is international terrorism, you might have terrorism at that (protest). You can almost argue that a protest against that is a terrorist act.”

He continued: “I’ve heard terrorism described as anything that is violent or has an economic impact, and shutting down a port certainly would have an economic impact.”

We here at Slingshot hope this guy (and the whole agency) gets removed for these comments — although we aren’t holding our breath. According to this logic, any labor strike would be “terrorism” because it would have an “economic impact.” Or how about a boycott against, say, non-dolphin safe tuna. Actually, pretty much any act — other than going to work — would be terrorism. Like perhaps, smoking pot, or calling in late for work so you can have sex again. Economic impact, you know. Haul ‘em off to Guantanamo.

The INS, Special Registration and the Patriot Act I & II

Did you know that the USA PATRIOT Act stands for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism?

This set of laws is another chapter in the extreme anti-immigration that is happening every day in this country. Detentions, detainments, immigrant and political profiling are regular practices used by the INS in the name of anti-terrorism. Male immigrants over the age of 16, from North Korea and 24 countries in the Middle East, from Afghanistan to Pakistan to Iraq and Iran, are being asked to come in to their local INS office for special registration, where they are interrogated, being asked everything from “Do you like Saddam Hussein?” to “What mosque do you pray at?”

For instance, in December and January in LA.., 400 immigrants many of them Iranian living in Southern California were detained for alleged visa irregularities after complying with the INS order. Families in telephone contact with the detainees stated that the detainees were forced to sleep standing up because of overcrowding, or on concrete floors. Some had been hosed down with cold water; some were denied adequate food or water. Thus far, the special registration process has led to deportation proceedings for approximately 5,400 of the 41,000 registered with over 1,700 being detained.

Many folks are being held and sent to county jails and detention centers across the country. Random people are being held based solely on their country of origin and are told that if they contact a lawyer it is an admittance of guilt. An updated INS document dealing with questions and answers about Special Registration states that legal representation is not necessary, but at your option you may be represented at your own expense. This legal representation lasts only until the authorities find something wrong with an individuals papers and then it does not exist at all. People are being held indefinitely. No one detained by the INS since September 11 has been charged with actual involvement in terrorist activity, yet President Bush declared that they “have hauled in about 2,400 of these terrorists, these killers.” The government still hasn’t divulged how many have been detained, deported, or under what charges they are being held.

In 1996 a wave of extreme anti-immigration laws were passed through congress that forced all people who weren’t naturalized citizens, that including people with green cards and people that had been living here since age one, to report to the INS if they have ever been convicted of a felony. Even if they have served jail time, they are then sent to detention centers and deported to their country of origin, some for crimes as minor as drug possession or fighting with their boyfriends. Many have been held since they were first taken in with no information on when they will be released or even what charges they are being held on.

Prisons are making $20-25 a day off of detainees as opposed to about $7-10 off of the general population because of the bloated INS budget. Many jails across the country are building new wings solely for the use of holding immigrant detainees, and are already making millions a year off of their current immigrant populations. This is a business venture for the prison industrial complex and a way for the regime to appear to be doing something to “make America safe again” while allocating funds to some of the most reactionary branches of the government.

Now we are in a throwback to American internment of citizens of Japanese origin with people arrested based solely on their country of origin.

For months, individuals inquired about the status of Patriot Act II and were told that no such legislation was being planned. It was not until a draft of the bill was leaked earlier this year, did we find out the wonderful new propositions.

Sect. 201 & 202: It would enhance the department’s ability to deny releasing material on suspected terrorists in government custody through the Freedom of Information Act. It would also restrict FOIA requests on the EPA’s worst case scenario reports which are referred to as “road maps for terrorists”.

Sect. 301-306: Authorizes creation of a DNA database on “suspected terrorists”, defined to include association with suspected terrorist groups or having supported any group designated as terrorist.

Sect. 405: Allows any suspected terrorist to be held before their trial without bail.

Sect. 501: Establishes that an American citizen could be expatriated “if he becomes a member of, or provides material support, to a group that the United States has designated as a terrorist organization.”

Sometimes I wonder, what are we doing, rather, what am I doing while all this is happening, throwing parties and living life as normal, while people are quietly being taken away and locked up, no explanation, no representation, nothing?

What can we do? What can you do?

Start by talking to everyone you know about what is going on and create an opposition climate, be outraged, and express it. Organize teach-ins, and public events to hear Muslim, South Asian, and Arabic immigrants speak who have been the targets of this oppression. Organize rallies and demos to demand that all detainees be set free, especially in front of special registration sites. Write letters to the editor of all your local papers, or make papers and write about it. Join and support the Blue Triangle Network an organization formed in opposition of the detentions of immigrants. You can find them at www.bluetriangle.org. Make media, change existing media to better represent what you think it should say. Whatever you do, do something, talk to people you know, talk to people you don’t, because as we all know, if it isn’t you yet, they will come for the rest of us next.

