-Caveat Lector-
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[Excerpt from an open letter from Green Party person to a Trotskist
activist]
Alan may not have been in Seattle, but I was. The fact is, the much larger
body of affinity groups that had planned (and was successful in)
non-violently blockading the WTO delegates -- including myself -- knew of
the plans of the window-breakers. They announced it at various meetings,
and it was one of the debates within the overall body of some 1,000 people:
How does a movement deal with a subgroup within it which generally supports
the ideals and strategy of the larger body, but announces that it will
employ tactics that the overwhelming majority don't wish to engage in and
actually oppose at that time? Do we call the cops? Do we police them
ourselves? Do we let circumstances take their course? There was no
agreement on any of this, except that we would not call the cops on anyone.
It would just become part of an ongoing discussion. Throughout the prior
week, this discussion raged through the direct action circles in Seattle,
although it was, most certainly, hardly the only thing we were occupied
with.
There is no doubt that the Seattle police knew not only of the window
breakers' plans, but of those of every cluster of affinity groups as well.
As soon as you walked into the main room of 420 Denny St., which the Direct
Action Network and Art and Revolution worked out of, and which was central
headquarters for all of the nonviolent blockade actions, you'd see a huge
map of the convention center area covering an 8-foot-square wall, with
affinity group clusters designated by letters A-Z in "pie-slices"
sectioning off the spots they would occupy on November 30. Since the police
were officially and unofficially in-and-out of that location throughout the
week, any thought that the cops did not know what was being planned -- even
to the point of having extensive knowledge of each and every affinity group
cluster -- is ridiculous. Which is why they let 420 Denny remain open;
they had full access to all the decisions being made at the nerve center.
Why shut it down and make their job so much more difficult, as well as
scatter affinity groups throughout the community?
And so we end up with the absurdity of people like Medea Benjamin, of
Global Exchange, calling for the police to arrest the window breakers! In
the name of non-violence! What an outrage. I am calling for a total boycott
of Global Exchange and all of its activities until Medea seriously
apologizes for her actions. Did she think the police would be less violent
than those who broke a couple of windows -- at superstores (no small or
"family" stores were touched) built on the blood of sweatshop workers and
superexploited labor, such as Nike?
When you get down to it, a dozen windows or so were busted. Coming from New
York, what's the big deal? The real danger was the stones bouncing back at
the demonstrators from plastic windows! What an absurd scene, as protesters
dove out of the way of the richocheting rocks! No stores were burned to the
ground. No people were physically assaulted by the demonstrators, not even
by the window-breakers. No burning dumpsters were pushed through the
windows. And very little looting took place -- the windows were done in for
political reasons, not for personal economic aggrandizement. I refused to
take part in those actions NOT because I am against those activities in
principle, but because our non-violent blockade was far more effective and
powerful. And window-breaking is hardly adequate for what the
mass-murderers who own Nike, The Gap, Banana Republic, and Old Navy
actually deserve. (The latter three companies are all owned by the
notorious Fischer family, which not only profits from sweatshop misery in
Southeast Asia but has been clearcutting the last oldgrowth forests in the
Northwest US.) The motives for targeting those particular stores are clear
as Julia Butterfly's heroic tree-sit, and those targets were announced
ahead of time. The anti-sweatshop coalition and environmental groups have
repeatedly targeted those same stores here in New York, and throughout the
country.
Interestingly, in one of the local corporate papers, a reporter asked some
of those whom she recognized from the window-breaking the day before, why
they were out marching with the Teamsters and other union members. "It's
not like all we do is break windows," came the reply. Hey, these are our
comrades!! Medea and the others (Norman Solomon, too? Oh, Norman!) have
just placed themselves on the other side of the class divide.
<snip>
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