Gay Shame — the militant queer action cluster — recently elevated street tactics to a new level during an anti-war demonstration in San Francisco. The crowd was massive and bored, marching down the street like cattle in typical ANSWER fashion. Amongst the gloom, Gay Shame’s bullhorn was spewing brilliant, sexy free-association chants and propaganda as fast as they could think of them. Suddenly, the Metreon theater complex was down the street, and the Gay Shame bullhorner was screaming “let’s hump the Metreon to stop the war.” The group charged up to the thick metallic columns at the entrance, surrounding them with gyrating pelvic thrusts. Then, someone noticed that a Starbucks was across the street. Everyone had a collective Seattle WTO flashback.

The bullhorn rang out “hump Starbucks!” Seconds later, all the large plate glass windows were shaking as the Gay Shame marchers took down their pants and made love to the cold glass surface. It looked like the glass might break from the exertion. The scene must have been intense for the surprised coffee addicts inside. The movement’s newest tactic in the struggle for liberation had been unleashed — the hump-in. —PB

Gay Shame — the militant queer action cluster — recently elevated street tactics to a new level during an anti-war demonstration in San Francisco. The crowd was massive and bored, marching down the street like cattle in typical ANSWER fashion. Amongst the gloom, Gay Shame’s bullhorn was spewing brilliant, sexy free-association chants and propaganda as fast as they could think of them. Suddenly, the Metreon theater complex was down the street, and the Gay Shame bullhorner was screaming “let’s hump the Metreon to stop the war.” The group charged up to the thick metallic columns at the entrance, surrounding them with gyrating pelvic thrusts. Then, someone noticed that a Starbucks was across the street. Everyone had a collective Seattle WTO flashback.

The bullhorn rang out “hump Starbucks!” Seconds later, all the large plate glass windows were shaking as the Gay Shame marchers took down their pants and made love to the cold glass surface. It looked like the glass might break from the exertion. The scene must have been intense for the surprised coffee addicts inside. The movement’s newest tactic in the struggle for liberation had been unleashed — the hump-in.

Living in the Homeland of Empire USA was depressing during the war against Iraq, but at least in the San Francisco Bay Area we could take a little heart in all the dedicated, powerful, militant and exciting anti-war protests. The day after the bombs started dropping, we lived up to our pledge to shut down San Francisco’s financial district. The action started at 6 a.m. and lasted until late at night as thousands of people ran circles around confused, impotent police. Vigorous protest continued for days after, with 2,500 people arrested over 3 days.

We need to remember the lessons we learned that first day and during the rest of the war — both in terms of actions that slowed down business as usual, and tactics that were ineffective.

The struggle has moved beyond the time for polite protests and “petitioning our elected leaders”. The men ruling the US empire are less and less interested in public opinion. For them, might makes right. Increasingly, the only way to stop their drive to empire, their wars, their domination of the earth, and their suppression of freedom is to make their rule physically impossible in the streets.

Direct action or withdrawal from cooperation aimed at stopping the economy, the military and the government from functioning are increasingly crucial in the face of Bush’s New World Order. In this struggle, our friend is disruption, not orderly cooperation with the police. Our actions need to be measured by our disruptiveness, spontaneity, decentralization, individual initiative and creativity.

Pre-planning and organization are good if they impair the system’s functioning, but organization for its own sake — especially when it produces scripted, compliant protest and merely symbolic “actions” — is not going to get the job done. Excessive emphasis on pre-organization will make our opposition bureaucratic — with leader figures who can be coopted, negotiated with or bought into irrelevance.

Conversely, now isn’t the time to succumb to fantasies that we can engage in armed struggle within the US against the US empire. In the war on Iraq, the regular Iraqi military units didn’t stand a chance against the better armed imperial troops. Those Iraqi units were better armed than any opposition group in the US could hope to be.

Organized and spontaneous civil disruption at home is far more threatening to an empire than either polite, predictable protest or armed resistance. The cops have a hard time crushing non-compliance and disruption, which gradually rots the capacity of an empire to project its military and ecological domination abroad.

Our movement is quickly being pushed into a resistance movement against an imperial power. The forces building the American empire have made it clear that domestic opponents of the regime may be labeled terrorists or “enemy combatants” and thus stripped of any formal legal “rights” accorded to obedient citizens. Even though we’re in our own homes, living in the United States means we’re operating in occupied enemy territory.

What Worked

As the day dawned in San Francisco on Thursday, March 21, small groups of unusual looking commuters began emerging from downtown subway stations, along with the usual crowd wearing their ties and skirts, briefcases in hand. The night before in Iraq, US cruise missiles had started raining down, opening an unjustified, preemptive war of aggression. The People had come to a financial nerve center of the empire to stop business as usual.

The action to shut down San Francisco had been planned for months, with hundreds of affinity groups assembling detailed, specific action plans. But many more people came downtown without precise plans — just the notion that something had to happen.

The organized affinity groups quickly threw up blockades at numerous pre-determined points. Because the location of these blockades had been announced in advance, the police were well prepared. Almost as soon as a blockade was established, it was surrounded by swarms of police.

This created an amazing opportunity for the thousands of folks who weren’t involved in pre-organized actions to seize control of the rest of the city. There weren’t enough police to simultaneously surround numerous pre-organized blockades and protect the rest of the city. At intersection after intersection throughout the downtown, there were no police in sight.

It only took 20 people holding hands to block a street and attract another 100 folks who were on the sidewalk out into the street. If the police came around in sufficient numbers to threaten one of these un-planned actions, the participants could simply melt back onto the sidewalk, only to reappear somewhere else where there were no police a few minutes later.

These blockades were short-term cat and mouse operations where the intent was to avoid arrest rather than to seek it. While it’s hard to know, it felt like the un-planned and roving blockades were able to stop business as usual at least as effectively as the larger pre-planned actions. The difference was that those who did pre-planned actions got arrested fairly quickly and now face court dates. Few people involved in roving blockades got arrested, so they were free to disrupt the city long after their pre-organized comrades had been removed, even once more police got freed up from the large pre-planned blockades.

What does this mean for the future? A lot of activists like sitting in meetings polishing plans for pre-organized actions. That’s fine — as long as the movement doesn’t conclude that those pre-organized actions alone will be enough to disrupt a target. Pre-organized actions often don’t create much real disruption — the police love it when they know precisely where all the activists are and have them surrounded with a double line of riot cops. We shouldn’t delude ourselves into believing that we’ve disrupted business as usual merely because we’ve blocked an intersection — if the police know which intersection we’ve blocked, we haven’t seriously threatened social stability or order.

The pre-organized actions can act as decoys — diverting police attention and opening space for other activists to achieve a higher level of disruption elsewhere. Just like police love knowing where all the activists are, they fear a scenario in which they have no idea where all of the participants are, or are heading next. Its even worse for the police when there are 50 autonomous groups moving in all directions all at the same time.

On March 21, the police and media struggled all morning as intersection after intersection was blockaded at random. The police didn’t know what might happen next or where. The cops would get a report of a disturbance, dispatch officers, and by the time they reached the intersection, the problem would have moved elsewhere. Such unpredictable, spontaneous disruption is far more threatening to the system than a stationary, pre-organized, controlled or largely symbolic action.

As the day and the war continued, the police cracked down harder and harder. Opportunities that were available early on became impossible later. Moreover, in the days after March 21, the media viciously criticized the financial district shutdown. “Blocking ordinary people on their way to work just hurts the anti-war cause.” These reactions from the police and the media just proved how effective the effort to disrupt business as usual had been. This proved that our actions threatened social stability and couldn’t just be ignored. The massive marches leading up to the war were beautiful, diverse, and heartening, but they didn’t threaten social order, and could thus easily be ignored.

Bike cavalry to the Rescue!

Another totally inspiring and amazing tactical innovation during the March 21 San Francisco shutdown was the application of critical mass bicycle tactics to militant disruptive
street protest. It is fitting that bicyclists finally realized their full potential as militant street fighters in San Francisco, where critical mass was born.

Critical mass bike rides, which have spread to hundreds of cities around the world, are usually good natured, fun, non-confrontational celebrations of bicycling. Since there is no organized “leadership” of critical mass, there is no organized political message or demands.

It is precisely these cultural traditions that helped cyclists on March 21 be so effective and disruptive. The bicyclists were used to making quick decisions on the fly without any formal organization or leadership.

When pre-planned blockades pinned down most of the police during the morning, numerous bands of roving cyclists were able to ride around at will, tying up and slowing traffic for miles. Since bikes can move rapidly, they were an even more confusing and disruptive problem for the cops and the media. They could be everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. Over and over, folks blocking intersections at random on foot would suddenly be reinforced by a roving band of bicyclists. The bikes also brought load after load of food, water and other supplies to people on foot. The bikes could scout ahead, warn of approaching danger, and distribute information about which roads were already blocked and which ones were waiting to be shut down. The one disadvantage of being on a bike is that it can be hard to dismount and change your role, because you have to do something with your bike. Thus, the bikes were most effective when they cooperated with folks on foot, each doing what they did best.

It was especially excellent to see all of the bikes, given that the war on Iraq was fought in part to enable Americans to drive as much as they want using cheap, foreign oil. During the brief war, spontaneous mini-critical masses calling themselves “Bikes Not Bombs” roamed San Francisco every weeknight, maintaining the momentum of protest. In a period of empire and war to maintain a dying motorized mode of transportation, riding a bike became our silent, daily protests against oil wars.

What Didn’t work

Police arrested about 2,500 people in San Francisco during the first 3 days of the war. Some of those arrested had “meant” to risk arrest at pre-organized blockades. But a lot of other folks got arrested — swept up and arrested en mass — the first day by accident because they tried to march in a black bloc.

We need to look critically at the black bloc tactic and figure out if it has outlived its usefulness. The black bloc tactic originated in Europe in the 1980s, and folks have marched in a black bloc in the Bay Area since the late 1980s, if not before. The idea is to have a large number of militant people in a large block so they can protect themselves and be disruptive. People dress alike (in black) so that the police can’t pick out a particular person from a crowd and try to pin a particular crime on them.

While at some points this tactic might make sense, recently marching in black has seemed to have more to do with making a fashion statement than trying to act collectively and effectively. Rather than allowing people to avoid police detection and arrest, the police have gone after the black bloc because they are wearing black, whether they do anything or not. The black bloc was surrounded and all its members arrested the weekend before the war — and then because no one seemed to learn anything, the exact same thing happened again the day after the war started.

Under these conditions, our tactics need to evolve. The point is to be disruptive and not get caught, not ensure that you’re going to get taken into custody. I realize black looks cool, and seeing a bunch of punks in black with face masks looks tough and militant. But if the group is singled out, monitored more closely by the cops, and thus can’t actually do anything, what is the point of looking cool? In Seattle, while the media and the police followed the small black bloc with helicopters, a much larger “plaid” block was able to get a lot of jobs done.

Face masks bring a certain level of militancy to a crowd, but they also can look unnecessarily scary and serve to separate those in the streets from the public at large. We want to inspire ordinary folks to struggle with us against the system, not convince them that we’re spoiled children with criminal tendencies. A lot of times you see face masks when nothing is even going on at all — what the fuck?!?

I thought the white face masks printed with “no war on Iraq” were pretty damn cool and a lot easier to understand. The point is to cover your face if you’re going to do something illegal, or if you might later on, not to just wear one all the time like it’s jewelry!

A lot more thinking, discussion and debate needs to go on within the community about the black bloc (and every other tactic we use). Far too often it seems like folks are just doing what they’ve done before, or seen done before, without actually thinking about what is going to be effective.

Finally, one the worst protest mistakes I saw during the war happened at a large and spirited blockade of the Chevron headquarters in San Ramon. The action, starting at 6 a.m. way out in the suburbs, was a triumph of pre-organization. Somehow, hundreds of us made it out there on crazy hipster shuttle school buses from the subway station in Walnut Creek. There were two roads going into the headquarters campus with large groups blocking both of them.

Although the action couldn’t have happened without a lot of pre-organization, it ended up demonstrating the limitations of pre-organization, and the tendency of pre-organized actions to become bureaucratic, predictable, tame, and ultimately non-disruptive and ineffective.

At the gate where I was, people were stopping cars, but the police were just parking workers a distance away and walking them in. Some people were trying to block the pedestrians, and the “organizers” were doing everything they could to stop participants from being spontaneous, effective and thinking for themselves. The “leader” on hand with the bullhorn told us that we had to “obey” the decisions of the spokescouncil and that he wanted to make sure the picket and the blockade were “orderly.”

I knew it was all over when the police came over a bullhorn and told people to be quiet so our “leader” could make an announcement. The “leader” told us to get out of the road or we would be arrested. People complied immediately, even though it was quite clear that the police had neither the numbers not the inclination to actually remove a large, fluid group from the road. That left the pre-appointed people willing to “risk arrest” sitting in a thin line, defenseless against the police who politely took them into custody. The potential disruption of the hundreds of people on hand was dismantled by one unelected “leader” cooperating with the police. Everyone stood on the sidewalk and watched the police carry out their duty.

We need to keep in mind that when we organize, we should be doing it for our own goals. Helping the police maintain order should never be one of our goals. Organizing to get a large group outside of a corporation is an excellent goal. Then the organizers need to fade away and trust the People to take responsibility for our own actions and our own future.